Amie Street Alert

Not a member of Amie Street yet? Boyhowdy's latest post has a code for $3 free when you sign up for Amie Street. I'm a big fan of the site: DRM-free downloads and sliding scale pricing (all songs start free and increase as they become popular to a max of 98¢). Lots of great indie bands, though there's a frustrating US Only restriction for certain record labels.

So you just got your first $3 or you're already a loyal user looking for new music, what to buy? Lucky for you cover lovers, I've been keeping tabs on the Amie Street cover song offerings... take a listen and load up!

Shortstack: a covers EP with songs by The Kinks, Captain Beefheart, and The Pupils. An early purchase for me was their cover of Commotion, my favourite CCR song.

Lili Haydn: Supertramp's Goodbye Stranger

Jake Shimabukuro: 7 albums from ukulele virtuoso jake Shimabukuro. Lots of covers including his great version of While My Guitar Gently Weeps, Zeppelin's Going to California, and Cyndi Lauper's Time After Time.

Lee Press-On & The Nails: a handful of good covers from this big band swing group. Pink Elephants on Parade from Disney's Dumbo, Van Halen's Hot for Teacher, Stones' Jumping Jack Flash, and more.

Mates of State: Bowie's Starman is covered on their All Day EP.

Jacqui Naylor: Probably one of the best deals on here, two albums for about $2 each. Naylor calls it "smashing" but essentially she and her band perform live band mash-ups. Some work, some not so much, but they're all in good fun. Particularly great is her cover of Santa Baby intermixed with Zeppelin's D'yer Mak'er from the Christmas album Smashed for the Hoildays. She must be a Zeppelin fan since we also have What Child is This? vs. Babe I'm Gonna Leave You and We Three Kings vs. When the Levee Breaks. I won't spoil some of the other bizarre clashes, but I will give props to her covers of Lola and Hot Legs.

Asobi Seksu: The Crystals' Then He Kissed Me

Dani Siciliano: Nirvana's Come As You Are

Sugarman Three: covers of James Brown's Papa's Got a Brand New Bag and Susie Q (apparently NOT originally by CCR as I thought, but Dale Hawkins).

Indie Translations of the White Stripes: White Stripes purists tend to bash this album, but I found at least a few keepers when I bought the physical CD in San Francisco a few months back. Unfortunately, Amie Street doesn't actually list individual artists on this compilation and as an added kick in the crotch, the downloaded tracks are mis-credited to the wrong band. It's a shame because the two best tracks are folksy/country covers of Ball & Biscuit and My Doorbell by an L.A. band called the Long Goners.

Bibbidi Bobbidi Bach: Disney covers in the style of famous classical composers.

US Only

Rasputina: From their live album A Radical Recital, gothic cello covers of Heart's Barracuda and Led Zeppelin's Rock & Roll, both under 40¢ each. I love their version of Rock & Roll from their covers EP The Lost & Found, but unfortunately it's not available.

Leave comments with other good covers you found on Amie Street!