Cover: Chromatics – "Ceremony" (New Order)

I’ve been in blog hibernation the last couple weeks (I’ll use the excuse that I’ve been working on year-end lists) but I’ve been snapped out by Chromatics‘ gorgeous cover of New Order‘s “Ceremony”, from Johnny Jewel’s Black & White mix.

Chromatics and New Order are a perfect match given both their affections for dreamy synth-pop with big hooks, and the Portland trio truly does the classic track justice, swapping out the original’s throbbing bassline and driving drumbeat with sweeping synths and minimalistic percussion, putting the focus on Ruth’s ethereal vocals and that iconic guitar line.

MP3 Chromatics – Ceremony (New Order Cover)

Listen to Johnny Jewel’s Black & White mix on Soundcloud.

Cover: Divine Fits – "Lost" (Frank Ocean)

Frank Ocean‘s Channel Orange is so chock-full of amazing songs that its easy to overlook a track like “Lost” especially coming directly after the magnificently epic “Pyramids”. The lively, upbeat tempo and invigorating melody was not lost on Britt Daniel though and last night with indie supergroup Divine Fits he debuted a fantastic cover of the track in Pawtucket, RI. The song turns out to be a perfect fit for Daniel’s raw vocals and jagged guitar playing (if you didn’t know better, you’d think it was a Spoon song), making it one interesting covers I’ve heard this year.

Buy A Thing Called Divine Fits at Merge Records.

Cover Songs (that are included on a proper album) Mix

Most of the time when an artist covers a song, they’ll release it as a single, b-side, EP, live performance, or as a part of a compilation or covers album. On the rare occasion though, artists will include a cover in the tracklisting of one of their proper albums, which usually signifies that they’ve put more thought into the cover version or have given it their own unique interpretation.

M. Ward is kind-of the apotheosis of this, including one or two covers on all his albums (including the just-released A Wasteland Companion) but this year I’ve also seen covers make it onto LPs for Chromatics and Kindness. I’ve made a mix of these particular breed of cover songs below, limiting myself to just tracks from the last decade-or-so. Download the mix below or listen to the Spotify Mix (which includes the original tracks). Let me know in the comments if you have any favorites that I missed!

MP3 M. Ward – Sweetheart (Daniel Johnston)
MP3 James Blake – Limit To Your Love (Feist)
MP3 Jenny Lewis with the Watson Twins – Handle With Care (Traveling Wilburys)
MP3 Jose Gonzalez – Heartbeats (The Knife)
MP3 Chromatics – Into The Black (Neil Young)
MP3 Feist – Sea Lion Woman (Nina Simone)
MP3 Gnarls Barkley – Gone Daddy Gone (Violette Femmes
MP3 Luna – Sweet Child O’ Mine (Guns N’ Roses)
MP3 Dale Earnhardt Jr. Jr. – We Almost Lost Detroit (Gil Scott-Heron)
MP3 Okkervil River – Black Sheep Boy (Tim Hardin)
MP3 Local Natives – Warning Sign (Talking Heads)
MP3 The White Stripes – I Just Don’t Know What To Do With Myself (Dusty Springfield)
MP3 Muse – Feeling Good (Nina Simone)
MP3 Cee-Lo Green – No One’s Gonna Love You (Band of Horses)
MP3 Kindness – Swinging Party (The Replacements)

Spotify Mix: Cover Songs (that are included on a proper LP) Mix (+ originals)

Cover: The Last Names – Me And My Arrow (Harry Nilsson)

It’s been a long while since I’ve posted any covers, but Bishop Allen side-project The Last Names playing Harry Nilsson’s “Me and My Arrow” (from the animated film The Point!) is something I couldn’t resist. The sweetly melodic, playful tune is a perfect match for the indie pop duo and Darbie Nowatka does a lovely job on lead vocals. The band is covering a new track every week this year, which so far, has included cuts from New Order, The Monkees, Buzzcocks and Dire Straits. Cool! Thanks to YANP for the tip.

MP3 The Last Names – Me and My Arrow (Harry Nilsson cover)

Listen to more of Last Names 52 covers project at their tumblr.

Cover: Painted Palms – I Will Truck (Dirty Projectors)

Every since I heard of San Francisco’s Painted Palms a few months back, I’ve been itching for them to release some new material. Their Canopy EP (out 6/27) continues to get tons of spins for me and with their recent signing to Secretly Canadian they will hopefully get around to releasing a full-length by the year’s end. To hold us off temporarily though, the band released a cover of Dirty Projectors “I Will Truck”, which premiered on I Guess I’m Floating (the very blog which introduced me to Painted Palms).

The original song is a freakishly eccentric cacophony of glitchy noises and weird harmonies, which is unsurprising since this is Dirty Projector’s were talking about, while Painted Palms cover gives the track a tropical, west coast-pop makeover making the song much more listenable while still maintaining some of that inherent weirdness that gives the song it’s character. Here’s the cover and the original.

MP3 Painted Palms – I Will Truck
MP3 Dirty Projectors – I Will Truck

If you’re interested in some of Painted Palms own songs, this exhilarating track is a great starting point:

MP3 Painted Palms – All of Us

Cover: Portland Cello Project – All of the Lights

This is the type of musical pairing that was just meant to be. Kanye West‘s most extravagant, orchestral pop song “All of the Lights” played by an actual orchestra, the Portland Cello Project, an amorphous collective signed to Kill Rock Stars that regularly plays with indie artists like The Decemberists and Thao With The Get Down Stay Down. The philharmonic ensemble does a beautiful instrumental rendition of the song, which includes the preceding interlude and symphonious renditions of all the guest verses. Download the track below (it’s a live performance, but still good quality).

MP3 Portland Cello Project – All of the Lights (Live)

*Update: A studio version of this cover has now been made available. Listen below and grab it at iTunes.

Portland Cello Project “All of the Lights” by killrockstars

Watch a video of the performance at NYMag.

Video: Headlights – Making Plans for Nigel (XTC Cover)

I’m busy working on the musicforants.com songs / albums lists, but I thought I’d share this video of local heros Headlights covering “Making Plans For Nigel” by XTC. The band recorded this earlier in the year as a warm-up of sorts for AV Club’s ridiculously cool Undercover series but it didn’t premier online till a couple weeks ago. After you check that out, go watch some of AV Club’s Holiday Undercover series which just kicked off and has already featured Shearwater, Kate Nash, and Andrew W.K!

'10 Covers Mix

We here at musicforants.com are big fans of cover songs and while versions of classic songs are all fine and dandy, sometimes I wonder if we really need another Springsteen, Dylan, or MJ cover?  Much of the time, I think it’s more interesting (and instantly gratifying) to hear an artist do their rendition of a song that was just released months or even days prior.

Whether it’s performed live in concert, on British radio, or it’s a studio-recorded version, all these “insta-covers” have made their way onto the web and I’ve compiled my 10 favorites covers of songs released in 2010 onto the following mix (and yes, “Islands” counts since it was released as a single in 2010). Let me know in the comments if you know of any more. Enjoy!

MP3 The Drums – We Used To Wait (Arcade Fire cover)
MP3 Silver Swans – Anyone’s Ghost (The National cover)
MP3 Shakira – Islands (The xx cover)
MP3 Jumpp Club – Futile Devices (Sufjan Stevens cover)
MP3 See Green – I Can Change (LCD Soundsystem cover)
MP3 Anjulie- F*** You (Cee-Lo cover)
MP3 Gavin Beach ft. Jamie Cleaton – Dancing on My Own (Robyn cover)
MP3 Darwin Deez – Teenage Dream (Katy Perry cover)
MP3 Telephoned – O.N.E. (Yeasayer cover)
MP3 KitnerBoy – When I’m With You (Best Coast cover)

Thanks to Cover Me Songs for providing many of the above songs.

Video: James Blake – Limit To Your Love

“Limit To Your Love” was originally heard on Feist‘s The Reminderas a whimsical pop song but in the hands of up-and-coming UK singer / songwriter James Blake it’s remade into a minimalistic, soulful ballad. The sparse, atmospheric track is matched perfectly with Martin De Thurah‘s stylistic video. De Thurah is a master of at creating mood and has a great eye (see last year’s superb video for Fever Ray’s “When I Grow Up”) so while the video has little in the department of narrative structure, the images of floating apples, rippling water glasses and black holes are beautiful to look at. Watch the video above and download the track below.

MP3 James Blake – Limit To Your Love (Feist cover)

Mates of State's Crushes (+ more covers)

I’ve long been a huge Mates of State fan, so I was very excited to hear they were coming out with some new material, albeit not being an official album, but an all-covers mixtape entitled Crushes. It’s super nice of them in their busy touring / baby-raising schedule to throw something the fans way. Plus, I’ve always felt the indie pop duo has done a wonderful job with the covers, whether it’s of classic rock icons like David Bowie or Nico or modern classics like Gnarles’ Barkley’s “Crazy”. Their covers mixtape has some stuff I’m really interested in hearing, most especially Belle & Sebastian’s fantastic “Sleep The Clock Around”.  Here’s a couple tracks from the covers mixtape (the Tom Waits cover was previously released on this year’s “Sweethearts” compilation from Starbucks) as well as all of the additional covers from the band that I could find.

MP3 Laura (Girls cover)
MP3 Long Way Home (Tom Waits cover)

More Mates of State covers!

MP3 These Days (Nico cover)
MP3 California (Phantom Planet cover)
MP3 Starman (David Bowie cover)
MP3 Like U Crazy / Crazy (Gnarls Barkley live cover)

Check out the full tracklist at Stereogum. Hey, this is my second covers post this week. Yay for variety!