COVER SONGS
One of the more straightforward playlists, a cover song is defined as “a new performance or recording by someone other than the original artist or composer of a previously recorded song.” With seemingly limitless song choices spanning the history of music, a consistent set of criteria will be used to judge these songs. The best cover songs have both the original and the cover being renown. Worst case scenario, either the original or cover should be quite popular. No one would be excited to go see a cover band play a set of last week’s “Lesser Known Artists” playlist. The best cover songs manage to eclipse the original, some so far surpassing the original that to the majority, the cover is the only version to exist. Lastly, the musician or band behind the cover should add their own artistic flair. Covers aren’t meant to be identical imitations but instead inspired interpretations. #alliteration
Tier 1
Hallelujah, Smooth Criminal, Louie Louie, With A Little Help From My Friends, I Will Always Love You, All Along the Watchtower, Hurt, Twist And Shout
These Tier 1 covers hit all of the required criteria to varying degrees. “I Will Always Love You” is an example of both the original by Dolly Parton and the cover by Whitney Houston being massively popular. Whitney Houston’s version, however, managed to outshine the original, even reaching #1 on the Billboard Hot 100. Excluding septuagenarians from south of the Mason Dixon, whenever anyone thinks of “I Will Always Love You,” they think of Whitney Houston’s version. Similarly, Jeff Buckley’s version of “Hallelujah” has far outshined Leonard Cohen’s original. “Hallelujah” is in the Library of Congress National Recording Registry, but it is Buckley’s version and not Cohen’s that was included. Other songs, like the covers of “Smooth Criminal,” All Along the Watchtower,” and “Hurt” are great for many reasons, not the least of which is the musical interpretation of the originals. All that being said, the most fun fact from this tier is that one of these songs (“Louie Louie”) resulted in a 31 month FBI investigation into the “profane” lyrics and concluded they were "unable to interpret any of the wording in the record."
Tier 2
Heartless, I Will Survive, Mad World, Free Fallin’, Valerie, Higher Ground, XO, Somewhere Over The Rainbow, Drift Away, Can’t Help Falling in Love, Tiny Dancer, Bittersweet Symphony, Jealous Guy
Tier 2 houses all the covers that are fantastic in their own right but do not have the same worldwide appeal as the Tier 1 covers. It is hard to find fault in any of these selections; however, in a macro sense there is a very clear separation in cover songs in the Library of Congress and topping the Billboard charts vs. The Fray covering a Kanye song or a band named after a baked good covering one of the most well known songs of all time. Haley Reinhart’s version of “Can’t Help Falling in Love” and Graeme James’ “Bittersweet Symphony” both outkicked their coverage to end up in Tier 2. For the majority of these, you’re already very familiar with these covers and/or their originals.
Tier 3
Nightcall, Umbrella, Romeo and Juliet, Wrecking Ball, Black Hole Sun, Bitches Ain’t Shit, Time After Time, Landslide, Roar, Wonderwall, If I Ain’t Got You, A Million Dreams, Every Breath You Take, Addicted To Love, Young Dumb & Broke
There aren’t any bad covers in this tier, but there also aren’t any that will be your new go to cover for any song. This tier is the “first page search result on youtube when searching famous song + cover.” All gifted musicians, they just haven’t done anything to take the song to the next level or become synonymous with the cover. “Wonderwall” by Tori Deal and Jordan Wiseley is a nice enough cover, but if you were at a bar while they were performing you probably wouldn’t be bothered to even look at the stage. Did anyone listen to “Wrecking Ball” by Dustin Kensrue and think, “Wow! I have to hear this song again.” That about sums up Tier 3.
Tier 4
All Or Nothing
Punk covers are great, and if you disagree, you are wrong. That being said, if you want to hear a below average punk song from a band you never heard of covering a song you wish you never heard, boy do we have a song for you. “All Or Nothing” is originally sung by O-Town and somehow further butchered by Fake ID. The song is from the “Punk Goes Pop” album, a 17 song album that is pretty self explanatory. There are approximately 16 better punk cover selections just on that album alone, and instead of going with a less than popular song by a great band (“Send Me an Angel” by Thrice), a super popular song by a less than popular band (“...Baby One More Time” by NICOTINE), or taking the best of both worlds and picking “Everywhere” by Yellowcard, this submitter had the choice between “All Or Nothing” and chose nothing.
Tier 5
Easy Love
What would the Playlist Power Rankings be without someone being totally incapable of following the most basic instructions and submitting a song that isn’t a cover? There’s only like 85 billion cover songs out there, so i can understand why this would be so difficult. “Easy Love” samples “ABC” from the Jackson 5. Rather than breaking down the difference between samples and covers, let’s just say that samples are very distantly related to covers, just like this submitter is very distantly related to creatures with brains.
Conclusion
Overall, this playlist is pretty solid. It contains most of the classics, as well as a very strong supporting cast. There’s a huge variety in covered genres, even though the covered versions aren’t from the most diverse genres possible, there’s enough of an assortment to keep it fresh. It was also exciting to almost have 100% of the songs actually be covers. Maybe next time. At the end of the day, you’ll probably add a couple of these songs to your own cover song rotation and never listen to the majority again (if you even listened to them the first time.) I guess that just about COVERS it.
Cover on.
Best: “I Will Always Love You” - Whitney Houston
Props: “I Will Survive” - Cake, “Bittersweet Symphony” - Graeme James
Worst: “Easy Love” - Sigala
Playlist Rank: 7.8/10
Complaints can be mailed to PlaylistPowerRankings@gmail.com where they will be promptly deleted.
No Bens were harmed in the writing of these rankings.