tjarrett

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Member Since: 1/16/2003
Total Mixes: 55
Total Feedback: 22

Other Mixes By tjarrett

Cassette | Alternative - College Rock
Playlist | Mixed Genre
Playlist | Alternative - College Rock
MP3 Playlist | Mixed Genre

coverflow

Artist Song
Batwa Pygmoids  Clementine 
Chris Whitley  Spoonful 
The Rolling Stones  Not Fade Away 
Sufjan Stevens  What Goes On 
Mediaeval Baebes  Scarborough Fayre 
Sonic Youth  I Know There's an Answer 
Bill Cosby  Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band 
Justin Rosolino  Stairway to Heaven 
Justin Rosolino  Brown Eyed Girl/Let My Cameron Go 
Jeff Buckley  I Never Asked to Be Your Mountain 
U2  Satellite of Love 
Beck  Diamond Dogs 
Red House Painters  Follow You, Follow Me 
Nouvelle Vague  A Forest 
Cathode  Maneater 
Eva Cassidy  Time After Time 
Nada Surf  If You Leave 
Nina Gordon  Straight Out Of Compton 
UMASS Front Percussion Ensemble  Paranoid Android 
Me'Shell NdegeOcello  The National Anthem 
Jeff Buckley  Calling You 

Comment:

This is my second covers mix. The first one did clumps of artists (groups of covers of George Harrison, for instance); this one tries to go chronologically by the original song, and mostly succeeds.

Specific notes: Track #1 is not, in the strictest sense, a cover, in that the original "Clementine" is public domain--but hearing the Batwa/Mbuti pygmy tribe perform it is certainly in the spirit of the mix. Chris Whitley's deathbed cover of "Spoonful" segues into the spirited Stones cover of the great Buddy Holly track. And then we're into the 60s, with Sufjan's cover of the Beatles' "What Goes On" transitioning into the Mediaeval Baebes' take on "Scarborough Fair" (not precisely the Simon and Garfunkel version, but still). Then. Bill Cosby's version of "Sgt Pepper" makes us wonder: Bill, if you weren't doing dope in the 60s, where the hell did this cut come from?

As a little intermezzo, two brief covers by Justin Rosolino indicate what happens to a tune when you bend it musically just a little bit.


Then the heavy hitting. Jeff Buckley's cover of his father's "I Never Asked to Be Your Mountain" is audacious enough, coming as it does as his first big stage performance at a Tim Buckley tribute in 1991, two years before his major label signing. But when you realize that Tim wrote the song about Jeff, and that it is Jeff singing back the lyric about his "scoundrel father"... well, that's kind of a mountaintop moment.


The seventies were generally less serious, so you get U2's faithful cover of Lou Reed's fey "Satellite of Love" followed by Beck's glam "Diamond Dogs" and the Red House Painters' version of Genesis' "Follow You, Follow Me." Then comes Nouvelle Vague's upbeat version of a grim Cure song and Cathode's grim version of an upbeat Hall & Oates song; Nada Surf's transcendent "If You Leave"; and Nina Gordon's cheerfully profane acoustic "Straight Out of Compton." A brace of Radiohead covers follows (and really, you haven't heard "Paranoid Android" if you haven't heard it performed by a marching band!).


The one non-chronological recording is the final one, Jeff Buckley's cover of "Calling You" (originally performed by Jevetta Steele). And it was too good not to let it be the closer.
image for mix

Feedback:

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Estaminet
Date: 1/6/2008
I'm REALLY looking forward to hearing this. Not least, perhaps, the Nina Gordon track.
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EclecticCo
Date: 1/8/2008
Yummy--cannot wait, though even in my intense anticipation I can't quite imagine Radiohead done by a marching band....
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Mixxer
Date: 1/11/2008
I like that Nina Gordon cover of NWA and used it on a mix once. Folks can hear it at Nina's site.