Is there a song you'd like to hear someone cover? I'm your man. I can never promise quality. And I certainly can't promise you'll like it. So suggest a song and if I pick it, you'll hear my interpretation.

Sunday, June 6, 2010

June's Challenge

1) Simple Minds with Don't You (Forget About Me). It's taken me 700 years to like The Breakfast Club. And even though Ferris Bueller's Day Off is far superior, the soundtrack to TBC is immense.
2) Bob Wills and his Texas Playboys with any song of my choosing. I remember working at Virgin and Willie Nelson had an album of Bob Wills songs. My first question was "who the F is that?". Then I saw the beautiful Nora Jones do one of the songs on Letterman with a start studded band of people I don't remember. But Bob Wills now just makes me think of my brother, who wants to be one of Bob's Texas Playboys.
3) ZZ Top with I'm Bad, I'm Nationwide. This request came with special instructions - which is totally allowed. The instructions are to do this song in the vein of some Dwight Yoakum Bakersfield sound. Very interesting. This is the first of 3 tunes I had to look up because I was not familiar with it.
4) Duran Duran with Rio. You don't grow up in the VanAusdal household in the 80's without a heavy diet of Duran Duran blasting from your sister's Hi-Fi.
5) Some Velvet Morning with When I'm Straight. The second song I had to look up. But couldn't find a copy of it for review. This may be the best song ever written, but I'll never know.
6) M with Pop Music. In the late 90's when this song was getting played on VH1 and enjoyed an ironic resurgence, I actually was legitimately in to it. One of my favorite sounds is disinterested female backing vox. Think The Rentals. The less emotion, the better.
7) Throbbing Gristle with Something Came Over Me. The great thing about this dirty band name is this dirty song. The third song I had to look up to review. I love pop/rock with deceptively dirty lyrics. The idea of people driving around unknowingly singing dirty stuff is hilarious.
8) Gene Clark with Why Not Your Baby. This is a great song. Mopey and saturated with great vox.
9) Dio with Don't talk to Strangers. This was suggested as a way to pay respects to RJD himself. I should combine efforts and do change the lyrics of "Rio" to "Dio". "His name is Dio and his rides on tigers".
10) Gershwin with any song of my choosing. Gershwin. Talentless hack. Joking of course. But which song? Yikes. Kid in a candy shop, for sure.
11) A Dream is a Wish Your Heart Makes by Cinderella. Not that ridiculous hair band, the actual Disney broad. But how bad ass would it be if they did this song?
12) Prince with Paisley Park. In only 3 months of doing the challenge I've had like 5 Prince suggestions. How awesome is that?

And the winner is...


I've actually kicked around the idea of covering this song for a few years now. It's such a killer melody. I have big things in my head for this. Which means I'll end up changing direction after 10 minutes and do something different. But if I can do what I hear in my head with it, this should end up being totally radical to the max.

But now for the lame news. This may be a June/July submission. Things at the VanAusdal casita have gotten very busy lately. Free time is at a minimum. It may take me 2 months to nickel and dime a full cover out of this. So don't give up on me. Wish me luck.

3 comments:

  1. good luck eric

    and yes, some velvet morning is possibly one of the best songs ever written

    ReplyDelete
  2. here is the lee hazelwood/nancy sinatra version

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Sb-SVPJM4L4

    and here is a great version by lydia lunch and rowland s howard

    http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8wJ2t0kyRTA

    ReplyDelete
  3. hey! where's Vonda Shepard? why I outa...
    also, for the record, I suggested the timeless classic: "220-4444 For Pizza Hut Delivery"

    ReplyDelete