34 Songs You Didn't Know Are Covers
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It's easy to not realise that a famous song is actually not the original version. So today we are going to look at 34 songs where the most well-known version isn't actually the original.
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Sir I am so happy to find your channel.. someone has knowledge and experience about the subject they talking about.. keep on the good work sir and thank you…!
From @jimlapbap's May 22nd post, "Cover song requests that don't make me angry... but maybe twitch a little"
Text mined with Google Lens
"Twist and Shout" by the Beatles
"Istanbul" by They Might Be Giants
"Hurt" by Johnny Cash
"I Will Always Love You" by Whitney Houston
"Tainted Love" by Soft Cell
"Smooth Criminal" by Alien Ant Farm
"What a Man" by Salt-N-Pepa and En Vogue
"Make You Feel My Love" by Adele
jimlapbap Any other examples?
#Arranging #arranger #musicarranger #arrangement #coversong
Y7f@@bacht4799
Y7f@@bacht4799
@@tiyenin7y😢
Jimmi Hendrix’s “Star Spangled Banner” was originally written for an 18th century men’s club
Niiiiiiiice.
Also hey Joe and all along the watch tower were also covers
@@JamesJames-li2wv.
I genuinely never realised that was a cover until reading your comment.
Yes! There's a bridge named after that gu .. ... ...., eh, well, not any more.
Jimi
I think you came up with the word "outshadowed" (a cross between "overshadowed" and "outshone"?), which I've never heard before. We'll have to see whether it catches on and anyone covers it.
@@simonvaughan6017 haha I didn’t catch that but that’s hilarious. I think I will cover it myself 😁
Always outshadowed, never outgunned.
Outshadow would be when you're overshadowing a third thing more.
If we are not careful this comment will outshadow the video.
@@jhsounds Or indeed, overgunned
"Istanbul, not Constantinopel" is commonly known for the They Might Be Giants version, but was originally by The Four Lads
This one broke my brain a little bit.
@@zephsamdperil blimey The Four Lads in 1953! I had no idea on that one.
I was about to comment this
came here to say this :)
I prefer the 4 lads version
I once talked to a UB40 fan, who regretted that "the only original song they did was Red Red Wine". I had to let him down, and point out the fact that it was actually written and originally recorded by Neil Diamond.
They did some great original songs before they slowly morphed into the Midlands' premier covers band.
@@pf7746 little known fact is that Rat in the Kitchen was written by Bob Dylan.
Interestingly, every significant hit UB40 had in the States was a cover.
- Red Red Wine (Neil Diamond)
- Here I Am (Come And Take Me) (Al Green)
- The Way You Do The Things You Do (Temptations)
- I Got You Babe (Sonny & Cher)
I thought "one in ten" was an original UB40 song.😮
Kingston town too
this whole video is just a big "well ackshually" and i love it
😁😁
@@DavidBennettPiano did you ever make the other three videos of your crash course to the orchestra How to compose for Strings
Every time I start to think it's the original, there's always something there to remind me.
I understand that reference.
Wink
Anyone who had a heart would understand that reference
@@R08Tam I will always love you people who go the extra mile to inform others
Cheers to all for this chain….
"Girls Just Wanna Have Fun", made famous by Cyndi Lauper in 1983, was originally recorded in 1979. Ironically, the only original song on "She's So Unusual" (Lauper's first album), is "Time After Time". "Time After Time" is the most covered song from the 1980's.
Yeah even Miles Davis covered Time after Time.
Wasn't it recorded by Robert Hazard?
Time after Time's a bloody classic, mind you.
She should have done more original tracks, if that was the quality she could attain.
@@RoyADane Where did the information that TAT is the most covered 80s song come from? Not disputing that, just curious as to who compiled all the data to get that result. I imagine they would have other statistics of interest.
That's just plainly not true. Among others, she wrote Witness (probably the most underrated song on the album) after watching a friend step off a curb and nearly get hit by a car.
I noticed how Otis Redding sang "a little respect when I come home" while Aretha Franklin changed it to "have a little respect when YOU come home" highlighting the obvious change in perspective.
Hahaha
I just realised that the record sleeve of London Calling by The Clash is a copy of Blue Suede Shoes by Elvis.
That's a cover of a cover.
Another example is the cover of the cover of "Whipped Cream & other Delights" by Soul Asylum
Mothers of invention’s we’re only in it for the money is a cover cover of sgt peppers
It's not Blue Suede Shoes it's his first self-titled album from 1956, Blue Suede Shoes was just one of the tracks on the album.
@@BixRibene Thanks for the clarification.
More precisely, it's a cover cover of a cover.
I didn't even know "I put a spell on you" was covered. the Screamin' Jay Hawkins original is so iconic!
Ditto. I didn't know about the Nina Simone version. I was eight when the Screamin' version came out. Naturally, I loved it.
Creedence Clearwater Revival also did a cover of it.
Seriously, this version is way more well known than the Nina Simone or even the CCR covers.
@@ociemitchell I love the CCR version. It's got great solos in it.
@iankrasnow5383 nahh.. more than Nina yes,but CCR's version is great.. the arrangement and his voice on it the way he sings it is gripping like Screamin's
Finally a list of covers that I actually didn't know were covers... Congratulations.
Great 😊
The Tommy James version of "I Think We're Alone Now" was actually well know at the time of Tiffany's re-make and was in fact enjoying a minor resurgence at the time owing to the whole "Big Chill" revival of 60s music in the 80s. I think that's one of the reasons Tiffany did it.
The song was by then already covered by The Rubinos (feat. Todd Rundgren's Utopia) and Lene Lovich.
I remember, at the time of Dolly the Sheep. it was known as' I think I'm a Clone now'
@@jarvsie "I Think I'm a Clone Now" was Weird Al's parody from his 1988 album _Even Worse_.
@@BrentRossow You can't tell me that Weird Al isn't a genius with lyrics like this:
I think I'm a clone now
And I can stay at home while I'm out of town
I think I'm a clone now
'Cause every pair of genes is a hand-me-down
@@IlliniDog01I'd be just about the last person on the planet to argue against Weird Al's genius. 😅
When I learned that 'It Must Be Love' and 'Something Inside So Strong' were made by the same person I was floored. Labbi Siffre is one of the greatest musicians of his time and really isn't talked about enough
He also made songs that Eminem and Kanye west sampled. He’s a very good writer and did more than people expect
I know "I Got The" because Eminem sampled it up.
It Must Be Love is the perfect running song - try it!
Very very true. One of the most underrated singer songwriters !
He's amazing.
"Tainted Love" by Soft Cell was originally recorded by Gloria Jones. Gloria was also romantically involved and had a child with Marc Bolen of T. Rex. She was driving the car that crashed and fatally injured Marc in 1977.
Gloria was also a songwriter for Motown
Her original version of Tainted Love is brilliant.
Indeed, the original version is hella better. New Wave can blow right off back across the Atlantic.
@@udasai Synthpop, you mean? Because Americans practically invented the new wave.
I know 2 other versions of Tainted Love, the Spanish version by La Unión, and the version by Marylin Manson.
The version by Marylin Manson is the only that I don't like, the other 3 are in my Top10.
Every time I hear Otis Redding, it still breaks my heart.
An artist and songwriter with that immense talent, and by all accounts a really great guy, gone way, way, way too soon.
He managed to do so much in such a short time, that the mind fairly boggles at how much he could achieved, had he gotten to live into his old age.
Fun fact: there is footage out there of George Harrison in 1964 requesting that I Got My Mind Set On You be played on the radio station he was listening to. That was a whole 24 years before he released his cover
I've listened to his versison countless times, and seen his name pop up, but not until this video did I realise that he's the same George Harrison as the Beatles member. 🤦🏻♀️🤦🏻♀️
He heard it while visiting his sister in the US a few years before.
@@VaryaEQ George has the best post-Beatles career of the four of them imo, All Things Must Pass is the best solo album any of them made and the Travelling Wilburys are great fun. Highly reccomend it if you've not listened to any of it before.
George was only allowed a maximum of two songs per Beatles album, but he wrote more than that. He just had to put them aside. When the group split, George had a bunch of songs ready to go and his solo album was the most successful.
@A.H-RBHSxcTF Actually only 23 cause Harrison's version came out in 1987 not 1988
The instrumental half of "Black Magic Woman" is "Gypsy Queen", originally by Hungarian jazz guitarist Gabor Szabo. His work is well worth checking into.
Thanks for mentioning this! I was confused when it wasn't mentioned in the video.
I grew up listening to Gabor Szabo, and I'm not even Hungarian!
@@itsROMPERS... I'd never heard of him until I started digging into music to write about it.
@@joeldcanfield_spinhead I've never heard anyone else mention his name.
Not the only time Szabo’s work has been an inspiration. John Legend sampled Szabo’s “Stormy” to make “Save Room”
"The First Cut Is the Deepest" was a hit for Rod Stewart, then Sheryl Crow, but was originally done by its writer, Cat Stevens.
The version I prefer is by PP Arnold
It's been covered like 6 times.
actually technically originally released by P.P. Arnold before Cat Stevens cut his own version
@@dobs407 The main point there, I think, is that Cat Stevens wrote it.
@@KingoftheJuice18 yeah I was just offering a technicality
"Just a Giggalo/I Ain't Got Nobody" by David Lee Roth is a cover of a song done by Louis Prima back in 1956. It was a combination of two songs. The "Just a Giggalo" part went way back to 1924, and stared as an Austrian tango. It was adapted in to English in 1929.
And the "I Ain't Got Nobody" part was first recorded by Marion Harris in *1916*! It's my favorite "older than you think" piece of trivia.
That whole album was just covers
The one that surprised me the most was the most iconic song of the early '80s, which was actually a cover of a 1964 R&B song by Gloria Jones, which Soft Cell covered rather faithfully: "Tainted Love."
There's a comment elsewhere against this video with a little backstory on that...
It's crazy how often I see "All Along the Watchtower" referred to as a Jimi Hendrix song, by people apparently unaware of Bob Dylan
Dylan has been quoted saying that he preferred Jimi's version
and that it was now his song.
@@UrbanGarden-rf5op Same with Hurt by Johnny Cash, but it is still a cover. At least with Hurt it's more openly known, but it's kind of wild how few people realize Jimi's version is a cover. (I also prefer Jimi's version as a die hard Dylan fan.)
Knock knock knocking on heaven’s door is another song that Dylan originally wrote. :)
@@dwc1964 or how tainted love wasn’t by soft cell. The original version of that song by Gloria jones is in gta San Andreas. You’d think music from that game series would be more well known.
Yes, but even Bob has acknowledged that Jimi’s is the definitive version. I mean he really took it to another level
one of my favourite cover songs is "The Door's: Alabama Song (Whiskey Bar)." It was actually a cover of The German opera song written in 1929 by Kurt Weill and Bertolt Brecht.
Of course Brecht also got the charts with Mack the Knife
@@michelfouche4599 How could i forget, love mack the knife.
@@ehxjsjd4553 I may be wrong, and I’ve not looked this up, but I always thought that the whiskey bar section was the Brecht / Weill part and the Moon of Alabama was a different song. I'll now look it up to see how wrong I am.
Believe it or not, The Doors version of Alabama Song was reviewed and discussed - favorably - in the February, 2007 issue of Opera News!
My favourite cover story is how Dusty Springfield's "You Don't Have to Say You Love Me" was originally Italian. Springfield heard it performed and it brought her to tears without understanding the lyrics.
Presley also performed it in 1970
One song that blew my mind that was NOT an original was The Supremes final hit, before Diana Ross left for a solo career, Someday, We'll Be Together (1969). The song was written by Johnny Bristol, Jackey Beavers, and Harvey Fuqua in 1961; Bristol and Beavers recorded the song together as "Johnny & Jackey" for the Tri-Phi label that same year. "Someday" was a moderate success in the Midwestern United States, but gained little notice in other venues. The song was a United States number-one hit on both the Billboard Hot 100 popular singles chart and the R&B singles chart, as well as charting in the top twenty at number 13 on the UK Singles Chart.
"Unchained Melody" was originally recorded as a song track for the 1955 movie "Unchained". Recorded by Todd Duncan, an African-American opera singer, the version we are all most familiar with is the 1965 cover by the Righteous Brothers.
Actually, Al Hibbler recorded it, then the Righteous Brothers.
This is many years after , but U2 did a really cool version of it
All true, but if you approach your girlfriend from behind when she’s working on a pottery wheel, you have to go with the Righteous Brothers. 😂
Wow that blew my mind
Now the name makes sense.
Johnny Cash last gold before he died, Hurt, was originally from Nine Inch Nails
Yup, the greatest cover of all time.
im interested can u explain more?@@rmnffx
Cash was great doing Hurt. Great video, too.
Trent Reznor, even said he could never sing that song again as Johnny Cash made it his song!
I’m thinking this must be a generational thing. As a gen Xer, I was extremely familiar with the NIN version before I ever heard the Cash version. Both are excellent, of course
FINALLY! Someone who actually has done the research and credits Lis Sørensen with OG song "Brændt" THANK YOU!
In addition to the "Simply the Best" connection between Tina Turner and Bonnie Tyler, there's also another song that connects them. Tina Turner also wrote "Don't Turn Around" that was covered by Bonnie Tyler, then covered reggae-style by Aswad and then that reggae cover became the basis for Ace of Base's version of "Don't Turn Around" (the version of the song everyone has heard). Kind of amusing, Bonnie Tyler sings one song saying "turn around" and another song saying "don't turn around".
I thnk Ace of Base got the idea of doing Don't Turn Around from another Swedish artist called Tone Norum. She was pretty bug/popular here in Sweden in the '80s and early '90s. Her version came one year prior Ace of Base's one.
Blondie's The Tide is High is another song I didn't realise until quite recently was a cover.
not to mention Hanging on the Telephone
Yep, Atomic Kitten did it first
@@Sim0n98🤣🤣
That’s funny.
Also Denis, which started as Denise by Randy and the Rainbows. There's a really nice story about Debbie Harry meeting R&tR and insisting on getting their autographs, even though she was the huge star at that point.
it was a cover of the jamaican singer john holt
Slight correction: “I Fought the Law” was written by Sonny Curtis of The Crickets and recorded after Buddy Holly’s death.
Pedant alert; Sonny Curtis had written it prior to joining the Crickets after Holly's death
Sonny also wrote the theme to the Mary Tyler Moore show
@@outtathyme5679 and "Walk right back" which was a hit for the Everly Brothers
@@outtathyme5679 Wow! Nice!
Correction: "I Fought the Law" was written by Scott Joplin following the 1893 Chicago World's Fair. The law referred to in the song is one forbidding parking a horseless carriage in a horse-drawn carriage zone. Joplin (or rather, his driver) parked a Benz Velocipede in the horse zone and was issued a parking citation in the amount of four cents, which he contested in court but lost. (See Collier, et. al. "That Time That Scott Joplin Went to Court Over Four Cents: Just Stick to Writing Ragtime.")
In the 1950s, there were a lot of covers of old songs from the 20s, 30s and 40s. One group that did lots of them was The Platters.
Shoutout to the fact that this video moves at the speed of light and wastes absolutely no time before moving to the next song.
There's a crazy back story about the writing of Dancing in the Moonlight
@@randallpink13 yeah I’ve heard about that!
I watched the Professor of Rock video on CZcams about that song.
Honestly, I wish I hadn’t learned the real meaning. I just thought it was a fun, carefree party song
A couple of facts I'd like to add:
It blurs the line if "cover" a bit, since Dave "Doc" Robinson, leas singer of King Harvest, was the bass player for Boffalongo and sang the low harmony on that version. But it's true that Sherman Kelly, who wrote the song, doesn't play in King Harvest's recording of the song.
Also, Toploader's version belongs to the album called Onka's Big Moka, which is the name of a 1976 BBC documentary of the same name.
How someone could write a song like that after what happened just amazes me!
Barbara Ann was a cover?!?! That one blew my mind.
I agree.
Same
Really? I remember that even as a kid I always felt that Babara Ann is somehow diffrent from other Beach Boys tracks.
@@oliverzwahlenit sounds like a jam session especially with the way they fall about laughing at one point
@@samsowden Yeah, and also there is chatting before the song starts. But its not only the obvious diffrence in the recording quality, I felt as a kid. I am more talking about the style. In Barbara Ann the background singers do simple chords with a specific rhymic patern, on top is a lead melody. No other Beach Boys song is like this. In most songs the singing resembles a bit a counter point arrangement.
It’s actually crazy how many mainstream hits were just songs written by black artists, covered by white artists to 100x the popularity and success.
My favorite fact is that “Gansta’s Paradise” by Coolio was actually a cover of “Pastime Paradise” by Stevie Wonder
I've never even heard of that Stevie Wonder track before, gonna have to give it a listen.
All the oldheads probably know this one but I only found out recently
No it isn't, it's a sample that's been reinterpreted. That's not the same thing as a cover. They're two different songs.
It’s an interpolation not a cover
Don't forget Weird Al's version, Amish Paradise. ;)
Thanks David! "I Fought the Law" was indeed originally recorded by the Crickets, but in 1960, after the death of Buddy Holly. Written by Sonny Curtis who by then had joined the Crickets on guitar.
Sonny Curtis wrote “Love is All Around,” theme from the Mary Tyler Moore Show, right?
@@DTatMC And sang it too, I believe.
He wrote many great songs, including 'Walk Right Back', for the Everly Brothers.
"Nothing Compares 2 U" by Sinead O'Connor is originally by Prince's band, The Family
I hear that Prince was a bit nasty with her because she had success with it. He was a weird person even if a great artist though.
@@Elesario I didn’t know that actually. I knew he was a weird guy but dang.
And the story I heard was that she recorded it without his permission and when he himself had not released a version, which was why he was upset at her.
So was “Manic Monday,” but Prince gave it to Cindi Lauper with his blessing.
@@yehoshuabenavraham9706 You mean the Bangles?
Two of Quiet Riot’s hits, Cum on Feel the Noize and Mama Weer all Crazee now, we’re both performed by a British band called Slade. When Quiet Riot covered Cum on Feel the Noize, they at first didn’t want to record it because they wanted to write all their own music. Their version was the first time they had ever played the song; they didn’t practice it in hopes that it would flop.
You asked for other covers, I was today old when I learned Laura Branigan's Self Control is a cover. Originally done by Raf. Might not be a very well known song anymore but I recently heard it again in some movie trailer.
As is her version of Gloria.
some more off my covers spotify playlist. I like adding them whenever I stumble upon these things
"The Tide is High" The Paragons, 1964
"Alone" (Heart) I-Ten, 1983
"Beggin'" Frankie Valli & The Four Seaons, 1967
"Police on my Back" The Equals, 1967
"California Sun" Joe Jones, 1960
"You Keep Me Hangin' On" The Supremes, 1967
"All Along the Watchtower" Bob Dylan, 1967 (some people still don't know)
"Cum on Feel the Noize" Slade, 1973
Not reeeaally a cover but "Video Killed the Radio Star" has a version before it
also Buddy Holly was dead by the time I Fought the Law was recorded
To make a note to “Hound Dog,” Elvis’s version of the song was more so a “cover of a cover.”
*Freddie Bell and the Bellboys* modified the lyrics to center around a literal dog (less a dissatisfied lover), added a more “rock n roll” rhythm, and released a cover in 1955. Elvis learned the song when he saw Freddie Bell’s band perform it in Vegas and decided to “Elvis-ify” the version by the Bellboys, even using their exact lyrics.
The song was written by Jerry Leiber and Mike Stoller, they claimed they offered the altered version to him because RCA had asked them for songs he could record, they modified a song they already wrote, Hound Dog, to be more masculine. Freddie Bell had nothing to do with writing it hence why he doesn’t get a writing credit.
For anyone interested in reading: I should also make special note that Freddie Bell and the Bellboys actually recorded “Hound Dog” on _two_ separate occasions. First in early 1955 with the new lyrics, then again in May 1956. The second version featured a more upbeat, punchy sound and would have certainly mirrored the style the band would have played it when Elvis encountered them in Las Vegas (around May 1956). Though this second version was recorded ~2 months before Elvis recorded his own rendition, it wasn’t officially released until Elvis’s version achieved popular success (in an attempt to capitalize on the hype around the song).
@@andrewft31 untrue, in their autobiography they discuss Hound Dog. They were blindsided (in a good way) when Elvis had a hit with it. They didn't love the lyric change, but they were happy with the money!!
Some others of note: Take Me To The River by Al Green then Talking Heads; California Sun by Joe Jones then The Ramones; Red Red Wine by Neil Diamond then UB40.
"Where did you sleep last night" of Nirvana, comes from Leadbelly, an old folksinger
Good cover of that by Long John Baldry with Maggie Bell.
As someone who is often fed up with today's remake/cover culture (especially with the songs coming out only 2-3 years later), it's very calming to realize it has essentially always been that way. I didn't know that covers came out so soon after the original in the past.
Duh welcome to recorded music - when bands didn’t have to be there anymore, music changed
Are you kidding?
In the Forties, several versions of a song might chart simultaneously. Wasn't that uncommon in the Fifties and early Sixties.
@@brianthomas2434 What do you mean "are you kidding?" i just talked about how I didn't know that.
@RetsamX you said you weren't aware of covers coming out SOON after an original. I said it wasn't unusual, in the past, for multiple versions to chart at the same time.
@@brianthomas2434 yeah well that is what I learnt from the video😅
“Without You“ is another candidate for a song where people think they know the original but in fact not even that is the original.
And for a recent one, I was surprised that Beyoncé’s “If I were a Boy” was a cover.
Aw shmoot.
I know Nilsson's version is the original.
Of course it is. I know that for a fact.
And now I'm going to have to look it up and find that I'm completely wrong.
...And after looking it up, Wikipedia tells me that Everybody's Talkin' is also a cover.
Is nothing I know true?
@@alwillcox I hear you.
@@alwillcox
Badfinger.
@@alwillcoxVideo Killed the Radio Stars by The Bugles is a cover too.
Almost always, when i see a title like this, turns out that i already knew all of them (bc i love this stuff.) This time, there were lots i didn't know! Thank you.
Same here. I knew some but a lot were surprises.
I am so old that King Harvest was already past their prime and performing "Dancing in the Moonlight" on my high school grad night in 1977.
"You'll never walk alone". The popular version by Gerry And The Pacemakers, played at Anfield Road for FC Liverpool, is a cover from a 1940s musical called "Carousel". The first single record was by Frank Sinatra.
Rodgers and Hammerstein!
The only good thing to come out of a problematic musical about domestic abuse.
It really blew my mind when I found out that The Flamingo's' "I Only Have Eyes for You" was originally from some old Hollywood musical.
I believe Smoke Gets in Your Eyes is also some ancient Hollywood song… I always it was a 50s classic by The Platters
@@marivg8948 Yeah, they both are. Dick Powell sang “I Only Have Eyes for You” in _Dames_ (1934) and “Smoke Gets in Your Eyes” was a showtune for a musical _Roberta_ (1934), which probably no one on the planet knows about. I knew vaguely that these were 1930s musical numbers and so the 1950s versions always sounded to me like updated remakes, not that that was a bad thing.
There’s also “Twilight Time,” which was an instrumental in the 1940s by The Three Suns, well before the Platters made it a hit. (I actually always preferred the Spanish version, “La Hora del Crepúsculo.”)
"Black Betty", perhaps most well known from the Ram Jam version, is so old that no one even knows for sure where the name originated. The pre-rock-n-roll version by Lead Belly (Huddie Ledbetter) from the 20's is amazing. It's also a great example of the path that was taken from the Blues to most other American music.
*the 30s but yes his version is definitely my favorite :v
Other versions of that song were recorded by manfred Mann's Earth Band, Meatloaf and my favorite, Spiderbait. Before Bill Bartlett formed Ram Jam he had a band called Starstruck. They recorded Black Betty. The Ram Jam version is the same recording remixed.
Also, "The Roar of the Greasepaint, the Smell of the Crowd" is one of the best names ever.
that always makes me think of an exchange from Quantum Leap
"The roar of greasepaint, the smell of the crowd"
"I think you''ve got that backwards"
"You never did summer stock"
@@Jourell1 Dean Stockwell's character was so fun.
@@joeldcanfield_spinhead had to love Al
CCR also had a minor hit with "I Put a Spell on You"
It's a brilliant version! :)
And “I Heard It Through The Grapevine”!
@@ExNihiloComesNothingand Suzie Q
I believe there is a specific compliation of *just* the originals (i.e. no covers), so no "Run Through The Jungle" etc. Green River, Cotton Fields, Born On The Bayou, etc., still bangers.
@@nickalotdegit Run Through The Jungle is a CCR original, written and produced by John Fogerty.
feels like half of these are covers of classic r&b and soul numbers
why imitate anything but the best?
I was surprised by the inclusion of so many of these songs, but I realize this is the perspective of a person who grew up in the UK, well past the '70s. There are (were) probably fifty other '50s and '60s well-known soul songs that were covered by mainstream and white artists. If you grew up in the U.S. in the '60s and '70s and listened to "right of the dial" AM stations, you knew most of the original versions of these songs ...
Yeah weird huh
@@bigboy6704why imitate
@@CrowClouds if you've ever started any creative endeavor you'd understand. skill isn't accumulated over night, usually people gain it by imitation
To make matters worse I’ve just found out my duvet is a cover.
Did you know that a mattress protection is also another cover? Shocking.
Having lived through the 60s and a bit of the 50s, many of these were no surprise.
Throughout history, musicians get started playing other people’s songs, and it’s common for them to record cover versions.
Thanks for sharing this list. 🎶
On the Billboard Top Popular Songs chart for 1946, there were FIVE DIFFERENT VERSIONS of a song called "To Each His Own." Five.
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Billboard_year-end_top_singles_of_1946
Gloria Jones originally recorded Tainted Love, later a hit by Soft Cell.
The gym in Los Santos
This gets a little ambiguous when you're talking about songs that were never performed by their songwriter. For example, Bonnie Tyler's "The Best" was written Mike Chapman and Holly Knight. So what makes that version an original and Tina Turner's version a "cover"? Is it simply that Bonnie Tyler's version came first? When you have a song written by non-performing songwriters and released and re-released by multiple pop stars, it feels like the term "interpretation" feels more appropriate than "cover." This was super common in the '50s and '60s. You'd get the same song performed by like 10 different artists.
Especially since the usual music source for doo-wop groups was Thirties and Forties torch songs (ex. Blue Moon)
It's a good question... I would say there is one "original" version, and that original version is which ever artist debuted the song, i.e. was the first to release a recording of it.
@@DavidBennettPianoMotown makes it kind of muddy because they would have their artists record the same songs to see which would hit.. Berry Gordy figured if it doesn’t work for one artist it will eventually work for someone.
@@DavidBennettPianoso would Dave Edmunds’s recording of Girls Talk (recorded before songwriter Elvis Costello’s version) be the original, or the cover?
@@iambrianparks Me thinks Nick Lowe dd this too: gave songs to Edmunds, but recrded himself later on. At least Lowe recorded Jupps Switchboard Susan before Jupp himself did. Hmm, actually this has interesting story: as Lowe just did put his vocals over the "original recording" which Jupp did not like so it was not on the record it was intented. Jupp used year later recorded version of the song on next album.
Another song that I was surprised to find out was a cover is Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft by The Carpenters. It was originally written and performed by a Canadian duo called Klaatu.
I'm Canadian. The Carpenters version was rarely played here, it's always the Klaatu version.
@@MKPiatkowski I must admit, I do prefer the original by Klaatu.
David - you are spot on about the many levels of covers, recovers in the musical industry. Although I tend to gravitate toward the versions closest to my age, I dig all versions.
This video reminded me of how much I love the original version of She's the One by World Party. This prompted me to search for World Party, and sadly I've just learned that Karl Wallinger died a few months ago. He had so many great songs. RIP.
This is so sad so sorry for your Louie
And Karl was hugely bitter about the Williams cover, especially with Williams claiming more than once that he had written it.
Surfin' Bird by The Trashmen is also a cover, of two songs in fact! It's a combination of two songs by The Rivngtons: "The Bird's the Word" and "Papa-Oom-Mow-Mow", although these two songs were relatively succesful before the Trashmen version
Written by Peter Griffin
@@danielburger1775have you not heard?
@@ExNihiloComesNothing It was my understanding that everyone had heard
Absolutely brilliant list, love how you avoided the obvious ones.
She's the One is a little less surprising as Guy Chambers was part of World Party, who also wrote many of Robbie Williams' songs.
So weird, I was thinking about how no-one seems to know that It Must Be Love by Madness is a cover just 10 minutes before seeing this video.
I have a whole playlist of these songs but here are some you missed that you might find interesting:
"Piece of my Heart" - Erma Franklin (later covered by Janis Joplin/Big Brother and the Holding Company. And yes, Erma is Aretha's sister who, along withe Carolyn, did backup on "Respect")
"I Just Want to Make Love to You" - Muddy Waters (most people associate it with Etta James)
"Jock-A-Mo" - Sugar Boy Crawford (later done by the Dixie Cups and also the Belle Stars as "Iko Iko")
"Everybody Needs Somebody to Love" - Solomon Burke (covered by Wilson Pickett and many others. Blues Brothers mistakenly gave credit to Wilson Pickett)
"What a Man" - Linda Lyndell (covered by Salt N Pepa)
"Tainted Love" - Gloria Jones (covered by Soft Cell. Side trivia: Gloria Jones was in a relationship with Marc Bolan (T. Rex) and was the one driving the car which resulted in the tragic accident which took Bolan's life)
"Strawberry Letter 23" - Shuggie Otis (made famous by Brothers Johnson)
"Hey Joe" - The Leaves (covered by many but Jimi Hendrix's is the most famous)
"Gloria" - Them (Van Morrison's band. Later covered by Patti Smith)
"Cum On Feel the Noize" - Slade (covered by Quiet Riot)
"Hanging on the Telephone - The Nerves (covered by Blondie)
"Tide is High" - The Paragons (also covered by Blondie)
"Police on my Back" - The Equals (covered by the Clash. Equals frontman Eddy Grant would later have a successful solo career)
"Going Down to Liverpool" - The Waves (later becoming Katrina & the Waves. The Bangles covered this with the resulting music video featuring Leonard Nimoy)
"Superman" - The Clique (covered by REM)
"Stop Your Sobbing" - The Kinks (covered by the Pretenders. Chrissy Hynde would later have a relationship with Ray Davies)
You could also do a whole video consisting solely of songs the Rolling Stones covered.
A lot of the 2 tone hits in the 70's and 80's were covers of Jamaican ska by artists like Prince Buster
I’m not sure if this was mentioned in one of your previous videos on the subject, but the song “Georgia On My Mind” which most people associate with the 1960 Ray Charles version, was originally released all the way back in 1930, written & performed by Tin Pan Alley singer-songwriter Hoagy Carmichael
Way back in the 80's I forked out ten pee at a bric-a-brac sale in the church hall on the vinyl album original motion picture soundtrack of 'Paper Moon' (1973), which is a bunch of this era music/songs by all the original artists. Georgia on my mind is a particular highlight. I'd no idea it had later been covered!
We Five's hit "You Were On My Mind" was actually written and performed by (Canadian) Sylvia Tyson of folk group Ian & Sylvia.
Well researched and presented ! there were a few surprises in there for me ..😯
Thanks 🙂🙂
"Midnight Train to Georgia" is a cover of the obscure "Midnight Plane to Houston" recorded a year or so earlier.
Nice! I didn't know that!
by Jim Weatherly
I know it's because it's what we've lways heard, but the new title just sounds so much better to the ear. Reminds me of Billy Ocean rereleasing "European Queen" under the much more exotic and satisfying "Caribbean Queen"
Maybe it was a connecting flight.
@@DavidBennettPiano And the song was based on something Farrah Fawcett said.
"Wild Thing" by The Troggs is an honorable mention. The song was first released by the american band The Wild Ones.
You had to play Barbara Ann. Every time I hear that song it gets stuck in my brain and doesn’t go away for months on end. Thanks so much!
One night, I was out singing karaoke, and a man sang I Fought The Law. Then the KJ came on the microphone and announced that that had been DeWayne Quirico, the drummer for the Bobby Fuller Four. I was so excited to meet him because I love that song. We had a nice conversation. That's one of my favorite karaoke memories.
Hi David, was hoping you might mention ‘I Don’t Want to Talk About It’…I play it a lot and I’m fed up with having to explain it’s not written by Rod Stewart. Original was by Crazy Horse a few years earlier (yes, Neil Young’s backing band). Sung by the writer himself, Danny Whitten and featuring gorgeous slide guitar solo by Ry Cooder. Nils Lofgren and Jack Nietzsche were also in the band at the time as well as CH stalwarts Billy Talbot and Ralph Molina
"Istanbul (Not Constantinople)" is probably most well known from They Might be Giants, but was written in 1953 by Jimmy Kennedy with music by Nat Simon and first recorded by The Four Lads.
Laura Nyro released her debut album More Than a New Discovery in1967 when she was 19. That album with songs she wrote included “Wedding Bell Blues” (a hit for the Fifth Dimension) and “Stoney End” (a hit for Barbra Streisand). Nyro also wrote and recorded “And When I Die (a hit for Blood, Sweat, and Tears), but she sold the song to Peter, Paul, and Mary who released their recording in 1966. Her debut album was re-released in 1973 with the title First Songs. She died of cancer in 1997.
Still one of my favorite singer/songwriter artists.
She also wrote "Eli's Coming" by Three Dog Night" and at least two other Fifth Dimension hits, "Sweet Blindness" and "Stoned Soul Picnic"
There are plenty of English classics that are actually covers of songs in other languages. Sinatra's "My Way" is an obvious example, but also "Tell Him" by The Exciters, made famous in the early 2000s by Vonda Shephard for the Ally McBeal soundtrack, is originally by Argentinian singwriter Juan Ramón.
ETA - "English-language songs that you didn't know were originally in another language" would be a cool idea for a video too!
Guy Chambers who was in World Party produced the Robbie Williams version of ‘She’s the One’ and used musicians from World Party to record the cover. So it’s not surprising it sounds similar. Williams has repeatedly claimed he wrote the song, upsetting Karl Wallinger, the actual writer, who was recovering from a brain aneurysm when the cover version became a hit.
Rip Karl
Great deep dive. BTW - The Arrows were American who had a British drummer...and stayed in England because they caught fire there first through BBC TV appearances.
I'm surprised that Slade's "Get Down With It" has been missed. I only learned a few days ago that it was a cover of the 1965 song by Bobby Marchan.
The clip cutting just as the Animals’ singer hits the high note for House of the Rising Sun made me laugh far more than it should have
Oh, hello, I actually knew Screamin' Jay Hawkins' version of I Put A Spell On You. It goes hard.
The 80s synthpop track, “always something there to remind me,” made famous by Naked Eyes, was actually written by Burt Bacharach and first performed by Dionne Warwick in the 60s. I didn’t learn that until recently and it blew my mind
Also covered by Sandie Shaw a year later than Dionne Warwick.
Actually, of 4 pre-Naked Eyes Hot 100-charting versions of this song, which was written by Burt Bacharach and Hal David, the sequence is:
1964 - Lou Johnson
1965 - Sandie Shaw
1968 - Dionne Warwick
1970 - R.B. Greaves
Also, the very next charting singles for both Dionne Warwick and Naked Eyes were both called "Promises, Promises", but they are different songs.
There's a song by Van Halen called "You Really Got Me" from the 70's which was a cover of The Kink's version of the same name from the 60's. (I feel like The Kinks version is more popular though)
Why would anyone even bother making a cover of that one, jeez. The Kinks' version is freaking iconic!
Jeez, kid, how old are you?
Correction: The original I Fought the Law was not sung by Buddy Holly, it was recorded after the plane crash, with a new lead singer.
Also of note, the album it came from also included the original version of "More Than I Can Say," later a hit for Leo Sayer.
Awesome list David, I knew some of these of course but also, of course, not all of them. My vast knowledge is expanding!!
Excellent!
You missed a couple of big ones; "I will always love you' made popular (again) covered by Whitney Houston is a Dolly Parton song. "Me and Bobby MgGee" made famous by Janis Jopin was originally a county song written by Kris Kristofferson.
"Jet Airliner" by the Steve Miller Band was a cover of "Jet Airliner" by Paul Peña. Peña recorded it for his 1975 album, New Train, but his label refused to release the album until 2000, just 5 years before his death.
Anither example is Mad World, most people think of Gary Jules cover when it was originally by tears for fears
That’s a case where the cover is actually better than the original.
Plus I always thought it was an R.E.M. song. It sure sounds like one!
I always think Tears for Fears. I don’t even know who that person is you mentioned. Guessing this is a US versus UK difference
@@pensive-penguin Nah this just depends on when you were born. The Gary Jules version was from the soundtrack for the movie "Donnie Darko", where the whole soundtrack was covers of 80s songs by various artists.
I used to like the Gary Jules version, but it's been so overplayed in various media that it just makes me cringe now. The Tears for Fears version is better.
@@pensive-penguin most people don't know Gary Jules by name, but if you listen to his version you've likely heard it before, though it could very well be a regional difference
'First Time Ever I Saw Your Face' by Ewan MacColl covered by Roberta Flack. While we're at it let's also go for 'Dirty Old Town' covered by the Pogues.
Father of Kirsty MacColl.
The Rolling Stones’ “Imagination” from “Some Girls” was originally a song by the Temptations. Judy Collins’s “Both Sides Now” was written by Joni Mitchell. Aretha Franklin’s “You Make Me Feel Like a Natural Woman” was written by Carole King. The Monkees’ “Pleasant Valley Sunday” was also written by Carole King, and “I Saw Her Face” was written by Neil Diamond. Manfred Mann’s “Blinded by the Light” was written by Bruce Springsteen. The Faitport Convention’s “Percy’s Song” was written by Bob Dylan, as was The Jimi Hendrix Experience’s “All along the Watchtower.” “Wooden Ships” appears in one version by Jefferson Airplane and one by Crosby, Stills, and Nash because it was jointly written by members of both groups.
“MacArthur Park” was written by Jimmy Webb and first recorded by Richard Harris, but Donna Summer really made it her own.
Strangely enough, Judy Collins wasn't the first to record "Both Sides Now," either. That honor goes to Dave Van Ronk and The Hudson Dusters. They released it under a slightly different title, "Clouds (From Both Sides Now)," but it's the same song.
"Always Something There to Remind Me" was a 1960s song (Bacharach/David, sung by a Lou Johnson) before the Naked Eyes cover of 1983.
“It's Oh So Quiet - björk” it’s one I was surprised to know it was a cover song. 😅
Sherman Kelly is the main member of King Harvest - I think he just happened to perform it with both groups, not sure that saying King Harvest did a cover of it is the best way to describe that situation.
I think Sherman Kelly only joined King Harvest a year after the song released
I thought surely "(There's) Always Something There to Remind Me" would have made the list.
Yep, I brought that one up before I saw your post.
Lou Johnson's was the first version of "Always Something There to Remind Me" I ever heard, so, for me, Lou's is the "original" - Later, I found that Dionne Warwick had recorded it.
@@MikeIdy6000 I think hers was just a demo, though. I agree, I consider Lou Johnson's the original, too. Love the dut dut sha da dut! at the end!
@@pghcoyote Oh Yeah!
@@MikeIdy6000Also Sandie Shaw and R.B. Greaves.
The Miracles were the first to record I Heard it Through the Grapevine, in 1966, but their version was not released until August 1968, when it was included on their album Special Occasion.
I knew quite a few.
Calling Occupants of Interplanetary Craft by The Carpenters was originally by Klaatu, although the original was a minor hit in Canada and the USA so maybe that’s just my U.K. perspective that I didn’t know it.
Private Life by Grace Jones I didn’t realise for years was a cover of a song by The Pretenders, although maybe plenty of other people did realise that one.
Since You’ve Been Gone by Rainbow was originally released as a solo record by songwriter Russ Ballard and covered by Clout (known in the U.K. as the South African band with the one hit wonder Substitute)before becoming a hit for Ritchie Blackmore et al.
The Tide is High by Blondie originally by ska band The Paragons.
And children’s favourite Mah Na Mah Na by The Muppets originally on the soundtrack of Sweden:Heaven and Hell which was a 1960s sort of soft porn Italian film.
Funnily enough, my first exposure to The Beatles was through a cover version of their song, which I didn't know was a cover at the time (or even who were The Beatles). My parents had a Joe Cocker CD and "With a little help from my friends" was on it. I still think it's one of the best covers ever made. Amazing example of how the same lyrics can be conveyed in completely different ways.
Loved this!! One of favorite songs that most people don't realize is a cover is the Faith Hill song "cry". It was originally done by Angie Aparo on his album the American.
I wouldn't say it's more popular than the original, but I've seen quite a few people think that Van Halen's cover of Oh, Pretty Woman released in 1982 is the original when in reality the original was released by Roy Orbison in 1964.