The City Veins

We are currently in the process of deciding what songs to cover. This is a remarkably arduous process. The problem is that we want to pick a song that people will know, and a song that we can play differently than the recording. The point of a cover is to have something that concert goers, particularly those that don’t know us, can immediately recognize. Something that will wake their ears up. The flip side, is that we want people to be able to learn something about us as a band based on the way we play the cover. For example, we could play “Across the Sea” by Weezer perfectly and all the you would learn is that we like “Across the Sea” by Weezer. And really, who doesn’t like that song?

For me, this creates a whole category of songs that I can never cover. Songs that I love. I could never cover “Let Down” by Radiohead because I love that song too much, and can’t contemplate playing it differently than the recorded version. What happens is that we have to find songs that are well known, and that we don’t love but that we respect and/or find interesting. This is a difficult proposition. Try to think of songs that fulfill these requirements. We are currently toying around with “Nothing Compares 2 U,” “Walk Away Renee” or maybe something from Motown. Something by the Clash might work, but then we quickly enter the songs that I love realm. I just don’t know.

Feel free to chime in with any suggestions. We are getting desperate.