Music is Padgett’s life, and writing about it, his life’s blood. Padgett is also a senior music publicist for Shore Fire Media, representing clients that include Ben Harper, and Lana Del Rey. If you think he just sits around all day listening to and researching covers, you’d be wrong. Ten years ago, he founded the blog, Cover Me, which has become the largest, most popular blog on the subject. Padgett is an expert in this particular field. The new book, Cover Me: The Stories Behind the Greatest Cover Songs of All Time, by Ray Padgett, takes an in-depth look at some unforgettable music. The fact is, without cover songs, some of the greatest songs ever written, may well have since been forgotten. In our experience, most of those people are the ones who have heard local bands play “Mustang Sally,” or “Sweet Home Alabama,” one too many times. Some people hate the very thought of them.

Kirk has condensed his Strong Songs picks into a single new list, which you can find on Spotify and Apple Music, and YouTube Music.Cover songs. Sign up for Kirk's mailing list to start getting monthly-ish newsletters with music recommendations, links, news, and extra thoughts on new Strong Songs episodes: Ĭheck out the Strong Songs merch store for some cool t-shirts, mugs, totes, and more: Īnd you can find Kirk on Twitter and on Instagram at He's got a bunch of albums you can check out and contributes to an array of interesting projects and experiments. This episode's outro soloist is the wonderful bay area pianist/accordionist Rob Reich.

Performances of 'Hallelujah' by John Cale, Pentatonix, K.D.

DEVO performing their 'Satisfaction' cover live in 1977:.

Ray Padgett's book Cover Me: The Story Behind the Greatest Cover Songs of All Time, 2017.

'The Story Behind Devo's Iconic Cover of the Rolling Stones' 'Satisfaction'' by Ray Padgett for The New Yorker, 2017.

Did We Respect It?' by Wesley Morris for the New York Times, 2018

'Hallelujah' by Leonard Cohen, as covered by Jeff Buckley on Grace, 1994.

'Mad World' by Roland Orzabal/Tears for Fears, as covered by Michael Andrews and Gary Jules for Donnie Darko, 2001.

'Satisfaction' by Jagger/Richards, as covered by Devo on Q: Are We Not Men? A: We Are Devo!, 1978.

'Respect' by Otis Redding, as covered by Aretha Franklin in 1967.

It's time for Strong Songs to talk about some Strong Covers! On this episode, Kirk tackles four famous covers, comparing each with the original while trying to suss out what makes a great cover in the first place.

Cover Me by Ray Padgett