Abdominal Remix contest

Abdominal has a contest up on his myspace site right now for the best remix of his song Pedal Pusher, which won the SOCAN ECHO Songwriting Prize last year. Download the a cappella track provided on myspace or grab it below (downloading from myspace is unnecessarily complicated). The winner's remix will be included on Abdominal's "Remixed" EP, which is due to be released later this year. All entries must be sent by June 19th to contest@dorightmusic.com. I'm not a remixer or anything, but if it helps, the tempo of the track is 112 bpm.

Abdominal - Pedal Pusher
Abdominal - Pedal Pusher [a cappella]

Concert Alerts for Vancouverites

I've been busy the last couple days settling into my new digs and finally completing The Big Move from Edmonton to Vancouver. The past few months I've been living out of a suitcase in my friends' spare room, but now have my own sweet suite. My folks are also visiting right now, so don't expect to hear much more from me until next week.

A couple big shows announced recently for late in the summer here in Vancouver, both at Stanley Park.

August 31 - September 1, The Stanley Park Singing Exhibition
A two day festival curated by The New Pornographers, who of course will be performing as a supergroup and in parts (i.e. Neko Case, Destroyer, The Evaporators). Other announced acts include Deerhoof, The 1900s, and Andrew Bird with more to follow. AAARRRGH! Here I was all jealous after reading Andrew Bird would be hitting the Calgary Folk Fest and now he IS coming to town but I already chose that weekend of all weekends to fly out to Toronto to visit relatives. Bah! That's bah to missed concert, not bah to visiting relatives-- I've got a brand new cousin to meet! At least, I've already seen Andrew Bird and the New Pornographers before, though I may weep as more acts are announced later. CBC Radio 3 is a proud sponsor of this first ever festival, which hopefully implies this will become an annual tradition. Tickets on sale Friday at Ticketmaster and probably any indie record store. $30 to $35 for one day, $60 for a 2-day pass.

September 18, The Raconteurs will inexplicably be coming back through Vancouver even though they were just here a couple months ago. No complaints here! Tickets also on sale Friday.

A couple other notable gigs coming up soon:
June 29, 12pm Elizabeth Shepherd is doing a free show at David Lam Park in conjunction with the Vancouver Jazz Festival.
July 6, Butch Walker, former lead singer of Marvelous 3-- a cover post on him is long, long overdue.

The New Pornographers - The New Face of Zero and One
Andrew Bird - Two Way Action
The New Pornographers - Three or Four
The Raconteurs - Five on the Five

Canadian Cover Content #9: April Wine Uncorked

All these posts of originals this week were instigated by a bit of an "originals" google bender last week. Of the originals dug up, none were more surprising to me than the following bit of CanCon classic rock. (Apologies in advance if this post holds absolutely no interest for non-Canucks)

In short, CanCan (Canadian Content) regulations require a certain percentage of radio and television broadcasting to be Canadian in origin. For the classic rock stations, that means we were taught early to love The Guess Who, Rush, BTO, Steppenwolf, and The Tragically Hip. That also means we're exposed to an unnecessary amount of Trooper, Loverboy, Streetheart, Harlequin... and April Wine. I mean there's really no reason I should be able to sing-a-long faithfully to 15+ April Wine songs, yet I can. In fact, I'm not even entirely convinced April Wine had that many hits, but they sure are played on the radio as if they did.

Here are a few April Wine songs you should recognize:

• April Wine - Bad Side of the Moon
  
• April Wine - You Could Have Been a Lady
  
• April Wine - Sign of the Gypsy Queen

Guess what? They're ALL covers.

A few years ago when I discovered Elton John's great live album 11-17-70, that's when I first realized that the April Wine hit Bad Side of the Moon was in fact a cover song.
Elton John - Bad Side of the Moon
Elton John - Bad Side of the Moon (11-17-70)
The original studio version was released as the b-side to my favourite Elton John song, Border Song.

Hot Chocolate - You Could Have Been a Lady
Here was another shocker: You Could Have Been a Lady was originally by Hot Chocolate, probably most famous for You Sexy Thing!

Lorence Hud - Sign of the Gypsy Queen
From his self-titled 1973 album, Lorence Hud wrote this song popularized by April Wine and played all the instruments on the track.

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I like April Wine fine enough, though they're best when taken in moderation (like wine!). I've even seen them live once, performing a free show in Sunshine Village in between ski runs. Here are a few covers of April Wine for you. Props to this fansite since I didn't really know anybody actually covered April Wine.

Treble Charger - Roller [originally by April Wine]
From the soundtrack to the cult Canadian mockumentary FUBAR, which featured several contemporary bands (Sum 41, Sloan, The New Pornographers, and more) covering Canadian metal and rock hits from the 70's/80's.

Clout - Oowatanite [originally by April Wine]
This is a pretty sweet cover of a song many of us now permanently associate with a Lotto 6/49 commercial that used to get a lot of airplay up here. "Ah, the lotto song!" is a familiar reaction to anyone who hears the distinctive bells that kick off Oowatanite. Clout was an all-girl rock group from South Africa who were active in the late seventies. If you imagine Heart covering April Wine, that'll give you an idea of this cover.

The Heelwalkers - Weeping Widow [originally by April Wine]
I have to admit I was surprisingly stoked to find a cover of this song.

Frost - Sign of the Gypsy Queen [originally by Lorence Hud]
Sure we now know it's a Lorence Hud original, but undoubtedly this metal cover is of April Wine.

Doctor, Doctor, give me the news

Moon Martin - Bad Case of Loving You (Doctor, Doctor)
Here's another I just found out about recently. Famously covered by Robert Palmer, the original was written and performed by Moon Martin from his 1978 album Shots From a Cold Nightmare.

Ciccone Youth - Addicted to Love [originally by Robert Palmer]
A side project of Sonic Youth, Ciccone Youth released The Whitey Album in 1988 with this Robert Palmer cover, which was sung by Kim Gordon and recorded at a karaoke booth in a mall.

Originals from Rudy Clark

Ever heard of Rudy Clark? I hadn't until writing this post, but I know you know a couple of his songs.

James Ray - I've Got My Mind Set On You
A hit for George Harrison in 1988, take a listen to the drastically different original version from 1962 written by Rudy Clark and performed by James Ray. And that's not the only obscure original penned by Rudy Clark...

Merry Clayton - The Shoop Shoop Song
The Shoop Shoop Song (It's In His Kiss), also a Rudy Clark song, was a hit for Betty Everett and has been covered numerous times over the years by artists such as The Supremes, Linda Ronstadt, The Hollies, and of course, Cher. Yet I was surprised to learn recently that the original recording of the song was by Merry Clayton, most famous for her intense wailing opposite Mick Jagger on the Stones' classic Gimme Shelter.

Merry Clayton - Gimme Shelter [originally by The Rolling Stones]
Despite having sung on the original, my gut instinct tells me this counts as a cover. An awesome soul version with some sweet horns, this is a strong contender for number one Gimme Shelter cover, though Ruth Copeland has claimed that spot in my books.

Ooh Ooh Love Hurts.

The Every Brothers - Love Hurts
Covered numerous times, though arguably most known as a rock ballad by Nazareth, the original was performed by The Everly Brothers and written by the husband and wife songwriting team of Felice & Boudleaux Bryant. With Nazareth's This Flight Tonight also being a cover of Joni Mitchell, I was surprised that I didn't suddenly find out Hair of the Dog was secretly a cover too. Felice & Boudleaux Bryant wrote a bunch of songs that were hits for The Everly Brothers including Wake Up Little Susie, Bye Bye Love, All I Have to Do is Dream, and Bird Dog.

Joan Jett and the Blackhearts - Love Hurts
Joan Jett and the Blackhearts - Bird Dog
Here's Joan Jett covering a couple of those Felice & Boudleaux numbers. I was mildly shocked to find out her big hit I Love Rock 'n' Roll is also a cover.

The Arrows - I Love Rock 'n' Roll
The original I Love Rock 'n' Roll by British rock group The Arrows. With this revelation, it turns out I have never heard a Joan Jett original.

Big Ol' Jet Airliner

On Coverville, Brian occasionally has "Originalville" episodes featuring original songs eclipsed by a more famous cover. It goes without saying that as a cover lover I'm equally fascinated with cover origins. Whether it's hearing for the first time Hard to Handle and Respect (both Otis Redding originals), Gloria Jones' Tainted Love, or Joni Mitchell's Woodstock, it's great fun unearthing originals of songs you thought were originals, plus you get to be a jerk know-it-all around your friends. Today's post and all this week I will hopefully enlighten you with some original tunes.

Paul Pena - Jet Airliner
Several years ago there were a bunch of us coming back from a ski trip in the Rockies and Steve Miller Band's Jet Airliner was playing on a mixtape. A casual acquaintance who was riding in the back seat with me asked us the ol' "Did you know?"... and no, I did not know Jet Airliner was a cover song. Written and recorded in 1973 for Paul Pena's second album New Train, the album actually remained unreleased for 27 years due to label conflicts until 2000. Steve Miller heard the unreleased album (Steve Miller Band keyboardist Ben Sidran produced it) and decided to cover Jet Airliner on the 1977 album Book of Dreams. That car ride was also the first time I learned of Tuvan throat-singing, which Pena had taught himself to do and was subsequently invited to participate in a throat-singing symposium in Tuva, his journey being the subject of the 1999 Oscar-nominated documentary Genghis Blues.

Steve Miller Band - Take the Joker and Run [Demo]
The 30th anniversary re-issue of the Steve Miller Band's hit album Fly Like an Eagle contains this peculiar demo, which is Take the Money and Run sung to the tune of The Joker.

By the way, I added my last.fm profile's "now playing" to the sidebar. I only signed up about a couple months ago and I don't really get it other than it's an easy way to post what I'm listening to, which I tried to do manually a couple years ago. Sometimes you might catch a sneak peek at a future post I'm working on.

Fun with Entomology & Etymology

Last week the world was introduced to a spider named Neil Young. Jason Bond, a biologist at East Carolina University, discovered a new species of trapdoor spider and chose to name it Myrmekiaphila neilyoungi after the legendary Canadian singer-songwriter. The article notes that earlier this year a whirligig beetle was named after Roy Orbison, which naturally got me thinking cover songs...

I remember Harrison Ford had something named after him (two, it turns out: Calponia harrisonfordi, a spider, and Pheidole harrisonfordi, an ant) so I figured there would be a few more musicians with bugs named after them. I guess it shouldn't have surprised me, but of course there's an extensive wikipedia list on "animals named after celebrities". There are so many it's hard to pick favourites, but I was amused by Strigiphilus garylarsoni (a louse), Arthurdactylus conandoylei (a pterosaur), Avahi cleesei (a lemur), and Psephophorus terrypratchetti (an extinct turtle). Here are some choice cover songs accompanied by an artist's representation of each species.

The Shins - Harvest [originally by Myrmekiaphila neilyoungi]
Rufus Wainwright & Chris Stills - Harvest [originally by Myrmekiaphila neilyoungi]
Discovered in Jefferson County, Alabama, the new species was actually announced in a December 2007 paper co-written by Jason Bond and Norman I. Platnick entitled "Taxonomic review of the trapdoor spider genus Myrmekiaphila," no doubt a thrilling read. In fact, the paper describes 6 new species, though these other critters drew the rock star short straw and were named less prominently: Myrmekiaphila coreyi, M. minuta, M. jenkinsi, M. millerae, and M. howelli. Regarding our friend M. neilyoungi, the paper states, "The specific name is a patronym in honor of Mr. Neil Young, in recognition of his social activism for peace over the course of his distinguished musical career." Males of Myrmekiaphila neilyoungi are recognizable by "the presence of an elongate, well-defined ledge on the palpal tibia, which is excavated retro-laterally (best seen in ventral view)"-- which, of course, instantly evokes the music of Neil Young.


Chris Isaak - Only the Lonely [originally by Orectochilus orbisonorum]
At a Roy Orbison tribute concert in Tempe, Arizona earlier this year, entomologist Quentin Wheeler of Arizona State University announced a new species of whirligig beetle named for Roy and his widow, Barbara. The ending of a species name with "orum" indicates it was named after a couple. The beetle looks as if it's wearing a tuxedo with a shiny black top and, um, a clear cuticle underbelly that allows its white internal tissues to be seen. Wheeler also presented an original piece of whirligig beetle artwork to Barbara who was in attendance. In 2005, Wheeler also co-discovered 65 new species of slime-mold beetles some of which were named after Darth Vader, George W. Bush, Dick Cheney, and Donald Rumsfeld, though perhaps not for the reasons you'd immediately think.


Stone Temple Pilots - Get Up Offa That Thing [originally by Funkotriplogynium iagobadius]
The godfather of soul is also one funky mite. In 1985, Asok Kumar Datta named a genus of mite Funkotriplogynium setting the stage for Owen Seeman and Dave Walter, who in 1997 named a new mite species Funkotriplogynium iagobadius: iago meaning James and badius meaning brown. Oh, those sneaky arcaologists! Stone Temple Pilots pay tribute with an unlikely acoustic cover.


The Busters - We Are the Champions [originally by Queen]
McFly - Don't Stop Me Now [originally by Queen]
A distinctive cirolanid isopod from the coral reefs of Zanzibar was named Cirolana mercuryi for Freddie Mercury who was born in Stone Town, Zanzibar. Described by discoverer Niel Bruce as "arguably Zanzibar's most famous popular musician and singer," one immediately wonders what other Zanzibar musicians or singers were even in consideration.


Shooter Jennings - Walk of Life [originally by The Dire Straits]
In 2001, a team of paleontologists led by University of Utah's Scott Sampson discovered Masiakasaurus knopfleri, named for Dire Straits guitarist and lead singer Mark Knopfler because the team had a tendency to find new specimens while listening to the Dire Straits out in the field. This countrified cover is served up by Shooter Jennings, son of Waylon Jennings, not to be mistaken for Happy Gilmore nemesis Shooter McGavin.


Ben Folds Five - All Shook Up [originally by Preseucoila imallshookupis]
When Elvis sang "my friends say I'm acting as wild as a bug," I doubt he imagined someday a wasp would be named after him and that very hit song. In 2004, entomologist Matthew Buffington of the University of California did just that, honoring the King with the naming of a new species of gall wasp. Do wasps have hips? Ben Folds channels Elvis through incomprehensible mumblings in this goofy cover of All Shook Up.

Indie Kids, pt. 2

I just read on the CBC Radio 3 comments board that those shows in Halifax would be held at elementary schools and not be open to the public, however "they might, just might, do a recording with CBC in Halifax - and that would likely be a public event." We'll keep our fingers crossed for that.

By request:
Langley Schools Music Project - Desperado [originally by The Eagles]
Unlike the other Langley Schools covers which had choirs of up to 60 vocalists, this is simply a remarkable solo performance by 9-year-old Sheila Behman accompanied by piano. The title of the album Innocence & Despair is actually the phrase that music teacher Hans Fenger used to describe this very performance. On one of last year's Inventories, the Onion AV Club declared this one of 14 cover songs better than the original, saying, "the simplicity and seriousness of her sad-angel singing lends the song a surprising poignancy that Don Henley's considerably glossier original doesn't approach."

Moxy Früvous - The Kids' Song
In the early 90's, the federal government of Canada established a public commission, The Citizen's Forum on National Unity, in response "to a perception that the country's unity was being threatened by linguistic and regional divisions," this after the failed Meech Lake Accord designed to bring Québec into the Canadian Constitution. Also known as The Spicer Commission (after its chairperson Keith Spicer), the commission probed Canadians on the future of Canada, gathering feedback on subjects such as Canadian identity and values, bilingualism, constitutional issues, and cultural diversity. OK, mini social studies lesson over. That should provide some context for this Moxy Früvous tune about the overlooked toddler demographic.

By the way, head over to Cover Lay Down today for my guest post featuring folk covers with a boxing theme including a zinger of a bonus cover by Muhammad Ali.

Indie Kids

Sweet gig going on tonight... actually considering the time zone difference it's probably over. But anyway, way out east in a small community outside of Halifax, Nova Scotia choir students from the Dutch Settlement Elementary School, Musquodoboit Valley Education Center, and Upper Musquodoboit Consolidated School put on a concert called Canada Rocks. This ain't no Kidz Bop. The choirs performed songs by Feist, Joel Plaskett, Shotgun Jimmie, Julie Doiron, AC Newman, Islands, K-OS, Wintersleep and Patrick Watson. The event organized by 26-year-old music teacher Jarred Gates also had Shotgun Jimmie and Julie Doiron on hand to perform.

Intentionally or not, this follows in the footsteps of a similar undertaking on the opposite coast of Canada 30 years ago when a music teacher in Langley, BC, Hans Fenger had his students performing contemporary rock songs. Originally pressed as LPs for the students and their families in 1976-77, the recordings were rediscovered in 2000 by a Victoria record collector who sent it to WFMU DJ Irwin Chusid. He in turn was involved in getting these released in CD form as The Langley Schools Music Project. I first stumbled upon this CD at the library a few years ago where I proceeded to play it enthusiastically for amused co-workers. Just listen to a few of these:

Langley Schools Music Project - Rhiannon [originally by Fleetwood Mac]
Langley Schools Music Project - Band on the Run [originally by Paul McCartney & Wings]
Langley Schools Music Project - Space Oddity [originally by David Bowie]

Bowie himself on the Space Oddity cover: ""The backing arrangement is astounding. Coupled with the earnest if lugubrious vocal performance you have a piece of art that I couldn't have conceived of, even with half of Colombia's finest export products in me."

Now imagine this with contemporary indie Canadian bands and you'll see why those Nova Scotia gigs would be awesome. The Musquodoboit area choirs are taking their show to the big city with a "two-date world tour" at Halifax schools in June. This project needs to be recorded immediately. I'd buy it!

[P.S. Check out Cover Lay Down tomorrow for a guest post by yours truly.]