Just Stop it!

I dig the 2 "Real to Reel" projects by Tesla. Those are songs I cut my musical teeth on. Sure they picked overdone stuff by Skynyrd and The Stones and the Sabbath tune sucked. Overall they did that putting their own stamp on the tunes for the most part.

Stypers covers album was pretty decent. I expected something else on a few of the tunes they did, but again not that bad.

The albums Shannon listed above are good too.

007 wrote:

I don't care who's on them, tribute albums hold no interest for me. Pass (again)

Ditto

I would like to produce a Phil Lynott tribute album. But with a specific theme, his songwriting. I would bring in a bunch of singer/songwriters and folk musicians to interpret his amazing lyrics and melodies into new acoustic arrangements. To me, that's the kind of tribute albums that would be interesting. Getting musicians from different genres to reinterpret the music of a famous artist.

Getting a bunch of hard rock bands to cover Thin Lizzy tunes would be boring.

Precisely the reason Judas Priest's covers of "Diamond and Rust" and "Green Manalishi" so cool. They were completely reimagined.

Same with Nevermore's Simone and garfunkle tune.

Or Johnny Cash covering more NIN and soundgarden, those are cool.

Some tribute albums are excellent. The first Nativity in Black album is awesome, for instance. Typically the most you'll get, however, is a great cover or two, like this:



Blows the original away, in my opinion. I don't care if we're talking classic Maiden here. This cover is f*cking brilliant.

Anyway, giving credit where credit is due, seems that UDR Music is at least making an effort here.





Sounds waaaaaaay better than expected. And goddamn, I just realized that Tim Owens is singing on nearly every track!

DevZor wrote:

Precisely the reason Judas Priest's covers of "Diamond and Rust" and "Green Manalishi" so cool. They were completely reimagined.

Same with Nevermore's Simone and garfunkle tune.

Or Johnny Cash covering more NIN and soundgarden, those are cool.

I love when bands do that and it works. The Priest tunes and Nevermore cover are perfect examples. One of my all-time favorites is this one:



A little rough and raw, but I love the alt-rock take on it. And on topic of tributes, this album has a number of really good if by-the-numbers cover tunes by some no-name bands.

Shoot. Says video unavailable when I click on it.

Iron Maiden covering Nektar, Jethro Tull and Beckett is an excellent example of how to take other peoples material and make it sound like your own.  That's actually what all covers (whether on tribute albums or whatever) should aspire to.

S.D. wrote:

Iron Maiden covering Nektar, Jethro Tull and Beckett is an excellent example of how to take other peoples material and make it sound like your own.  That's actually what all covers (whether on tribute albums or whatever) should aspire to.

Agreed. Like this:



One of the most classic heavy metal tunes of all time as a kick-ass emotional piano ballad? Damn right!

Holy crap that is bizarrely awesome.

I don't mind tribute albums if some more obscure tracks are covered or if the covers are interesting. For instance this Jasta cover of Black Sabbath's Buried Alive is vicious as hell, but it's still in the same style as the original:



I also like Shades Apart doing a punk cover of Tainted Love:



I do find these "allstar cast" tribute albums to be fairly crappy and I generally don't buy them.

Eyesore wrote:

S.D. wrote:

Iron Maiden covering Nektar, Jethro Tull and Beckett is an excellent example of how to take other peoples material and make it sound like your own.  That's actually what all covers (whether on tribute albums or whatever) should aspire to.

Agreed. Like this:



One of the most classic heavy metal tunes of all time as a kick-ass emotional piano ballad? Damn right!

That is pretty cool. I do like my piano cover versions with a little less sanity though.



Anyone who has read the cover versions thread knows that I love them, they can be amazing. It's just that this one looks totally 'rent out the usual hired guns and make some money' type of affair. I'd like to hear some guitarists that actually inspired Randy like Schenker or Uli give their interpretations of his songs, that would be cool.

I wondered why pretty much the only song not included in the clip above was "Crazy Train." Now I know why. It sucks. It sucks baaaaaaaad!



I love System of a Down, but Serj sounds terrible here. Not right for this song at all!

Here's a unique take on Holy Diver (and quite tongue-in-cheek methinks)



The online comments about this song are hilarious, nothing more entertaining than metalheads blowing a gasket.

S.D. wrote:

I would like to produce a Phil Lynott tribute album.  But with a specific theme, his songwriting.  I would bring in a bunch of singer/songwriters and folk musicians to interpret his amazing lyrics and melodies into new acoustic arrangements.  To me, that's the kind of tribute albums that would be interesting.  Getting musicians from different genres to reinterpret the music of a famous artist.  

Getting a bunch of hard rock bands to cover Thin Lizzy tunes would be boring.  

It's been done - It was called Grand Slam. Phil on smack is better than anyone else trying to pull off his stuff.

Not sure when someone says "makes it their own" if they mean they need to change it up (Nevermore covering the Sound of Silence, Uncle Slam covering Dazed and Confused) or meaning that it sounds like there's integrity behind it (Metal Church covering Highway Star, Powermad covering Gimme, Gimme Shock Treatment, WASP covering the Real Me, etc)?
To me, I guess if it's done well and I like it, then well, I guess I like it. I don't really overthink it.
Do you all have a preference?

allthingsmetal wrote:

Not sure when someone says "makes it their own" if they mean they need to change it up (Nevermore covering the Sound of Silence, Uncle Slam covering Dazed and Confused) or meaning that it sounds like there's integrity behind it (Metal Church covering Highway Star, Powermad covering Gimme, Gimme Shock Treatment, WASP covering the Real Me, etc)?
To me, I guess if it's done well and I like it, then well, I guess I like it. I don't really overthink it.
Do you all have a preference?

Either way really. Iron Maiden doesn't really change the Jethro Tull version of Cross-Eyed Mary, it just has a crunchier guitar sound.

S.D. wrote:

I would like to produce a Phil Lynott tribute album.  But with a specific theme, his songwriting.  I would bring in a bunch of singer/songwriters and folk musicians to interpret his amazing lyrics and melodies into new acoustic arrangements.  To me, that's the kind of tribute albums that would be interesting.  Getting musicians from different genres to reinterpret the music of a famous artist.  

Getting a bunch of hard rock bands to cover Thin Lizzy tunes would be boring.  

Being that Thin Lizzy is my fave band I would wanna cover a million tunes but I would definitely choose "Dublin", "Gonna Creep Up On You", Sweet Marie", Don't Believe A Word both the original slow version and version on Johnny The Fox as one song, "Parisienne Walkways, "Spanish Guitar" (both appeared as demos during the Black Rose sessions), "For Those Who Love To Live", "Borderline" & "Fight Or Fall". I could go on but do I really need to?

S.D. wrote:

allthingsmetal wrote:

Not sure when someone says "makes it their own" if they mean they need to change it up (Nevermore covering the Sound of Silence, Uncle Slam covering Dazed and Confused) or meaning that it sounds like there's integrity behind it (Metal Church covering Highway Star, Powermad covering Gimme, Gimme Shock Treatment, WASP covering the Real Me, etc)?
To me, I guess if it's done well and I like it, then well, I guess I like it. I don't really overthink it.
Do you all have a preference?

Either way really.  Iron Maiden doesn't really change the Jethro Tull version of Cross-Eyed Mary, it just has a crunchier guitar sound.

For me, a great cover works when, no matter what, whether the music or structure or whatever has changed—or not—it sounds like that particular artist wrote it.

Hahaha!

Right after slagging off tribute records I hear the greatest tribute album I have ever heard!!



Brownout presents Brown Sabbath is an amazingly great record, mixing in latin funk to the Sabbath sound while keeping the spirit of the original songs fully intact, here's the guys in action



Luckily Amazon had a couple of vinyl copies left (at a price!) because it was sold out evrywhere else.

Here's another track from the Ultimate Ozzy tribute - "Mr Crowley" with Chuck Billy on vocals:

Sounds ok....its just missing something....not sure what it is. Its miles better than Serj & Tom's abomination of Crazy train though.

But I find it interesting that they've not released any of the Tim Owen's tracks since he's on 85% of the album.

If they are going to make a Randy Rhoads tribute album I wish they would include a couple of his Quiet Riot era tracks...some of those songs are very good and Randy just shines in them....

brokentulsa wrote:

If they are going to make a Randy Rhoads tribute album I wish they would include a couple of his Quiet Riot era tracks...some of those songs are very good and Randy just shines in them....

They have done......It's still going to suck!

Witchfinder wrote:

Here's another track from the Ultimate Ozzy tribute - "Mr Crowley" with Chuck Billy on vocals:

The way this is shaping up, it may win a grammy for best comedy record, both of the songs on here are hilariously baad!! How the hell can Chuck manage to sound tone deaf when he's growling through the whole song? Somehow he manages it!

Tribute my arse, this is nothing but a lazy half arsed cash grab.