Bad Cover Versions

Trying to mock Limp Bizkit is a thankless task. They’ve already done all the hard work for you in a series of selflessly moronic gestures:

• the band’s masturbatorily-themed name;
• the pathetically mindless music;
• Fred Durst’s matching cap-and-bootees ensemble;
• Fred Durst’s name;
• Fred Durst’s face;
• Fred Durst.

Who else, other than Limp Bizkit, would take a concept as obviously flawed and stupid as Rap-Rock, and not only take it seriously, but make a (briefly) globe-straddling career out of it?

There are evil geniuses at work here – ones who prey on the likelihood that you’ll be distracted deleting swathes of parental emails or too busy playing at party poker to notice that their songs have the appeal of putrid dog vomit.

Despite this, upon discovering that they have covered George Michael’s Faith, a mental routemap of exactly which direction the band is going to take quickly forms. And the sinking feeling that soon follows is confirmation that, sadly, you were wholly correct.

Surely, you thought, they can’t be so pointless as to dredge up the old ‘fake-sincere cover that suddenly turns heavy and angsty for the chorus ‘ routine?

THEY COULD BE THAT POINTLESS.

In some respects, this cover is a resounding success: Teenyboppers can sing along to lyrics they know, and still feel edgy; TV network execs can rest assured that they’re being ironic and cool; and jocks can do that snappy-finger-above-the-head thing and remark, “Dude, he just totally burned that fag Boy George Michael’s ass!” before chugging another Heineken and smashing the empty cans against their foreheads.

For the rest of us, normal, human beings, the misery associated with the original version of the song is forever compounded by Durst and Co.’s plunge into the stinking depths of the corporate-friendly-cover-version sewer.

Congratulations Fred – a generation of burger-flippers salute you.

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Picture the scene. It’s 1990. You are Public Enemy – young, gifted and the “black CNN”.

You’ve released your angriest, funkiest, most brazenly controversial record yet – Fear Of A Black Planet. The key track is 911 Is A Joke, a fiercely critical song highlighting the longer response times of US emergency services visiting black neighbourhoods.

A million albums are sold in the first week – and America is running scared of its own problems. All is well.

Now imagine it’s 1995, and you have the deep misfortune to be in Duran Duran. For reasons unfathomable, you are still a million-selling act. A voracious, excited fanbase awaits your new album… of cover versions. What could go wrong?

This is what could go wrong:

The immediate question, as with all ill-thought-out cover versions, is ‘….but… why?…”. You must learn to immediately reject such notions. The key to truly appreciating excruciatingly bad cover songs is to disregard rational thought.

Rational thought, after all, would never have led to a soppy 1980′s quasi-boyband to cover the angriest song ever written by the angriest hip hop group there has ever been.

The secret is to revel in the detail:

• Luxuriate! in the blunderingly stupid faux-bad-attitude styling of Simon Le Bon, as he hops around, busting middle-class stupid-fresh stylings and attempting to look menacing, in skin-tight pink spandex trousers.
• Gasp! at the excruciating use of the mouth-organ – a pre-emptive Yeah-I-Feel-The-Black-Pain-Too sop to the critics, the sound of whom’s jaws collectively slamming against the floor was heard by even the most addled Duran Duran member.
• Shudder! at the dawning realisation that Simon Le Bon looks like a drunken escaped mental patient enjoying a night of freedom in a Karaoke bar.
• Laugh yourself silly! at the bewildered faces of the audience, who are wondering if the whole enterprise is for some sort of hidden-camera prank.
• Prepare To Sue! for the emotional pain caused by the ‘impromptu’ segue into a verse of Shaft. (Seriously, this happens.)

Watch the video right to the end, and then go and scrub yourself clean with bleach. A cover version so monumentally stupid, it has become the low-tide mark by which all others are tearfully measured.

It might be worth remembering at this point that when Public Enemy performed this song live, they had 10 Security Of The First World guards, wielding Uzis, marching on stage with them. Just to put it all in context.

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