00:00Welcome to WatchMojo, and today, we're counting down our picks for the top 10 cover songs
00:12that took inspiration from the original, but radically changed in terms of style and sound.
00:25Number 10. Hallelujah.
00:28Jeff Buckley.
00:37Whenever people talk about the truly great cover songs in music history, it's hard not to look at Jeff Buckley's Hallelujah as a prime example.
00:45Taking the gospel-infused roots from Leonard Cohen's original, Jeff Buckley strips things down to bare bones.
00:51The baffled king composing Hallelujah.
00:55However, even though his version is more minimal, his vocal delivery and guitar work elevate the song into a totally different stratosphere.
01:05Buckley's voice carries so much more emotion and weight than Cohen's more understated style.
01:10Whether you prefer the youthful take that Buckley gave us or the more weathered original from the great poet Cohen,
01:15Hallelujah is truly a timeless piece of music.
01:19Hallelujah.
01:26Number 9.
01:27With a little help from my friends.
01:29Joe Cocker.
01:31Ringo Starr didn't sing too many songs in the Beatles' catalog, but when he did, they were generally quite memorable.
01:37If I sang, how did you, would you stand up and walk out on me?
01:43With a little help from my friends is one of the standout tracks on Sgt. Pepper's Lonely Hearts Club Band,
01:48and it might just be Ringo's finest hour as a vocalist.
01:51But when Joe Cocker got his hands on it for his debut album,
01:54this chirpy and optimistic song was transformed into a blues rock classic.
01:59Cocker's vocal delivery, along with his backing singers,
02:09imbues this Lennon-McCartney track with a level of soul that takes things to a totally new level.
02:15And trust us, the live versions are even better than the studio recording.
02:27Number 8.
02:29Killing Me Softly.
02:30Fugees.
02:31I heard he sang a good song.
02:35I heard he had a style.
02:39Roberta Flack's legendary number 1 hit Killing Me Softly with his song was so well-received
02:44that it won her a Grammy in 1974 for Record of the Year and Best Female Pop Vocal Performance.
02:50So when Lauryn Hill and the Fugees took the song in a much more modern and hip-hop-infused direction 23 years later,
02:56it was a move out of left field.
02:58However, the result was an absolute masterpiece.
03:01Killing Me Softly with his song.
03:07It perfectly bridged old-school R&B with the direction the genre was headed in during the 90s.
03:12It should come as no surprise that the Fugees came away with a Grammy of their own for their efforts.
03:17Killing Me Softly with his song.
03:21Killing Me Softly.
03:23We didn't know that we needed to hear a stripped-down Tori Amos version of Smells Like Teen Spirit until we actually heard it.
03:41Somehow, someway, this piano-driven take on this grunge masterpiece works phenomenally well.
03:46Here we are now, entertain us.
03:52Gone is all of the heavy distortion and angst-ridden vocals, replaced with a surprising amount of control and restraint.
04:00Amos covers Cobain in a manner that is almost the complete opposite of the original, but it retains some of the attitude.
04:07When a song is truly great, it can take on a myriad of different shapes.
04:12And that's what Tori Amos achieves here.
04:17Number 6.
04:22Nothing Compares to You.
04:24Sinead O'Connor.
04:26It's been 7 hours and 15 days.
04:30Prince's original composition, Nothing Compares to You, was destined to be remembered among his finest pieces of work.
04:39But even though his version is truly excellent, Irish singer Sinead O'Connor reinvented the song as one of the most heart-wrenchingly yet uplifting ballads of all time.
04:48Nothing Compares to You.
04:52O'Connor's voice alone sells the performance, but she also changes the melody in places, bringing some real tension to the chorus.
05:03Prince himself, who famously did not enjoy covers of his work, was actually full of praise for her version.
05:09Nothing, nothing.
05:14But when they finally met, they supposedly didn't get along.
05:19However, that doesn't really matter, because, at the very least, this indirect collaboration between these two iconic artists exists.
05:27All the flowers that you place, mama, in the backyard.
05:34Number 5.
05:35Heartbeats.
05:36Jose Gonzalez.
05:37You gotta give props to Jose Gonzalez for hearing the potential for a modern folk classic buried within the knife's excellent synth-pop anthem, Heartbeats.
05:53He took the original tune and stripped away all of the electronics, adding his own warm voice and acoustic guitar.
05:59In the end, what we got was something entirely new.
06:10In Gonzalez's hands, Heartbeats became an incredibly influential piece of indie music culture in the early 2000s, eclipsing the fame of the original and inspiring a number of cover versions of its own.
06:22It catapulted Gonzalez to international fame and remains his biggest hit to this day.
06:28What'd I be doing now?
06:35Number 4.
06:36Mad World.
06:37Michael Andrews featuring Gary Jules.
06:40All around me are familiar faces, worn out places.
06:47Tears for Fears were truly a special band.
06:49Their ability to write timeless pop classics has made them as relevant as ever in the 2020s.
06:55Mad World.
06:57Mad World.
07:02But even they must have been surprised at how much success Michael Andrews and Gary Jules were able to have with their track, Mad World.
07:10This version totally rips out the foundation of the original, turning it into a bleak but undeniably beautiful slice of perfection.
07:18The dreams in which I'm dying are the best I've ever had.
07:23Released as part of the Donnie Darko soundtrack in 2001.
07:27This track completely switched up the genre of the original while retaining the overall message.
07:32Songs don't come much sadder than this one, folks.
07:36Mad World.
07:38I will always love you, Whitney Houston.
07:45If I should stay.
07:53When Dolly Parton wrote, I will always love you, it was bound to be a smash hit.
07:58Her understated but sincere performance vocally was matched by some of the most immediate pop lyrics ever written.
08:04However, for as much as Dolly's original was beloved.
08:14When Whitney Houston took the reins in 1992, she took things to a totally different place.
08:20Released as part of the soundtrack for the film The Bodyguard, which also starred Houston, this became the power anthem to end all others.
08:28End all others.
08:33It was a declaration of love that was perhaps bigger and bolder than anything before it.
08:38To this day, it remains the highest selling single by a female artist of all time.
08:42Number two, All Along the Watchtower.
08:53The Jimi Hendrix Experience.
08:54There must be some kind of way out of here.
08:59Say the joker to the thief.
09:01Covers don't come along much more transformative than Jimi Hendrix' take on Bob Dylan's All Along the Watchtower.
09:07The original is a pretty straightforward track within Dylan's catalog in terms of the instrumentation,
09:12and vocal delivery.
09:13No reason to get excited, the thief he kindly spoke.
09:20But when Hendrix got a hold of it, he well and truly blew the doors off their hinges.
09:25It was a shockingly effective overhaul of what was essentially a folk rock song.
09:29Dylan's words were brought to life by an incredibly urgent-sounding Hendrix and his band.
09:43As psychedelic as anything he ever released, it was his incredible guitar work that really set this one on fire.
09:49It's the gold standard for how to reinvent a piece of music.
09:53Before we unveil our top pick, here are a few honorable mentions.
10:04Mrs. Robinson, The Lemonheads, takes the folk rock roots of the original to totally new places.
10:10Knocking on Heaven's Door, Guns N' Roses, brings Bob Dylan into the world of hard rock.
10:23Knocking on Heaven's Door, Guns N' Roses, I Just Don't Know What To Do With Myself, The White Stripes.
10:34An old classic gets a garage rock makeover.
10:36I just don't know what to do with myself.
10:42Maggie's Farm, Rage Against the Machine, Bob Dylan went electric.
10:47Rage went even further.
10:49Stagger Lee, Nick Cave, and the Bad Seeds.
11:00An ancient murder ballad, modernized by the gothic rock icons.
11:04So he walked through the rain and he walked through the mud till he came to a place called the Bucket of Blood.
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11:271. Hurt Johnny Cash
11:30The idea of the old folk troubadour Johnny Cash taking on a song by industrial rockers Nine Inch Nails
11:41might have seemed like the biggest left turn imaginable.
11:44And that's because it was.
11:462. Hurt Johnny Cash
11:46But Cash was pretty adventurous in his twilight years, covering a wide range of music on his critically lauded American album series.
11:58When he turned his hand to Trent Reznor's Hurt, it blew every cover he had ever done out of the water.
12:032. Hurt Johnny Cash
12:04Backed by one of the greatest music videos of all time, listening to this song was like hearing Cash reflect on his entire life.
12:16And he didn't even write the song.
12:18It truly doesn't get any better than this.
12:22I would find a way
12:26What genre switching covers would you add to our list?
12:33Let us know in the comments below.
12:35The face to face
12:38Of a man who's all in love
12:42What made the UFC
12:44That's pretty wild
12:47Let me jump in
12:52I had it
12:55Running
12:58If it wasn't
12:58A man who's all in love
12:59But every movie
13:02hedgehog
13:04And every movie
13:06And every day
13:07That's right
13:07It every movie
13:09Dia's
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