Cover songs are increasingly blurring borders. Indie rockers are doing teen hits, bookish singer-songwriters covering R&B Casanovas, lounge singers covering heavy metal. Even the occasional celebrity gets into the fray (pictured). On today's show: behind the latest trends in cross-genre cover songs. Also: Live music from one of England's brightest young troubadours, the Mercury Prize-nominated singer-songwriter Laura Marling.
Enter Soundcheck’s songwriting contest! Your lyrics could be selected by our Grammy Award-winning judge and set to music by New York-area musicians. Click here for rules and more details.
Enter Soundcheck’s songwriting contest! Your lyrics could be selected by our Grammy Award-winning judge and set to music by New York-area musicians. Click here for rules and more details.
Cross-genre covers
As musical boundaries erode in the digital age, cover songs are becoming ever more farfetched – from indie boys covering teen starlets, to lounge lizards covering metalheads, to bookish singer-songwriters covering R&B Casanovas. Blender magazine editor and Slate.com contributor Jonah Weiner joins us to talk about this “thorny tangle of ...
Laura Marling live
Eighteen-year-old folkie Laura Marling aims to join a crowded field of young, female British songwriters that includes Lily Allen, Kate Nash, Adele and Amy Winehouse. On her full-length debut, "Alas, I Cannot Swim," Marling does more than keep her head above water, buoyed by rapid-fire confessional lyrics and a voice ...
The Musical Power of Bhutan Monks
Thirteen elaborately garbed and dagger-wielding Monks from the Himalayan kingdom of Bhutan are in New York City for a weighty mission: a week-long "cleansing" of various city plazas and parks. Joining us to explain is Lam Pema, one of the monks, and Tim McHenry, from the Rubin Museum of Art.
The Art of the Cover Song
Cover songs can be tricky – on one hand, a cover of a song you like will often simply remind you of why you liked the original in the first place, and will often suffer by comparison. (There are exceptions – I liked “Hurt” by Nine Inch Nails, but let’s ...