Cover versions, that's my forte, that's all I ever used to do. When you play your own songs, it's quite scary, 'cause I'm quite honest and open, they can be very revealing. But covers, I don't have to think about, just get me up there!
I suppose in some ways doing some of the songs in the show felt a bit like I was doing cover versions. I was covering myself. Not that they didn't feel like my songs, but the way I was approaching them was from a place so outside where they were written. The fact that these songs were in the context of a live show was a new thing.
It's fun to take songs from a completely different context and reframe them. We did two mixtape albums called 'Other People's Heartache' and 'Other People's Heartache Pt. 2,' which were full of those kind of covers and mash-ups, mixed with film music and film quotes.
I always say it took me 10 minutes to write 'Cars,' but if I am honest it could have been even less than that - and it has been a really successful song over the years. It is still massively used, in advertising, in films, and people do cover versions of it a lot.
I really love that song. I love when people cover songs that are familiar but have been kind of forgotten about. So when you play it, it takes people back to a certain place. That's what I wanted for 'Torn.'
There haven't been many credible electronic covers records.
There are so many songs I've recorded, only to hear other people singing them. It happens all the time.
I write heavily under the influence of James Taylor.
I think no-one was surprised to hear that Janis Joplin was dead. She seemed to be living up all of her energy that she had to give in just a few years. Now you listen to covers of her songs by various women, and it's pale in comparison.
There haven't been many examples of times when we've done a cover and not put it out in some form.
I think a "song" is, like, just play it on the guitar and sing it. You look out and see thousands of covers of "Animal" for example, so you think, "That was probably a pretty good song, because people feel like it's satisfying to just play it with one instrument accompanying it."
My opinion of covers is that unless you're going to change and take a cover in a new direction, it's gonna get put up against the old one, and you're gonna lose. It's like, which would you rather listen to? The Righteous Brothers' 'Loving Feeling' or Hall and Oates' 'Loving Feeling?'
Back in the '90s, we saw prominent non-film artists like the Bombay Vikings do a splendid job on old classics and people danced to those new tunes without ever feeling that the song had been spoiled. We slowly saw this trend creeping into mainstream cinema.
People have heard my music, but all my famous songs were made famous by somebody else... But that was my goal.
I must have listened to at least 10 covers of Leonard Cohen's 'Hallelujah' - Jeff Buckley's cover is usually my go-to song.
I think all the covers I do have nice sentiments, particularly 'Your Song.' People write me very sweet messages about that song, though I'm sure there are people out there saying that I've ruined it too!
Once you think you know the song, then you have go and see how other people have done it.
The thing about covers is that the first thing you're going to notice is the vocals, because it's not the same person.
There are many examples of great songs that become more famous when they are covered.
When we were writing the 'Stage' album, we realized we'd never really done proper covers, where we were taking songs and making them our own and kind of playing around with them. I came up with the idea of doing a cover of 'Wish You Were Here,' but we didn't really want it on the record.
I started out doing covers.
Very few people do covers of my tunes.
