Flashpoint:Papa Mars and Joe Dick team up to fight crime!

Last week in the comments, I briefly mentioned that Hugh Dillon, lead singer of the Headstones (who covered Tweeter and the Monkey Man once upon a time), was co-starring in a cop drama this fall on CTV called Flashpoint opposite Enrico Colantoni (Veronica's dad on Veronica Mars). The show, originally titled Sniper, focuses on an elite tactical police team that handles hostage negotiations, bomb threats, and other fun stuff. It made some ripples a couple weeks ago when CBS picked up the Canadian show for this summer's programming in spite of the on-going Writer's Strike. But the strike's all over now, so no worries. Whether he was serious or not, Boyhowdy suggested a blog post on the matter and I was more than up for the challenge. So today I present music tenuously associated to Hugh Dillon and Enrico Colantoni!

First off, Toronto-born actor Enrico Colantoni. I basically know him only as Keith Mars on Veronica Mars and Mathesar in Galaxy Quest, though a quick perusal of his IMDb credits would point to his 7 seasons of Just Shoot Me as Elliot DiMauro as his biggest role. I have to admit having never seen Just Shoot Me, though if it lasted 7 seasons it must have been alright, eh? And in a crazy bit of planets aligning, it turns out today is in fact his birthday(!). Happy Birthday, Enrico!

Enrico Colantoni - I Finally Got the Police Report on the Dean's Suicide!
I didn't exactly find an Enrico Colantoni cover song around or even any song for that matter. But while finishing off season 3 of Veronica Mars on the weekend and thinking about this post, I stumbled upon this musical moment that made me laugh.

Kristen Bell - One Way or Another [originally by Blondie]
Veronica Mars herself performs this truncated karaoke version in Season 1. Does this count as a cover song? Well, as my film prof liked to say all the time, close enough for government purposes.

The Dandy Warhols - We Used To Be Friends [Kenn Richards Remix]
The theme song for Veronica Mars was this Dandy Warhols song, which was later remixed for Season 3. Dandy Warhols lead singer Courtney Taylor-Taylor cameoed on the show performing karaoke to Love Hurts. Britt Daniel of Spoon also showed up in another episode singing Elvis Costello's Veronica at the karaoke club. One of the more peculiar aspects of Veronica Mars was spotting the most random and unlikely guest stars... Kevin Smith, Joss Whedon, 2 of the 3 kids from Home Improvement (Zachary Ty Bryan and Jonathan Taylor Thomas looking creepily like Christian Slater), Arrested Development's Michael Cera and Alia Shawkat (in the same episode!), Dan Castellaneta, Rider Strong (formerly of Boy Meets World), Lucy Lawless, Patty Hearst, and probably many, many more.

The Dandy Warhols - The Wreck of the Edmund Fitzgerald [originally by Gordon Lightfoot]
Since I'm heavy on the CanCon today, here's a Dandy Warhols cover of the classic Gordon Lightfoot ballad. According to wikipedia, Courtney Taylor-Taylor's cousin was in fact a crew member on the ill-fated SS Edmund Fitzgerald. This particular version is from Come on Feel the Dandy Warhols, a collection of b-sides and covers, and a different version of this cover was recorded for The Black Album.

Hugh Dillon was the lead singer of the Headstones, a Canadian hard rock band active from the late 1980's to 2003. In the mid-90's he began to take on some film roles, most notably the lead in Bruce McDonald's cult rock film Hard Core Logo. Some other credits include three episodes of Degrassi: The Next Generation, the third Ginger Snaps film, the Assault on Precinct 13 remake, and a Genie-nominated role in the Trailer Park Boys movie.

The Headstones - Smile and Wave
The Headstones - Cubically Contained
The Headstones' third album Smile and Wave is chock-full of great rock tracks and they had a radio hit if I remember correctly with Cubically Contained.

The Headstones - Tweeter and the Monkey Man [originally by the Traveling Wilburys]
For a long time, one of the only covers of the Traveling Wilburys around. With Jenny Lewis' cover a couple years ago, the total has risen to about... four, maybe.

The Hugh Dillon Redemption Choir - Streets of Bakersfield [originally by Buck Owens and Dwight Yoakam]
Following the break up of the Headstones, Hugh Dillon's next band was The Hugh Dillon Redemption Choir and this cover was offered to fans on his website one year as a X-Mas bonus.

You may not realize this, but one of the trademarks of Canadian cinema is the depressing and/or downbeat ending. Also: roadtrips. And that's Hard Core Logo in a nutshell, a Canadian rock & roll mockumentary (rock mock doc?) directed by Bruce McDonald in the vein of This is Spinal Tap, but only superficially. That is, there are some darkly funny moments, but you wouldn't call this a comedy. Based on a book by Michael Turner, it follows the fictional once-influential punk band Hard Core Logo as they embark on a last gasp reunion tour. Punk rock hijinks ensue. Like Chungking Express, Hero, and Iron Monkey, this film carries the questionable distinction of being "Presented by Quentin Tarantino" (i.e. "I had nothing to do with this movie, but I liked it and my name is Quentin Tarantino"). Hugh Dillon carries the film as the charismatic, self-destructive Hard Core Logo lead singer Joe Dick.


Hard Core Logo - Edmonton Block Heater
The Pursuit of Happiness - Edmonton Block Heater [originally by Hard Core Logo]
The Pursuit of Happiness - Edmonton Block Heater (Live) [originally by Hard Core Logo]
Every Edmontonian knows the importance of a block heater. This winter was particularly brutal with some -40ish temperatures at times, but we seem to take it in stride. For instance, when I went to L.A. I was miserably cold at times, muttering to myself at bus stops with the other shivering and wet patrons. And even though it was a good 30 degrees Celsius colder when I got home, at least I could bulk up in a huge puffy jacket, put on some big gloves, pull on my Oilers touque, and make epic treks to the post office or library like an arctic explorer. Embrace the bitter cold and it becomes your friend. The Hard Core Logo soundtrack was actually a "tribute" to Hard Core Logo featuring Canadian artists such as 54-40, the Odds, Kinnie Starr, the Headstones, and more performing the real songs of the fictional band. This tribute CD was also available with the Hard Core Logo special edition DVD. The Pursuit of Happiness is a rock band (lead singer from Edmonton) who had a hit song I'm an Adult Now in the 80's and endeared themselves to hockey fans everywhere with Wayne Gretzky Rocks. They recorded the Hard Core Logo cover for the tribute album and the live cut is from one of their Best-of compilations. Curiously, there's actually a band called Edmonton Block Heater from, uh, Vancouver whose name is inspired by Hard Core Logo song even though they're not a punk band.

Billy Talent - Ever Fallen in Love (With Someone You Shouldnt've)? [originally by the Buzzcocks]
Canadian rock band Billy Talent gets their name from Hard Core Logo's guitarist Billy Tallent (different spelling), played in the film by Callum Keith Rennie. This cover was released with their 2nd album, Billy Talent II, but only on iTunes.

Don't forget I'm giving away some FREE STUFF that you can enter to win here (scroll to the bottom). So far, there are 4 entries and 2 prizes... you do the math! One week left.

Harvey Danger coverage

I've got my next rock vacation lined up. Come March 6th and 7th, I'll be bussing down to Seattle to go see Harvey Danger play a 2-night stand at the 300-seat Triple Door. In the late-90's they attained one-hit wonder status with Flagpole Sitta from their debut album Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone?. I remember hearing the song in a commercial and scouring the p2p networks trying to find it. Problem was I couldn't remember any of the lyrics and for some reason I thought it was Oasis (don't ask), two big detriments to my search progress. A year or so later I re-discovered the song in the middle of a Weird Al polka and frantically looked over the liner notes to finally find out the song's name and artist. Flagpole Sitta. By Harvey Danger. Gee, why didn't I think of that? And who is this "Harvey Danger" person?

Two founding members Jeff Lin and Aaron Huffman were classmates at the University of Washington with the band's name coming from some random graffiti written on the wall of the student newspaper office. The full story (rise/fall/resurrection) of the band is officially summarized here. I think I borrowed that first album from the library but barely listened to it before having to return it. In 2000, by which point I was actually working at the library, I picked up a brand-spankin' new copy of their 2nd album King James Version straight from cataloguing/processing. Admittedly, I borrowed it on a whim and a shiny case thinking "Oh yeah, I sure liked that Flagpole Sitta song". I still remember coming home and casually putting it in the CD player. Whatever I was planning to do, washing the dishes or something, I simply stopped and stood there in the kitchen listening to the rip-roaring opening track Meetings With Remarkable Men (Show Me the Hero). Than I sat on the couch with the liner notes and listened to the rest of the CD, reading along with the lyrics (which are phenomenal, by the way). I don't have too many big rock epiphanies, but this was one. I am Harvey Danger fan for life. Now 8 years later I am finally ready, geographically speaking, to see them for the first time.

In honour of the 10th anniversary of their first album Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone?, over two nights they will be playing all three of their albums in their entirety. It'll be an epic doozy of a first live Harvey Danger experience. The big highlight for me will be hearing King James Version live, start to finish one of my favourite albums ever. Last year I saw Roger Waters perform Dark Side of the Moon in its entirety (amazing) and let me tell you I'm equally excited, if not moreso about watching/hearing/experiencing King James Version, not to mention the opportunity to hear them pull out rare tracks, b-sides, and covers. To quote lead singer Sean Nelson, "Indeed, it would be prudent to assume that some of these songs will be (unofficially) retired after these shows".

Last summer I was expecting to be in the Caribbean in January rocking it up on a cruise headlined by Ben Folds along with special guest Amanda Palmer of the Dresden Dolls... a dream trip to be sure. I was all booked, rearing to go when it was unceremoniously cancelled last June. Somewhat ironically it's actually Harvey Danger of all people who ended up jumping on a ship with the Barenaked Ladies a couple weeks ago on a cruise to Jamaica put on by the same company, Sixthman. As much as I would have liked to, the cost would have been a bit too much, a sentiment shared by even hardcore fans. When asked by fans why they'd be participating in the cruise anyway, the answer was pretty simple: it was basically a paid vacation and the idea of playing on a cruise ship was appealingly ridiculous. Getting out of a frigid Seattle in January was a nice perk too. By all accounts it sounded like a great time. One enviable session to have attended was the Barenaked Ladies' frontman Steven Page teaming up with Harvey Danger's Sean Nelson for a 'Songs of McCartney' session. Gah! I'm told it was Steven who met Sean in Toronto recently and invited the band on board.

Pretty much since the inception of this blog, I've been repeatedly plugging Harvey Danger. Right now if you're not a fan already, you might need some convincing. In general, my cover song philosophy is that hearing a band you're unfamiliar with perform a cover is the most directly accessible way to digest their music. You can tell when there's more to the band than just the cover, which leads you to seek out their other music. Tainted Love was my intro to The Living End and Young Americans to Danny Michel, two of my favourite artists I've discovered through covers. I really can't say the same thing about, say, Alient Ant Farm or The Ataris (sorry!). Though for all I know those bands are like someone else's Harvey Danger. So let's get to some covers, shall we?

Harvey Danger - Save it for Later [originally by The English Beat]
Harvey Danger - Is There Something I Should Know? [originally by Duran Duran]
**song title corrected... thanks Kel]
Harvey Danger - Oh! You Pretty Things [originally by David Bowie]

Harvey Danger - I've Got a Feeling [originally by The Beatles]
On New Year's Eve 2006, Harvey Danger and guests played an epic show where they covered side 2 of the Beatles' Abbey Road from Here Comes the Sun to Her Majesty. Before jumping into that, they kicked it off with this Beatles gem from Let it Be.

Sean Nelson - Gotta Get Up [originally by Harry Nilsson]
Sean Nelson - Daddy's Song [originally by Harry Nilsson]
A great but unreleased album is languishing somewhere... Sean Nelson's tribute to Harry Nilsson called Nelson Sings Nilsson (the title in turn refers to Harry Nilsson's tribute to Randy Newman, Nilsson Sings Newman). There are some demos on Sean's site and some full versions on myspace. He played sold out Nelson Sings Nilsson shows and the 15-track CD was completed I believe in 2006. For some reason it never came out. Copyright issues? No publisher? No one seems to know. It's number 1 on my lost albums list because the quasi-released stuff is fantastic. At the very least, it introduced me to Harry Nilsson who had flown under my radar for years. Go here to watch a youtube video of Davy Jones dancing and singing ridiculously to Daddy's Song in the 1968 Monkees film Head. Stay tuned to the end of the video where Frank Zappa gives Davy some advice with his talking cow... and I should mention the film was co-written by Jack Nicholson. Those wacky Monkees!

Death Cab for Cutie featuring Sean Nelson - Fortunate Son [originally by Creedence Clearwater Revival]
Harvey Danger's Sean Nelson sings lead on this CCR cover backed by Death Cab for Cutie. This comes from a Vietnam war benefit CD called Don't Know When I'll Be Back Again with lots of cover songs on it that I recently found in L.A.

Magnificent Tracers - Flagpole Sitta [originally by Harvey Danger]
Hairy Canary - Flagpole Sitta [originally by Harvey Danger]
(Just iTunes links for these ones! Listen to samples for a taste... but I recommend tracking down the original.)
There are not a lot of Harvey Danger cover songs around, though in a sense these are the very definition of cover songs: quick cash-ins on a popular hit put out by another company with the intent to mimic the original as closely as possible. In a horrible, bizarre twist of fate the Harvey Danger original is not even available on iTunes, but the preceding cover versions are. Yikes! The Magnificent Tracers-- even the band's name alludes to the fact that they are essentially "tracing" the song-- is from a K-Tel compilation called Extreme Sports. What's even more baffling is that the Hairy Canary version has a variety of techno, acapella, and percapella(?) remixes to go along with it. I was so tempted to buy the Hairy Canary "album", but I just couldn't bring myself to do it and I don't really encourage you to either. Probably the worst crime with these covers is that uninformed consumers actually believe these to be the original. I cringe when I've seen arguments such as "This is definitely I'm Not Sick but I'm Not Well by Hairy Canary!" or "Sorry to burst your bubble, but it's actually the Magnificent Tracers!" or "No, no, no, it's definitely Harvey Dangerfield..."

The Lounge-o-Leers - Flagpole Sitta [originally by Harvey Danger]
Not a particularly great cover, but it'll have to do until a big Harvey Danger revival in pop culture consciousness leads to an influx of HD covers.

Unknown A cappella group The UNC Achordants - Flagpole Sitta [originally Harvey Danger]
Generally I don't like posting songs of unknown origins... but it's a Harvey Danger cover, proving once again that there's an a cappella cover of virtually anything. Presumably it's a college a cappella group. Who? I have no idea, so give me a shout if you can identify it.
**UPDATE: Thanks to an anonymous reader, we now know this is the UNC Achordants from their 2007 album High Stakes Old Maid, available from their website.

Weird Al Yankovic - Polka Party!
Thank you Weird Al for introducing me to Harvey Danger! Spice Girls, Beastie Boys, Matchbox 20, Marilyn Manson, Third Eye Blind, and more get the ol' Weird Al polka treatment from 1999's Running With Scissors.

FREE STUFF!
Everyone loves free stuff right? In this, my inaugural giveawway on Fong Songs, I would like to share my Harvey Danger passion with you. I have in my collection spare copies of Where Have All the Merrymakers Gone? and Little by Little..., their 1st and 3rd albums. So first prize will be one CD and second prize will be, uh, the other CD. No guarantees as to the condition of the CDs (this is free, mind you). I will send these anywhere at my own expense, cheapest shipping possible. If you want in on this free stuff, no strings attached, leave a comment with your e-mail and I'll pick winners on Friday next week. If I get pie in my face and only one person comments, he/she will take both prizes. If no one comments, I will cry myself to sleep or donate them to the library, both excellent alternatives. Depending how this goes, I may actually give away actual CDs with COVER SONGS in the future... *cough* veiled threat *cough* Don't forget Harvey Danger's third album Little by Little can also be downloaded for free at their site. The physical edition comes with a bonus CD of demos, alternate cuts, and extra songs so there's your incentive to win or buy your own copy. First album is available on Amazon (though not iTunes). And the great, underrated King James Version can be bought on iTunes or as a used CD on Amazon.

In parting, one of my favourite Harvey Danger originals:
Harvey Danger - Loyalty Bldg.

Last Night

Last night I became acutely aware of the number of covers of the Strokes' Last Nite there are.... I'm working on a couple more substantial posts, so let this tide you over until then.

The Detroit Cobras - Last Nite
Vitamin C - Last Nite
...Also samples Blondie's Heart of Glass
Jumbonics - Last Nite
Adele - Last Nite
The most recent Last Nite cover from Jo Whiley's Live Lounge show on BBC 1

Lenlow - Last Night [The Strokes vs. Traveling Wilburys vs. Kid 'n Play]
There should really be some more Traveling Wilburys covers in existence.

Serena Ryder - Last Night I Had the Strangest Dream [originally by Ed McCurdy]
From her 2006 album of mostly Canadian cover songs If Your Memory Serves You Well.
"Last night I had the strangest dream
I'd ever dreamed before
I dreamed the world had all agreed
To put an end to war.

Zooey (to be continued...)

Clearly I've missed some stuff while I was away... I belated just read a post on music blog I Am Fuel, You Are Friends about the forthcoming M. Ward and Zooey Deschanel collaboration. Working under the new moniker She & Him, their debut album Volume 1 has a release date of March 18, 2008. Definitely go to IAFYAF to download their recent 4-song performance on KCRW. I've been waiting for some sort of Zooey album since hearing her croon with Leon Redbone on the Elf soundtrack.

Also check out the site for their record label Merge Records, which has the official bio blurb and a free song too. Bonus news: the album features 9 originals and 2 covers. So far they've got two concert dates in March lined up: the Noise Pop festival in San Francisco followed by the SXSW festival in Austin. Hopefully they go on tour or something.

While I was in L.A. I went on the Warner Brothers studio tour on a very rainy afternoon. With the writer's strike and not a heck of a lot was going on, although one of the projects in production was the upcoming Jim Carrey flick Yes Man co-starring Ms. Deschanel herself. Having read the book it's based on by British comedian/writer/TV personality Danny Wallace, I really have no idea who would have read it and thought "We have got to get Jim Carrey in this!", but I'm sure I'll check it out for the Zooey factor at least. By the sounds of it, they're just taking the basic idea of the book (a man who says yes to everything) and building a fictional narrative out of it.

Guess I've only got a month left to put together that Zooey cover post I've been mulling over for a year...

Time for some Beatles Love

Well, I'm back from rainy California. Turns out sunny California was a myth, in January at least. When you fly south for the winter you're supposed to fly way farther south. Most of the time I was there mini waterfalls gushed off the curbs and each night I'd come back to the hotel and hang up my pants to dry overnight. When I got home Tuesday night I was warmly welcomed by a parade of snow and -31ºC feels like -40 temperatures. Incidentally, -40 is where Fahrenheit and Celsius meet to hang out and drink hot cocoa. Yay for Edmonton! Now it's back to work, or rather back to not working. As it turns out, by definition I've not been unemployed for 4 months. I've just not been working. See, I've been out of work voluntarily and if I had known that I might have been able to avoid repeated hassle at Canadian customs where an unemployed single traveller on short trips equals drug dealer. But I cannot tell a lie and the more accurately I would answer questions the higher the customs agents' eyebrows would arch before I would would be hauled away to join the other ethnic folk for full bag checks. Sigh. Anyway, I'll be flying back to Vancouver next week to "settle" and find a job. If only I could pay myself to keep writing Fong Songs! If you're curious, the impetus for all this travel in the past month is an Air Canada flight pass I bought that allowed me to fly unlimited flights anywhere in western North America they fly for one month. There are obviously some catches, but it's a pretty decent deal to check out some places I've never been to before. To get full value though, you basically have to be unemployed (ahem, not working) or retired (like my dad who joined me in Vegas and San Fran).

Now the moment you've all been waiting for, back to covers! And as I rejoin the fray, could it be that I resort to the most clichéd cover source of all-time?? Yes folks, it's The Beatles!

My travels began in Las Vegas, but I'm a pretty cheap gambler. For instance, I placed a bet on the Oilers game at Bally's and sat for the next 3 hours watching that $5 bet play out. Over 5 days, I lost less than $100 mostly on a sad round at the blackjack table. So my dad and I had to find some other sources of entertainment (yes, it was a father/son bonding trip). My dad's primary reason for going was to check out CES, which was a horrible exhausting experience. I got in with dubious credentials and it was awful-- I get a headache thinking about it. Definitely not for your average schmuck like me. In my head I imagined it would be like those first few pages of Popular Science with the coolest, wackiest gadgets and future technology that would wow the most jaded consumers. But instead it was like 50 football fields of iPod covers, digital picture frames, massage parlors, TVs, and bigger TVs. We walked up and down the Strip, collecting those casino club memberships like credit cards (give up your privacy for some cheap souvenirs!). When the glitz started to wear off, we visited Red Rock Canyon (quite cool) and Hoover Dam (Damn you again Michael Bay for Transformers!). We saw Penn and Teller who were not bad, but kind of disappointing since I'm a fan of theirs (the 25% theatre capacity also made for an awkward atmosphere).


...And we saw the Beatles LOVE. While planning our trip, I knew I wanted to see this show if we could get a ticket. My dad is a huge Beatles fan, which has made for some easy Christmas and X-Mas gift decisions whenever a new anthology or Beatles thing comes along. I've never seen a Cirque du Soleil show and I've never been remotely tempted to see one, but an acrobatic spectacle set to newly recontextualized Beatles music definitely intrigued me. My dad's the same way and has been holding out to see Across the Universe on DVD since he thinks it will be too artsy for him. After checking the half-price ticket booths to no avail and blowing off the other shady discount dealers, we just went directly to the box office and bought the cheapest seats possible. We both quite enjoyed the show, which was good if possibly great. The best part is simply having the Beatles blasted at you as your entire peripheral vision is filled with Beatles iconography taken to extremes. The show begins with a wonderfully austere cut of Because (just the a cappella vocals) in near pitch black before the stage explodes visually and sonically to Get Back. One of my favourite moments was the surreal-- most of the show was surreal but this was moreso-- Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite with creepy faceless moptop dancers, live action Jack-in-the-Boxes, fascists, multi-legged freaks in cages, and other carnival oddities Beatles-style (apparently). Another visually spectacular piece involved a massive billowing sheet engulfing half the audience as some kids floated on a bed in the middle of the blanket-y ocean before plunging 4 stories into the middle of the stage. Even though we had the cheap seats, we had a great vantage point above and could see all the action in the theatre in the round. If we were sitting a lot closer I imagine you'd miss things going on behind you and be craning your neck upwards for much of the show. I'm not even going to try to describe the rest of the show, which featured a ton of extremely talented performers and an incredibly dynamic stage that transformed in unexpected ways. I've read that the show is actually shutting down for three days, forsaking $3 million in ticket sales in order to perform 2 songs at the 50th annual Grammies in less than a couple weeks. So if you want a glimpse of the nonsense I'm spouting, check that out.

Of course, the star of the show is the music, the Beatles catalogue reworked by George Martin's son Giles with the blessing of the Paul, Ringo, Yoko, and Olivia (not quite the Fab Four, but it'll do). Apparently the soundtrack features elements from 130 individual Beatles songs mixed, mashed, and stripped but never really losing any of the power of the originals. It's astounding to imagine the cultural impact of the Beatles and unbelievable when you think of the short time the band was actively together producing albums... which was (please don't quote me on this) 7 or 8 years. Anyway, the show got me thinking about my favourite Beatles mash-ups, which I present for your listening enjoyment along with some of my personal favourite Beatles covers and miscellaneous related tracks.

Hank Handy - Beatles Mash-up Medley
This is a mash-up tour-de-force, first introduced by the folks at Boing Boing a few years ago. This is amazing fun to listen to and play "Name that Song" as elements from numerous songs are layered so skillfully that it never descends into chaos as one might imagine with about 40 Beatles tracks in 3.5 minutes.

Go Home Productions - Crazy Little Fool [Beatles vs. Queen]
Fool on the Hill vocals over Crazy Little Thing Called Love. Works unexpectedly well with some Dear Prudence in there too.

team9 - Eleanor's in My Head [Beatles vs. Queens of the Stone Age]
This mash-up is stunning in that it recontextualizes Eleanor Rigby as a dark electro-rock number that sounds completely natural.

Lenlow - To the Taxmobile! [Beatles vs. Neil Hefti]
This was the driving force behind the Batman vs. Taxman post I wrote over a year ago, which I self-link to repeatedly. Even though the links are are all dead, I often marvel incredulously at the results that can come about when I get a goofy idea and carry it out with maximum effort.

Jonathan Coulton - When I'm 25 or 64 [Beatles vs. Chicago]
As part of his Thing a Week series, Jonathan Coulton produced his very first mash-up: When I'm 64 clashing with 25 or 6 to 4, which by his own admission is not completely successful. Though I think it works better than I think he gives it credit for. This is a hotlink directly from JoCo's site. The funny thing is he bought both songs from iTunes then he proclaims, "I circumvented the DRM in a blatant violation of federal laws! And I’d do it again!". Probably the most disappointing thing about going to CES in Vegas was that I arrived a day after Jonathan Coulton appeared on a panel with Mark Hosler of Negativland, Samantha Murphy, and Lady Miss Kier of Deee-Lite! And there was a concert that night, grrrr! I felt better when I got home and in my mailbox was a Thing A Week box set I ordered from CD Baby in a cute tin box with the 4 Thing a Week CDs inside and unexpectedly signed and numbered (#1078) with liner notes by college buddy John "I'm a PC" Hodgman. Curiously this mash-up was Thing a Week #10, but is not in the box set. And yet there are still 52 tracks... I spent 5 minutes staring at the track lists and cross-referencing it with the actual Thing a Week posts to figure out where the extra song came from. I'll leave it to you to do the same thing once you buy the box set too. While I was late in Vegas to catch his show, I was also way too early in San Francisco for a concert DVD he's recording there on February 22nd (now sold out). You should also check out this awesome ukulele cover of JoCo's Tom Cruise Crazy. At this point, I'm just re-hashing links from Jonathan Coulton's blog so you should just go ahead and add it to your RSS feed reader of choice.

Toad the Wet Sprocket - Hey Bulldog
World Party - Happiness is a Warm Gun
Funny thing about these is that they're both pretty straightforward covers, not deviating much from the originals. But I like them both a lot. The Breeders also do a nice cover of Happiness is a Warm Gun.

Jake Shimabukuro - While My Guitar Gently Weeps
There's a studio version of this wonderful ukulele cover by virtuoso Jake Shimabukuro from Gently Weeps (available on Amazon, eMusic, or your best deal on Amie Street... several other covers too). But I love the urgency of this version recorded in Central Park near Strawberry Fields, which I ripped from a video seen here. He really gets into it and his fingers float magically across the uke. It's an beautiful cover and watching it is even better.

Yukio Yung - Free as a Bird
This cover of the 1995 "new" Beatles song is kinda wacky. The original, due to the circumstances of its production, inherently had a melancholic, bittersweet feel to it. Here it's transformed into an upbeat pop song that recalls an earlier era Beatles.

Lulu Hughes - Helter Skelter
Lulu Hughes is a singer from Québec whose self-titled 2002 album I stumbled upon at the library and luckily found this cover. She's also responsible for that wicked cover of Pink Floyd's Time that I love. Her Helter Skelter starts off with a laid-back reggae feel than explodes into a more traditional rock number, but with a bevy of back-up singers and a horn section. I'm a huge sucker for horns. The only mis-step is her laughable snarl of "I've got blisters on my fingers!" which was a startling death scream from Ringo at the end of the original, but here sounds woefully calculated like "Yeah, I'm rocking out!" or "Coincidentally I've got blisters on my fingers too!".

No Doubt - Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da (live)
From their Live in the Tragic Kingdom DVD, this silly Beatles song suits their ska stylings. Alliteration, ha!

Jamie Cullum - Being for the Benefit of Mr. Kite
Last year was the 40th anniversary of Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band and to celebrate the BBC brought in a bunch of artists to cover the whole album (like us, the BBC is clearly obsessed with covers). Other artists involved were Bryan Adams, Razorlight, Athlete, Kaiser Chiefs, The Fray, Magic Numbers, Oasis, Russell Brand, Travis, The Zutons, and Stereophonics. That line-up sounds a lot more exciting than the results. The Jamie Cullum cover stood out, though I'm admittedly biased. In general, Beatles covers are best when you're not tackling the sort of songs that show up on every Beatles greatest hits package and it's nice to hear a cover of the underrated BftBoMK!, which coincidentally is also a criminally underused Batman sound effect.


The Beatles - Kansas City/Hey, Hey, Hey, Hey [originally by Jerry Leiber & Mike Stoller / Little Richard]
Not a mash-up, but a medley from Beatles for Sale, a half-covers Beatles album. This is my favourite Beatles album and is deeply ingrained in my childhood psyche as it was probably the first Beatles album I ever heard. This was the second CD our family ever bought, the first being a 3-inch Chuck Berry one, at Sam the Record Man on Yonge Street in Toronto. I think it's my dad's favourite Beatles album too so it's sort of hereditary. It kicks off with No Reply, my favourite Beatles song of all-time. In fact I don't think I ever really want to hear a cover of this song, though wikipedia reports (with absolutely no backing) that the Red Hot Chili Peppers have recorded this for their next album. The "If I were you..." bridge just kills me every time. When I was little I used to listen to that part, rewind it and listen to it over and over. Reviews often point out that the album was rushed or banged out with Mr. Moonlight often being called out as possibly the worst Beatles song ever recorded (I don't mind it), one of 6 covers that fill out the tracklist. Probably the most well-known track from Beatles for Sale is Eight Days a Week but it also features a killer cover of Chuck Berry's Rock & Roll Music. I was definitely an unconscious cover lover at an early age.

Elton John - Burn Down the Mission/My Baby Left Me/Get Back
Also not a mash-up, but a medley... a truly epic medley pushing the 20-minute mark from one of my favourite live albums Elton John's 11-17-70. This radio broadcast is from near the very beginning of Elton John's career and captures the wicked energy of his live performance. The sound quality is excellent and you're in for a treat if you haven't really heard him completely rocking out. Hard to believe this is just a trio making all that noise, bringing the house down. Reportedly Elton cut his hand at some point in the show and by the end the piano keys were covered in blood. That's rockin' out.

Geoff Gascoyne - God Only Knows (featuring Jamie Cullum) [originally by the Beach Boys]
I first heard this version on Jamie Cullum's Live at Blenheim Palace DVD. Geoff Gascoyne, an accomplished jazz bass player who tours with Cullum and helped produce his first album, composed a string quartet arrangement inspired by Eleanor Rigby for a cover of God Only Knows. This version is from Geoff Gascyone's 2005 album Keep It To Yourself.

The Beatnix - Stairway to Heaven [originally by Led Zeppelin]
From an Australian TV show called The Money or the Gun, this Beatles tribute band performed a startling version of Stairway to Heaven as if performed by the Beatles. Search youtube for the video, which enhances the performance by uncannily re-staging their Ed Sullivan appearance. A collection of numerous Stairway to Heaven performances from the show were collected on a CD called Stairways to Heaven. The show's host Andrew Denton is also responsible for a couple CD compilations of Andrew Denton's Musical Challenge where on his radio show he would challenge guests to cover unlikely songs. This is where you would hear the Wiggles cover AC/DC, Neil Finn's great cover of Billie Jean, Willie Nelson tackling Nirvana, and more.

Mark Ronson - We Can Work it Out (feat. Daniel Merriweather, Tawiah and Sean Lennon)
Last year Mark Ronson performed at the BBC Electric Proms festival in London with tracks from his cover album Version with many special guests backed by the BBC Concert Orchestra. The whole thing can be seen on youtube and would benefit from a DVD release someday. The evening was capped off with Mark Ronson's Favourite Cover of All-Time which is Stevie Wonder's cover of The Beatles' We Can Work it Out. And in a surreal narrative twist, Mark Ronson is joined by childhood friend Sean Lennon who sings along to his dad's song... in the style of Stevie Wonder! So there we have it, a cover of a cover. I love it.

Coincidentally last night I caught the tail end of The Hour where George was interviewing Jerry Levitan who at age 14 in 1969 weaseled his way into John Lennon's hotel room in Toronto (just prior to John & Yoko's bed-in for peace in Montreal) and interviewed him. He's produced a short film directed and animated by Josh Raskin with illustrations by Alex Kurina and James Braithwaite using audio from the original interview. I Met the Walrus has been nominated as Best Animated Short Film at this year's Oscars. While many offers had been made to make use of his recorded material, it was a pitch as an animated short by Toronto animator Raskin that finally grabbed his attention. Check the trailer at the official site. Looks cool.

FYI

Hello intrepid readers. I am in LA now. Will be back next week. I'm blogging from an iPod touch (not mine!) one painstaking letter at a time. You have no idea how long it took to type that sentence... Or that one. Thanks to Kurtis and Boyhowdy for taking care of things.

I was shocked, sad, angry, and depressed when I heard about Heath Ledger yesterday. Words seem pretty useless to describe it. Sad, tragic, devastating. A truly great loss for everyone.

Jar of Covers

Hello once again! It's me! Kurtis from Covering the Mouse! I'll be guest posting today while Fong is enjoying the California sunshine!

One of my favourite bands is Jars of Clay. The main reason I love them is the amount of care they put into their songs. The production is always high on their records and I love the way they use their instruments and their harmonies.

While they are quite famous in the Christian circuit, they are still unknown to the rest of the world. They don't record albums to tell everyone they are Christians, but the subject matter of some of their work has kept them from breaking through to the mainstream market.

The band has covered many songs over their career and I've broken them down into three groups: Covers of Famous Groups, Covers from the Christian World, Christmas Covers.

Covers of Famous Groups

Lonely People (America)
No Matter What (Badfinger)
Crazy Love (Poco)
God Only Knows (The Beach Boys)
Swingtown (Steve Miller Band)


Covers From the Christian World

If I Stand (Rich Mullins)
Rose Colored Stained Glass Windows (Petra)
Dig (Adam Again)

Jesus Blood Never Failed Me Yet (Gavin Bryars)
I need to talk about this track because it has a cool story. Gavin Bryars is an English jazz bassist turned composer. His most famous work is the LP he released in 1971 called Jesus' Blood Never Failed Me Yet. Bryars heard a homeless man singing this song over and over which inspired him to recreate this loop, layering more and more instruments and countermelodies before fading out at the end. For the first recording as an LP, Bryars was limited to a duration 25 minutes for the piece; when cassettes came along, Bryars made a 60 minute version of the piece, and for CD, a 74 minute version. Jars of Clay's version is only 4 minutes long but you still get a good sense of what Bryars was trying to accomplish.

In 2006, Jars of Clay recorded Redemption Songs, an album of a few originals but mainly reworkings of famous hymns. I could post the whole album but instead I've picked four tracks. Nothing but the Blood features the Blind Boys of Alabama.

I'll Fly Away
Nothing but the Blood
They'll Know We Are Christians by Our Love
It Is Well with My Soul

Christmas Covers

Christmas for Cowboys (John Denver)
This song was covered for the Maybe This Christmas Tree compilation album.

A few months ago, Jars released a Christmas album full of great arrangements of famous and obscure Christmas songs.

Wonderful Christmastime (Paul McCartney)
I actually don't like the original at all but the Jars of Clay version has some really great production and makes it very easy to listen to.

Christmastime is Here (Vince Guaraldi Trio)
This is quite a different take on the classic tune from A Charlie Brown Christmas but I like it.

God Rest Ye Merry Gentlemen
Little Drummer Boy
These two tracks originally appeared on an EP early in the bands career and were rerecorded for this album.

In the Bleak Midwinter (Christina Rossetti, Gustav Holst)
This is originally a poem written by Christina Rossetti sometime before 1872. It has been put to a few different melodoies, the most famous composed by Gustav Holst and Harold Edwin Darke in the early 20th century. It has also been covered by Julie Andrews, Allison Crowe, Sarah McLachlan and many others over the years.

Gabriel's Message
Sting has covered this song but he changed "Christian" to "everyone".

All Folked Up: Pop Punk Covers of Folk Songs

Hi ho, this is your old pal Boyhowdy, host of folk-music coverblog Cover Lay Down. Your usual host left me with the keys to the place while he's off galavanting around in the lower 48 for a week or two; I've fed the plants and watered the cat as instructed, and now it's time for a little noise.

Because while Fong's away, the cats will play. Loud, and with plenty of feedback.

Though my own blog runs to the mellow and acoustic, as audiophiles go, I'm more than a collector of folk covers. I spent my late teens and early twenties in thrall to the rising fuzz and feedback of the pre-grunge, post-punk late-80s alt rock movement, particularly the east-coast manifestation -- The Lemonheads, Dinosaur Jr., Juliana Hatfield, Sonic Youth and others -- and over the years I've retained a fondness for this genre, even as its seminal artists go mellow and find alt-folk along with the rest of us. (I'm also a man who once brought a picture of Val Kilmer to a hairstylist, but that's a story for another day.)

In my constant search for new folk covers to share with my own listeners, I find plenty of stripped down covers of songs by the west coast grunge camp -- Nirvana covers are a dime a dozen in every genre. But it's comparatively rare to find a folk cover of a Lemonheads tune. Seems these guys were known for their sound more than their songs.

Luckily, a coverlover with a genre bias always has two places to look for his earcandy: covers IN that genre, and covers of songs FROM that genre. As such, the happy place where my two loves meet turns out to be full of driving drums, fuzzed guitars, howling vocals and the squeal of feedback, all to the tune of some classic folk song.

Today, some punked up, fuzzed up, sped up, juiced up folk songs from both coasts, and beyond. These are the guys who paved the way for Nirvana, Hole, Green Day, Blink 182, and The All-American Rejects, among others, so give a little respect as you pass. And if anyone has a copy of The Lemonheads cover of Suzanne Vega's Luka, please let me know -- I used to have it on a transparent yellow vinyl 45, but I gave it to a great friend and serious collector as a holiday gift over a decade ago.


The Lemonheads, Mrs. Robinson (orig. Simon and Garfunkel)
A decade before Stacy's Mom brings the MILF back into the popular imagination, the original angry young late-eighties kids fall in love with a new kind of Mrs. Robinson. Picture a stringy, greasy long-haired grunge-rocker in Dustin Hoffman's place, hunched over a bass guitar and amp in the basement while he moons over some unattainable baby boomer friend of his baby boomer parents, and you've got it exactly.

Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, The Boxer (orig. Simon and Garfunkel)
Me First and the Gimme Gimmes, Me & Julio Down By The Schoolyard (ibid.)
Can you tell I've been gathering in covers for a Simon and Garfunkel post over at Cover Lay Down? Prolific pop-punk cover band Me First and the Gimme Gimmes is well known to coverbloggers; they specialize in tearing top forty ballads and light folk hits to shreds.

Sebadoh, Pink Moon (orig. Nick Drake)
I saw these guys at Bard College in 1992 with Superchunk -- they were late and almost too messed up to play, but they still ROCKED. Today, like The Lemonheads' Evan Dando before him, Sebadoh frontman Lou Barlow is known for his alt-radio sound; last year's Emoh was a blogfave. This is back when they were seriously punk. The best part is when the lead singer screams like a banshee. Never has the word "pink" sounded so terrifying.

P.J. Harvey, Highway '61 Revisited (orig. Bob Dylan)
The song sounds quiet at first, like the audio levels are off, but beware -- it's a trick, designed to get you to crank the volume. Fall for it. P.J. Harvey is only pop punk sometimes, but this is one of those times.

Sonic Youth, I'm Not There (orig. Bob Dylan)
Included on the incredible soundtrack to recent Dylan biopic of the same name, as a nod both to the indierock roots of most of the other artists, and to the continued genius of still-kicking experimental post-punkers Sonic Youth. This is what a pop punk power ballad sounds like. (Sonic Youth also does an electronic folk version of Mama You've Been On My Mind; it's out of this world, but I'm saving it for the folkblog.)

Jason Falkner, Both Sides Now (orig. Joni Mitchell)
Jason Falkner's dreamy, lushly-synthed album of instrumental Beatles covers used to work wonders at bedtime. This is not it. No, this is a fast-paced romp meant to speak for a generation dripping with anger and frustration at not being able to put words or meaning to that crazy little thing called love.

Dinosaur Jr., Lotta Love (orig. Neil Young)
More Lou Barlow, in his other band Dinosaur Jr. -- the guy defined the lo-fi alternative indierock sound way back in the 80s, but don't tell the indiekids, it would break their hearts. This barely recognizable cover comes from a 1989 alt-rock and grunge-heavy The Bridge: A Tribute To Neil Young, which is so awesome it could have been the entirety of this post, if we let it.

Screeching Weasel, You Are My Sunshine (orig. Jimmie Davis)
You'd think the sentiment of this song wouldn't fit with the style, but it works pretty well as a full-bore, post-punk, almost metal-tinged paean to someone clearly just as unwashed and emo as Screeching Weasel themselves.


Fong won't be coming home for a while, so I might be back again over the next two weeks. Then again, I might not. I left the water running for the cat, just in case, and rumor has it you might be getting a drop-in from at least one other familiar guest as well. In the meantime, how about joining me over at Cover Lay Down, where today we're featuring a short set of stripped down folkcovers of songs by The Smiths.

As always, all puchase links above go to artist and label sites wherever possible. The better to stick it to the man with, my dear. Be punk; buy disks and disdain downloads, because downloads don't pay artists like plastic does.

Pinball Number Count Revisited

[EDIT: 7/19/2008 2:46pm]
MP3 links temporarily restored in conjunction with Muppet Covers Week!

[EDIT: 1/11/2008 10:36pm]
Now with direct links! Dear readers, a spike in traffic to this blog in which the 10GB/month bandwidth limit was exceeded in the last 2 days has had me reconsider the benefits of the box.net pay account. Lucky you I decided to not invest $80 in more blackjack, but rather get a box.net account with unlimited bandwidth and as an added bonus, direct links! And guess what? Despite great temptation I will not start soliciting donations... Everybody wins! To boot, there are a couple new covers by Venetian Snares and Inglewood Jack added.

First post of the new year and instead of looking forward, I'm going to delve into the past to wallow in possibly unhealthy nostalgia. In one of the earliest posts on Fong Songs, I focused on a funky little ditty known as the Pinball Number Count, which we should all fondly remember from our collective childhood memories of Sesame Street.


To pretentiously quote myself:
"I remember several years ago going on a mission to find this song and eventually downloading a shortened version (just the number 4) through Napster. This was also pre-"google-takes-over-the-world", so I never did really find out anything more about it. What a difference a few years makes."

Well, what a difference a few more years makes. In the meantime, the influx of Pinball Number Count-related material has been incredible. Since that original post, the song has been covered several times, parodied on Family Guy, released on DVD(s), gotten its own wikipedia entry, inspired clocks, and much more. Its place in pop culture history is cemented as long as the internet doesn't implode, which considering the percentage of dead links on the previous post (3 of 5) is not entirely unlikely.


Pointer Sisters - Pinball Number Count [DJ Food Re-Edit]
Originally composed by Walt Kraemer and performed by the Pointer Sisters, the full story of the Pinball recording sessions can be read here in a letter from the composer himself obtained by unofficial Pinball Number Count historian Matt Jones. As I would learn later, this full-length edit of the Pinball Number Count is actually a remix by DJ Food released on the Ninja Tune label in 2003. The 3-song release Solid Steel Presents Sesame Street also contains 2 disco remixes of C is for Cookie.

The Dead Hensons - Pinball
The Dead Hensons are an 8-piece band from the San Francisco Bay area that exclusively perform covers from the Muppets and Sesame Street. Active since 2004, the band was assembled after founding member Ryan Beebe placed an ad on Craigslist seeking seeking Muppet-music enthusiasts. And thank goodness he got some responses. I'm still waiting for a follow-up to their only release, a 4-song 7" vinyl. Find some more mp3s on their official website.

Big Organ Trio - Pinball Number Count
This organ-based jazz cover sounds like Medeski Martin & Wood invading Sesame Street. And hey, why not? Incidentally, a Medeski Martin & Wood children's album will released tomorrow. Check out Big Organ Trio's website and you may just find some more covers...

Neil Cowley Trio - Pinball Number Count
A sweet, sweet piano jazz cover is from the Neil Cowley Trio's 2006 debut album Displaced, which won the BBC Jazz Award for Best Album.


Wicked Hemlocks - Number Count
This experimental/funk/rock cover by Wicked Hemlocks is the most recent addition to the Pinball Number Count collection, just released last June by indie label Stick in Your Spokes Records.

Blind Spot - 12
From the impossible-to-find 1995 compilation called 20 Bands Trash 20 Songs to find the way to Sesame Street. Trash is a fairly accurate description of the punk covers inspired by Sesame Street, though luckily the Pinball Number Count is the best cover on there, done in a ska/punk fashion.

Nude Continuum - Twelve (live)
Australia-based funk/acid jazz outfit Nude Continuum perform a sweet rendition of the Pinball Number Count live. This mp3 is ripped from a youtube video, which features lead singer Princess Freesia rockin' out in her underwear on stage. Clips from their impending debut album Nightclub of the Nudist sound promising and Jamiroquai drummer Derrick McKenzie is a guest performer.

Serious Aeolian Belfry - Twelve (live)
I consider it a major coup to find this cover, recorded live in the summer of 2002 at Nelson Ledges Quarry Park in Garrettsville, Ohio. On occasion I'm prone to go all Veronica Mars-like in pursuit of covers. After extensive research (read: googling), I found a mention of a band called Serious Aeolian Belfry performing the Pinball Number Count live and a recording that may exist. I was able to contact Andrew Rothman, drummer for the now defunct band, who graciously indulged me with my strange request for the cover. Now here's the really cool part: does the name Andrew Rothman ring any bells? Just a couple weeks ago, Andrew won first-place in the Coverville theme remix contest that ran in conjunction with the Coverville Countdown! Congratulations! And to boot, Andrew also won Coverville Idol last March! Wow, it's a small coverworld after all.


Braces Tower - Eleven Twelve
Sweet head-bobbin' remix by the possibly non-existent Braces Tower (their website has been "coming soon" for a long time).

Venetian Snares - Twelve
Thanks to many readers who've pointed out this 2005 Venetian Snares remix that I missed the first time around. Different but good, a schizophrenic breakdown of the original track. I've read it described as "breakcore", a term that really means nothing to me. By the way, Venetian Snares is the alias of one Aaron Funk (a highly appropriate name) who hails from Winnipeg, Manitoba.

Inglewood Jack - Pinball Number Count (live)
One more cover for ya! Just when I think I've exhausted all cover sources, I stumble upon this live cover from Ottawa band Inglewood Jack on the Internet Live Music Archive. If you scroll around, they've got a few different shows with the Pinball Number Count. Go Canadian Content!


Hockey Night - For Guys' Eyes Only
Not limited to mere covers, the Pinball Number Count gets a shout out in this catchy Hockey Night tune.

Stephen Lynch - Jim Henson's Dead
In spite of its morbidly blunt title, this is a terrific ode to the muppets creator from comedian/musician Stephen Lynch, possibly with the most melodramatic rendition of one two three four five six seven eight nine ten eleven twweeEEEeeeeEELLVE! The chorus is as follows: Oh Jim Henson's dead and gone / But his muppets will live on / And Kermit's still hot, 'cause it's still not / Easy bein' green.


Pinball Number Count international
As it turns out, the funkiness of the Pinball Number Count transcends many languages. Sort of. While the master instrumental tracks cannot be de-funked, some of these versions do not benefit from the awkward extra syllables. I'll leave it to you to laugh inappropriately when necessary.
Flipperkast [in Dutch]
TallSangen [in Norwegian]
Пинбол [in Russian]
Pinball Numeros [in Spanish]
Sayılar [in Turkish]

Strangest Pinball Count-related video: "SE7EN!"
David Fincher's Se7en is mashed-up with the Pinball Number Count. Funky AND disturbing. Really quite brilliant.

Best Pinball Number Count video on Youtube
It starts off innocuously at a radio station in Hamilton, Ontario. 2 guys in a broadcast booth, one guy standing awkwardly facing the camera, the other in chair facing away. Someone whispers "Six!" and the pinball number count is on! The guy standing proceeds to unashamedly dance his socks off as the other eventually shuffles off camera. This appears to be an on-going project of one Mike Long of Hamilton whose youtube video count is nearing 300 (!), most of which are him dancing guerrilla-style in and around Hamilton, sometimes to the utter bafflement of passerbys. Getting jiggy to Mickey Lee Lane's Hey Sah-Lo-Ney in a health food store is particularly brazen. The hilarious kick-off to France Gall's Poupeé de cire, poupée de son is also not to be missed. Napoleon Dynamite and the Torrance Community Dance Group would be equally proud. Dance on, my friend.

The Fox lawyers have been busy... It was surprisingly hard to find a working link to the spot-on Family Guy pinball parody. But you know, you can't really stop the internet from doing it's thing.

Want to own your own piece of Pinball Number Count? The DVD collection Sesame Street: Old School, Volume 2 contains a replica animation cel from the Pinball Number Count! A tempting offer no doubt.

A nice 1280 x 1024 wallpaper can be found here. Originally available in conjunction with the Ninja Tune release.

Gee, I've always wanted a clock based on the Pinball Number Count animation, but I just didn't know how to go about making my own. I'm sure you've been struck by that same insight at one point or another. Well, we're in luck. Someone more capable of putting thoughts into action has a step-by-step guide to creating such a clock. Very, very impressive. Ironically, he was struck by a wave of nostalgia triggered by the Family Guy parody. Inspired by the DIY clock, someone else made a flash version of the same clock. At first I thought I was looking at a static image, until I realized that indeed the clock was accurately displaying the time.



OK, I'm off to Las Vegas & San Francisco for the next few weeks. You may or may not see guest posts in the meantime. Later 'gators.

2007.

Sit down, tape your eyes open, and unplug your ears. This'll be a doozie of a post. I know, I know we've all been suffering through these year-end lists, but it's just blogger nature to think others care about what we think. I'm no different, so here are my picks of 2007 in no particular order because it's pretty futile to rank these. Also, these aren't the "BEST" of 2007 per se... I'm usually behind the eightball in terms of actually listening to things the same year they're released, not to mention I'm unreasonably biased so every year-end list is basically made up of my favourite bands/artists that happened to release an album that year. See, I can already picture next year's list: Who Killed Amanda Palmer?, new Ben Folds album, Zooey Deschanel's debut, Ben Lee's Mixtape, new Raconteurs album, The Ditty Bops, Supergrass... sigh, I'm so predictable. Alright, here we go:

Top Covers/Cover Albums:

One of my favourite albums of 2007, covers or otherwise, was Mark Ronson's Version. In early 2006, I put a mental checkmark next to Mark Ronson's name when his masterful cover of Radiohead's Just featuring Phantom Planet's Alex Greenwald was making the blog rounds. I hesitate to call any one cover "definitive", but for now that will be the definitive cover of Just. Once I heard Ronson was working on a covers album, that immediately jumped up to one of my most anticipated releases of 2007. Ironically, I didn't know most of the songs being covered and I listened as if they were originals, so I was immune to claims of "Oh! He ruined this song" or "What a pointless cover of that song". I've read some pretty harsh reviews of the album-- "Pandering!", "Unoriginal!", "What a rich spoiled jerk!"-- which kinda baffles me but I guess to each his own. I've said before (possibly to myself) that Britney Spears' Toxic is a great cover song, which is to say it's been covered so many times in various styles that (for the most part) all manage to make it interesting. Mark Ronson's version is no exception, throwing in some Ol' Dirty Bastard vocals and somehow making it work. Other highlights are Amy Winehouse performing The Zutons' Valerie, Lily Allen on The Kaiser Chiefs' Oh My God, a b-side cover of Queens of the Stone Age's No One Knows, and this instrumental Coldplay cover:
Mark Ronson - God Put a Smile Upon Your Face (feat. The Daptone Horns) [originally by Coldplay]

A covers album that grabbed my attention out of nowhere in early December was Shawn Lee's Ping Pong Orchestra Hits the Hits. Similar to Mark Ronson, Shawn Lee (a multi-instrumentalist) has brought a retro sound to modern hits. Covers include choices as diverse as the Gorillaz' Clint Eastwood, Red Hot Chili Peppers' By the Way, and (surprise!) Britney's Toxic. I first heard of him when I tuned into KCRW's Morning Becomes Eclectic when Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings were performing. With a couple minutes to spare before the top of the hour, a groovy little piano-based cover of Hey Ya came on and naturally my ears perked up. Just when I thought I'd heard enough Hey Ya covers, this one comes along to re-inject some life into it. Snag the whole album from eMusic or Amazon.

Shawn Lee's Ping Pong Orchestra - Hey Ya [originally by Outkast]
Have you ever seen that online video of the Peanuts gang synced to the original Hey Ya? Originally created by some clever bear at Venis Productions, they got cease & desisted by United Media, though we all know once it's online, you can't stop the signal... It's pretty hilarious especially when Andre 3000 sings "we know we're not happy here" and it cuts to a grumpy Charlie Brown standing alone in front of an empty mailbox. Ha! Even though it can get repetitive with not enough footage to fill out the whole 4 minute song, the "Cooler than being cool" section is quite brilliant. Anyway, Shawn Lee's Ping Pong Orchestra, unintentionally or not, takes this concept to its logical conclusion with a Hey Ya cover in the style of Vince Guaraldi's Linus & Lucy.

Shawn Lee's Ping Pong Orchestra - Rehab [originally by Amy Winehouse]
I was probably one of the last people to hear Amy Winehouse's Rehab sometime in November, so I totally missed the whole overexposure to it. Not surprisingly, I started digging the song after hearing covers by Girls Aloud and Paolo Nutini. While train wreck seems to be the phrase most often used to describe Amy Winehouse, it's disappointing since I actually enjoy her music & voice as opposed to say Britney Spears or Lindsay Lohan who just won't leave us alone. While Winehouse has been making it on to best-of lists this year for Back to Black, the album was technically released in October 2006 in the UK and last December in Canada. So belated '06 kudos to that album.

The Bad Plus - Tom Sawyer [originally by Rush]
Being Chinese-Canadian, I must be genetically inclined to love piano-based jazz covers of Rush. This so happened to be one of my most played covers of the year. Unlike some Bad Plus covers, this never derails into total chaos and unrecognizability.

Corinne Bailey Rae - Steady As She Goes [originally by The Raconteurs]
Once upon a time in August, I mentioned that BBC was putting together a covers compilation of 40 contemporary artists covering 40 tracks to celebrate 40 years of BBC Radio One. Well, I seem to have missed the whole release part of the equation. It guess it was released in November, though typing combinations of "BBC" "Radio 1" "40 Years" and "Covers" will hardly bring up any Amazon links. To find it, search for "Radio 1 Established 1967", which is available for the low, low price of $63.99! The Amazon 3rd-Party sellers seems to be the way to go if you're desperately seeking this album. After a fly-by listen of that plethora of covers, the most outstanding cover to me is Corinne Bailey Rae's take on The Raconteurs' Steady As She Goes. She continues to blow me away with her covers... first Zeppelin, then the Raconteurs? That's two years in a row that Corinne Bailey Rae has made my top covers. She could probably cover any song and I'd enjoy it-- love her voice!

MC Chris - Dare to Be Stupid [originally by Weird Al Yankovic]
This is interesting: a cover of a Weird Al original. Honestly, though I'm a big Weird Al fan I never really liked this song... until I heard this amped up electro version, which made me reevaluate the original as all good covers do.

The Quartertones - Here Comes the Fuzz [originally by DJ Format]
Somehow over the course of this blog I've never once mentioned DJ Format even though that's the closest thing to rap or hip-hop that I listen to regularly and thoroughly enjoy. The original from 2003's Music for the Mature B-Boy is an instrumental track based on a repeated guitar sample with horns. This cover from the b-side to DJ Format's The Hit Song is performed "unsampled" so to speak by The Quartertones, a Canadian jazz/funk outfit from Toronto. While in the UK last year I specifically went on the hunt for DJ Format albums, which (at the time) were notoriously hard to track down here in Canada for a reasonable price even though a regular collaborator is Toronto rapper Abdominal. Now you can get DJ Format quite simply on iTunes, though it's no match for a physical album.

You may recognize some of DJ Format's music videos such as We Know Something You Don't Know featuring breakdancing mascots (one of my fav all-time videos) or the arcade game-inspired 3 Feet Deep, directed by Keith Schofield who incidentally has a string of awesome retro music videos like Hard 'n Phirm's Pi and Wintergreen's When I Wake Up (telling the legend of the E.T. Atari landfill burial of '83). The We Know Something video was directed by Ruben Fleischer and I've always wondered if he and Kanye West went to the same bear costume shop (FYI, the music video released in early 2003 predates Kanye's debut album The College Dropout by almost exactly one year). Someday soon I'll write up that post I've been meaning to write for months regarding interesting cover/sample breakdowns of DJ Format's The Hit Song and Here Comes the Fuzz.

Same bear? Or just a coincidence?


OK Go - Don't Bring Me Down [originally by Electric Light Orchestra]
This fun acoustic cover comes from a live iTunes session.

Angélique Kidjo - Gimme Shelter (feat. Joss Stone) [originally by the Rolling Stones]
As Angélique Kidjo has done earlier on a cover of Jimi's Voodoo Chile, she transforms the Stones classic (which has been covered often) with latin beats and African chants. Joss Stone contributes guest vocals.

The Kleptones - War of Confusion [Genesis vs. Edwin Starr]
While the mash-ups fad has kind of worn off, The Kleptones have proved why the sub-genre was so exciting to begin with. From the 2007 internet release Live'r Than You'll Ever Be (available in its entirety for free here), War of Confusion seamlessly blends Edwin Starr's War with Genesis' Land of Confusion to create the best anti-war mash-up since George W. Bush sang Sunday Bloody Sunday. The whole live set (the logistics of a "live" show I don't really understand) is an example of some of the best-sounding mash-ups I've heard. This guy's a pro and he doesn't lazily fall back on simply overlaying rap vocals over instrumentals. Just look at the songs mashed together in Underground Hand: Queen's It's a Kind of Magic, Aerosmith's Dude Looks Like a Lady, Nine Inch Nails' The Hand That Feeds, and The White Stripes' The Hardest Button To Button. Other inspired combos include Jet vs. Stevie Wonder, The Doors vs. Dick Dale & The Del-Tones, Beck vs. The Eagles... all to a rockin' dance beat.

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Favourite songs/albums of '07:

The White Stripes - Icky Thump
Icky Thump is one of my top albums of 2007, which should come as no surprise to any regular reader since I seem to talk about the White Stripes every 5 posts or so. Even ignoring the Conquest cover (which is hard to ignore), the album is full of nuggets such as the Effect & Cause, Rag & Bone, Little Cream Soda, Catch Hell Blues, I'm Slowly Turning Into You... OK, so I'd better just stop there before I list the entire album. I am under the impression that almost nobody has heard the original Corky Robbins Conquest, except for possibly Jack White.
The White Stripes - Baby Brother (Icky Thump B-side) [originally by Bill Carter & The Rovin' Gamblers]


The Polyphonic Spree - The Fragile Army
The Arcade Fire is topping many best-of lists this year and conspicuously missing from many lists in my opinion is The Polyphonic Spree's The Fragile Army. More than a few times I've seen The Polyphonic Spree unfavourably compared to the Arcade Fire. I've read, for example, that they're "The Arcade Fire's hippie cousins" or they're "trying too hard to be the Arcade Fire", which isn't really fair to either band, especially since the Spree predate the Fire by a few years. The Polyphonic Spree seem to inspire either adoration or extreme hate. I think some people just have a hard time with the Spree's earnestness. Lack of irony doesn't go over so well these days. Anyway, I don't mean to get all defensive here. The Fragile Army was one of my favourite albums of the year. Plans to see them on tour this year clashed with my White Stripes roadtrip, but hopefully I'll see them in 2008. My desire to see them has boosted significantly since I heard they added a cover of Live & Let Die to their repertoire.
The Polyphonic Spree - Guaranteed Nightlife

Coconut Records - Nighttiming
I was completely enthralled by Coconut Records debut album Nighttiming. In case you didn't know, Coconut Records is Jason Schwartzman. Yes, the actor and former drummer/founding member of Phantom Planet, here playing every instrument on the album which is not as pretentious as it may sound. From the disco groove of the title track to the melancholic West Coast to the Tom Petty-esque rocker Minding My Own Business to the dreamy Summer Day, Schwartzman features a range of music, none of which really feels out of place. It took me a long time to disassociate him from his role as Max Fischer in the brilliant Wes Anderson film Rushmore. With an insignificant performance in the underrated CQ and an obnoxious turn in the god-awful Slackers, I was ready to just write him off completely as a one-hit wonder. A few years later, my sister and I would rent I Heart Huckabees and proceed to laugh hysterically throughout. In the process, I was finally able to view Jason Schwartzman as an actor and not Max Fischer. 2007 must have been a good year for him since he released this solo album independently and also reunited with Wes Anderson in the wonderful film The Darjeeling Limited (and the preceding short film Hotel Chevalier). I found out about Coconut Records quite by accident while investigating the limited music samples of Zooey Deschanel (remnants for a future posting), who is a guest vocalist on two tracks on the CD. The album, which I bought directly from Schwartzman's Young Baby Records, came with a "surprise gift" that turned out to be one of hundreds of polaroids he took. These will supposedly be used in a future music video (my polaroid seems to be of clippings/photos on his fridge or wall). I guess he ran out of polaroids since now there's a new surprise gift offered with each order. In fact, I just went ahead and ordered another copy for someone's belated x-mas gift.
Coconut Records - West Coast
Coconut Records - Slowly (featuring Zooey Deschanel)

Andrew Bird - Armchair Apocrypha
This year I got to check off Mr. Bird from the list of must-see acts after finally catching his show in Vancouver. Armchair Apocrypha was another solid record of indie goodness as only Andrew Bird can do it, this time 'round with some electric guitar in the mix. Here he revisits the track "I" from his earlier album Weather Systems with new lyrics and arrangement.
Andrew Bird - Imitosis

Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings - 100 Days, 100 Nights
Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings put out another awesome record of old school funk soul that's even better than her last album. Nobody's Baby has got "AH-ooh's" that would do Aretha Franklin proud and Let Them Knock is a perfect showcase (as is the whole album) for Sharon's wicked soul vocals.
Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings - Let Them Knock
Sharon Jones & The Dap-Kings - Nobody's Baby

The Ditty Bops - Dead and Gone
This was from their 5-song Pack Rat EP, a nice gift to tide us fans over until the next album due early in '08. No one sings retro harmonies as beautifully as these girls.

Danny Michel - In the Belly of a Whale (live)
On Danny Michel's live DVD from this year that he released independently, one of the extras was this version of In the Belly of a Whale, one of my favourite of his songs.

Supergrass - Diamond Hoo Ha Man (live)
This live track released towards the end of 2007 is a sneak peek at the direction they're taking with the new album expected in March 2008. Diamond Hoo Ha Man sounds like it's borrowing from the heavy fuzz riff of the White Stripes' Blue Orchid, but that's not altogether a bad thing.

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Cover finds of the year:

Tok Tok Tok - The Weight [originally by The Band]
This incredibly groovy head bobbin' cover of The Band is from the 2003 release It Took So Long. This was on constant repeat as I discovered it shortly before departing for China.

Doug & The Slugs - Nobody But Me [originally by The Isley Brothers]
For years this had been on my list of covers to track down. I remember this from an old mixtape my parents had on our family roadtrips. My sister and I loved to sing the lyrics, which are basically "No no no no-no no-no-no-no-no no No No No no No no NO NO no No no no" etc... which makes for some difficult google searching. A couple years ago I finally found out the song was called Nobody But Me, originally by The Isley Brothers and a hit for The Human Beinz in the 1960's. Except neither of those were the version I had heard as a kid. Over the years I would track down covers by George Thorogood, The Dickies, a non-cover of the same name by Blake Shelton, and more, but never that exact one. Then a few months ago I dug up that old cassette tape and recorded it to mp3 with the tag "unknown artist". In a move that should have been obvious from the get-go, I asked my mum if she knew the song, seeing how she originally would have made the mixtape from an LP. She didn't know immediately, but I was inspired to dig through old records in the basement looking for an LP with that cover. As it turns out it was taped off an LP from the library (gee, how times have changed) and my mom remembered it was Canadian rock band Doug & The Slugs from an album originally released the year I was born. Mystery solved!

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2007 in Film:

The best film I saw in 2007 was Zodiac, David Fincher's brooding meditation on the Zodiac killer and the individuals heavily involved with the investigation. Even though it came out early in the year, that was the one film I saw that completely engrossed me and left my jaw on the floor as I left the theatre. Last year it was Children of Men, this year it was Zodiac. Of the summer of blockbuster sequels, only the old school action throwback of Live Free or Die Hard and the visceral thrills of Bourne Ultamatum (best of the series) stood out. I hated Transformers, Ratatouille was a delight, The Simpsons Movie was surprisingly not terrible, but Stardust was a disappointment. I caught the Danny Boyle sci-fi thriller Sunshine on the flight home from Hong Kong and it was riveting even on a teeny-weeny seat monitor. I really liked Wes Anderson's The Darjeeling Limited, which had unintended extra pathos in light of the real-life turn of events surrounding Owen Wilson this year (hopefully he bounces back in '08). The absolute worst movie I saw this year was August Rush. Gag! Vomit! I saw it at a free screening and felt totally ripped off. No Country For Old Men was excellent, but I didn't love it.

2007 films I really want to see still: Sweeney Todd, There Will Be Blood, and Gone Baby Gone.

Most anticipated for 2008:

• Be Kind Rewind (new Michel Gondry film with Jack Black & Mos Def)
  
• 21 (long in the works adaptation of Ben Mezrich's Bringing Down the House about the MIT blackjack team)
  
• Shine a Light (Scorsese's Rolling Stones concert film; Jack White is a guest star)
  
• Iron Man (never really a fan of the comic, but the crew/cast involved seem to trying really hard to make it a worthy comic adaptation)
  
• Indiana Jones and the Kingdom of the Crystal Skull (George could have called this anything and I'd show up)
  
• The Happening (new Shyamalan film... Lady in the Water was his first film I outright disliked; hoping he returns to Sixth Sense/Unbreakable form)
  
• Get Smart (probably going to suck, but hopefully not)
  
• The Dark Knight (THE film of 2008)
  
• new X-Files movie (I don't have much expectation, but I'm definitely intrigued)
  
• The International (Clive Owen + Naomi Watts with Run Lola Run's Tom Tykwer directing)
  
• Where the Wild Things Are (Spike Jonze directing the children's classic with a screenplay co-written by Dave Eggers??? Sold!)
  
• Harry Potter & The Half-Blood Prince (love the books; movies not so much... but I'll check it out anwyay)
  
• The Curious Case of Benjamin Button (David Fincher re-teaming with Brad Pitt)
  
• new Bond film (no brainer)

Phew! After that post, I wouldn't expect to hear anything from me for a while! Happy New Year!