Tiff’s Theory of Pop Music Covers
A cover can generally only be a success if it meets one of the following two conditions:
1. The artist is bigger than the song he/she is covering.
2. The artist is covering a song bigger than him/herself as an homage to the original artist.
Thus, Johnny Cash could cover just about anything and make it work (cf. “Hurt,” “Personal Jesus,” “One”). Madonna’s cover of “American Pie” sucked because she chose one of the few songs that is bigger and more iconic than she’ll ever be. At the same time, almost any artist with a reasonable level of musical talent can cover “Ring of Fire” if in doing so he/she is paying tribute to Johnny Cash.
January 22nd, 2006 at 10:15 am
Interesting theory. Where would kitsch covers fall, e.g., the Saturday Morning Cartoons from a few years back?
January 22nd, 2006 at 11:08 am
Kitsch covers are an entirely different genre and have an different set of rules because they’re created for a different purpose. Just as one doesn’t judge tiki kitsch on the same standards of artistic merit as a Picasso or Gaugin, you can’t judge a cover of “Scooby Doo” on the same basis as a cover of “Under Pressure.” Corollary: Richard Cheese covers can only be judged on how well they succeed in being ridiculous. (And I love Richard Cheese.)
January 27th, 2006 at 6:57 pm
You forgot Johnny Cash’s cover of “Rusty Cage”. That was downright holy.
January 30th, 2006 at 3:59 pm
I think the covering artist also has to change the interpretation significantly. I’ve heard covers that I wasn’t even sure *were* covers, except that the singer’s voice was wrong. What’s the point of that?