Alright, I've been itching to do a music list for a bit now, so here goes nothing. A lot of covers are absolute shit. Like shit that will make the original artist spin in their grave. Remember Michael Jackson covering the Beatles' "Come Together"? God fucking damnit that was a crime against nature. Or when Everclear (air quotes) reimagined "Brown Eyed Girl." A fucking floating turd that couldn't be flushed. So today we're gonna go ahead and celebrate a couple of the cover songs that got it right.
5. Travis - Hit Me baby (One More Time)
Hilarity points obviously push this a bit higher in the rankings. Travis also has a hauntingly good acoustic cover of Radiohead's "Fake Plastic Trees," but it lacks the falsetto choruses and on-the-brink-of-laughter moment where they realize just how ridiculous it is to cover a song made famous by the Queen of All JB Ever.
4. Jim James - Goin' to Alcapulco
Pretty much all of Dylan's catalogue has been covered. And for the most part pretty well. But as far as modern recounts, this absolutely takes the cake, even over The White Stripes' awesome cover of "One More Cup of Coffee." Not to mention it stands out completely from its contemporaries on the I'm Not There soundtrack, which is literally nothing but Dylan covers.
3. Pearl Jam - Crown of Thorns
"Crown of Thorns" is obviously the least known original here. It was the crowning (no pun intended) achievement of Andy Wood's very short song-writing career. It may be cheating a little as Jeff and Stone were both members of Mother Love Bone, the group that originally wrote the song, but I don't care. It's pretty fucking awesome to see Eddie pay tribute to the guy whose tragic death paved the way for Pearl Jam.
2. Nirvana - The Man Who Sold the World
From the iconic Unplugged... special comes the only time in history that David Bowie was bested at one of his own songs. I mean jesus, this version is somehow lightyears better than an already great original. By the way, you could say the same thing about Kurt's Meat Puppets covers from this same set.
1. Jimi Hendrix - All Along the Watchtower
Like I said, pretty much every Dylan song ever has been covered, but none better than this virtuoso performance by Jimi. This is the cover song every band should hope to produce when they decide to bite on someone else's work. It holds true to every note Dylan hit, but took it all a step further, melding Jimi's beautiful guitar work seamlessly into a version of the song that sounded like his own.
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