Monday, August 01, 2005

Are you ready for the time of your life?

Sorry I'm so sporadic all the time. I was all stressed out the past few weeks with job-related woe, but now I'm back on track. I start a shiny new job in a few weeks, but until then, I suppose I'll have a little more time to post.

Today's random smattering involves songs that—either the original or the cover—make me nostalgic. But I guess that could be the theme of all my posts.

  • Herman Dune "Smalltown Boy" (Bronski Beat cover)
    I'm a really big fan of Herman Dune, covers or no—although had it not been for his covers, I might not have learned about his original stuff.

  • Propaganda "Femme Fatale" (Velvet Underground cover)
    Ah, Propaganda! Could this remind me more of gay boys I lusted after in the '80s? Probably not.

  • Kirsty MacColl "You Just Haven't Earned it Yet Baby" (Smiths cover)
    Kirsty rules. I miss her. (I post lots of Smiths covers, don't I?)

  • The Detroit Cobras "Breakaway" (Irma Thomas cover, written by Jackie DeShannon)
    Six degrees of picking covers: Kirsty always reminds me of Tracey Ullman (because Tracey covered Kirsty's "They Don't Know," of course) and when I think of Tracey, I remember her version of "Breakaway," which was my first introduction to the songs of Irma Thomas. The Detroit Cobras LOVE Irma Thomas. I think they've covered nearly every Irma Thomas hit.

  • They Might Be Giants "Maybe I Know" (Lesley Gore cover)
    I've long been a fan of the 1960s girl-singer "I know my boyfriend is a jerk, but I just can't get enough of him" tracks. (See above as well.) This was always one of my favorites in the genre. In fact, nearly every song on Lesley Gore's greatest hits album is.

  • The Housemartins "Caravan of Love" (Isley Brothers cover)
    Dorky, fey, British? Delicious.

  • The Number 12 Looks Like You "My Sharona" (The Knack cover)
    Thanks to SoulSeek's "upload" feature, this wound up in my files when my pal Eric sent it my way. Yeah. It sounds like something he'd know about.

  • The Polecats "John, I'm Only Dancing" (David Bowie cover)
    I had some sort of attack last week in which I absolutely had to listen to the Polecats' "Make a Circuit With Me" about 10 times in a row. I'm not sure where that impulse came from, but I did it and it jostled my memory of this.

  • Rasputina "Bad Moon Rising" (Creedence Clearwater Revival cover)
    I used to make fun of Rasputina because I was mired in an anti-goth love of shoegaze and Brit-pop when I became aware of them, but in retrospect I don't hate them at all. This is pretty good.

  • St. Etienne "Only Love Can Break Your Heart" (Neil Young cover)
    I was in my sophomore year of college when St. Etienne's Foxbase Alpha came out and I remember heading out to Ozarka's in my winter coat to buy it. A few months later, I was listening to it and one of my annoying roommate's "boyfriends" overheard me playing it and said, "Man, that girl listens to weird shit." Heh. I think it was the most non-weird CD in my collection at the time.

    Heads-up/reminder: I've received a lot of comments and e-mails lately with requests and/or questions on how readers can "submit" a song to the site. Um. Unfortunately, that's not really how I work this thing. As always, if you have a song you want me to know about or hear, feel free to send it my way, but I make no guarantees it will end up here. Keep in mind that my cover sickness is full-blown, and in most cases, I probably already have it and/or know about it and/or have ALREADY POSTED IT. Heh. People alerting me to songs I've already posted are my favorite.
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