My Top 1000 Songs #707: Girls Talk

[I've been writing up my Top 1000 songs on a daily basis--you can see them all in descending order by hitting the All My Favorite Songs tag.] 

There have a been a few times on this list where I was explicitly praising a cover rather than the original version of a song. Most notably (or at least highest on the list) was Elvis Costello delivering the definitive version of "(What's So Funny About) Peace, Love, And Understanding," originally written & recorded by Nick Lowe during his Brinsley Schwarz years. 

Elvis is in the mix again, but this time on the giving rather than the receiving end. He wrote the song for British retro-rocker Dave Edmunds, a longtime associate of Lowe's (and Lowe, with the rest of the Edmunds/Lowe supergroup Rockpile, performs on Edmunds' version). While Elvis' version (later released as a 1980 b-side and showing up on various compilations/reissues) is great, it's a stripped-down, fairly sparse little ballad. Edmunds (for his 1979 Repeat When Necessary LP) amped it up with his old-school (yet new wave-informed) rockabilly and added a killer hook to the chorus, turning Elvis' intricate, baroque track into straight-ahead power pop with a rootsy vibe. The two versions are different enough that they're both great in their own way, but given how everything Elvis touched during this era was near-perfect, it's still impressive that Edmunds managed to improve on the original.

Elvis Costello version:

Edmunds, live 2008:

And, good god, yet another song that's been covered by Matthew Sweet & Susanna Hoffs:

And a Tegan And Sara version: