I never knew who Lissie was until her cover of “Bad Romance” was a blogging phenomenon. I guess she likes to cover songs, and she does it well. She covered Kid Cudi’s “Pursuit of Happiness” at Brighton’s music festival The Great Escape back in May, but now there is an official, HD video of it.

She’s great. Based on the covers I’ve heard from her, I know I love her already. Let’s just hope her debut album ‘Catching A Tiger’, which came out yesterday, is as great as what I know from her already.

[via WAWSTSF]

Lissie – “Pursuit of Happiness” (Kid Cudi Cover)

When I came home this afternoon a buddy of mine sent this over to me. Just thinking about The Antlers covering The xx’s “VCR” gives me chills. While performing at WPGU, they covered it, completely stripped down. This song suits Peter Silberman’s voice perfectly, but I still like the original’s quirky, sassy instrumental.

[via]

The Antlers – “VCR” (The xx Cover)Link 2

Conan O’ Brien covered Radiohead’s “Creep” during his comedy tour. I miss him on my TV.

Over the weekend Dirty Projectors played a new song called “Scrappy Nephew” live. It sounds great, and there is no other way to describe the song than ’scrappy’, if you listen to the riffs. Can’t wait to hear a studio version.

This week we’ve brought you a load of covers. Dirty Projectors covered Bob Dylan and Jónsi covered MGMT. Next is Girls, who covered Radiohead’s “No Surprises“.

During on of their sets in Göteborg, Sweden, Christopher Owens from the band sang a solo performance of Radiohead’s “No Surprises”. There’s nothing more to say than that it was a fantastic performence. Download the cover below via We All Want Someone:

Girls – “No Surprises” (Radiohead Cover)Stream

I’m always interested when a musical artist covers another, especially if they are both different genres and the artist covering it adds their own ’signature’ to it. It’s an artist’s way of celebrating a song that they like. If the end result is good, then both of the artist’s fan loves it. I haven’t really heard any horrible covers though.

Just today Jónsi posted streams of his BBC Radio 1 live lounge performances and interview on his website. For one of the live performances he sang a dazzling piano rendition of “Time To Pretend” by MGMT. Fans of both MGMT and Jónsi will love this.

 
 Jónsi – “Time To Pretend” (MGMT Cover)Stream

[mp3 via]

Dirty Projectors dropped by Triple J’s radio show Like A Version in Australia to perform “Cannibal Resouce” and while they were there they also performed a Bob Dylan cover of “Dark Eyes”. Of course, they add their signature harmony style to the cover, but without overdoing it. This might be one of the only songs I’ve heard from them that has been ’stripped down’ and you get to adore their voices along with the strumming of an acoustic guitar.

Dirty Projectors – “Dark Eyes” (Bob Dylan Cover)Stream

Lykke Li performed “Possibility” live recently, and to celebrate her birthday her team recorded her in a beautiful black and white video and released it today. “Possibility” is a track that she recorded specially for the Twilight New Moon soundtrack.

Jónsi, the frontman of Sigur Ros, is ready to debut his solo album in 2 months. With already one song released, his still-to-be released album ‘Go’ is receiving much hype from music bloggers. Everyone has “Boy Lilikoi” in their iTunes library, and it’s getting constant rotation in mine. He sings most of the songs in English, with extravagant lyrics.

A month before the release, Jónsi is releasing an EP on March 15th titled ‘Go Do’ to excite us before the album release. The title track “Go Do” is the next track we are being offered to sample from the EP. No download link is provided but the full studio track has been posted on Youtube. The embedding is disabled, so you have to click here to hear the song. (What the heck!)

He also performed a couple of songs acoustically accompanied with an interview with WNYC, listen to it:

Yesterday night Vampire Weekend performed “Cousins” on David Letterman, and Ezra even added in some special effects such as ‘distorting’ or ‘compressing’ his vocals during the performance.

I was reading some of the comments on Youtube on this video, and some person claimed that they are using autotune. They are in fact, not. Can’t you hear it? I also read another comment that went like this:

“I listened to Contra… I didnt think I would like it. Its a good techno album but, like all sophomore albums, (or so it would seem) this one doesn’t really hit me like the first one did.”

Uhh…what? Vampire Weekend is not techno at all…not even close. What the hell are you talking about?

The band has also released their winter/spring tour dates for Contra. Keep on reading to see them:

THEY ARE COMING TO EDMONTON!!!! I am so glad…I’ve been waiting for this moment forever. This is so exciting. Hopefully I will be able to get a hold of an interview…

01-12 Los Angeles, CA – Henry Fonda Theater
01-17 New York, NY – United Palace Theater *
01-18 New York, NY – Webster Hall !
01-19 New York, NY – Bowery Ballroom #
02-05 Bexhill, England – De La Warr
02-07 Cambridge, England – Corn Exchange
02-08 Manchester, England – Manchester Apollo
02-09 Leeds, England – Leeds O2 Academy
02-10 Birmingham, England – Birmingham O2 Academy
02-12 Newcastle, England – Newcastle O2 Academy
02-13 Glasgow, Scotland – Barrowlands
02-14 Edinburgh, Scotland – Edinburgh Picture House
02-16 London, England – Brixton O2 Academy
02-17 London, England – Brixton O2 Academy
02-19 Berlin, Germany – Astra
02-20 Cologne, Germany – Gloria
02-21 Hamburg, Germany – Uebel or Gefaehrlich
02-22 Brussels, Belgium – AB
02-24 Amsterdam, Netherlands – Paradiso
02-25 Paris, France – Olympia
02-26 Toulouse, France – Le Bikini
02-27 Barcelona, Spain – Penelope
02-28 Madrid, Spain – Teatro Circo Price
03-14 Edmonton, Alberta – Edmonton Event Centre
03-15 Calgary, Alberta – MacEwan Hall
03-16 Missoula, MT – Wilma Theatre
03-18 Salt Lake City, UT – In the Venue
03-19 Denver, CO – Ogden Theatre
03-20 Aspen, CO – Spring Jam Core Party
03-22 Minneapolis, MN – First Avenue
03-23 Milwaukee, WI – Riverside Theatre
03-25 Chicago, IL – Riviera Theatre
03-27 Knoxville, TN – Tennessee Theatre
03-29 Columbus, OH – The LC Pavilion
03-30 Toronto, Ontario – The Sound Academy
04-01 Boston, MA – Orpheum Theatre
04-02 Philadelphia, PA – Electric Factory
04-03 Washington, DC – DAR Constitution Hall
04-05 Nashville, TN – Ryman Auditorium
04-06 Asheville, NC – Orange Peel
04-08 Atlanta, GA – The Tabernacle
04-09 New Orleans, LA – House of Blues
04-10 Austin, TX – Stubb’s BBQ
04-11 Dallas, TX – House of Blues
04-13 Tempe, AZ – Marquee Theatre
04-14 Pomona, CA – Fox Theater
04-19 Oakland, CA – Fox Theater

Last week, BBC 1 Radio held a very special Christmas gig with artists like Florence and The Machine and Out Like A Lion performed.

Florence belted out multiple acoustic covers of Rabbit Heart and even the Christmas favorite “Last Christmas”. Her soft, crispy voice flows perfectly with the smooth, breezy guitar. I’m not a big fan of Christmas songs, but I have to say that this is brilliant.

Florence + the Machine – “Last Christmas”Stream