I am sure there is a much better phrase than ‘re-doing’ for this phenomenon but it escapes me at this time. The other day I heard the original ‘Mad World’ by, was it, tears for fears??.
Anyway, it was immediately obvious that it was too fast, too ‘pop’, generally bad. All the re-doings (that I’ve heard) of that song have been vast improvements (IMO). (especially Alex Parks, the winner of one of the Fame Academy shows*)
Normally it’s the other way round. Re-doings of songs are offensive to the original song in their generic pop crapness.
[sub]*I am a strong critic of these tv based band/idol manufacturing shows, that underneath are just money-making ploys who’s winners are always generic ‘good’ singers. But IMO Alex Parks is actually IMO truly talented and special[/sub]
In the 70s and 80s, it was routine for top 40 radio stations to play songs 5-10% faster than they were recorded. Thus, a three-minute song becomes 2:42. Two three-minute songs give you an extra half-minute that you can sell as ad time.
In order to do this, the songs were rerecorded faster. Once the song lost popularity, the radio station would record over the tape. If they wanted to play the song, they’d go back to the original record. This would sound slightly slow.
If you mean remixes, though, you got me. I can’t see any point in them.
I mean when a modern band or singer does an older song. Same words and tune, but different/modern instruments.
The original was more than 5-10% faster, It was like 40% faster. It just sounded a lot like a pop song. Modern re-workings of it sound more deep, sad, thoughtful.
I don’t think it’s a matter of the originals being generally better than later versions. I think it depends on which one you’ve become accustomed to hearing.
Even in Classical music, two orchestras/conductors might perform the same piece with the same instrumentation, with very different interpretations, and you’ve got to get past the feeling that the newer interpretation is “wrong.”
Marilyn Manson doing “Tainted Love”, originally by Soft Cell.
The Cult doing “Born to be Wild”, originally by Steppenwolf.
The Tea Party doing “Paint It Black”, originally by The Rolling Stones.
That sort of thing.
I’m not familiar with “Mad World” off the top of my head, but I’ve heard some pretty drastically altered covers in my time. William Shatner’s “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds” comes to mind. Hell, he speaks the entire song.
There’s some rap song out now that one part of it is very similar to the Archie’s Sugar Sugar.
Shriekback, an obscure punk/alternative band from the 80’s did a cover of Get Down Tonight by KC and the Sunshine band. What was cool about it was that it was so out of character for a band that mostly sang about snakes and sharks.
“Everyone can see that you can’t go wrong
Shriekback crash landing on a K.C. song.”
Just a side note: the original Mad World was indeed by Tears For Fears. The cover version on the Donnie Darko soundtrack was done by Gary Jules, and aside from the lyrics, bears little resemblence to its source material. It has a different tempo and different rhythm, and omits a good deal of instrumental that was present in the original. So, while the phenomenon you mention may exist, it is not the primary cause of difference in the track times for the Mad World versions.
I’m just glad someone finally asked something about TFF…
I’m a HUGE fan of cover songs; I’m always disappointed when a CD by an artist I like doesn’t have at least one cover on it. I really, really like a fresh take on a stale song. Judging a version as “bad” according to how many ways it differs from the original is ENTIRELY missing the point of a cover song. I tend to judge a cover as “bad” according to how many ways it FAILS to differ from the original. It’s extremely important, IMHO, to vary the tempo, or even the signature, of a song you’re covering. At the very least. YOu should at least totally change the attitude of the song, to be successful to MY ears.
Favorite example: Doris Day (whom I love, btw) sang the original version of “Que Sera.” In her many recordings of the song, she sang it as an uplifting, encouraging song; “what will be, will be” meant, to her, “Hey, don’t worry! Whatever happens will be wonderful, so look forward to the future with open arms!”
Holly Cole did a BRILLIANT cover, which she sang as a nearly dirgy blues song. Without changing a single lyric (ok, she replaced “my sweetheart” with “my lovers”), she took the same song and made it very clearly a song about teenage suicide. In her version, “what will be, will be” would translate “no matter what you do, you’re fucked, and there’s fuck-all you can do about it.”
Did she get it “wrong”? Not in the least. She made it say something new; she pointed out the ambiguities in the lyrics, and that it was Doris Day’s delivery that gave the original its meaning, not the lyrics themselves.
That’s the kind of cover song I love, and I kind of collect examples.
Some people just “get” certain songs, and love them enough that when they perform them, they can bring something to a song that was absent from the original recording. This is a very rare and magical occurrence. Rod Stewart covered “Reason To Believe.” I think his is the definitive version. Every other one I’ve heard, including the composer’s recording, is uniformly lame in some respect. Heard Jerry Jeff Walker do “Mr. Bojangles?” It can’t hold a candle to the Nitty Gritty Dirt Band’s record.
On the other hand, Bananarama totally ruined the Shocking Blue’s “Venus.” The original has real human content, soul, feeling. The cover - it’s a toss-up over which is more plastic, the rendition or the record it’s pressed on. Celine Dion massacred “Without You” (Badfinger via Harry Nilsson) and “All By Myself” (Eric Carmen). Why do they do this? I have no answer outside of money. I’ve been a musician since the '60s. I’ve played hundreds and hundreds of songs I didn’t write. And I played every one of them in a way that if the composer and/or artists were present, they’d be happy about it. In my capacity as occasional producer, I have had to tell a group to stop trying to record a cover version and go on to something else. If you can’t improve on somebody’s record, and if you can’t play it at least as well as the original, don’t even bother.
Some of the most interesting covers are by older artists of their own songs of youth.
Joni Mitchell redid “Both Sides Now” in 2000 or so as a slow, smoky lament for the trials and tribulations of life. You heard every one of the thirty past years in the remake. Claws your heart out.
And while some people don’t like the Unplugged version of “Layla,” I found it brilliant. Clapton turned it into an elegy for lost love. How else could a man of 50 sing a primal scream of desire to a woman he had since divorced?
Rage Against The Machine released an album called Renegades, composed entirely of cover songs. Hearing a Rage-ified version of Bob Dylan’s Maggie’s Farm is pretty interesting.
Limp Bizkit {Have I spelt it right? Who cares?} bludgeoning The Who’s Behind Blue Eyes to death. Oh yeah, and they transposed Lalo Schifrin’s Mission Impossible theme into 4/4 time. A fatwa on them, sez I.
I generally like covers. But the new artist HAS to have a new take on it. Re-invent it. Play it twice as fast, or twice as slow. Change the instrumentation, change genres.
The last thing I want to hear is ‘faithful’ redition. That’s what top 40 bands are for.
Second on Exapno Mapcase’s take on Joni Mitchell’s “Both Sides Now.” That later version really is a tearjerker.
Speaking of that, if you want to hear more along those lines by her you might also like her expanded orchestral exploration of her back catalog, the two-disc set Travelogue, which came out in 2002. (The full Both Sides Now album is primarily covers of other artists, barring the title track and “A Case Of You.”) I was surprised to hear how good those reworkings were, from the arrangement to her more resonant voice on top. I’ll say I actively prefer most of those later versions over the originals, barring maybe anything she did after 1991, say.
As regarding Joni being covered, though…to my ears, Counting Crows’ version of “Big Yellow Taxi” was unnecessary and annoying, especially the lyric change to accomodate gender/preference that didn’t even go to the trouble to rhyme in the third verse. Just ICK on so many levels.
For good cover versions, Cassandra Wilson’s albums from 1993 forward are gorgeous…they really put an entirely different texture on songs that might sound hackneyed coming from anyone else. I know I’ll probably never get as much from anyone else covering Robert Johnson’s “Come On In My Kitchen” or “Someday My Prince Will Come” ever again.