Flush it Friday: Cover Songs, Tribute Albums, and Other Impossible Tasks
There is nothing new under the sun Son.
At some point over the summer, a random Thursday league bowling night was saturated with Soundgarden hits on repeat, and I ended up tossin’ rocks that night. It felt like I had found my perfect bowling soundtrack. Subsequently, I started running back the Soundgarden discography–and by discography, I mean from Ultramega OK through Superunknown–before finally just settling on keeping Superunknown on repeat. Because of that, I inquired on the ToH Discord if anyone had any hot tips on primo Soundgarden covers. Ultimately having to answer my own question–thanks, Discord dweebs!–I discovered, serendipitously, that Magnetic Eye Records was, in just a few short weeks releasing two Soundgarden cover albums, one a track-by-track dive into the aforementioned 1994 opus and the other a hodgepodge of songs from Louder Than Love, Badmotorfinger, and Down on the Upside. My plan was to dive into both and offer up a review or two of the cover albums, crafting all sorts of criteria for all the different ways a cover song can succeed or fail. It would have been an intellectually rewarding exercise, and, I am sure, a nearly rewarding article. Alas, best laid plans and all that.
Instead, it’s Friday in late August, and I’m actually listening to a Toilet ov Hell podcast episode about cover songs we like, so I’ll simply just say this about Magnetic Eye’s tribute to Superunknown: some of it is pretty okay and some of it isn’t! One or two tracks might very good. Somnuri‘s “Mailman” is aces; Frayle‘s “Head Down” and Darkher‘s “Like Suicide” are appropriately lugubrious; Jack Harlon‘s “Kickstand” actually fixes the album’s worst song; and Marc Urselli skirted disaster by doing something legitimately cool with “4th of July.” Listen to ’em all on bandcamp, ya rubes!
All of this as preamble to the questions: what are your favourite cover songs? what are your favourite tribute albums? do you actually have any good memories of cover bands or tribute bands you’ve seen live? what do you think of Magnetic Eye’s double-dipped tribute to Seattle’s finest? do you like that I’m not capitalizing these questions as they’re actually all part of the same sentence as indicated by following the colon? Now it’s a new sentence! Now it’s time to answer all these questions! Or is it? It’s not! Let’s flush.
You have to incorporate Jake in these lists.
Yes, I actually listened to this week’s episode. No, I am not happy about it. (36 Crazyfists? Really?)
The mighty Jake wrote a mighty review of a band he thinks is mighty and who released what he thinks is a mighty debut.
Gage did the legitimately difficult work of reviewing a band with 30 years of albums.
That’s it! That’s all there is to flush. Of course, you gotta share the Goods, those Bads, them Uglies. Along with your G/B/Us, answer all those questions about cover/tribute songs/albums/bands I asked above. I love you all. You are all blessed. Be well.
