I was watching an interview with one of my favourite South African bands the other day and one of the questions posed during the interview was if the band “after doing two cover songs would ever go back do doing something original or if they were stuck on the covers?”.

I started thinking about this. Does doing a cover make you a bad artist? Does it mean that you have nothing original left to say? I discovered that this was too complex to be answered by a simple `yes` or `no`.

I dug into my own CD collection and realised (with a shock) that most of my favourite bands/artists (some of which have been declared as rock/grunge/metal/pop legends) covered quite a few songs during their careers.

But what is a cover song? It’s taking a classic, existing song (those songs we sing in the shower; play air guitar to, drum on the steering wheels of our cars) and re-creating it in a new context.

Taking the big hits of yesterday and revamping it for today.

Some notable examples:

· Nirvana’s `The Man Who Sold The World` (originally done by David Bowie)
· Pearl Jam’s `Tearjerker: Last Kiss` (originally done by Frank Wilson & the Cavaliers – bet you didn’t know that)
· A Perfect Circle’s `Imagine` (The John Lennon classic which is probably one of the most covered songs in music history.)

Why bands/artists do cover versions, is a separate discussion altogether.

Sometimes bands produce cover versions for artistic reasons. Performing songs that would normally be completely out of character for them to record, but which give them the chance to prove their versatility. A perfect example is The Narrow’s take on A-Ha’s `Living Daylights`. Pop, twisted to a kick-ass track with a rock-edge. Another is Marilyn Manson’s nu-metal rendition of the Eurythmics pop classic, Sweet Dreams. It’s a damn catchy tune…

Then there’s the tribute. When established artists pay homage to the artists or songs that influenced/inspired them.

Nirvana contributed to more then two tribute albums for the Velvet Underground (`Here She Comes`) and Wipers (`Return of the Rat`). In SA, record label Alter-Ego has invited a couple of (great) SA bands to contribute to a Depeche Mode tribute album.

It’s evident that most popular songs have been recorded as cover tracks at one time or another. It’s also clear that that the success of these covers are directly linked to whether or not the cover is radically different or virtually indistinguishable from the original. Why record a song if your version is so close to the original?

Success is when artists really make a song their own, flexing their creativity by taking something familiar and giving it a fresh edge. Bridging the generation gap by revamping the music from yesterday to be enjoyed yet again. Let’s be honest we are comfortable with the familiar (there’s some whacked-out psychological answer for that – but I’m no Freud). Someone once said “The effects of good music is not just that it’s new; on the contrary, music strikes us more the more familiar we are with it.”

Who knows, maybe a great rendition can make you a fan of the original and the current band or artist… (But maybe that would be a stretch too far for the mainstream masses).

Let`s be honest, popular music rarely brings something truly original to the studio - it’s mostly a recreation, a reformatting of existing styles and forms. The cover version is merely a basic example of this concept.

Thus, the notion that musicians/artist/bands who do covers are somehow less skilled musically or have nothing original to offer is simply not true. It takes a lot of skill and originality to take an existing song and make it your own.

The bottom line is: no matter what your views on covers are, it’s sometimes just plain fun to kick back, enjoy the nostalgia and sing along…