Can you feel it? It’s like an invitation to another game of Cover Me. Can you hear it? That’s the sound of me running out of bands to use in this game. Seriously, you guys are hard, nay, impossible to stump.

Below are magnified fragments of 25 album covers. Most of them are well-known albums, but there are a few obscure covers (or lesser-known albums from well-known artists) mixed in to keep you honest. You must guess both the artist and album cover. In order to keep things simple, live albums, soundtracks and singles compilations will not be used, and with all apologies to our European and Japanese friends, we are going with the covers that appeared in the US record stores…back when we had record stores. Sigh.

The rules are the same as Name That Tune. Each player can make three guesses between updates (“Update” is defined as “The time when I post a comment listing all of the covers that have been guessed correctly”), so everyone will have a chance to contribute. And, just to spice things up, we have a puzzle cover this week, yay! One guess per player of the puzzle between updates, please. Don’t worry, I won’t hurt you. I only want to have some fun.

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2) (more…)

The show must go on. Scraps may be temporarily out of action, but the rest of the Popdose staff is picking up the slack and carrying on with Name That Tune in the hopes that our efforts come remotely close to the lofty standards he set for us all.

The Rules:

• MAXIMUM THREE GUESSES between updates of the list, to give everyone a chance to play. An update of the list is when I post the entire list of correct guesses with the words “OFFICIAL UPDATE.”
• While I’m not going to be a stickler for spelling and punctuation, you must guess the correct musician and song title to a close approximation.

How the game is played: I have uploaded twenty-three very brief song clips. Most of the songs are well known, though for the sake of this game (which will make sense once you’ve started playing), some of them are obscure. The clips are drawn from a variety of styles and decades. It’s likely that you’ll find a few of them instantly recognizable, while a few others you won’t know at all (but other people will, and you can’t hold it against them). There is no puzzle song this week, sorry. There is also no acrostic this time, however the clips all have something in common. I do not suspect it will take you long to figure out what this week’s theme is. Heck, you might be able to guess it without listening to a single track.

And here are the clips:

1. clip 1
2. clip 2
3. clip 3
4. clip 4
5. clip 5
6. clip 6
7. clip 7
8. clip 8
9. clip 9
10. clip 10
11. clip 11
12. clip 12
13. clip 13
14. clip 14
15. clip 15
16. clip 16
17. clip 17
18. clip 18
19. clip 19
20. clip 20
21. clip 21
22. clip 22
23. clip 23

I suggest subscribing to the comments on the post to more easily follow the progress of the game. Remember — please! — NO MORE THAN THREE GUESSES between updates of the list. Have fun!

Or, White Label Wednesday, Before They Were Stars Edition

Underworld would like you believe that they were immaculately conceived in 1994 as the spooky techno band that “debuted” with dubnobasswithmyheadman, with no past or, if pressed, a Jason Bourne case of amnesia about their former life. Ah, but we know better, don’t we? Underworld indeed has a past; they were just hoping that they could pull a Ministry and leave it all behind. The incredible thing is, it worked; almost no one remembers Underworld’s days as a synth-pop band.

But we do.

Underworld formed from the ashes of the band Freur, which scored a minor hit with the Kraftwerk-esque “Doot Doot.” When they disbanded, Freur members Karl Hyde and Rick Smith recruited three more dudes and went whole hog for the brass ring, impressing Seymour Stein enough to hire Rupert Hine – he worked with Howard Jones, man, we’re gonna be huge! – to produce 1988’s Underneath the Radar, the band’s first album for Sire. The album, well, seemed really cool at the time. Hell, even the music supervisors of “Miami Vice” liked them enough to drop the title track into a big bar fight scene. The song cracked Australia’s top ten. In the States, however, it scratched and clawed its way to #74.

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Did you find last week’s quiz physically exhausting? Get it, physical, ‘cause I used Olivia Newton-John? God, those puns just write themselves, don’t they? My friend Sid would punch me in the face if he read this column.

Below are magnified fragments of 25 album covers. Most of them are well-known albums, but there are a few obscure covers (or lesser-known albums from well-known artists) mixed in to keep you honest. You must guess both the artist and album cover. In order to keep things simple, live albums, soundtracks and singles compilations will not be used, and with all apologies to our European and Japanese friends, we are going with the covers that appeared in the US record stores…back when we had record stores. Sigh.

The rules are the same as Name That Tune. Each player can make three guesses between updates (“Update” is defined as “The time when I post a comment listing all of the covers that have been guessed correctly”), so everyone will have a chance to contribute. And, just to spice things up, we have a puzzle cover this week, yay! One guess per player of the puzzle between updates, please. Are you ready, Mr. Burns? Are you set, Mr. Burns? Go, Mr. Burns.

1)

2) (more…)

“I dooooooon’t wanna be old, and sleep alone / An empty house is not a home.”

The back half of that line is pure cliché, but that is the beauty of a good melody; you can sing any old dumb, tired expression and get away with it, as long as you say it the right way.

Indeed, it was downright ballsy of Keane – this might be the first time anyone has ever used ‘Keane’ and ‘ballsy’ in the same sentence, so let’s pause for a second and savor the moment – to open their 2006 album Under the Iron Sea with “Atlantic.” Yes, their 2004 debut Hopes and Fears played many of the same cards that Iron Sea does in terms of overwrought sentimentality, but there isn’t a single song on Hopes and Fears as naked or as vulnerable – not to mention downright odd – as “Atlantic,” and to open your sophomore album with a song like this is to risk career suicide. Of course, it only made me like them more.

Hopes and Fears was about bending but not breaking, the places only we know, and how your ex has no time for you now; it sure as hell wasn’t about the fear of dying alone. They showed glimpses of a darker side on the album’s last two songs, “Untitled I” (“You’re not the one I hoped for / I’ll see you on the other side”) and the brilliant “Bedshaped” (“Don’t laugh at me, don’t look away / You’ll follow me back with the sun in your eyes / And on your own”), but “Atlantic” takes an inter-dimensional leap from those songs. “I hope all my days will be lit by your face,” singer Tom Chaplin confesses, but Chaplin’s delivery of those words betrays the sentiment. This isn’t a love song; it’s the prayer of a groveling man. “I doooooon’t wanna be old, and feel afraid…”

And just then, just past the 2:30 mark, the clouds break, and the song sees its first major chord. The storm is over, and while the singer hasn’t escaped his dilemma, he at least begins to think in more positive terms: “I need a place that’s hidden in the deep / Where lonely angels sing you to your sleep / Though all the world is broken.” And, as one final gesture to show that Keane was trying to expand their sound as much as a keys/vox/drums band can, Chaplin’s last note is a half-step underneath the key. “The day is beginning,” he says, and you’re just waiting for him to climb up to the base note in the chord — but he never does. It’s a small thing, but I eat that stuff up.

Embedding is disabled, but there is a video for “Atlantic” (including an extended version of the song, to boot) that is just as dark as the first half of the song. Get ur mope on.

Keane – Atlantic

Note: due to frequent scheduling conflicts involving its creator being unable to monitor his own game (his day job keeps getting in the way, sucker), Cover Me is moving from Tuesdays at 9:30 EST to Mondays at 1:30 EST. Think of it as the Popdose equivalent of “Scrubs,” only not as funny.

Did you bring a nickel and tap your feet last week? That’s just swell. I’d say more, but you’re already picking my bones clean enough as it is. I’ll reference a cover from last week, but no more hints for this week’s album covery goodness.

Below are magnified fragments of 25 album covers. Most of them are well-known albums, but there are a few obscure covers (or lesser-known albums from well-known artists) mixed in to keep you honest. You must guess both the artist and album cover. In order to keep things simple, live albums, soundtracks and singles compilations will not be used, and with all apologies to our European and Japanese friends, we are going with the covers that appeared in the US record stores…back when we had record stores. Sigh.

The rules are the same as Name That Tune. Each player can make three guesses between updates (“Update” is defined as “The time when I post a comment listing all of the covers that have been guessed correctly”), so everyone will have a chance to contribute. And, just to spice things up, we have a puzzle cover this week, yay! One guess per player of the puzzle between updates, please. Are you ready, Mr. Burns? Are you set, Mr. Burns? Go, Mr. Burns.

1)

2) (more…)

Everyone seemed to have so much fun jumping into the wayback machine with Nicolette Larson – and really, who wouldn’t want to jump into a wayback machine with Nicolette Larson? – that I thought I’d write up another song from the same era, though from a completely different universe than the one that birthed “Lotta Love.” I bring you, Sir Cliff Richard.

Cliff Richard was the Kylie Minogue of his time – and a lot of other people’s times – in that he racked up hit after hit after hit in his native UK (born in India to British parents, technically), while scratching and clawing his way into the American Top 40 a mere nine times. Nine times, compared to…wait for it…one hundred and twenty-five Top 40 hits on the UK charts (number spelled out for dramatic effect), including a staggering 70 Top 10 hits. Wow. Just…wow. That’s insane. And it will never happen again.

By the time “We Don’t Talk Anymore” reared its mellow disco head in late 1979, Richard had already cracked the UK Top 40 sixty-seven times. To establish a point of reference, the Beatles have notched 52 Top 40 hits in the States to date. No wonder he was knighted in 1995. The man is a national treasure, and not even a 1985 remake of his 1959 hit “Living Doll,” performed with the cast of BBC cult show “The Young Ones” (resident douchebag Rick, “spelled with a silent ‘P’,” was a big fan of the Cliff), would change that. If he were an X-Man, he’d be Juggernaut. Unstoppable, that Harry Rodger Webb.

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Man your battlestations, it’s time for another quiz. No clue for this week’s puzzle, as you guys are far too good at this already.

Below are magnified fragments of 25 album covers. Most of them are well-known albums, but there are a few obscure covers (or lesser-known albums from well-known artists) mixed in to keep you honest. You must guess both the artist and album cover. In order to keep things simple, live albums, soundtracks and singles compilations will not be used, and with all apologies to our European and Japanese friends, we are going with the covers that appeared in the US record stores…back when we had record stores. Sigh.

The rules are the same as Name That Tune. Each player can make three guesses between updates (“Update” is defined as “The time when I post a comment listing all of the covers that have been guessed correctly”), so everyone will have a chance to contribute. And, just to spice things up, we have a puzzle cover this week, yay! One guess per player of the puzzle between updates, please. Is it on? Oh, it’s on.

1)

2) (more…)

Yep, another Duran Duran post from Popdose’s resident DD fanboy (or Durannie, as we were once called). Between this, my White Label post on “Hold Back the Rain,” and John Hughes’ post on “My Own Way,” Popdose has officially covered one third of the band’s 1982 album Rio. I’m sure Lord Jefito never envisioned that when he assembled this alleged All-Star lineup of bloggers.

Now, I loved “Save a Prayer” as much as the next teenage girl, but when it came to Duran ballads, my heart lay with “The Chauffeur.” As pretty as “Prayer” is, the lyric never really meant anything to me (yes, I know that Simon’s lyrics didn’t really mean much to anyone). I was too young to call one-night stands paradise, and there was no reason for anyone to say or save a prayer for me.

Maybe the problem was that I just hadn’t heard the right arrangement of it yet.

In 1992, Steve Anderson, the Brothers in Rhythm member who made an earlier appearance in my White Label column on the Human League’s “Love Action,” assembled the most beautiful, absolutely fucking brilliant mix of a track I have heard before or since. Dubbed the “Thunder in Our Hearts” mix –- he samples Kate Bush in the intro, but not, strangely enough, “Running Up That Hill,” the song that features those words –- Anderson strips out the drum and bass tracks, replacing them with tasteful, electronic versions of each. Most of Nick Rhodes’ keyboard tracks are scrapped too, in favor of strings and piano. But it’s not just the new additions that make this mix so good; it’s Anderson’s arrangements and breakdowns that make the re-instrumentation so effective.

There really isn’t anything else to say. If you didn’t care for the original song, this might change your tune. If you are a fan of the song, prepare to be mindblown.

Duran Duran - Save a Prayer (DMC Thunder in Our Hearts Mix)

Are these quizzes still bringing on the heartbreak, or is this the time you show that you’re for real? Or did I just give you a clue to one of this week’s covers? That’s for me to know and for you to find out. Homer Simpson once said it takes two to lie: one to lie, and one to listen. In 16 years, I never understood what he meant by that.

Below are magnified fragments of 25 album covers. Most of them are well-known albums, but there are a few obscure covers (or lesser-known albums from well-known artists) mixed in to keep you honest. You must guess both the artist and album cover. In order to keep things simple, live albums, soundtracks and singles compilations will not be used, and with all apologies to our European and Japanese friends, we are going with the covers that appeared in the US record stores…back when we had record stores. Sigh.

The rules are the same as Name That Tune. Each player can make three guesses between updates (“Update” is defined as “The time when I post a comment listing all of the covers that have been guessed correctly”), so everyone will have a chance to contribute. And, just to spice things up, we have a puzzle cover this week, yay! Oh, and just for kicks, I flipped one of the covers around (it’ll make sense when you see it). One guess per player of the puzzle between updates, please. Ready, Freddys and Bettys? Time to rock steady.

1)

2)

UPDATE: Expanded looks at the final two covers contained at the bottom.
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