Best Covers

No, this is not an entry about duvets, comforters, blankets, bedsheets.

This is not about album covers (I might do that one day but...) that debates about whether or not Joy Division/New Order under Peter Saville had the best album covers and if the new Coldplay album cover was a tribute to them....

Should read this first....LINK

Personally, my favourite album cover is _____________(yet to be determined).

This is about covers as in cover versions. Like Westlife, K One, Black Box Recorder doing Terry Jacks' Seasons In The Sun. Anyone know that this was originally a french song named Le Moribond (The Dying Man)?

There are more than ten covers that I personally enjoy so I had a really hard time choosing which ones to put into my top ten. I decided to leave those in close contention in for posterity.

Some bands/singers can do fantastic covers eg. Jeff Buckley, Tori Amos, Pet Shop Boys...
Some bands/singers have many covers done on their fantastic songs eg. U2, Leonard Cohen, Bob Dylan, Elvis, The Smiths, The Beatles...
Some fantastic bands (U2, REM) can't do covers...well barely.
Some fantastic songs are not well covered (Jamie Cullum should never have covered Jeff Buckley's Lover, You Should've Come Over - sacrilegious! or Radiohead's High And Dry - blasphemous!).

But below are ten (plus ten twelve) songs that I thoroughly enjoy and just so happen to be cover versions. As far as possible I tried to include as much information about the songs as possible and a bit of a blurb. I might be wrong but hey it's my blog.
They are not in any order but the top ten will beat the bottom ten, sort of.
And these cover version that I enjoy usually differ very much from the original
eg. Knockin' On Heaven's Door originally by Bob Dylan covered by Guns & Roses and Comfortably Numb orginally by Pink Floyd covered by Scissor Sisters. These two songs, however great, I can't comment because I have yet to listen to the original Knockin' On Heaven's Door and I have yet to listen to Scissor Sisters' take on Comfortably Numb.
You won't find Westlife in this list. But there is Take That lurking in the corner.....

The song titles are in RED and original singers in parenthesis and the album which the cover can be found in BLUE

1. Hallelujah - Jeff Buckley (Leonard Cohen) Grace

But all I've ever learned from love
Was how to shoot somebody who outdrew you

2. I Wish I Never Saw The Sunshine - Beth Orton (The Ronettes) Trailer Park

And if I never saw the sunshine baby,
Then maybe I wouldn't mind the rain

3. Everybody's Gotta Learn Sometimes - Beck (Korgis) Eternal Sunshine Of The Spotless Mind OST

I need your loving like the sunshine
And everybody's gotta learn sometime

4. Hurt - Johnny Cash (NIN) American IV

If I could start again,
a million miles away,
I will keep myself,
I would find a way

5. Time - Tori Amos (Tom Waits) Strange Little Girls

And Matilda asks the sailors are those dreams
Or are those prayers
So just close your eyes, son
And this won't hurt a bit

6. I Saw The Light - Lori Carson (Todd Rundgren) Everything I Touch Runs Wild

Then you gazed up at me
And the answer was plain to see

7. Across The Universe - Fiona Apple, Rufus Wainwright, The Smiths (The Beatles) Pleasantville OST, I Am Sam OST, live bootlegs

Pools of sorrow waves of joy are drifting through my open mind, Possessing and caressing me

8. Wonderwall - Ryan Adams, Mike Flowers Pops (Oasis) Love Is Hell, A Groovy Place

Back beat,
the word is on the street
that the fire in your heart is out

9. Landslide - The Smashing Pumpkins (Fleetwood Mac) Pisces Iscariot

Can the child within my heart rise above
Can I sail through the changing ocean tides
Can I handle the seasons of my life

10.Such Great Heights - Iron And Wine (The Postal Service) Such Great Heights EP

I have to speculate that god himself
did make us into corresponding shapes like
puzzle pieces from the clay

11.Running Up That Hill - Placebo (Kate Bush) Sleeping With Ghost (Bonus Disc)

Unaware that I'm tearing you asunder.
There is thunder in our hearts

12.The Man Who Sold The World - Nirvana (David Bowie) Unplugged Live In New York

Although I wasn't there,
He said I was his friend
Which came as some surprise

13.Shipbuliding - Suede (Elvis Costello) Help (warchild music)

With all the will in the world
Diving for dear life,
When we could be diving for pearls

14.All Along The Watchtower - Dave Matthews (Bob Dylan) Live At Folsom Field, Boulder, Colorado

There are many among us
Who feel that life is but a joke

15.How Deep Is Your Love - Take That (BeeGees) Greatest Hits

We're living in a world of fools
Breaking us down

16.I Don't Like Mondays - Tori Amos (Boomtown Rats) Strange Little Girls

I want to shoot the whole day down

17.I Will Always Love You - Whitney Houston (Dolly Parton) The Bodyguard OST

We both know I'm not what you you need

18.Always On My Mind - Pet Shop Boys (Elvis Presley) Introspective

Little things I should've said and done, I never took the time

19.Only Love Can Break Your Heart - St Etienne (Neil Young) Fox Base Alpha

I was always thinking
Games that I was playing
Trying to make the best of my time

20.You Only Live Twice - Björk (Nancy Sinatra) never released commercially

You only live twice or so it seems
One life for yourself and one for your dreams
You drift through the years and life seems tame
Till one dream appears and love is its name

21.Heartbeats - José González (The Knife) Veneer

To call for hands of above, to lean on
Wouldn't be good enough for me, no

22.Mad World - Gary Jules (Tears For Fears) Trading Snakeoil For Wolftickets

The dreams in which I am dying are the best I've ever had.

So there!

Are there any worthies that I might have missed?