Awesome Music

Wheel of Fortune, Sally Ride, heavy metal suicide. Leo Morachiolli didn’t start the fire, but he did an impressive job covering Billy Joel’s wordy 1989 hit, adding fuel to the inferno with his hard-edged guitar and gravelly vocals. If you’re waiting for Joel to update the song for the 21st century, don’t hold your breath.

Musician Joel James has a unique talent – he’s able to perform songs backward so they sound like the original when played back in reverse. It’s a simple concept, executed brilliantly by Joel. See if you can guess these songs before he hits rewind.

During their visit to the BBC’s Radio 2 Piano Room, U2’s Bono and The Edge were joined by an orchestra for this toned-down cover of the ABBA track SOS. They also turned in an excellent orchestral version of their hit track Vertigo. Also, this isn’t the first time U2 performed an ABBA song.

While it’s obvious that Daft Punk’s music relies on sampling, some other songs on David Bennett’s list are surprising music recyclers. Songs like Gotye’s Somebody I Used to Know and Coldplay’s Talk feature samples or re-recorded musical passages. We also suggest checking out Tracklib’s Sample Breakdowns series.

Now that he’s schooled us on the history of heavy metal music, guitarist Andrea Boma Boccarusso is back with a medley of iconic rock riffs from 1965 to 2022. Crank up the volume to 11 on your headphones and see how many you can guess without looking.

The KISS song I Was Made for Lovin’ You offered a deliciously fun blend of rock and disco music. Now the 1979 track has a whole new sound courtesy of Postmodern Jukebox and vocalist Effie Passero. Scott Bradlee’s deft arrangement of the song is equal parts cabaret act and Ennio Morricone western soundtrack.

Musician Scott Bradlee has proven that just about anything can be a Ragtime song with the proper arrangement. His 1920s cover version of Radiohead’s 1997 classic Paranoid Android sounds fantastic, and we can totally imagine it being played in the speakeasy in Westworld’s Golden Age.

GLASYS has perfected the art of performing music which also is a drawing. This time, he used his own likeness as the subject for a musical portrait. The tune sounds like the soundtrack from an underground level of an 8-bit platform game. His composition Spectro Dragon is also quite special.

Pianos have been an important part of the musical landscape for hundreds of years. To celebrate this popular instrument, musician David Bennett put together this excellent 17-minute chronological medley of some of the most melodic piano intros ever. See how many you can name with your eyes closed. No peeking.

A banjo is not typically associated with rock or heavy metal music. But it turns out that if you tune it to standard C and shred metal riffs on a 6-string banjo the same way you’d play an electric guitar, it’s possible to rock out on the country-bluegrass instrument. Guitarist Bernth shows us how it’s done.

Given the nature of our website, we admit we might come across as materialistic. But that’s because there’s just too much awesome new stuff out there. Daniel Thrasher shares the same affliction and wrote a little song about his obsession with shiny new objects.

As we’ve seen before, inventor Nicolas Bras loves to make unique musical instruments. His latest instrument is one of the sillier ones we’ve seen. He created an improvised bagpipe by attaching his PVC pipe clarinets and a kid-sized duck pool float. It doesn’t sound much like the traditional Scottish instrument, nor does it quack like a duck.

School of Rock is a great place for kids (and adults) to hone their musicianship and performance skills. This group of AllStar students was a the top of their game when they took on Europe’s hair-metal classic The Final Countdown in the studio. Lead vocalist Eliza could go out and record an album right now.

Back in the 1980s, there were few bands to achieve the popularity of Depeche Mode. Despite their success, their melancholy alt-rock was at times quite formulaic. Musician Desmond Doom breaks down the basics so you can create your own Personal Jesus in under a minute.

Guitar strings are usually made from nylon or metal wire. Musician Bernth wanted to hear what an acoustic guitar might sound like when its strings are replaced with rubber bands. The low-frequencies sound more like a bass than a guitar, but they worked well enough that he recorded a song called Elasticity with them.

Richard Rey aka Office Drummer, has a unique skill. He accepts song requests, then live streams an improvised drum beat regardless of whether or not he’s played it before. His performances include Beastie Boys’ Intergalactic, Outkast’s Hey Ya!, Green Day’s Brain Stew/Jaded, and MGMT’s Electric Feel.

Look Mum No Computer is known for building some crazy electronic music makers. He’s also a master of wiring and programming modular synthesizers. He put together this fantastic arrangement of Vivaldi’s The Four Seasons that’s every bit as good as Wendy Carlos’ analog synth classic Switched-On Bach.

Musician Todd Barriage specializes in pop-punk and emo remakes of popular songs. Among his covers is this version of Ricky Martin’s mega-hit Livin La Vida Loca as if it was also the Sum 41 track Still Waiting. He nailed the sound, but Todd’s look is more “Weird Al” Yankovic than Deryck Whibley.

We recently went down the rabbit hole, creating a playlist of original versions of hit songs. SecondHandSongs helped us find lots of obscure originals and also revealed tons of unique covers we never knew existed. Like, did you know that this guy recorded Girls Just Wanna Have Fun four years before Cindy Lauper did?

Musician David Bennett performs accurate recreations of classic songs. After impressing us with his version of A Day in the Life, he teamed up with vocalist Guy Bangham to produce a spot-on version of The Doors’ Riders on the Storm. The Rhodes V8 virtual keyboard helped recreate the sound of Ray Manzarek’s keyboard.

Time and space travel is a common theme between Doctor Who and The Rocky Horror Picture Show, so it makes sense that the Time Lords might know the song Time Warp. Doctor Who Sings edited together footage which makes it look like the Doctors and other characters were singing along with Riff-Raff, Magenta, and Columbia.

Pakistani singer Nusrat Fateh Ali Khan was beloved for his incredible vocal talents and songwriting skills. Now Andre Antunes has taken part of his performance of Akhiyan Udeek Diyan and blessed it with a heavy metal companion track. The result is a sublime mix of two very different cultures. Turn on captions for the translated lyrics.

Good morning! It’s time for your wake-up call, and there’s no better sound to get you up and going than the screaming vocals of metalhead Leo Moracchioli. This time, he sharpened the edge of the Simple Minds track Don’t You (Forget About Me</a>. Rain keeps falling, down, down, down works really well as a metal lyric.