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Great covers singles 2015-2020


Al Krow

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We try to 'refresh' our set lists from time to time and have just included a few new tracks that seem to be going down really well with our audiences. But these were all from 1988 to 2014.

I had a start-of-the-year look at our set lists and noticed we've only got two tracks from the last five years (Jan 2015 to Dec 2019): Fonsi - Despacito (our lead vocals is bilingually Spanish which really helps!) and Portugal.The Man - Feel it Still.

Had a listen to the top 20 best selling singles from 2019 this morning (believe me, it's the sort of productive / useful cra*p you get upto when you've signed up to a 2020 gear abstinence thread) but nothing jumped out at me as being an obviously good track to include in our sets!

Be really interested to hear what modern tracks you have in your set lists from the past 5 years that are fun to play as a band and go down well with your audiences. Please feel free to post links of the tracks themselves or your bands playing them.

Cheers AK

Edited by Al Krow
Extended the thread out a year to include the current one!
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8 minutes ago, Crawford13 said:

Adventure of A Lifetime - Coldplay, 

Cant stop the feeling - Justin Timberlake

Orphans - Coldplay

These tracks are all generally well received and not mind numbing to play.

We do the top 2 on occasion to. Forgot about them! 

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3 minutes ago, BrunoBass said:

Good luck getting that together, great track to cover. Post audio if you do, I’d like to hear it 👍🏻

I will. We have it musically. Vocally it’s a timing thing, more rap than sing. 🤞🏻

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Slightly scary that the recommendations for great new material to cover, other than Juice, relates to seasoned old hands, given that part of the goal here is to try to keep our set lists relevant to younger audiences.

Coldplay (been around 25 years), Iggy Pop (around 50 years!) and even young master Bieber has been around a decade.

I'm hoping that Ariana Grande might have a couple up her sleeve (and tbf we've just added her version of 'Santa Baby' to our Christmas numbers)

No other new artists taking the world by storm in your sets?

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6 minutes ago, Crawford13 said:

But in a more serious note Bad Guy - Billie Eilish, and Don’t start now - Dua Lipa, could be pretty decent covers.

Yeah - Bad Guy was probably last year's iconic track. Could work if we stop at 02.45 in I think our drummer is balking a little at including that one 😁 ...although could be the excuse to get him to invest in a hand clap.

Agreed re Dua Lipa, she's had a few decent tracks for sure.

Are you doing either in your sets?

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We had trouble finding new relevant material to cover that was a) guitar based, b) currently on the radio / appealing to a younger audience. I was really pushing for this as we billed ourselves as ‘modern indie / alt rock’ and yet the most recent song we did was a Royal Blood track from 2013. 

In theory my bandmates were all up for it but in practice they baulked at nearly everything suggested; Blossoms, The 1975 etc. We got close, with a Sam Fender song, but it was too high for the singer, and he refused to change the key. They liked the idea of playing new stuff but we just always ended up doing another Kasabian album track... There was always resistance and prejudice towards certain bands (‘don’t like Muse, don’t like The Killers...’ ad infinitum) when in reality personal taste shouldn’t come into it.

I was always keen on the idea of taking something pop / dance / hip hop and giving it an alt rock treatment but they could never see it. Words failed me at times.

Edited by BrunoBass
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17 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

Yeah - Bad Guy was probably last year's iconic track. Could work if we stop at 02.45 in I think our drummer is balking a little at including that one 😁 ...although could be the excuse to get him to invest in a hand clap.

I would try this version of Bad Guy.

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That's a great version! 

But would you agree that's clearly not a live version with the instruments they have? There's a LOT of sound engineering going on there and a keys player lurking in the background probably some spotty geek who would have spoiled the video 😁

We don't have a keys player in the main band but could be about to get one for one of my other projects. But could be an interesting version for @bassfan's crew.

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9 minutes ago, Al Krow said:

That's a great version! 

But would you agree that's clearly not a live version with the instruments they have? There's a LOT of sound engineering going on there and a keys player lurking in the background probably some spotty geek who would have spoiled the video 😁

We don't have a keys player in the main band but could be about to get one for one of my other projects. But could be an interesting version for @bassfan's crew.

Yeah it’s definitely not live there. Yeah most new music would definitely be a struggle to pull off without  a keys player, as most commercial pop from the last few years has been either minimalist or overly produced, neither of which makes for easy covers in a guitar based covers band. It does however leave a lot of room for creative covers.

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Agreed there is a whole heap of synth in the background of a load of these tracks, but playing them live even in a 3 piece is entirely possible - the crowd will vibe off what you give them and won’t moan there was no synth.

There are a load of synth guitar pedals out there to help with this, especially if you have 2 guitarists but I think drummers have to get on board with sample pads hooked up to the PA so they can trigger synth/samples/atmospheric sounds whatever.

But as some of the guys have said, it’s a willingness for people to move out of 3 bar blues etc.

Keys help, but there is loads that can be done without

Edited by Cuzzie
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Our acoustic band struggles to find modern popular songs as, like said, there's not a lot of instrumentation going on. We're not adverse to changing songs around and actually thrive on doing stuff which 'shouldn't' work on these instruments (doublebass, guitar (12 & 6 string) mandolin, cajon (drum machine on a couple), 80s synth pop works well with the staccato nature of the mandolin as does 70s disco. We will do any music style in our own way but it's hard to find modern pop with enough going on for four different instruments. Dua Lipa's 'Be The One' works well, as does Portugal The Man, although I'm a little tired of that one. 

There was just more going on in older pop than today, not better or worse, just different, and that makes it easier to find stuff to play. It doesn't always make it easier to play though, Rio is rediculous on doublebass. 😄

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25 minutes ago, Maude said:

There was just more going on in older pop than today, not better or worse, just different, and that makes it easier to find stuff to play. 

I think 'word on the street' is that the typical modern pop star is a solo artist with a social media presence. It's now much more about the individual than the band.

Which completely ties in with what you're finding and the paucity of stand-out covers tracks from the past 5 years.

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Dua Lipa - Don't Start Now - grooves along nicely

Attention - Charlie Puth - also grooves nicely

Sigala/Beck Hill Wish You Well - might need to be a bit guitar heavy but easy to do the quiet/loud thing on verse chorusI'd say there's rock or 'versions' of these on line.

Wrecking Ball - Smiley Virus

Also check out future idiots for many's a rock cover of pop hits

We tend to pick a song we like and rework it to fit in with our line up/instrumentation.

 

 

Edited by krispn
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Dua Lipa - definitely getting a lot of thumbs up on this thread. I'm a fan of CP's Attention (I love the bass tone on that track) and actually suggested to my bandmates this morning!

We've had Wrecking Ball in the set for quite a while now, probs cos it's a 2013 track 😉

Not surprisingly Sheeran and George Ezra coming up in band discussion too.

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  • 2 weeks later...
On 05/01/2020 at 15:48, krispn said:

Dua Lipa - Don't Start Now - grooves along nicely

Attention - Charlie Puth - also grooves nicely

There's a tonal similarity (to my ears anyway!) of the bass line (048s in on Attention,, 011s in on Don't Start Now) on both these tracks and I particularly like them 'cos the bass is key to both.

What fx would folk suggest to nail that bass tone?

 

 

Edited by Al Krow
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