Sometimes a band can do someone else's song and make it rock. Just look at Quiet Riot's "Come On Feel The Noise", which was a cover of a band I'd never heard of. However, some covers are so horrible, they are a disgrace to the original artist.

So far, the worst I've heard are from the Japanese version of the game Donkey Konga 2, a music game using a bongo controller. The song choices were awesome, but the covers sound like they are MIDIs, and the vocalists can sing out of a paper bag. Anyone else know bad covers?

'Personal Jesus', 'Tainted Love' and Sweet Dreams' by Marilyn Manson.  He ruined great songs with his drowining vocals that sounds like the devil choking on a hotdog.

I still claim that Kim Wilde (yes, the one you remember from the New Wave anthem "Kids in America") doing a cover of... a cover of...

Look, if you'd never heard the original, you'd think it was pretty incredible techno.  If you liked techno, you'd think it was pretty good techno.  If you'd heard the original and liked techno, you'd think it was the worst abomination ever burnt to CD... and you'd keep an MP3 of it on your "road trip" playlist anyways.

I dare you to listen to the thing to which I'm going to link.  You'll laugh.  You'll cry.  You may go completely catatonic and sit there, slackjawed at the screen, drooling over your keyboard.  But you will not keep a straight face.  This is a cover that sounds so wrong that it's gotta be right... but it's so wrong that it not merely overflows wrongness to become so-wrong-its-right, it's so so-wrong-its-right, that it wraps so-wrong-its-right right back into wrongness again.

I'm Foo Bar, and Kim Wilde's 2002 cover of Steppenwolf's Born To Be Wild is my secret cover shame.

There is a techno type style of The Cure's "Just Like Heaven" that I heard on the radio the other day.  Didn't catch who did it, but I could not stand it.  It was kinda slowed down but with kind of a reggae/ tecno beat to it...  Trying to find it on youtube now.

Nazareths cover of the Boudleaux Bryant song Love Hurts is bottom line the most screechy, whiny, boring, song ever.  Roy Orbison, Jim Capaldi did a fantastic version, but Nazareth may have well have been sucking splinters from the bottom of the barrel.

These Boots Are Made for Walking - Jessica Simpson

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c18YB3329SQ

Nazareths cover of the Boudleaux Bryant song Love Hurts is bottom line the most screechy, whiny, boring, song ever.  Roy Orbison, Jim Capaldi did a fantastic version, but Nazareth may have well have been sucking splinters from the bottom of the barrel.


It takes all types....I just love that version!  ;D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c18YB3329SQ


Gah! I couldn't even stand the original! 8-P

Gah! I couldn't even stand the original! 8-P


I was just gonna say .. when was that song ever good? ;D

Nazareths cover of the Boudleaux Bryant song Love Hurts is bottom line the most screechy, whiny, boring, song ever.  Roy Orbison, Jim Capaldi did a fantastic version, but Nazareth may have well have been sucking splinters from the bottom of the barrel.

I like Nazareth's version of the song quite a bit, but I understand how you can find it a little screechy and whiny.

Aaron Carter - Surfin USA. But at the same time, it's funny.  ;D

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4T1Sm1Pff_Y

Britney Spears "I Love Rock N' Roll"

Britney Spears "I Love Rock N' Roll"


AMEN!

Britney Spears "I Love Rock N' Roll"


I third that one.  blech

Guns N Rose's cover version of Mama Kin comes to mind as one of the worst to me.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VqOxt3DwK0c

Ugh. Make it stop.

Barbara Streisand did John Lennons "Mother" .  What was she thinking???

BUMP. Flo-Rida's cover of Dead Or Alive's "You Spin Me Round" was crap.

Barbara Streisand did John Lennons "Mother" .  What was she thinking???


I think Douglas Adams said there was a place in the universe were everything that was never supposed to exist exists, and sometimes one of those things escapes, and you end up with Dick Cheney, or Streisand's cover of "Mother."
http://www.inthe00s.com/smile/08/redblob.gif


Here are some really godawful covers, even the ones that are kind supposed to be bad are bad for the wrong reasons:

The Rubinoos: Surf Trek
The Cure: Hello, I Love You (1990)
Dinosaur, Jr: Just Like Heaven (1989)
Ministry: Lay Lady Lay (1996)
POTUSA: Video Killed the Radio Star (1997) -- This song does not lend itself to covers, that's the point.
The Bobs: Helter Skelter (1983) -- New Wave a Capella, I don't think so.
Vanessa Carlton: Paint It Black (2002) -- A few are worse in other ways, this is just vapid.
Hate Dept: Blasphemous Rumours (1997)
Cyndi Lauper & Roger Waters: Another Brick In The Wall -- Live (1990)
Heaven 17: Holiday (1999) (1983)]
Alice Donut: Sunshine Superman (1988)
The Flying Lizards: Summertime Blues (1979)
Duran Duran: 911 is a Joke (1995)