• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join freeLog in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

That one random song your cover band does that nobody else does.

Yep, same here. I want to see the joy on someone's face when you play those forgotten gems. So many bands won't take that chance and it's a shame, because those are the things that keep people coming back, at least for us. Not know what you're going to get next, but knowing it's going to be good is what keeps certain clubs asking us back.

Just scrolling through this thread for more song ideas and read this.

That joy when they hear something they don't expect is worth more than non-musicians will ever understand. We see it when we play some of the ones I listed. Vanity Faire's Hitchin a Ride does that for us. Nothing hard about the song but it sure brings memories back for folks.
 
Just scrolling through this thread for more song ideas and read this.

That joy when they hear something they don't expect is worth more than non-musicians will ever understand. We see it when we play some of the ones I listed. Vanity Faire's Hitchin a Ride does that for us. Nothing hard about the song but it sure brings memories back for folks.
Even Zappa did that:






:)
 
Last edited:
Hope you can count past four


My brother and I discovered, while in a bar one night, that you can sing this "Counting to 12" song over "Low Rider" by War. Give it a try sometime!

Turning Japanese - by the Vapors
A former band used to play Billy Idol's "Dancing With Myself" and then go straight into "Turning Japanese". A few people got the joke. :D

The same band did Devo's "Jerkin' Back 'N' Forth", and "It's Alright For You" by the Police. Most people didn't know the songs, but dug them anyway.




A buddy and I play acoustic duo gigs now and then. He always enjoys playing "Ice Cream Man" (the Van Halen version). I knew it was a cover, so I looked up the original by John Brim and played it for him. The next time we played it live, we did the Brim version, and everyone loved it. It kind of surprised most of them, too.
 
Last edited:
My brother and I discovered, while in a bar one night, that you can sing this "Counting to 10" song over "Low Rider" by War. Give it a try sometime!

My band discovered that one of our songs was a perfect fit for the lyrics to the SpongeBob SquarePants theme. We haven't performed it live yet, but it's probably a matter of time...

A former band used to play Billy Idol's "Dancing With Myself" and then go straight into "Turning Japanese". A few people got the joke. :D

OK, I'll bite: what's the joke?
 
It's "Go" by Chemical Brothers.



Never heard anyone else play it. Not that I go see a lot of other cover bands. Sort of fell out of the list when we changed guitarists a while back though. It was obscure, the new guy didn't learn it, we stopped playing it.
Ironically, I wrote this a few days ago. Just got the setlist for a wedding we have a week from tomorrow and this song is on it. Hope the new guy learned it.
 
Except that Turning Japanese isn't actually about masturbation...

Unless you have extrinsic information provided by the writer of the song explicitly denying that the lyrics are about masturbation, there's nothing intrinsic about these lyrics that proves they aren't...and just enough innuendo to make it a very plausible explanation.

"I've got your picture of me and you
You wrote I love you, I love you too
I sit and stare at it, there's nothing else to do

Oh, it's in color, your hair is brown
Your eyes are hazel and soft as clouds
I often kiss you when there's no one else around

I've got your picture, I've got your picture
I'd like a million of you all over myself
I want a doctor to take your picture
So I can look at you from inside as well"

Sure it's all poetic license and imagery and metaphor, yadda-yadda-yadda... but the guy might as well be singing "I'm lying here all alone spanking it to your photo!" It's basically a re-write of The Who's "Pictures Of Lily"
 

Latest posts