The consensus pick is likely to be Leonard Cohen's Hallelujah, though I haven't got the time at the moment to hunt down a particularly egregious offender.
According to Wikipedia, "Girl from Ipanema" is the second-most recorded pop song of all time, and every version after Getz/Gilberto is terrible.
Also, any cover of a Roy Orbison song suffers from the comparison, but why would anyone even try to sing "Crying," which is built entirely as a showcase of his vocal ability? Even the pretty okay versions (Don McLean, kd lang) are failures.
According to Wikipedia, "Girl from Ipanema" is the second-most recorded pop song of all time, and every version after Getz/Gilberto is terrible.
I agree in general but, one exception, Ella Fitzgerald singing, "Boy From Ipanema" is great.
Most covers of Smells like teen spirit are pretty bad, but Patti Smith's is fantastic.
Redemption song maybe, since a lot of the covers are anemic.
5 I have no idea at all what the OP is talking about. I kind of like the Tedeschi version myself, but there's no denying the Raitt version's quality.
3: Mute sound before clicking through to the ranked list of 60 "Hallelujah" covers. I did like the Regina Spektor version. I guess it's a great song, but not, as the article points out, because Cohen himself brought out the best in it originally.
There's a local gypsy jazz ensemble that is playing hot club Beatles covers around town at the moment. I can't fucking imagine.
I have not amassed sufficient evidence to say, but I think probably every cover of "Because the Night" sucks compared to the original; every cover I've heard certainly does. (A great sentimental favorite of mine.)
Public Service Announcement: "Girl from Ipanema" is a powerful earworm antidote. (probably especially true if it's the Getz/Gilberto version playing in your head).
I have no doubt that the Ella Fitzgerald version is good, because Ella Fitzgerald, obvs. But the Nobody Else/Gilberto version from Gilberto's Live at Montreaux recording is a distilled concentrate of loveliness, for the record. Also a very potent earworm antitdote.
Also: 3 is correct. What's-his-name pretty dead singer did the only cover anybody needs to know about, and I wish everybody since would cut it out.
I didn't say all the covers were bad. I like the Tedeschi version a lot.
Do you count both Smith's and Springsteen's versions as original versions of 'Because the Night'?
My answer to the original question is 'Imagine'
Disqualified because it's fucking awful in the original
The Night They Drove Old Dixie Down is surely in a special category.
Disqualified because it's fucking awful in the original
I was going to say, "Gentle On My Mind" but decided that, for as great as John Hartford is, the original isn't very good.
Disqualified because it's fucking awful in the original
I hope some day you'll join us
16 is exactly right. I don't like any cover I've eve heard, but at least they're not the original.
I don't like any cover I've eve heard, but at least they're not the original.
Imagine all the people, living life in peace
18: Huh. I would go in the reverse direction and say that's a fine song, and that Hartford was well-served by Glenn Campbell. But I haven't heard either version in a long time.
I have listened to both the original Imagine and a cover in the last week or so, and I sure do like that song. The idea of being against the idea of heaven is lovely and perfect and right-on.
Though the cover - from a tribute album, I forget by whom - wasn't so successful, nor have I ever heard an adequate cover.
Joan Baez sang Imagine here last year. Or the year before. Didn't work for me, but I may be a little young for that . . .
So, Imagine is sweaty garbage balls, but it did allow this, which, while maybe not exactly either either a a cover or good, is very special.
Also, they took All Day off youtube, which is some bullshit.
There's probably some kind of general rule about soul songs.
So, are there any good covers of "It's a Man's Man's Man's World"?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/It%27s_a_Man%27s_Man%27s_Man%27s_World#Cover_versions
Like 'Hallelujah' it's a paradise of ersatz soul with over-sung melisma. It's a TV singing show staple.
There's loads of versions of 'Aint' not Sunshine' but none of them (Ed fucking Sheeran, John fucking Mayer) are a patch on this:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tIdIqbv7SPo
(Check the drummer! And the bassist sitting in an armchair)
26.link: Holy shit! Youtube comments that are worth reading!
So, are there any good covers of "It's a Man's Man's Man's World"?
Ooh, that's good. Unsurprisingly, Ttam may have the best answer to the question in the OP.
Youtube comments that are worth reading!
I've found a surprising number of times when there are good comments on songs on youtube.
I went to Ipanema one time. The girls were hottt, but what really struck me about the place that I hadn't realized before is that Ipanema is the richest neighborhood in Rio, and maybe even in all of Brazil.
Which I think changes the meaning of the song a bit. Instead of just being song about a sad sack who longs for this girl who won't give him the time of day, its also about being a poor, service-industry worker from the favela that wealthy people walk past but don't even see.
Never mind. I'm thinking of the wrong song.
Really? I was impressed. Few people know that the girl from Ipanema's first name is actually "Mandy."
Cohen's Hallelujah has been overdone, but has it been done especially badly?
27.1: We'll, there's The Residents, certainly.
So, are there any good covers of "It's a Man's Man's Man's World"?
Yes: by the Happy Valley Band.
Here's one of the worst reddit covers I've seen.
27.1: There's no general soul-cover rule. Like all of modern Jamaican music came from soul covers. Here's a famous one. Alton Ellis did a bunch, as did Prince Buster, all sorts of people.
Also, The Committments was a good movie.
It's a Man's Man's Man's World, as covered by the Happy Valley Band.
(String Cheese Incident with Peter Rowan)
That SCI concert comes up pretty often on my pod. Here's my second favorite tune, also a cover: Cold Rain & Snow
The best isn't a cover, but Rowan's ode to the pre-Columbian world: https://archive.org/details/sci1999-04-27.shnf/sci99-04-27d2/sci99-04-27d2t04.shn You really want this one loud.
34: the animated elephant version comes to mind:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xzVTb17IuPc
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=oPmcnvAcbNA
I've linked this song before, but I think this is a much better recording. Listen, loud, and think about what might have been. Horns!
Every time I read this post title I'm reminded of a prof I had who, talking about justifying some kinds of work to management, kept saying: "What's your value-add?"
Every cover is necessary. For example, here is a necessary kazoo-based cover of the Final Countdown, as well as a necessary ska cover of Gin and Juice. If you like Rolling in the Deep, here is 71 necessary covers in one.
re: 38
I think the rule still generally holds. Fantastic Jamaican versions -- which I know, thanks to a bunch of excellent Soul Jazz/Trojan etc compilations -- not-withstanding.
Maybe the rule is something like, 'soul covers after 1980' or something.
So, are there any good covers of "It's a Man's Man's Man's World"?
I have a soft spot for the musical Return to the Forbidden Planet, which this song features in. I suppose the quality of the cover is going to depend on the particular performance though.
There are a lot of shitty covers of Bob Dylan songs, including many by Dylan.
Sexual Healing. Can't think of any cover that changes anything for the better. The gold standard for me is "Respect" as covered by Aretha.
I like this version of Sexual Healing, but its a remix, not a cover.
Delroy Wilson x the Temptations. It's genius on genius.
On a similar theme, but with even more meta. The Beat do Tears of a Clown.
And then there's this.
Bonus fourth link: a photo I took walking along Ipanema last year.
https://www.flickr.com/photos/yorksranter/30136015393/in/album-72157676122520725/
"Hallelujah" is better by Jeff Buckley than by Laughing Len, but the version that changed the format and made it a better, more singable, song was by John Cale. He rescued it from oblivion.
Another essential cover is Jackie Chan's cover of "I'll Make A Man Out of You", from Mulan.
I'm rather fond of Nouvelle Vague doing "The Guns of Brixton".
re: 54
I have to say, not into the The Beat version at all. Then again, that's probably my least favourite of the well-known Smokey songs.
I've always loved the Beat's version.
54.last reminds me of how much I like the way Rio does their sidewalks.
Sexual Healing.
This is an A+ suggestion. Just don't cover it, people. You won't make it better, and you won't be able to bask in its reflected glory, because it will just make you look JV.
Piece of My Heart. Erma (original) or Janis (cover)? Personally I think both versions are great, and almost complementary. Dusty's version isn't contemptible either.
Bacharach/David x Average White Band:
Oh hell yes.
re: 62
The Joplin one is a version I've gradually come to dislike, even though it was the first one I heard. Dislike is maybe too strong a word. Become tired of, maybe.
re: 64
Do you know the George Benson (semi-instrumental) version? It's from a 60s album that's quite cheesy in bits, but has an amazing band on it. It's very of its time.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OdvIZms-Eg8
The arrangement is nice, with the tight vocal harmonies. Good for inducing fear in guitar players, too.
Happy Mondays vs. Bee Gees:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=igQd_41xNCE
John Lennon's Happy Christmas has tons of covers in Northern Europe. I've heard German, Norwegian, and Swedish versions. Even though the song is British, but the overly-earnest vaguely leftist schlockiness to me feels like it belongs in that part of the world more than in Anglo/America. (Though, maybe that's because I didn't realize it was a Lennon song until I was much older, I assumed it was originally German.)
Speaking of value-added, I had a minor issue with my cell phone plan and decided to go in to talk to someone about it in the store since it's a 3 min walk from my apartment. I ended up paying my bill in the store, and paid EIGHT fucking dollars in taxes/fees on a $40 plan. When I pay online I pay 75 cents in taxes.
paid EIGHT fucking dollars in taxes/fees on a $40 plan
You were adding value.
Nominee for Do not click this cover champion
Post -1980 sexual healing cover that I kind of like. They do an OK "Ghost Town" also. Possibly I am tainted by really loving this genre live.
Hypnotic brass ensemble cover of "War" that I think adds something
14: technically yes, but Smith's is the standard. The Springsteen version is all lazy sweet talk. Patti Smith sounds like she really has a sword, she really will use it to cut anyone who threatens her date night to ribbons, and no one should expect anything less. I have a real weakness for her sentimental stuff for this reason.
70: Of course, you're right. I thought that Springsteen put out a version in the 70s, but he didn't. It's just on recent live album and a recent compilation. I prefer Smith's version, but Springsteen's version is a good Springsteen song, and he's gotta be allowed, since he wrote the thing.
Here's a Shirley Manson/Marissa Paternoster version for which the value added is the guitar solo at the end.
The Boz Scaggs thing that Charley linked to at 43 is absolutely wonderful
Surprisingly good: "Pinball Wizard" sung to the tune of "Folsom Prison Blues"
I love Springsteen, but the 10,000 Maniacs cover of "Because the Night" is amazing.
I'm rather fond of Nouvelle Vague doing "The Guns of Brixton".
Nouvelle Vague's "Bela Lugosi's Dead" is wonderful.
I'm going to out myself as an Adam Lambert fan.
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Unfogged 2017 where only the spam makes cock joked anymore.
Unfogged: sounding less mature than the President 2003-2016.