Nick Splint’s 2012 favorites: Tributes – The Cosmic Clash
The Cover Albums
I know what your thinking. Albums chock-full of cover songs have long been a overlooked fallout of big box culture. We have all seen them while browsing the cd aisle of various media outlet centers. Rod Stewart Plays The Standards, The String Quartet Tribute to A Perfect Circle, Kids Bop, etc, etc, ad infinitum. Why do people buy this stuff? It’s because someone somewhere loves Rod Stewart so much they will listen to him read the obituaries (okay, I would listen to that too), because people watch hours worth of youtube videos of sixteen year olds playing their bass guitars to “Judith” anyway and because string quartets in their own right are pretty awesome.
That said, I pieced this concept together by (suprise!) listening to musicians I like playing the music of other musicians I like. Really though, what struck me was the conceptual ways they’ve been doing it lately. It’s simple, you take a classic album and a group of various bands and musicians and you have them cover the album from front to back in its entirety. Twice this year I was impressed with a full album cover effort. In fact they both have become essential to my favorite things of 2012 list.
Playing Hide and Seek with the Ghosts of Dawn
Back in 2009 the Flaming Lips released their attempt at Pink Floyd’s Dark Side of the Moon. Despite the use of Henry Rollins and Peaches on the record, the rework fell flat for me. Soon after its release they promised more full album covers to come.
This past October Playing Hide and Seek With the Ghost of Dawn started selling at a secret Flaming Lips show. It turned out to be a complete tribute to King Crimson’s debut record In the Court of the Crimson King. On it we have four seperate bands (Linear Downfall, Spaceface, Stardeath and White Dwarfs and New Fumes) playing alongside Lips members on four of the LP’s five Flaming Lips produced tracks. The remaining track, side A closer “Epitaph”, features all of the musicians including the Lips playing to a crescendo of glitch.
The entire tribute project was recorded, produced, mixed in Wayne Coyne’s Pink Floor Studio. This aspect lends itself beautifully to the flow of the project. Not a beat is skipped as Linear Downfall passes the torch onto New Fumes between “21st Century Schizoid Man” and “I Talk to the Wind”. Ears need not readjust.
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The Velvet Underground & Nico – Castle Face and Friends
This year marks the 45th anniversary of the classic album famously banana’d by Andy Warhol, The Velvet Underground & Nico.So cue the deluxe edition releases, the vinyl repress, the cover album. Let’s get this over with, guys, and try not to over do it. I want to keep loving this shit in 2013. So, the tribute album – that looks to be in your court, Castle Face Records. Whats that? “featuring reimaginations by Kelley Stoltz, Warm Soda, Ty Segall, Blasted Canyons (featuring Jeremy Cox of Royal Baths), White Fence, The Fresh & Onlys, Burnt Ones, The Mallard, Here Comes the Here Comes, K Dylan Edrich, and Thee Oh Sees!!!”
And that’s how I found the best set of tunes to put on after a stupid drive home from stupid work.
You know the original album, you know a good handful of the bands friendly Castle Face has tickled the talent bones of for us. You probably have a stupid work day coming up that you’d like to come down from in the best way. Get on it.
