Awesome Accordion

Musician GRAYSSOKER’s primary instrument is a customized accordion that he uses as a sound source for some incredible, genre-bending electronic mayhem. He uses a number of effect pedals to augment its sounds and to create mesmerizing, live-looped sequences. Can’t get enough? Enjoy another cool live performance.

We recently stumbled upon the EZ Band, and we’re glad that we did. This Houston-based group of musicians has many talents, among them the ability to take alternative music and spice it up with their Norteño sound. This cover of The Strokes’ Last Nite is one of our favorites, but you should also check out their Smiths and My Chemical Romance tracks too.

Viljami and Herman Morander are two of the most talented accordion players we’ve ever heard. After their explosive performance of Through the Fire and Flames, they’re back with an impressive accordion arrangement of Metallica’s Master of Puppets with a few other Metallica references woven in for fun.

The DragonForce track Through the Fire and Flames is known for its impossibly fast chord progressions and blister-inducing appearance in Guitar Hero III. The Morander Brothers turned in a flawless cover version of the song, performed on a pair of accordions. Their cover of Iron Maiden’s The Trooper is just as impressive.

A few years back, musician Alexandr Hrustevich wowed us with his mad accordion skills. Now sit back and fill your ears with this nearly 30-minute classical solo concert that includes music by Bach, Sibelius, Vivaldi, and Albinoni. All we can say is he must have some serious calluses on his fingertips.

If you haven’t seen Edgar Wright’s The Sparks Brothers yet, what are you waiting for? During production of this most excellent documentary, Wright convinced “Weird Al” to perform an accordion cover of Sparks’ track This Town Ain’t Big Enough for Both of Us from their 1974 classic album Kimono My House.

We’ve heard a million and one versions of the Super Mario Bros. theme music, but it’s still fun to discover a new take on the classic video game tune. The very talented Ukrainian duo B&B Project performed a live run-through of World 1-1, with the button accordion providing the music, and the bandura creating the sound effects.

It looks like SirTremendous could use a housekeeper, but we’ll forgive the mess in the background because his performance of the Green Hill Zone soundtrack from Sonic the Hedgehog is just too good to ignore. His YouTube channel has more great covers like Want You Gone from Portal 2 and a Star Wars medley.

When we think of accordion music, we immediately have visions of a polka band, or maybe Weird Al. But musician Beeble proves this underappreciated instrument can sound just as great in some prog rock psychedelia – when in the right hands.

Ukraine accordion duo Vasyl and Viktor Kravchuk turn in an impressive cover of John Williams’ Imperial March from the Star Wars saga. We can imagine Darth Vader making a typically grand entrance to the music, while an army of stormtroopers dance the polka.

The Who’s 1971 classic Baba O’Riley has one of the most memorable synthesizer riffs of all time. Here, the guys from Those Darn Accordions! turn in a fun cover version of the track with the synths replaced by accordions. They need to do a version of Squeeze Box now.

Musician Douglas Borsatti cranks out a wonderful and unique cover version of the King of Pop’s 1982 uber-hit on his squeezebox. If Michael Jackson performed while strolling the streets of Paris wearing a beret, we imagine this is what his music might have sounded like.

The accordion may not have the range of an Electone, but accordion virtuoso Alexandr Hrustevich shows us that it’s enough to stand in for a string section in this 2013 performance of Vivaldi’s Summer and Borodin’s Petite Suite.

Musician Lucjan Drewicz lets his fingers fly across the keys and buttons on his instrument, turning in an insanely fast performance of a Brazilian track called Tico-Tico no Fubá. He’s not as fast as this guy, but his performance is more nuanced.