Awesome Covers

The original theme song from The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air stands on its own, but we’ve gotta hand it to musician Ed Sheeran for putting a fresh coat of his smooth acoustic folk-pop style on the ’90s rap track during a recent appearance on Capital FM.

Musician Alexandr Misko performs a wonderful fingerstyle guitar arrangement of the King of Pop’s massive hit, infusing new life into the 1982 track. His covers of The Cranberries’ Zombie and System of a Down’s Chop Suey! are equally sublime. (Thanks Nathan!)

Another great cover by the Vitamin String Quartet. This time we’ve got Radiohead’s True Love Waits, which they recorded as well as Burn the Witch. If they sound familiar, that’s because they also recorded Motion Picture Soundtrack for Westworld.

YouTuber Grant Woolard is back with another classical mashup cover. Featuring 52 of your great-great-grandpappy’s jams from the OGiest of OG beatmakers such as Beethoven, Liszt, Strauss and Sousa.

Lamont Landers and his bandmates Bowen Robertson, Jaraven Moe Hill, and Kevin Canada turn in an awesome medley of Earth, Wind & Fire, Sly and the Family Stone, and a dash of funky love makin’ tossed in for good measure. Want some mo? Try on some Bill Withers.

Multitalented musician Kawehi reminds us why we love her so much, as she turns in an awesome one-woman performance of the Muse track Time is Running Out during a live performance. We’re looking forward to her recently crowdfunded new album EVE.

James Corden and Jim Parsons did a simultaneously amazing and hysterical job replicating the music video for Kansas’ 1977 classic Dust in the Wind. We’re pretty sure Parsons has no idea how to play the violin, but his beard more than makes up for it.

A decidedly lo-fi version of AC/DC’s classic Back in Black, performed by French group The Wackids, three musicians known for playing their concerts entirely on kid’s toys and other cheap musical instruments. Here they are playing some Joan Jett and Metallica.

Musician Leo Moracchioli takes on the 1993 track All That She Wants by Ace of Bass and applies a fresh and heavy coat of screaming, shredding, and devilish looks to the cheesy Swedish pop hit. Seriously though, how does Leo still have a voice?

If you don’t remember Wintergatan’s marvelous marble machine, go back and watch the video first, then watch this clip, in which they arranged a version of the memorable track that can actually be played on a piano. You can grab the sheet music or MIDI file for yourself.

Made from a bunch of bent metal rods and a wooden soundbox, the kalimba is one of the more rudimentary musical instruments. But Acoustic Trench shows how it can still make some sweet sounds, with a soothing cover of the 1999 Blink-182 hit on the little music box.

We’ve featured several videos of musician Luna Lee playing modern tracks on her gayageum, but this cover of Gorillaz’ Feel Good Inc. might be the most natural fit yet, thanks to the abstract and complex rhythms of Damon Albarn’s original track.

Jon Sudano has built a name for himself by creating a series of videos in which replaces the lyrics to popular songs with those from the Smash Mouth hit All-Star. We can’t decide if we like his RHCP, Foster the People or Radiohead best. He also knows some Nickelback.

We’ve heard plenty of cover versions of the music from Mario games, but Samuraiguitarist knocked it out of the park with this one, which not only perfectly lines up with the gameplay in the top left corner, but includes appropriate sound effects produced with his guitar.

Musician 331Erock cranks out an energetic electric guitar cover version of Ramin Djawadi’s hypnotic opening theme from the hit HBO series Westworld. We can’t get the image of a freshly-printed host being bathed in milky white liquid out of our minds now.

Postmodern Jukebox performs a Burt Bacharach inspired, rainy day jazz version of one of our all time favorite tracks, fronted by the smooth vocal stylings and ukulele strumming of Sarah Marie Young.

The Foo Fighters can already rock pretty damned hard, so we were kind of surprised to see Leo Moracchioli turn in a metal version of one of their tracks. Regardless, Leo knocked it out of the park with his latest cover.

Musician Luna Lee rocks out another awesome cover version on her classic Korean string instrument, this time taking on Pink Floyd’s 1979 classic Another Brick in the Wall. While Lee is from the South, the tune seems especially apropos of North Korea’s confomist society.

Please don’t make any sudden moves. Instead, sit back and enjoy this literally grand piano version of Twenty One Pilots’ big hit as arranged and performed by Costantino Carrara. Sheet music available for purchase here.

Mike Oldfield’s Tubular Bells (aka The Exorcist theme) requires multiple musicians when played on anything but a synthesizer due to its layering. Arranger Phil Toms and musician Steve Bingham replicated the track using a loop box to augment his single string instrument.

Haddaway’s 1993 tune What Is Love conjures up images of Will Ferrell, Chris Kattan, and Jim Carrey endlessly bobbing their heads, but Lisztlovers‘ piano arrangement turns the cheesy dance track into an elegant and moving piece of classical music.

The Warp Zone and Jimmy Wong team up to remind us how much better TV theme songs were when they actually explained the plot of the show, with a head-boppin’, finger-snappin’ rendition of Mark Mueller’s theme song from the late ’80s classic DuckTales.

There’s something just so wrong when vocalist Natalie Angst sings “Well, I’d pop a cap in Sancho and I’d slap her down.” We can think of no stranger cover version of Sublime’s controvertial 1996 classic than this jazzy remake by Postmodern Jukebox.