Video: Holiday Undercover 2010: The Walkmen cover "Holiday Road"
For Holiday Undercover, we did away with the master list of songs and simply asked bands to come to the ol' round room and play a song--with two rules: It had to be a cover, and it had to somehow be...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Brendan Benson covers "Merry X-Mas Everybody"
You may know Brendan Benson as the rock-solid solo artist whose career launched with 1996's One Mississippi. Or perhaps you recognize him as the singer-guitarist in The Raconteurs who isn't Jack...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Kate Nash covers "Merry X-Mas Everybody"
Recognize this song? Intrepid Undercover watchers whose memories stretch back a few days will recognize "Merry X-Mas Everybody" by Slade as the song that Brendan Benson covered. But here's a wildly...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Andrew W.K. covers "Silent Night"
We tried to rope our old pal Andrew W.K. into doing the original Undercover series, but our schedules didn't quite mesh. We're making up for that with two Holiday Undercover appearances--the second,...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Andrew W.K. and Rodney The Mailman cover...
Andrew W.K. had just wowed our office with several vastly different versions of "Silent Night," including one with a very somber delivery, and we thought to ourselves, "Which one will we use? They're...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Shearwater covers Randy Newman
To address some commenter concern about song choices for Holiday Undercover: We actually encouraged everyone who participated to think outside the Christmas-carol box. (I was hoping against hope that...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Dresden Dolls cover Neutral Milk Hotel
It's a treat to see the fantastically theatrical Dresden Dolls stripped down to their component parts, and we were delighted that Amanda Palmer and Brian Viglione made Holiday Undercover part of their...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Fran Healy covers Joni Mitchell
You might recognize Fran Healy as the singer of Scottish band Travis, who, along with Coldplay, picked up the mantle for thoughtful Brit-rock after that wacky genre "Britpop" died in the late '90s....
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: The Music Tapes cover "Let It Snow"/"Zat...
Indie-rock fans might recognize Julian Koster's name from Neutral Milk Hotel's classic In The Aeroplane Over The Sea, to which he contributed banjo and singing saw. Koster also leads The Music Tapes,...
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Vetiver covers The Ramones
We were secretly hoping that someone would tackle the Ramones' not-exactly-classic "Merry Christmas (I Don't Want To Fight Tonight)" for Holiday Undercover, and Vetiver fulfilled that Christmas wish....
View ArticleVideo: Holiday Undercover 2010: Badly Drawn Boy covers "Do They Know It's...
It's tough to make a star-studded charity single like Band-Aid's "Do They Know It's Christmas" sound intimate, but if anybody can do it, it's Badly Drawn Boy, a.k.a. British singer-songwriter Damon...
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