Lyle Lovett sang a great version of “Stand by Your Man” on the album Lyle Lovett and His Large Band.
I heard Michael Crawford sing a version of “Total Eclipse of the Heart” in Jim Steinman’s musical “Dance of the Vampire.” Not pretty, let me tell you.
Andrew Lloyd Webber combined two of his works (“Tell Me On A Sunday” & “Variations”) to creat “Song & Dance” a musical about an English “girl” in New York City. That show would be great as a gay guy in NYC. I’ve know gay men who play “The Last Man in My Life” at their commitment/wedding ceremonies.
Hey thanks - yeah, Mary can sing! I think that is why the gender-crossing stuff works so well - she clearly sounds like a woman, but has the lower, Alison Moyet (from the band Yaz) type of register and authority. That’s why it is both cool and pretty funny to hear her sing Tush - “oh lord take me downtown - I’m just lookin’ for some tush” - you don’t really doubt her!
As for other cross-gendered interpretations - when he was at the top of his game, I always dreamed of hearing Axl Rose singing Another Piece of My Heart by Janis Joplin - I just think that if he found the right vulnerability from a male POV to go with the toughness of the delivery - like JJ did from a female perspective - it could’ve been great…
Even their cover of Black Dog is nearly as good as the original and it doesn’t even work with her voice and point of view (although, like someone said about another singer in this thread, she has the vocal authority to make it sound more believable in the opposite gender). But their covers of Battle of Evermore and Misty Mountain Hop are even better than the original, then again I never saw LZ do them live in their heyday.
She’s covered male artists before, but I’ve never heard Kate Bush sing a Peter Gabriel song solo (the duet in “Don’t Give Up” is wonderful but doesn’t count for what I want to hear). Any song would do, but if I had to pick one, I’d choose…I’d choose, oh gosh, this is hard…maybe “Wallflower.”
As far as covers that have been done…
All of Holly Cole’s Tom Waits covers are pretty terrific.
I love Happy Rhodes’ cover of Bowie’s “Space Oddity” (all links are to YouTube videos). She’s done lots of covers originally done by men, including Duran Duran’s “Come Undone,” Peter Gabriel’s “Here Comes The Flood,” Queen’s “Lily of the Valley” and I love them all, but one of the most interesting ones is her cover of Peter Gabriel’s “Mercy Street” since the song was originally written and performed by a man, but the lyrics are from a woman’s point of view, so a woman singing it brings an added dimension.
To answer the question, I’d like Heart to do an entire cover of Led Zeppelin IV. While I don’t have much hope for Rock n Roll (although I hear they have covered it live, Plant’s singing was simply perfect and leaves nothing to be improved on in its sublimnity) I’d think they could do Stairway, Goin’ to California, and When the Levee Breaks at least as good (besides the Stairway solo), if not better, and I’m pretty sure that they could do Four Sticks better, in which Plant seems so bored he’s ready to go to sleep.
They did some really good Plantesque wailing in Misty Mountain Hop, and Four Sticks is full of those opportunities.
For all I know, she has already covered it at some point, but I never heard it.
I always thought Tina Turner would do a freaking kickass cover of The Rolling Stones’ Bitch, with its high-energy danceability and big horn section.
a live Heart recording of Rock n’ Roll is readily available here (Amazon link to their 1990 live album). It rocks - and since Ann has more control over her vocal instrument than Plant does - don’t get me wrong, I love Plant and Zep a ton, but there is no question that Ann Wilson is a technically much better singer - you get a solid take on the song…
Well, they’re not a punk band, but Guster did a cover of it when they played at my college. However, the drummer sang the song, and he CAN. NOT. SING.
The song is only good on the “it’s kind of fun” level, cause his voice cracks, he can’t hit the notes, etc…
I was thinking of the Grateful Dead’s cover of Me and Bobby McGee. As it turns out, Kris Kristofferson cowrote the song and deliberately chose Bobby as a name that could be either gender. Indeed, the gender is switched between Janis’s and the Dead’s version.
I was thinking this could be my karaoke song because it sounds like it only spans half an octave, but the gender was wrong. Now I’ll just have to admit to being a chicken shit.
…and of course, lots of men have covered her songs. Maxwell’s This Woman’s Work being a favourite of mine. But I’d like to hear her doing something completely different - Aqualung by Jethro Tull. I don’t know why.
I’d also like Jarboe to do more Joy Division covers (even though I think the Gira Love Will Tear Us Apart is the better swans version)
As long as it’s closer to “Open Your Eyes” than “Here In Your Bedroom” I can almost hear Goldfinger doing it. But, inexplicably, there are horns in my imagining on the word “heeeeaaaarrrrtttt.”