Run For Cover is a weekly music column comparing cover songs to the original version. Prepare for a major bending of rules as we hear musicians throw around genres, tempos, style, and intent. Whether they’re picking up another’s song out of respect or boredom, the results have impressed us.
Shoegaze icons Galaxie 500 were only around for a sobering four years, but during that time they craft three albums that would shape the dream pop and alt rock bands who followed them. Comprised of singer and guitarist Dean Wareham, drummer Damon Krukowski, and bassist Naomi Yang, the trio formed during their time studying at Harvard University in 1987 and chose to name the group after their friend’s 1960s car, a Ford Galaxie 500.
Their lifestyle often mirrored, intentionally or not, their sound. In a lazy move, Krukowski didn’t own a drum kit when they began playing, so he borrowed one from his classmate and future late night icon Conan O’Brien. They played gigs in Boston and New York and, eventually, tracked down producer Mark Kramer to ask him to work with the band. With Kramer by their side, they put out their first single, “Tugboat,” later to be release on their debut album Today.
Despite lo-fi sighs of The Velvet Underground and similarities to Boston icon Jonathan Richman, the band gained popularity in England instead of in America.
Part of what makes single “Tugboat” so mesmerizing is Wareham’s stunted vocals and their limited range. While US press saw that as a flaw, it’s gone on to be one of the band’s trademark sounds. His vocals draw out their intelligent indifference, letting it hang while 1950′s blues guitar lines shed a couple tears and Krukowski’s slow drumming cushions their fall. And yet, years later, it made its way onto The Perks of Being a Wallflower soundtrack. Surprise.
Biting their lips with irony two decades later is Joanna Gruesome. The Cardiff-based noisepop band clings heavily to the DIY aesthetics of Riot Grrrl and the C86 cassette collection, working to put out music that has a gritty fizz and sticks to the basics of middle-finger flipping and youth’s garage rock. Most importantly, when the five-piece met in anger management, they all rallied together to fight back against sexism, homophobia, and stereotypes.
They’re today’s musical superhero with a paper Joanna Newsom mask tied to their face.
Joanna Gruesome work hard to bring out pop melodies within noisy hardcore. Obnoxiously loud live, the five members line up together to kick things over with the intent of showing the better things hiding in their shadows. It’s angry, it’s scratchy, and it’s going a little too fast for anyone to hold on, yet everyone’s grinning wildly through the chaos.
Released as the B-side to 2013 single ”Sugarcrush,” their cover of Galaxie 500′s “Tugboat” melts their pent up fury so that it becomes a calming pool of mercury, poisonous but still. It’s a faithful cover that nods to the indie icons in solidarity, keeping their posture stiff while their hands–donning black-painted nails–shoots away from their face, frontwoman Alanna McArdle lets out a haunting scream, and the group launches into the Yo La Tengo-like downpour of noise.
It’s obvious when listening to Joanna Gruesome’s cover of “Tugboat” that they have internalized Galaxie 500′s hit and are regurgitating it with burnt memories and broken hearts slivers floating in the mess. There’s a stinging pain in McArdle’s voice that’s inpossible to ignore. It’s that vivid wound she’s sharing that elevates their cover, giving it a genuine honesty and emotion that not only makes itself known, but felt.
