# And the absolute worst cover ever done to any hit song by professional entertainers is... **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [September 2, 2010, 8:54am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364 "2010-09-02T08:54:30Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 4
**Author:** ![asterion](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/4da419/32.png) [@asterion](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/asterion)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 12:04pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/61 "2010-09-03T12:04:22Z")
> [@jjimm](#): > > > [@Casey1505](#): > > > > I’m kind of with you. It wasn’t the early 80’s, and it wasn’t a roller rink, but this disco hatchet job of Comfortably Numb is the worst cover ever. Scissors Sisters can go on to cure cancer and find homes for every stray animal on the planet, but they will still be guilty of this [crime against humanity](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lsCEgcRozY). What the hell was Waters thinking when he said “Sure, that sounds like a wonderful idea for a cover, and you are just the ones to do it!” Is money that tight for him? > > The Scissor Sisters are apparently _huge_ fans of Pink Floyd (they were observed in the wings crying at the Live 8 Pink Floyd reunion). This was clearly a joke - I mean, a disco version of one of the most emotive songs ever? It was heresy for humour. And allegedly Pink Floyd thought it was hilarious. Let’s see…The Wall came out about three years before I was born. I had never heard of the Scissor Sisters before someone on this board mentioned the cover in a previous thread. I also don’t mind covers that try to do something different (after all, look at All Along the Watchtower) but I’ll admit that some work better than others. That said, I rather like the cover of Comfortably Numb, because it’s humorous because of the juxtaposition. Then again, I’ve also got Paul Anka’s Rock Swings album, and various other odd covers such as Jonathan Coulton covering Baby Got Back, the Connells covering Insane in the Brain, William Shatner covering Common People, Johnny Cash covering Hurt, Tomoyasu Hotei doing an odd remix of Immigrant Song, and some odd covers more along a trance line, such as Jes’s cover of Love Song. So I’m probably not the best person to be talking about bad covers. Also, I’ve got Springsteen covering Viva Las Vegas, I think I have Pearl Jam’s cover of Last Kiss, and I’m sure looking through my iPod would bring up several more. ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 1:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/62 "2010-09-03T13:24:06Z")
> [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > > [@Sampiro](#): > > > > Chris Kenner’s _Land of a Thousand Dances_, amended and made a hit by _Cannibal and the Headhunters_, made absolutely legendary by Wilson Pickett, then held against its will in a dungeon room, starved, reduced to a persistent vegetative state and mocked as it died by > > > > [The Lawrence Welk Show](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKw-xV_IN_I). > > The Lawrence Welk show played music that was all technique and no passion or soul. If you take a song that’s all about soul, of course they’re going to muck it up. Everyone knows White Folk don’t got no soul. That video frightens me. ---
**Author:** ![Shirley\_Ujest](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/45deac/32.png) [@Shirley\_Ujest](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Shirley_Ujest)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 1:34pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/63 "2010-09-03T13:34:41Z")
> [@Lute Skywatcher](#): > > [Crispin Glover covering Nancy Sinatra.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKoP_hM_nUc) I am so playing this the next time I have company over that I cannot get rid of. This is awesome. ---
**Author:** ![Skywatcher](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/skywatcher/32/254_2.png) [@Skywatcher](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Skywatcher)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 6:18pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/64 "2010-09-03T18:18:58Z")
> [@Shirley\_Ujest](#): > > > [@Robot\_Arm](#): > > > > The Lawrence Welk show played music that was all technique and no passion or soul. If you take a song that’s all about soul, of course they’re going to muck it up. > > Everyone knows White Folk don’t got no soul. Particuarly when [an original Mouseketeer](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bobby_Burgess) is involved. ---
**Author:** ![Yookeroo](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/yookeroo/32/323_2.png) [@Yookeroo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Yookeroo)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 9:16pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/65 "2010-09-03T21:16:24Z")
> [@Casey1505](#): > > I’m kind of with you. It wasn’t the early 80’s, and it wasn’t a roller rink, but this disco hatchet job of Comfortably Numb is the worst cover ever. Scissors Sisters can go on to cure cancer and find homes for every stray animal on the planet, but they will still be guilty of this [crime against humanity](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2lsCEgcRozY). This belongs in a best covers thread, not a worst covers thread. ---
**Author:** ![challkhmc](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/cdc98d/32.png) [@challkhmc](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/challkhmc)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 9:23pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/66 "2010-09-03T21:23:25Z")
How about Eric Clapton’s cover of his own\* Layla\*? ---
**Author:** ![CPomeroy](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/c/ed8c4c/32.png) [@CPomeroy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/CPomeroy)\ **Post date:** [September 3, 2010, 10:09pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/67 "2010-09-03T22:09:16Z")
I have to throw in a vote for Will to Power. The cheesy video alone makes it a defilement of not just one but two classic songs. [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSCzN3FxLeo](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=fSCzN3FxLeo) ---
**Author:** ![rowrrbazzle](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/rowrrbazzle/32/414_2.png) [@rowrrbazzle](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rowrrbazzle)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2010, 4:20am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/68 "2010-09-05T04:20:26Z")
> [@Shirley\_Ujest](#): > > > [@Lute Skywatcher](#): > > > > [Crispin Glover covering Nancy Sinatra.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mKoP_hM_nUc) > > I am so playing this the next time I have company over that I cannot get rid of. This is awesome. It wouldn’t work on me. It IS awesome and hilarious! ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2010, 5:47am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/69 "2010-09-05T05:47:51Z")
> [@Contrapuntal](#): > > You need you some [Richard Cheese and Lounge Against the Machine](http://www.amazon.com/Tuxicity-Richard-Cheese-Against-Machine/dp/B00008RH8V/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1283460494&sr=1-3). Seriously. It’s killer shit. > > Dick Cheese doing [Baby Got Back.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KCv2cgIlnHA) Probably NSFW. 😃 I never heard of this guy and now I can’t stop watching his youtube videos. Check out his Nine Inch Nails cover: [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5m\_CdCzKYY&feature=related](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=W5m_CdCzKYY&feature=related) ---
**Author:** ![davidm](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/davidm/32/225_2.png) [@davidm](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/davidm)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2010, 5:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/70 "2010-09-05T05:57:11Z")
> [@digs](#): > > I met some of the Lawrence Welk performers through a friend, and they were The. Creepiest. People. > > All big fake smiles and perfect makeup and exactly correct fashion… with so much seething psychic angst and bitterness underneath it all, that it actually haunts me to this day. They were actually like that in real life? :eek: ---
**Author:** ![Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/e/5daacb/32.png) [@Ellis\_Aponte\_Jr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Ellis_Aponte_Jr)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2010, 7:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/71 "2010-09-05T07:15:36Z")
> [@palindromemordnilap](#): > > Mercifully, I’ve pretty much blocked out the details of the worst cover ever. It was the early 1980s and I was at a roller rink when I heard a disco version of a Pink Floyd song. I don’t recall (and don’t want to know) which song and never knew who did the murderous deed. I only heard it that one time. Sorry but I can’t respect your wishes. What you probably heard was the Italian disco group Pink Project doing a cover of “Another Brick in the Wall,” from 1982. [http://videosift.com/video/Space-Disco-Cover-of-Pink-Floyds-Another-Brick-in-the-Wall](http://videosift.com/video/Space-Disco-Cover-of-Pink-Floyds-Another-Brick-in-the-Wall) ---
**Author:** ![Acorns.but\_not\_Bacon](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/3da27b/32.png) [@Acorns.but\_not\_Bacon](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acorns.but_not_Bacon)\ **Post date:** [September 5, 2010, 3:01pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/72 "2010-09-05T15:01:57Z")
Can’t find anything on YouTube of - **Lulu** - **Mr Tamborine Man**. It was an awful dance pop cover with dancers waving tamborines around ☹ ---
**Author:** ![ojdiditoo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/o/e19b73/32.png) [@ojdiditoo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/ojdiditoo)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 7:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/73 "2013-12-30T07:32:08Z")
and I’ve got the video tape to prove it. I listened to more than half of it just knowing it had to be a joke. Nope! Absolutely, positively, no doubt about it the worst rendition EVER. I thought the two co-hosts were gonna go into cardiac arrest. ---
**Author:** ![installLSC](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/i/54ee81/32.png) [@installLSC](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/installLSC)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 9:14am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/74 "2013-12-30T09:14:43Z")
[Barbra Streisand covering David Bowie’s “Life On Mars”.](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5rtL73TSHxM) What’s the over/under on the number of minutes Babs heard this song before she recorded it? ---
**Author:** ![aruvqan](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/aruvqan/32/2891_2.png) [@aruvqan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/aruvqan)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 11:32am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/75 "2013-12-30T11:32:49Z")
> [@RandMcnally](#): > > I’m going to say anything by Pat Boone. Well, [Pat Boone](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_a_Metal_Mood:_No_More_Mr._Nice_Guy) did do a heavy metal cover album… And I can remember working for Service Merchandise one Christmas season and the muzac was running some Jimi Hendrix and Doors music all muzaced up. 😕:dubious::eek: All Along the Watchtower does not work as muzac. [Though mrAru does a hysterically funny AC-DC Highway to Hell, and at one point back in 1983 the band I was in were at a gig and something happened to the guitar so we hammed up a muzacy keyboards/drums/bass riff of Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here while they got the guitar back up.] [Toledo Polkamotion doing Secret Agent Man](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZhAE04FjJc) ---
**Author:** ![NiceGuyJack](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/niceguyjack/32/3069_2.png) [@NiceGuyJack](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/NiceGuyJack)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 11:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/76 "2013-12-30T11:59:12Z")
> [@Sampiro](#): > > Chris Kenner’s _Land of a Thousand Dances_, amended and made a hit by _Cannibal and the Headhunters_, made absolutely legendary by Wilson Pickett, then held against its will in a dungeon room, starved, reduced to a persistent vegetative state and mocked as it died by > > [The Lawrence Welk Show](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=DKw-xV_IN_I). Mine eyes!..Mine ears!..They are bleeding! Whatever you do, don’t click on that link! How am I ever going to unsee that? It’ll be stuck in my head til the day I die. Why did they have to do that to such a great song? Why? What ever did it do to them? ---
**Author:** ![Chefguy](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/chefguy/32/138_2.png) [@Chefguy](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Chefguy)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 4:02pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/77 "2013-12-30T16:02:21Z")
> [@aruvqan](#): > > Well, [Pat Boone](http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/In_a_Metal_Mood:_No_More_Mr._Nice_Guy) did do a heavy metal cover album… > > And I can remember working for Service Merchandise one Christmas season and the muzac was running some Jimi Hendrix and Doors music all muzaced up. 😕:dubious::eek: All Along the Watchtower does not work as muzac. [Though mrAru does a hysterically funny AC-DC Highway to Hell, and at one point back in 1983 the band I was in were at a gig and something happened to the guitar so we hammed up a muzacy keyboards/drums/bass riff of Pink Floyd’s Wish You Were Here while they got the guitar back up.] > > [Toledo Polkamotion doing Secret Agent Man](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_ZhAE04FjJc) An old thread, but a good one. Pat Boone has been ruining music going back to [Tutti Frutti](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=heveoNP3Ht8) in 1956. Compare it to [Little Richard’s version](http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=F13JNjpNW6c). I nominate most jazz covers of rock songs; they’re almost always cringe-worthy. ---
**Author:** ![digs](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/digs/32/14889_2.png) [@digs](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/digs)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 4:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/78 "2013-12-30T16:03:17Z")
Now THIS is the kind of thread that needs to get resurrected every once in a while! Loved watching the video again, if only to understand that when SNL goes over the top, it’s really just a documentary. I mean, can’t you just picture Will Ferrell “dancing” in that video (it was a lot like his cheerleader character). Oh, and I see I missed someone asking me if the Welk cast were really like this: > [@digs](#): > > I met some of the Lawrence Welk performers through a friend, and they were The. Creepiest. People. > > All big fake smiles and perfect makeup and exactly correct fashion… with so much seething psychic angst and bitterness underneath it all, that it actually haunts me to this day. YES! They’d be all bubbly when they met you, but it was so fake. They were so psychologically scarred. One guy was _super-upbeat_ (yes, he used words like _suuuper-UPbeat!_), but his friend told me he’d been having an affair with another (married) guy on the show, and had attempted suicide. Imagine a used car dealer/evangelist the day before he gets up in a tower with a rifle. I only spent ten minutes with these people, and I wasn’t exaggerating that it still haunts me. ---
**Author:** ![pulykamell](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/pulykamell/32/3166_2.png) [@pulykamell](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/pulykamell)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 4:08pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/79 "2013-12-30T16:08:50Z")
I like or don’t mind a good portion of the covers here, but that Lawrence Welk one…wow. That may be the worst I’ve ever heard. (I’m surprised to see the Rolf Harris _Stairway to Heaven_ mentioned as coming up often in these threads–it seemed clear to me to be a tongue-in-cheek cover.) I don’t like the Richard Cheese ones–too gimmicky–but they’re meant to be fun and tongue-in-cheek, so I’ll give them a pass. ---
**Author:** ![don\_t\_ask](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/e68b1a/32.png) [@don\_t\_ask](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/don_t_ask)\ **Post date:** [December 30, 2013, 4:24pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364/80 "2013-12-30T16:24:03Z")
I really deeply love the first comment to the video in the OP’s link. In case it disappears: After watching this I no longer want to be white. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364.md?page=3) [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/and-the-absolute-worst-cover-ever-done-to-any-hit-song-by-professional-entertainers-is/552364.md?page=5)