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New Yorker music critic Sasha Frere-Jones has been contemplating cover songs on his blog recently, specifically how a great cover either Kills (“be killingly good, perhaps good enough to stand alongside the original”) or Owns (“redefine the song and steal it from the author”). I had that topic on my mind this weekend when I was talking with a friend about the CSS cover of L7’s “Pretend We’re Dead.” After listening to it a ton in the past few weeks and watching it totally slay in some DJ sets, I have to say that I prefer it to the original.
It’s almost unfair that some artists come up with inspired remakes that merely Kill—the Posies with “Richie Dagger’s Crime,” Ted Leo with “Since U Been Gone”—while CSS and the Clash straight up jack their covers and end up Owning them. They just bring out an energy the original lacks, leaving us little choice but to hand the song over.
