Covers: 7 Nation Army

Covers is a new series of posts looking at a song and the covers it produces. The good, the bad, the weird...all will be looked at.

I'm not sure why I'm not a bigger fan of the White Stripes. I like blues. I like the modern take on blues. And I'm a sucker for a showman with talent. I mean, I do enjoy most of the stuff I hear, so I guess it's more of a "musical saturation," theory. While I enjoy finding new music, and will never not explore it, we all have bands that we miss or skip for whatever reason, and decide never to go back - even when we know we're missing out.

The brain is a funny thing.

Regardless of my feelings, I do appreciate their ability and talent. And I do like the song 7 Nation Army. Sufficiently strange enough to stick out on the banal, mass produced pop songs on the radio airwaves, 7NA always seemed to be that song that mixed things up...

It's immediately recognizable, driving riff, which sounds like a bass (but who would be playing it in a 2 person rock band?) is actually not a bass at all. Given tons of critical acclaim, the song is easily one of the most recognizable White Stripes song out there.

And yet, I don't think it's the best version of the song.

Now, I realize that is a dangerous thing to say. Cover songs should never be better than the original material because (at least in my thinking) original creation is more difficult. So for a cover song to be better, that has to be saying something.

(And I also realize that all of this, at the end of the day, has to deal with personal opinion. Best of lists, and awards are only based on the whim of people. There simply can never be something considered the Best of anything, because, as I'm sure you are aware, there will always be someone out there on the other side of the opinion. And that person is never wrong. Opinion can't be wrong. So at the end of the day, this is just my take. But of course, I'm right.)

But seriously, this cover of 7 Nation Army is by Nostalgia 77, featuring Alice Russell is awesome...

To me, both Nostalgia 77 and Alice Russell took this song and delivered something completely different than what The White Stripes did...something more soulful, meaningful and passionate.

But there of course are other versions of this song...to narrow them down I've created some categories (all from research on Youtube:

Weirdest

Fewest views

Artist you would never in a million years think they would do it

Countrified

Acoustic

So without further adieu...

Countrified: The Oakridge Boys

Artist you would never in a million years think they would do it :Kelly Clarkson

Fewest Views: Squirrel Tooth Alice

Weirdest: Afra and Incredible Beatbox Band

Acoustic

And then just a few more, because I couldn't classify them but I thought they sounded kinda cool...

Singer/Songwriter: Kate Nash

Soulful: Ben L'Oncle

And finally one more - and I dare you to listen to the whole thing, all the way through (I couldn't):

Oh Oh Oh!!

Links of Interest 3/10

Oh sure, we're all sad for Conan O'Brien and his sudden departure from television. But what about his sidekick? What about Andy Richter?

I'm shocked, shocked, that The Marriage Ref might be seen as having a negative effect on marriages.

The medical marijuana boom can have some far reaching negative effects. What about the corner drug dealer? How is he going to make a living now?

Oh boy, that Kathy Ireland performance at the Oscars was uh...interesting.

If you're headed to Austin (possibly for SXSW?) here's a breakdown of one of the city's greatest products: the breakfast taco.

Sometimes where-are-they-nows have happy endings.

White Stripes fan? Get a preview of the latest album here.

Women can't be funny? These examples will prove that silly axiom wrong.

Mick and Keith look back at their classic Exile on Main Street.

The history of Facebook is a sordid mess.

Links of Interest 1/7

Interview with Artie Lange.

Michael Cera has a new film coming out.

Rowing across the Atlantic. I guess because it’s there.

Oh my god it’s a Maine Yeti! (Or Sasquatch, depending on your ancestral bloodlines)

A list of some of the stranger ads on television.

Talking to the White Stripes’ Jack White.

Warren Beatty reminisces about what happened on the set of Ishtar.

Sometimes, finding Waldo isn’t the fun part.

This list of 25 lesser known Simpsons characters is a little lame, in the sense that many of them aren’t so “lesser known.” Barney? Selma and Patty? Ralph Wiggum? I’d argue these are fairly well known recurring characters.

Give me Roy everyday of the week. And give yourself a gold star if you remember Roy.

Catch you on the flip side Mrs. S!

Just how important is it to let meat rest after cooking it? Let’s find out.

PODCAST RECAP - Episode 6.00

This was a long one. Our longest one. We had the feeling it would be, so an in-depth dissection of weird Wikipedia pages was cut before we even started.

It helped that we both loved our The Bests (they had to beat out some good ones which almost made the cut), and the field of cover songs is a vast & fertile one.

Sneaking in a little bit of Lost, and there's your Episode 6.00.

Lots of music & YouTube links after the jump.
Couple of random links:

--Scarlett Johansson is really covering Tom Waits
--Tom Waits wasn't aware of it originally.
--Battle of the Network Stars Info


Songs From & Inspired by our Musical Interlude this week (Cover Songs):
I couldn't find a version of Matthew Sweet's "Don't Cry No Tears" off of his Son of Altered Beast EP, so I included a live version of his Evangeline.

Ditto for the Afroskull's version of "...Elizabeth Reed".

SeeqPod - Playable Search



Videos:

Battle of the Network Stars - So much good stuff in this one:

-Captain Savalas smokes and lodges a complaint.
-The music
-The discussion of the phrase "hullabaloo" while a lesbian, possibly a transsexual wears a trench coat in the background.
-Conrad & Schneider's ethnic slurs.
-The genuine excitement on the part of Penny Marshall & Ron Howard when the ruling came down.
-Linda Carter mauling Gabe Kaplan.
-Bob Conrad losing his shit and threatens to leave the competition.
-"Farrah baby, I'm not in charge of the rules committee" - If you think I won't use that line in every single Ultimate game from here on out, you're crazy.
-An apparently unscripted impromptu sprint-off between Kaplan & Conrad. That would never happen nowadays.
-Kaplan SMOKING Conrad like Savalas smokes a Camel.
-Epstein waiting to congratulate Mr. Kotter.
-Everything.


BotNS - This is worth it to watch Ted McGinley kill himself playing "doubles" while his corpse of a partner stands sullenly. And then he patronizingly pats her on the shoulder. She's not happy. As a bonus, Dick Van Dyke's narration and smooth jazz compete to see which can be the most soothing:


BotNS - Billy "Hot Shoes" Crystal ganks the obstacle course in 77, but comes back strong against Letterman in 78. He was a fast little bugger:


The Apples version of "Killing in the Name Of":


The introduction of The Jesus:


A reasonable facsimile of what I saw at Dangerous Curves (except less organized and more violent):


Hope you enjoyed this one, and stay tuned for Episode 7.0x.

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