Easter weekend has never meant much to me beyond candy and chocolate. But it’s always nice to have a long weekend and I enjoyed spending this one with my family, especially since a growing list of complications had meant I hadn’t seen them since Christmas (and it almost didn’t happen again, as my car battery was dead when I went out to start the car on Saturday. Thankfully, I have a good neighbour who was home to give me a boost and get me on my way).

There were a lot of Easter posts, and Easter jokes on my Facebook wall over the weekend. None of this has anything to do with music though! While I was thinking about what I’d been listening to with great frequency over the past week, and with apologies for one more bad joke added to the pile:

(The Al Jourgensen remix of The Jesus and Mary Chain’s “Reverence” nearly made the cut.)

Remixes and cover songs. I love them, except for covers of Rolling Stones songs (which, by and large, most of them I wish I’d never heard. The only ones I’ve enjoyed tend to be sung by women. But that’s another blog).

I used to make tons of mix-tapes, and then mix CDs for myself and others, and a good cover was always a great way to draw someone into a mix that they didn’t think they’d like. The familiar spun out in a fresh way that’s more palatable to the potential listener.

When I moved to Winnipeg for university, a lot of the friends I made in second year were really into 90s Brit Pop (you know who are). I wasn’t. It took me a long time to form any opinion on The Stone Roses, Oasis, Blur, The Charlatans, or Suede, and many many more. (Although, I felt I was one of the few folks who really enjoyed The Stone Roses second album–Second Coming. Probably because it didn’t sound like the rest of the Brit Pop I’d been exposed to. It had a 70s rock-riff vibe.) They were all fun to dance to, but I never went out of my way to listen to them on my own.

Anyway, I stumbled across this remix and I wasn’t disappointed. It was one of those cases where a remix made me go back and appreciate the original more.

Lyrics that count:

Down, down, you bring me down

I hear you knocking down my door

and I can’t sleep at night

Your face it has no place

No room inside my house

I need to be alone.

The above are actually from the opening of the original, as the remix only uses “Down, down, you bring me down” but I tend to finish the verse in my head these days anyway. So what’s your favourite remix or cover song, music fans?

Write on!