Awesome Music

Get your day started right with this warm and enveloping arrangement of Fleetwood Mac’s 1987 hit track Everywhere performed by the always entertaining Seb Skelly on five brass instruments. Need more brass to wake up? Try a dose of Killer Queen.

There is a house in this beautywood; they call the rising sun. There I Ruined It proves that there’s no ruining Mr. Rogers with this wonderful, but woefully short mashup of Won’t You Be My Neighbor? with The Animals classic House of the Rising Sun. We wonder what he could do with It’s Such a Good Feeling.

Daft Punk is re-releasing its final album, Random Access Memories to celebrate its 10th anniversary. The new edition includes 35 minutes of previously unreleased recordings, including this 8-minute segment that takes us inside the creative process of the song Fragments of Time with vocalist and co-producer Todd Edwards.

Multitalented composer, singer, and songwriter Danny Elfman stopped by Hollywood’s famed Amoeba Music for their What’s In My Bag? interview series. While there, he picked out some of the albums and artists that most influenced him. You can really hear the connections between his selections and his music.

Inspired by that commercial where the guy plays drums on his Pringles cans, Eric and Tony G from EMCproductions made their own set of drums out of potato crisp (and Gatorade) cans. They replaced the plastic lids with balloons as drum heads and used their metal bottoms as “cymbals.”

Musician T-Pain isn’t the first person you’d think could pull off a Black Sabbath cover. But he proves us wrong with his incredibly compelling version of War Pigs that showcases his vocal abilities and emotional power. It’s one of eight songs on his 2023 album On Top of the Covers.

We’ve heard Radiohead’s In Rainbows played with the sounds of Super Mario 64. Now enjoy another classic alternative album played in Nintendo style. Something is Real put together this epic remake of Nirvana’s Nevermind using the 64-bit game console’s sounds. The chiptune version of In Bloom is something special.

The Auralnauts used some editing and visual effects trickery to make it look like the characters in The Matrix movies (and Wilford Brimley) are reciting the lyrics to the Vanilla Ice hit Ice Ice Baby. Take the red pill, and it’s really Queen and David Bowie’s Under Pressure.

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.