History Main / CoveredUp

* A downplayed example with [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MQ6J4xHuMgc Bacao Rhythm & Steel Band's cover]] of Music/FiftyCent's "P.I.M.P.", famously heard in ''Movie/AnatomyOfAFall''. While the cover does not exactly outshine the original in popularity, [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/P.I.M.P. according to]] ThatOtherWiki, it is common for people to assume that the piece by Bacao Rhythm existed first and that the iconic steel drum tune in P.I.M.P. was sampled from it, which is very much not the case.

** "I Can't Turn You Loose" is more well known as the chase theme to ''Film/TheBluesBrothers''. There are people who don't realize that the song has lyrics (or that the Blues Brothers song is actually a medley of "I Can't Turn You Loose" and "Time is Tight" by Booker T. & the M.G.'s.)

* Allen Toussaint

*** "Whipped Cream", which Toussaint wrote and recorded with his band The Stokes in 1964 (partly to capitalize on "Java"'s success) became the title track of Herb Alpert's hugely popular ''Whipped Cream & Other Delights'' album the next year, in a note-for-note cover.

** Music/TheEagles covered "Ol' '55".

* "I'm Henery ''[sic]'' the Eighth, I Am" was not written by Herman's Hermits. It is significantly OlderThanTheyThink, having been penned in 1910 and first recorded by Harry Champion. The same applies with "Leaning on a Lamp Post" which was a North American hit for Herman's Hermits and was first recorded by British Music Hall legend George Formby in 1937 for the motion picture ''Feather Your Nest''.

* Think of the song "Iko Iko". You're probably thinking either of the version used in ''Film/RainMan'', the Dr. John version, or the Grateful Dead. Or Cyndi Lauper. Or maybe even the 1965 version recorded by The Dixie Cups which most people believe was "the original". They are all pre-dated by a 1953 recording by James "Sugar Boy" Crawford, who himself adapted a bunch of Mardi Gras parade chants into a song that he called "Jock-a-mo". The Dixie Cups' version came when the singers were on a break during recording and just started singing it--one band members' grandmother was a fan of the Crawford song--and didn't know that the producers were recording them.

* The version of "Lady Marmalade" recorded for ''Film/MoulinRouge'' definitely fits. Even if you know that [=LaBelle=] had the original hit version, that one still counts, since it was written by Music/FrankieValliAndTheFourSeasons producer Bob Crewe and future OneHitWonder ("I Like Dreamin' ") Kenny Nolan and first recorded as a 1974 album track by the short-lived {{Disco}} group The Eleventh Hour.

* Remember Music/DuranDuran's original "Ordinary World"? If you're of the younger generations, you likely know it from the 2000 trance cover by Aurora, featured in ''[[VideoGame/DanceDanceRevolution DDRMAX]]''.

* "Rivers of Babylon" was performed by The Melodians before it became a hit for Boney M.

* "Rosalie", written by Bob Seger in tribute to a Windsor, Ontario radio executive and first recorded for his ''Back in '72'' LP, but much better known in Thin Lizzy's rendition for their live album ''Armed and Dangerous''.

* "Rose Garden" was first recorded by Billy Joe Royal (of "Down in the Boondocks" fame) in 1967 as "I Never Promised You a Rose Garden", but it's Lynn Anderson's 1970 version that is considered the [[CountryMusic country]] standard.

* [=McBride=] & the Ride's biggest hit, "Sacred Ground," was released by Kix Brooks two years before he became one-half of Music/BrooksAndDunn.
* "Sailing" is probably best known to younger generations as an *NSYNC song. Older generations (plus ''WebVideo/YachtRock'' addicts) are more likely to remember the 1980 original, which gave its writer and performer Christopher Cross a US #1 hit and three Grammy Awards (plus a leg up on a fourth Grammy). Here's [[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=NX9z_hU7cts a performance]] in 1999 of the song featuring Cross and the boys.

* "Say That We're Sweethearts Again" is from the 1946 film ''Meet The People'', and sung by Virginia O'Brien, but more modern audiences know it as being sung by ComicBook/HarleyQuinn in the '''WesternAnimation/BatmanTheAnimatedSeries'' episode "Harlequinade".

* Music/{{Donovan}}'s psychedelic standard "Season of the Witch" is still pretty well-known, at least if you're over 45, but younger generations are more likely to remember one of its more-than 50 cover versions, particularly since Music/LanaDelRey covered it.
* "Set the Night to Music" is best known as a U.S. top-10 duet by Roberta Flack with Maxi Priest in 1991. Not many people know now that it was first recorded four years earlier by Music/{{Starship}}.
* "Seven Bridges Road" has the distinction of having had this happen ''twice''. Written in 1959 by Music/SteveYoung, it was originally a waltz with only one vocal track. English folk musician Music/IainMatthews, with his producer Mike Nesmith, sat down in 1973 and put down a 4/4 version with 5-part vocal harmonies. Music/{{Eagles}} ripped this off wholesale: their pre-concert custom was to warm up in the bathroom by singing the arrangement, and it wasn't too long before they started adding it to their performances. ''This'' version, twice removed from the original, is the most famous one.

* "She's the One", best known as a #1 UK single for Robbie Williams in 1999, but originally recorded by World Party on their 1997 album ''Egyptology''. Robbie Williams' version is so close to the original that World Party [[IAmTheBand singer/songwriter]] Karl Wallinger has remarked "The only difference between my version and Robbie's is that [[TakeThat I know who 'she' is.]]"

* "Southern Nights" may be most famous as Music/GlenCampbell's last #1 country and pop hit in 1977, but it had first been released in 1975 by its writer, Allen Toussaint.

* The Grammy for Song of the Year for 1986 went to Music/BurtBacharach and Carol Bayer Sager as writers of "That's What Friends Are For", performed by Dionne and Friends, a one-off collaboration between Music/DionneWarwick, Music/EltonJohn, Music/GladysKnight, and Music/StevieWonder. Dionne and Friends picked up their own Grammy for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocals. Few realize that this version is a cover of a song recorded four years earlier by Music/RodStewart for the movie ''Film/NightShift''.

* The Grammy for Song of the Year for 1986 went to Music/BurtBacharach and Carol Bayer Sager as writers of "That's What Friends Are For", performed by Dionne and Friends, a one-off collaboration between Dionne Warwick, Music/EltonJohn, Music/GladysKnight, and Music/StevieWonder. Dionne and Friends picked up their own Grammy for Best Pop Performance by a Duo or Group With Vocals. Few realize that this version is a cover of a song recorded four years earlier by Music/RodStewart for the movie ''Film/NightShift''.

* "O.K. All Right!" by Annalise (the {{Eurobeat}} stage name of Music/AnnerleyGordon) is mostly known through the cover version "Loner" by KPop group T.T.MA, which gained a much wider reach in the global sphere when it was added to the ''VideoGame/PumpItUp'' RhythmGame series.

* "O.K. All Right!" by Annalise (the {{Eurobeat}} stage name of Music/AnnerleyGordon) is mostly known through "Loner" by T.T.MA, which gained a much wider reach in the global sphere when it was added to the ''VideoGame/PumpItUp'' RhythmGame series.

** Not everyone may know that the "theme" from ''VideoGame/SpyHunter'' is in fact the Series/PeterGunn theme. Indeed, for the Playstation 2 remake, the rock band Saliva did a "cover version" of "The Spy Hunter Theme" using their own new lyrics.

* "The Battle of New Orleans" was originally written and recorded by Jimmy Driftwood, based on an old fiddle tune called "The 8th of January", but it was Music/JohnnyHorton who won the Best Country & Western Performance UsefulNotes/GrammyAward for it.