Cover And Recover (one). Unexpected Brilliance. "Straight To Hell."

Cover versions. One of those eternal topics for music geeks. Pretty much everyone plays someone else's songs at some point, sometimes to nod at influences, sometimes to draw attention to lost classics, sometimes for pure love of a song, often simply for lack of enough original material. It's not an easy trick to pull off, though. Most covers flop, victim to uninspired combination of act and tune, general over-exposure ("Freebird", go screw), slavish adherence to the source, or contrived deconstruction without justification. But once in a while it all succeeds, and the elements combine to ignite pure magic. There's serious power in the thrill of hearing something you ALMOST know but not quite, sure of your general destination without having a map to guide you through the countryside. Variations on a theme, new twists on the familiar, personal stamps on pre-existing creation. I picked up a couple of tribute-ish compilations in the last week, and that sent me off revisiting lost corners of my record collection in an attempt to sift thru and pick out some great "originally recorded by" moments. I expect there'll be many many installments on this topic ahead... But for now, on with the show.

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Let's start with the latest thing warping my headspace. From the brand-new War Child benefit disc Heroes, one of those big overblown celebrity-stuffed endeavours that inevitably do nothing but besmirch the original artists. Or so conventional wisdom goes. Still, I figured there had to be some decent bits with so much talent assembled in one place, so I picked up a copy.



See, the conceit of this album is "classic artists pick younger acts to reinterpret a specific song from their catalog". And oddly, it works real well. Sure, there's lots of predictable moments (The Hold Steady living their dream of being the ultimate E Street cover Band, TV On The Radio covering Bowie), but predictable doesn't mean bad. There's quite a few highlights- TVOTR turn "Heroes" into an apocalyptic strobe-light-in-a-bunker-dance-party, Beck storms through Dylan's "Leopard-Skin Pillbox Hat" as though he hasn't a care in the world, the Yeah Yeah Yeahs do a totally credible tear through "Sheena Is A Punk Rocker", Rufus Wainwright repays his selection by Brian Wilson with a lovely take on "Wonderful" from Smile. There's also some ordinary and less-than-thrilling moments, but none that are anywhere near dire enough to make me skip ahead to the next track...

And then, there's the bit I kinda dreaded hearing. Lily Allen. Covering The Clash. With Mick Jones along, complicit. And not just any Clash hit, not simply "Should I Stay" or "Magnificent Seven" or "Rock The Casbah", but "Straight To Hell", certainly one of Joe Strummer's finest moments. The original manages to sound both intimate and all-encompassing, stark and spacious and almost terrifying, a campfire song broadcast from the middle of an endless rainforest. No one should ever touch it, any cover is inevitably doomed by comparison. I mean, yeah Lily Allen is a totally awesome popstress, but to take on something with this much weight? Sigh. Roll eyes. Grit teeth. Listen with no expectation.

So of course, it works. Perfectly. Rescuing the tune from the modern-day purgatory of being the basis for a ubiquitous M.I.A. smash, it's a straightforward reading of Strummer's lyrics over jingle bells and piano and some synth and a little shuffle-beat, with Jones along for the ride to lend backing vocals and guitar, somehow making everything fit. It's disconcerting and stunning and amazingly lovely to hear a familiar voice underpinning such a wholesale re-envisioning; the opening hook and Vietnam-by-way-of-Kingston vibe of the original is stripped away, replaced with modern pop texture, full and lush and dreamlike and equally unplaceable as the Clash's original. It's a car stereo in London, a beach on the French Rivera, a café in Manhattan, a transistor radio in Zimbabwe, a jukebox in São Paulo. It could be anywhere. There's so much happening with each listen- a completely fresh take on something held near and dear, a new view of an old friendship, an unorthodox (and therefore perfect) tribute to Strummer. I'm hearing the song again as if for the first time, running back to listen to the original with new ears, and it sounds better than ever.

Just like that, I have a new favorite thing. Unexpected, unforeseen, blindsiding me in the best pop music tradition. New and old, familiar and fresh, 5:22 of soundtrack for whatever happens next.

So yeah. Welcome to Springtime, 2009. My latest newsound pop injection snuck up in a form I'd never have guessed at, a familiar face turned upside-down. That's one of the essential elements of this great disposable music, the never knowing where the next perfect shot of song will appear... Exactly as it should be. As rock 'n' roll's original innovator put it: "It goes to show, you never can tell."