Songs that would sound good covered in another genre.

^ Exactly What It Says on the Tin

Personally, I think that Still Alive (from Portal, jsyk) would sound BEAST if it was covered by a Ska band. Particularly Streetlight Manifesto, since I can just imagine (hearing) Tom singing the lyrics.

• The Fall's "Repetition" (grizzled post-punk) in the style of bluesy, old-school piano jazz.
• Cupol's "Like This For Ages" (paranoid industrial) as a trip-hop song.
• Panda Bear's "Bonfire of the Vanities" (sample-heavy dub-pop) by a hardcore punk band.
• Colin Newman's "Life On Deck" (whacked-out synth-punk) as by Godflesh.

I have more...

Industrial Metal Toxic by Britney Spears, I don't know who'd be good to cover it but someone.

The weirdo post-punk revival band HEALTH could, in theory, do wonders with that song...

I don't know, I don't think Toxic fits Health.

*shrugs* Just a thought...

Any Neu! song performed in the style of early doom metal.

That's what this thread is for

I wouldn't mind hearing Megadeth done in a soft blues style, ala Layla. It would help highlight the technicality.

Iron and Wine's "Tree by the River" done as a Motown song.

Looks like an interesting thread to necrobump *does so*.

I've always wanted to hear "Separate Ways (Worlds Apart)" to be covered as a Gothic Alt-Metal song after listening to Evanescence for a bit.

I would love to hear an Industrial Metal band perform Nirvana's "Polly" in their genre.

* "Knowing Me, Knowing You" (ABBA) done in a Post-Punk style (or various Post-Punk styles).

edited 25th Mar '14 12:33:08 PM by Quag15

I've always thought it would be hilarious if Slipknot covered "My Sharona"...there's something about the staccato tempo and the vocals that feels like it would translate to their style of metal really well.

There have been a number of covers of high-energy classical music given the orchestra-and-electric-guitar treatment; I want to see more. Giving Beethoven's third movement of the Moonlight Sonata the electric guitar and drumset treatment is like updating a cannonade and cavalry charge to an artillery and tank blitz. Let's see something similar for, say, the sheer exuberant joy of Brahms' Academic Festival Overture or the power of Mozart's Requiem.

edited 25th Mar '14 2:47:51 PM by SabresEdge

I dreamed once about Sixteen Horsepower's cover of "Wayfaring Stranger", reworked as a big band swing song. I'd like to hear it again, in the waking world.

I imagined a Death Metal cover of Gangnam Style last night in bed. Ditto for PoPiPo, which ended up sounding more tolerable than the original.

Also, I want to hear Calexico cover Talking Heads' "Mommy Daddy You and I" in their own style. Failing that, a mariachi, banda, or Norteño version, or any other traditional Mexican style.

Henson Cargill's "Skip a Rope" as a loud, angry punk/hard rock/whatever song. It's a surprisingly dark country song. The Kentucky Headhunters rocked it up a little on their debut album, but I'd like to hear someone go even further.

ETA: "Favorite State of Mind" by Josh Gracin could work that way. There's some pretty fast drumming in it for a country song, and the melody kind of reminds me of a much angrier song than it is.

edited 26th Mar '14 3:25:27 PM by Twentington

It's not a drastically different change in genre since it's basically just turning blues rock into psychedelic blues rock, but I've always kind of wished "In the Cold, Cold Night" by the White Stripes was written about 35 years earlier and originally performed by the Doors.

Of course, there'd probably need to be a slight lyrical change for that to work because of the, "You make me feel a little older like a full grown woman might" bit, but I don't think Jim Morrison would sound too out of place singing the rest of the lyrics. Really, though, I think the main reason I wanna hear the Doors play it is that I like the atmospheric keyboard part that happens about halfway through the song and I think if the Doors played it, they would have added a lot more keyboard work to the song. I'd imagine it'd be low key background stuff for most of it, but then there'd be crazy fills and/or solos at the sections where it picks up a bit.

I would really like to hear Careless Whisper sped up and sung by a band with more rock influences. It's a simpery ballad thing in its original form, but if the tempo was upped and the instrumentation was different, it might be pretty rockin'.

I also would like to see a more minimalistic interpretation of Emilie Autumn's "Shalott", without the dumb industrial noises that come in later. In fact, I'd like to hear it as just an instrumental.

"Maybe Someday" by the Cure and "Romeo and Juliet" by Dire Straits would both sound amazing if Social Distortion did them in their unique punk/rock style.

Maybe not quite what you had in mind, but several years ago there was a hit Post-Grunge cover by Seether.

@Finger Puppet: Damn you, now I wanna hear that.

Someone on my facebook posted "Time Passages" by Al Stewart due to it being their current earworm, and I decided I wanted to hear Daft Punk cover it - it's really not that far off from Random Access Memory territory, they'd just have to make the beat a bit punchier and dancier and maybe drop the saxophone bits. As it is, I kind of want to fool around with sampling the keyboard intro. Update: I actually get a similar vibe from "Year Of The Cat", which was somewhat more familiar to me... Maybe Daft Punk should just flat out do an Al Stewart cover album?

edited 1st Apr '14 10:12:45 PM by MikeK

A few more:

• The Cure's "All Cats Are Grey" (gloomy organ-driven proto-Gothic post-punk) as a witch house/shoegaze fusion track.
• Death Grips' "The Fever (Aye Aye)" (experimental hip-hop) as an extreme metal track, perhaps black metal or death/doom.
• Ludus' "Unveiled (A Woman's Travelogue)" (prog-tinged, jazzy post-punk) as a solo piano-jazz number.
• Ramleh's "Eightball Corner Pocket" (heavy noise-rock) as a punkish folk tune in the vein of Andrew Jackson Jihad.
• St. Vincent's "Surgeon" (jazz/funk-inflected synth ballad) as a string-laden torch song, because it's written like one already.
• Throbbing Gristle's "Persuasion" (prototypical industrial) as an early dubstep track in the vein of The Bug's London Zoo material.
• Wire's "On Returning" (spiky art-pop) as a ska-punk dance tune with a full brass section.

edited 2nd Apr '14 1:24:11 AM by JHM

Cyndi Lauper - "She-Bop" turned from New Wave to grunge. I heard it in a club today and just decided the bass-line in the verses would sound cool being played on a loud, grungy guitar.

A-1 - "Same Old Brand New You" turned from typical Boy Band pop to Baroque Pop-leaning Power Pop. Somehow the chorus harmonies are epic enough that I'd like to hear this song done In the Style of Jellyfish.