Awesome Music

Musician Seth Everman takes a moment to step away from his keyboard to bang on the drums. To spice things up a bit, he used them to add a whole new rhythm track to ABBA’s 1975 classic Mamma Mia. Seth, we challenge you to do the same with Herb Alpert’s theme from Casino Royale next.

This fun puzzle was inspired by David Bowie’s Berlin Trilogy. Illustrated by Kev Gahan, the 500-piece puzzle features a scene of 1970s West Berlin filled with all kinds of colorful people, and Bowie scattered in the crowd in his various personas. There’s another Where’s Bowie? puzzle that takes place on the Moon.

While heavy metal music started to pick up steam in the 1970s and 1980s, its roots originate in 1950s and 1960s rock. Musician Andrea Boma Boccarusso looks back at the history of the genre with a medley of metal examples accompanied by descriptions, artists, and albums that typified each era.

(Flashing Images) Last Halloween, the Melodicka Bros. took The Cranberries’ 1994 track Zombie and reimagined it as a gloomy, synth-heavy track that could have easily have been a track on the Depeche Mode album Music for the Masses.

Vocalist Matthew Van Ness has impressed us with his orchestral vocal covers of the Star Wars and Jurassic Park themes. This time, he did something a little different, but similarly entertaining by turning 100 copies of his voice into the choir from the familiar opening theme from Halo video game series.

Oleg Berg’s YouTube channel is packed with popular songs electronically reworked into a minor or major key. This version of the crowd favorite Neil Diamond track Sweet Caroline has a decidedly more foreboding sound to it than the original, and as one observant commenter pointed out, it could be the theme to a James Bond movie.

The members of Korean a cappella act MayTree turn in a spot-on vocal version of the original theme song from Mortal Kombat, complete with the whole “Test Your Might” part and the character intros. Get out your gamepads and start mashing those buttons!

Let’s go crazy… down in this Hell. Bill McClintock imagines a world where Prince and Slayer could perform on the same stage, combining bits of Let’s Go Crazy, Black Magic, Angel of Death, Seasons in the Abyss, and War Ensemble, with a dash of Van Halen’s I’m the One and Led Zeppelin’s Whole Lotta Love for added flavor.

In this horror-comedy flick, the Foo Fighters look for an inspiring location to write and record their new album. They end up choosing a creepy haunted mansion as their recording studio, and things go off the rails when Dave Grohl becomes obsessed and possessed. In theaters 2.25.2022.

This awesome Bluetooth wireless controller connects to iOS and Android devices to provide a full set of controls for live DJ sets. It works in concert with Algoriddim djay software and music streaming services. In the hands of a talented performer like DJ Carlo Atendido, it’s truly an impressive bit of kit.

Puddles Pity Party pays tribute to the late, great David Bowie with a powerful and emotive cover of the track Lazarus off of Bowie’s final album, Blackstar. It’s especially apropos how Bowie paved the way for performers like Puddles to express themselves through costume and theatrics. Grab the single here.

Musician Michael Wilbur of the band Moon Hooch shows off some of the fantastically fuzzy bass notes you can make by stuffing a tall traffic cone into the bell of a saxophone. And that’s not the only way that you can make funky saxocone music.

Modern hardcore punk band Turnstile cranks up the volume while surrounded by a sound-dampening wall of stuffed animals in this most excellent NPR Tiny Desk Concert. The seven-song sit-down offers a fresh take on their acclaimed 2021 album Glow On.

There I Ruined It lives up to their name again by transforming Radiohead’s 1992 hit Creep into something you might hear coming out of one of Nashville’s Broadway honky tonks at three in the morning. The only thing missing is a cowboy hat atop Thom Yorke’s mop of blonde hair.

Musician Luca Stricagnoli trades his guitar for a banjo for this wonderfully unexpected cover version of Eminem and Dr. Dre’s track Forgot About Dre. Even without the acerbic lyrics, Luca’s pizzicato plucking cuts sharp as a knife.

Andre Antunes improves another viral video by adding a heavy metal soundtrack to it. This time, he amped up the already formidable footage of New Zealand’s All Blacks rugby team performing a traditional Maori war dance known as the Haka. Original video here.

It’s been a little while since we checked in with beatbox maestro Tom Thum, but from the looks of his TikTok channel, the dude’s still got it. Turn up the volume and listen up as he lays down beats, scratches, raps, and even sounds like an electric organ.

Back in the day, The Beatles rarely licensed their music for use in television or movies. But if George Harrison had lent his music to a TV series, it might have sounded something like DJ Cummerbund’s reimagining of My Sweet Lord as the theme song from Full House.

While they might not use all seven octaves, piano arrangements are generally designed for an 88-key piano. Musician Nahre Sol wanted to see what would happen if she condensed famous songs down to a single octave and played them on a toy piano. She then proceeded to rank them based on quality and effectiveness.

Musician Andy Thorn was enjoying a beautiful view and playing his banjo when a wild fox dropped in for a private concert. The little guy liked the music so much that he came back for more after he started to wander off. This wasn’t just a random occurrence either.

The Melodicka Bros. progressive rock cover of Green Day’s American Idiot brilliantly captures the improvised and meandering style of the genre. The only way they could make it better is if they added an 8-minute guitar solo and a laser light show.

Randy Newman’s You’ve Got a Friend in Me is one of the most memorable movie songs of all time. We really enjoyed this soothing cover of the Toy Story tune, performed by Korea’s Pulse Percussion on a marimba. Disney fans will also appreciate their marimba covers of He’s a Pirate and A Whole New World.

Guitarist Charlie Parra del Riego knows how to celebrate Christmas with style. Turn your speakers up to 11 and enjoy as he shreds a very special heavy metal edition of Jingle Bells. We recommend adding this to your holiday playlist between the Bing Crosby and Burl Ives.

We’ve been following musician Feng E since he was 10 years old. Since then, he’s continued to perfect and evolve his string instrument skills. You’ll want to crank up the volume for his sublime ukulele arrangement of the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ 2002 hit track Can’t Stop, performed with perfect pacing and precision.

Musician Nahre Sol performs a unique classical piano arrangement of The 12 Days of Christmas in which each verse gets progressively more and more modern. The performance starts out with the early 18th-century sounds of J.S. Bach and ends with an abstract 21st-century MIDI composition.

Unlimted Time Only created this wonderful music video for John Roseboro’s warm and heartfelt cover of It’s You I Like by beloved children’s show host Fred Rogers. Roseboro said: “There’s a generation of people in the middle of figuring out who they are… and I think it’s a message that we all really need to hear right now.”