Awesome Bluegrass

Hey-oh-way-o! In 1986, The Bangles had a hit on their hands with their unstoppable pop-rock track Walk Like an Egyptian. The song was quirky on its own merits, but this country-bluegrass performance from The Cleverlys on Country Road takes it to a whole new level. Like that? Check out their cover of CeeLo Green’s profanity-free Forget You.

If you’ve seen the Coen Brothers’ film, O Brother, Where Art Thou?, you’ll immediately recognize the song I Am a Man of Constant Sorrow, made famous by The Soggy Bottom Boys. Singer Geoff Castellucci sang all parts of the American folk classic and embellished the track with his impressive low bass vocals.

The Vince Guaraldi Trio’s Linus and Lucy from A Charlie Brown Christmas brings happy memories flooding in. While the jazzy original was performed on piano, bass, and drums, Foggy Mountain Spaceship gave it a twangy new sound by playing the track on banjos. For more banjo goodness, check out their cover of Walking on the Moon by The Police.

Composer Lalo Schifrin’s theme from Mission Impossible is one of the most recognizeable TV and movie theme songs of all time. But we bet you’ve never heard it like this. Musician Jamie Dupuis found a way to preserve the urgency of the original while adding a dash of bluegrass on the 5-string banjo.

There I Ruined It imagines how people celebrate Halloween in Kentucky by turning Michael Jackson’s megahit Thriller into a bluegrass song. We like to imagine the zombies dancing down the street in overalls and nibbling on straw. Also, it turns out this isn’t the first bluegrass version of the song.

Finnish band Steve’n’Seagulls pays tribute to the Top Gun franchise with a jangly bluegrass version of the Kenny Loggins track Danger Zone. The video combines live performance footage and a series of vignettes featuring a stereotypical American dude who really wants to fly like an eagle.

Vocalists Robyn Adele Anderson and Anthony Vincent of Ten Second Songs fame teamed up to perform this twangy bluegrass cover of the Guns N’ Roses track Sweet Child O’ Mine. Get out your dew rags and your best square dancin’ outfit for a good old time.

The Coen Brothers’ 2000 movie O, Brother Where Art Thou featured a fantastic bluegrass soundtrack, highlighted by George Clooney’s lip-syncing to Dan Tyminski’s version of Man of Constant Sorrow. Nearly two decades later, Tyminski stopped by the Paste Magazine offices for this flawless performance of the tune.

Saskatchewan bluegrass band The Dead South takes on The Doors 1967 classic People Are Strange, giving it a twangy country sound and a music video that reminds us that space aliens are people too. From the EP Easy Listening for Jerks – Part 2, a collection of their rock covers.

There I Ruined It is back to mess with another classic tune, transforming Beck’s 1994 hit Loser into a twangy Bluegrass tune best suited to square dancing. Kill the headlights and put it in neutral! Now Do-si-do and Promenade!

There I Ruined It have outdone themselves, turning Eminem’s Without Me into a twangy bluegrass song that sounds like it could have been the theme to The Beverly Hillbillies or Hee-Haw. We suppose that’s what you get when you start your song with square dance instructions, Marshall.

Ukranian folk-rock cover band Sedo i Ludy offers their unique spin on the Bon Jovi track It’s My Life, with a rollicking cover version that combines bluegrass with traditional Russian folk sounds. About halfway through it turns into a Haircut 100 version of the James Bond theme song.

Ain’t nothin’ but a heartache. The Backstreet Boys track I Want It That Way gets a new sound courtesy of The Petersons, who transformed the 1999 boy band hit into a twangy bluegrass song, complete with the requisite fiddle, banjo, upright bass, and steel resonator guitar.

Performing under the name Goat Rodeo, musicians Yo-Yo Ma, Stuart Duncan, Edgar Meyer, and Chris Thile turn in a wonderfully stripped-down performance that combines elements of jazz, bluegrass, country, folk, and classical music. Vocalist Aoife O’Donovan accompanies the quartet for the final song “The Trappings.”

Once we rose above the noise and confusion, we came across this fun cover of the 1976 Kansas rock hit Carry on Wayward Son, played with way more squeezebox, mandolin, banjo, and upright bass than the original. Performed energetically by the Finnish bluegrass band Steve’n’Seagulls

YouTube channel There I Ruined It is in the business of messing with popular songs and, well, ruining them by covering them in a totally inappropriate style. Their bluegrass reworking of Michael Jackson’s “Bad” is so wrong that it’s right. We also chuckled at their swing version of Nirvana’s “Come As You Are.”

Alt-bluegrass band Keller Williams & The Keels‘ latest album features some great, jangly cover versions of classic tracks from Weezer, Presidents of the United States of America, The Doors, Ricky Martin, and Fiona Apple, among others. Let’s kick things off with a little Hash Pipe.

There are a zillion covers of Billie Eilish’s hit Bad Guy out there, but we’re going to have to give our vote to Dan Davidson’s group DD and the Butterlovers and their bluegrass version. We have no idea what the deal is with their outfits, but we still say “yee-haw!”

Ah, there’s nothing quite like a Finnish bluegrass band performing a Lenny Kravitz song in a French street corner restaurant. So sit back, crank up the volume, and enjoy as Steve ‘n’ Seagulls gives the 1993 hit Are You Gonna Go My Way a fresh new sound.

We like to imagine David Hasselhoff pulling up in a rusted out old jalopy (with an LED light bar on front) as the visual accompaniment to Banjo Guy Ollie’s awesomely bluegrassified cover of the familiar theme from Knight Rider.

Jump back, what’s that sound? It’s a banjo and an upright bass! The bluegrass wizards of Finland’s Steve ‘n’ Seagulls turn in another insanely delightful cover, this time taking on Van Halen’s hit Panama with their trademark rapidfire twang.

We’ve heard more than a few of cover versions of a-ha’s 1985 hit Take on Me, and now we can add bluegrass to the list. The guys from My Brother’s Keeper do the track proud with their jangly sounds and layered harmonies. Bonus points for hitting that impossibly high note.

We’ve heard a few interesting cover versions of Toto’s Africa, but we’re particularly enamored of the jangly and twangy country sounds of Doug and Cletus as their band turns in a catchy bluegrass arrangement of the 1982 pop hit.