Awesome Covers

It was just yesterday that we paid our respects to Floppotron 2.0. As we hoped, Paweł Zadrożniak was at work building an even bigger and better electromechanical band. Floppotron 3.0 has 512 floppy disk drives, 16 hard disks, and four flatbed scanners for a richer and fuller sound than its predecessors.

Paweł Zadrożniak’s electromechanical orchestra has entertained millions with over 120 covers of popular songs. Now, the Floppotron 2.0 is being retired, and Paweł is sending it off with a performance of Andrea Bocelli’s Con Te Partirò, and there’s not a dry eye in the house. We’re hoping he’s just making room for Floppotron 3.0.

Whenever we go to a mall, the music they’re playing is some kind of canned garbage designed to make you spend more money. But these shoppers were treated to something way better – pianist Glaucio Cristelo, who played an epic cover of Foo Fighters’ Everlong. His channel is filled with many more great performances.

Tenacious D’s 2022 covers-for-charity song is a trio of classics by The Who – Pinball Wizard, There’s A Doctor, and Go To The Mirror! Jack and Kyle bring their usual mix of humor and melodrama to the medley, which is available on streaming platforms, and an exclusive 7″ single, with proceeds going to Everytown for Gun Safety.

Puddles Pity Party takes on haters and trolls by doing what he does best – singing away the pain. His mashup of Black Sabbath’s Paranoid and The Police track Driven to Tears is the perfect combination of madness and sorrow for the Sad Clown with the Golden Voice.

Here’s an oldie but a goodie. Back in 2011, the members of MercyMe performed this exuberant cover of The Beatles’ classic Ob-La-Di, Ob-La-Da in a very long hallway. Along the way, they got by with a little help from their friends.

Despite their very different sounds, The Beatles and Muse have at least a couple of things in common – they’re both English and both have filled large stadiums. Andre Antunes finds more middle ground between the two bands with this great performance of While My Guitar Gently Weeps done in Matt Bellamy’s grand style.

We suppose that a frog who dates a pig is a bit of a weirdo, so it only makes sense that Kermit would want to sing the Radiohead track Creep. This tasty morsel of Internet eccentricity comes to us courtesy of singer Rich Alvarez.

The members of 40 Fingers are back with another wonderful guitar performance. This time, they took on two classic compositions from John Williams’ Star Wars catalog, including the Main Theme and epic Emperor’s March, imbuing the tracks with their richly-layered acoustic sound.

Musician Leo Moracchioli is known for his heavy metal covers of pop music. We guess the classic singalong Row, Row, Row Your Boat is as popular as kids’ songs get. So Leo and his puppet avatar got down to business to give us the most metal version they could come up with. Life is but a dream, woooooooooooah!

A rambling, improvisational style is a trademark of jazz saxophone great John Coltrane’s sound, making them notoriously difficult for others to perform. Listen as harmonica player Cy Leo shows off his incredible breath control as he keeps perfect time with a passage from Coltrane’s 1960 classic Giant Steps.

The Stylophone is a very basic analog electronic instrument that uses a conductive pen and a metal circuit board of “keys” as its input device. But with the help of a Digitech Whammy effects pedal and some quick pen play, maromaro1337 jammed out some iconic rock riffs on the monophonic keyboard. More here.

The Melodicka Bros. are back with another cool cyberpunk/synthwave cover version of a classic tune. Their synth-heavy cover of Pink Floyd’s Another Brick In The Wall (Part 2) pays tribute to their supporters, who took on the part of the prep school chorus.

Cake already proved that the Gloria Gaynor track I Will Survive could do quite well with the addition of a trumpet. NYC bands Too Many Zooz, Lucky Chops, and the High & Mighty Brass Band teamed up to perform the disco classic primarily on brass instruments, and it sounds pretty stellar.

Franzoli Electronics is back with another great musical performance on his trio of tesla coils. This time the high voltage towers zap out an energetic cover of Koji Kondo’s oft-played theme music from Super Mario Bros. More of a Zelda fan? Be sure to check out his Tesla cover of The Legend of Zelda’s theme.

Musician Leo Moracchioli is here, there, and everywhere with energetic heavy metal cover of the Huey Lewis and the News 1986 hit Hip to Be Square, a song you might also remember from the novel and film American Psycho.

The always entertaining Cybertronic Spree is back with another awesome rock cover. This time, the musical Transformers took on the 1973 Sweet track Ballroom Blitz and peppered the music video with references to Wayne’s World, which featured a version of the song performed by Crucial Taunt.

Musician Alex Payler shows off the symphonic capabilities of Yamaha’s Electone Stagea ELS-02C electronic organ with an epic arrangement of Monty Norman’s James Bond theme music. The rich layering and realistic sounds really do make it sound like Alex has an entire orchestra right there with him.

During the Buckeyes’ game on 4.16.22, the Ohio State University Spring Athletic Band paid tribute to Van Halen with a half-time performance of the band’s hits “Runnin’ With the Devil,” “Dreams,” “Panama,” and “Jump.” We’re guessing “Hot for Teacher” would have been awkward at a college game.

Nataly Dawn and the talented musicians of Pomplamoose dance into the danger zone where the dancer becomes the dance with this awesome cover version of Maniac from the 1983 hit Flashdance. Michael Sembello’s synth-heavy track sounds as good as we’ve ever heard it here.

German band The Heimatdamisch is best known for their oompah-infused covers of rock songs. If you’re looking for a soundtrack to go with a stein of beer and some bratwurst, their ska-tinged version of Guns N’ Roses’ hit Sweet Child o’ Mine should do the trick.

Musician Alex Melton seems to have a thing for Blink-182. This time, he performs Rick Astley’s Never Gonna Give You Up in the style of the masters of pop punk. Next time you want to Rickroll someone, send them a link to this video.

Musician Luca Stricagnoli busts out his reverse triple-necked guitar yet again for an awesome fingerstyle cover arrangement. His performance of Foster the People’s Pumped Up Kicks is a delight for the ears that will have you bobbing your head to the beat, despite the song’s dark subject matter.