I've been listening to Joe Jackson's "Night & Day" for almost 30 years now, and it's been almost 40 that I've been listening to Badfinger's "Straight Up," and it took "STEVES" suggestion to finally have it hit me. "Breaking Us In Two" is "Day After Day." How did I miss that one?
@ "ITSOK2BRIGHT," all of your Zeppelin entries would make a great mix on their own, but I'm not sure if that's what I was looking for. LZ just took a song, re-worked it, and claimed authorship...like 30 times. I know I used the word "rip off" on Wednesday, in which case, your suggestions would indeed make sense.
Thanks to all who participated. Here's what I've got for you.
TRACK LIST
Day After Day- Badfinger
Breaking Us In Two- Joe Jackson
In Between Days- The Cure
Pot Kettle Black- Wilco
Death Is Not The End- Bob Dylan
Tender- Blur
Welcome Back- John Sebastian
Mystery's All Mine-Jules Shear
It Only Costs A Dime- The Everly Brothers
Brilliant Mistake- Elvis Costello
I Want To Tell You- The Beatles
Only A Memory- The Smithereens
Ooh! My Head- Ritchie Valens
Boogie With Stu- Led Zeppelin
My Heart Hurts- Nick Lowe
Mary Anne- Marshall Crenshaw
Young Americans- David Bowie
When You Come Back To Me- World Party
THE ZIP
Coming in just under the wire for posting, but not soon enough for inclusion on the mix, was this suggestion from "LAMEREX." It's a good one.
The Animals' "Cheating" vs. Tom Petty's "Breakdown."
Thanks Lamerex, and to Soundsource for the quick supply of the Animals MP3, which I still only have on vinyl.
CHEATING
BREAKDOWN
14 comments:
Great concept, Sal! It will be a good listen.
Someday maybe you can do multiple rip-offs, like 1984's "I Want A New Drug" and "Ghostbusters," both "inspired by"* 1979's "Pop Muzik."
* at least they sure sound like the same song to me
I'm too distracted at the moment to look this up, but I remember listening to a Steely Dan song from just a couple of years ago and yelling in the car, "That's Brown-Eyed Handsome Man"!
Is "Cheating" fron ANIMALIZATION? God, I haven't heard that album in years, but yeah, it's "Breakdown."
I'll be damned.
And speaking of the Smithereens, I'm sure I've told this story, but a friend of mine who was in a pop band used to work at Folk City, when Pat DiNizio was a part time emcee for their New Wave nights or whatever.
Anyway, Pat said "Wanna try writing a song together?" and my friend said sure thing. So a few days later they were sitting in Pat's living room, guitars in hand, and all of a sudden Pat looks up after playing and riff and goes "Wow -- did you hear that? That's fantastic -- kind of like "Ticket to Ride'."
And he's all excited, and plays it again.
And my friend goes "Uh, Pat -- that IS 'Ticket to Ride.'"
True story.
:-)
Great story and YES, Animalization.
I'm honored to have grabbed the lede in today's post. Thanks!
And here's a true story to go along with it...
I already mentioned that JJ and I had a somewhat irksome interview session some years back. But a few years before that, I was sitting in one of my favorite watering holes in the Village one night when the man himself came in (accompanied by a rather nice-looking black woman, whom he was obviously keen on). After 10 minutes or so, I pointed him out to my buddy behind the bar, who suggested we play one of his tunes on the jukebox. Night & Day was still current at the time, and I told him about the similarity to the Badfinger song. "I think we have that on the box," he said. So, being the instigator that I am, I got up and put some quarters in the jukebox. Several minutes later when the song came on, the bartender loudly stated to no one in particular, "Hey, isn't that a Badfinger song?" To which, Jackson exclaimed (again, to no one in particular), "I never heard that song before! I swear to God, I never even heard it!" He and his girl left quietly a few minutes later.
Geez, you don't have to go back that far for Petty..."First Flash of Freedom" from Mojo is "Dreams," Allman Bros.
And the Smithereens...don't get me started...they perfected the Lenny Kravitz sideways-ripoff approach back when he was still cleaning out the deli case at WaWa.
...by the way, Huey Lewis did end up with a writing credit on "Ghostbusters"...
I remember seeing a writing credit for Mrs Valens on Boogie With Stu and wondering what that was all about. Then I saw one of those early R&R movies with Richie Valens doing Ooh! My Head and thinking, "Well that's not right."
I'm with Simels, The Smithereens sounded more like Ticket To Ride than I Want To Tell You.
I'm with you on Breaking Us In Two. How could we miss that?
The rest were fun to hear especially Lowe/Crenshaw.
Did anyone mention Louie Louie and Hang On Sloopy? I though that would have been a shoo-in.
Nomination for best song about stealing a song:
Richard Thompson "Little Blue Number"
I've got a good one for ya that'll open some eyes... try playing Boston's "More Than A Feeling" right before you play Nirvana's "Smells Like Teen Spirit" and you'll be amazed...
great post Sal!
Oh, boy. It must've been a couple decades ago now, but shortly after I got The Beatles Past Masters 2 on cd, I heard, I think it was a Bon Jovi song, and I was raising and waiving the red flag - "hey, this part is totally a Beatles song!" The song got popular and I never heard any mention of them ripping off the Beatles song (I would check my cd to figure out which song it is, but it has been missing for several years... I just ordered the Beatles Mono set, so perhaps the last disc in that will jog the memory).
Anyway, I look forward to checking this out - thanks!
By the way, last year I picked up a couple discs by The Jam, trying to fill in old gaps, and heard the song that is a total rip-off of Tax Man. I wondered if there was some talk at the time of this being some sort of clear tribute. I mean, the bass line is, um, the same, most distinctive part of the song...
As for the Steve Miller, well, I've heard he has "taken" his share of stuff, too. At least the Jam's version sounds like Swingtown via Gang of Four.
playing the songs at the same time on separate speakers---u nailed it, sal, music detective...
hey, they accused my grandfather, Frank Silver, a one hit wonder with YES WE HAVE NO BANANAS in 23' from stealing the melody that could have been derived from a combination of parts of other songs including the Hallelujah Chorus from Messiah by Handel, "My Bonnie Lies Over The Ocean" and "I Dreamt I Dwelt in Marble Halls".
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