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seedarklyxeroWelcome to SeeDarkly Sunday DisCOVERies:
a weekly exploration of goth, industrial, & dark alternative cover songs!
First time here? Click here for details from first entry.
It came up in an online conversation, as it does, about the nature of being a music fan and the legitimacy of goth/industrial fans who also like pop. If this blog is a testament to anything, one of those things certainly is that various goth/industrial artists are themselves fans of, and inspired by, pop. ¯\(◉‿◉)/¯ In fact, today's cover comes from an industrial/synthpop duo whose "Bad Girl" frontwoman once affirmed, "life is too short to pretend to hate pop music.":
Night Club - Need You Tonight (INXS)
INXS, whose musical style has been defined as new wave, alternative rock, post-punk, and pop, released their sixth studio album, Kick, in October 1987. The first single from the album, Need You Tonight, was released three weeks before in September. The central riff of the song was composed by guitarist Andrew Farriss while he was waiting for a cab. When it arrived he reportedly made that cabbie wait an hour while he ran back to his hotel room to record a demo of it. That hook driven riff, along with the addition of Michael Hutchence's lascivious lyrics, led to the band's only #1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The track has been used a few times in film and television, most recently in 2016 on San Junipero, an episode of Black Mirror centered around the interracial homosexual romance between two women that develops inside a virtual afterlife. It's been covered over a couple dozen times in formats ranging from smooth jazz to country to rap to death metal.
Speaking of rap and death metal, interestingly, the director of the Black Panther animated series and a writer/director of Adult Swim's Metalocalypse, Mark Brooks teamed up with vocalist Emily Kavanaugh to form their dark electronic project, Night Club. They included their cover of Need You Tonight on their third self-released E.P., Black Leather Heart in September 2014. They had already released the track on the web in June and its video in July. In one statement the band said their motivation for the cover was, "because we both think it's a captivating and sexy pop song. Even though the song is seductive and seedy, there is a desperate loneliness and longing for love that is relatable. This is the mental space from where our own pop songs originate. For this record we've been exploring a darker, funkier sound and it seemed like a perfect companion to all the other songs we've been writing..." They added that they also, "thought it'd be cool to hear the song with only synths and a female singer."
The influence of the 80's on their work is evident in a lot of their sound; at the time of this release they had simultaneously been working on the synthwave soundtrack for Comedy Central's animated series, Moonbeam City (also directed by Brooks), a spoof on crime-dramas from that era.
Night Club will join three other acts opening for Combichrist on their upcoming "Everyone Still Hates You" North American tour this spring (and are apparently the only band on the line-up with any female representation.) Their edgy synth version of Need You Tonight is a crowd pleaser you can fully expect to enjoy live if, of course, you're one of their kind!
The Cover:
The Original:
Next week:
April Fool's Easter! So far from format... or... not? This should be fun!
Feel free to tell me what you think about today's cover! Comments, suggestions, discussions, etc... welcome!
(You do NOT need a Dreamwidth account to comment, but all comments are screened for spam prevention.)
I'll be spinning a goth/industrial PJ party later this week in Western Mass. If you're able to join, check my schedule for details, the RSVP link on Facebook, and other upcoming events and news! ↼‿ಠ
Explore the darkness,
-Xero
Previous DisCOVERies
Mar 18 - Eva O - The Killing Moon (Echo and the Bunnymen)
Mar 11 - Grypt(w/Myrrh Ka Ba) - Naughty Girl (Beyoncé)
Mar 04 - Ayria - Headhunter(Front 242)
Feb 25 - The Alpha Complex - #1 Crush (Garbage)
Feb 18 - Assemblage 23 - Love My Way (The Psychedelic Furs)
Directory of All Previous DisCOVERies
a weekly exploration of goth, industrial, & dark alternative cover songs!
First time here? Click here for details from first entry.
It came up in an online conversation, as it does, about the nature of being a music fan and the legitimacy of goth/industrial fans who also like pop. If this blog is a testament to anything, one of those things certainly is that various goth/industrial artists are themselves fans of, and inspired by, pop. ¯\(◉‿◉)/¯ In fact, today's cover comes from an industrial/synthpop duo whose "Bad Girl" frontwoman once affirmed, "life is too short to pretend to hate pop music.":
Night Club - Need You Tonight (INXS)
INXS, whose musical style has been defined as new wave, alternative rock, post-punk, and pop, released their sixth studio album, Kick, in October 1987. The first single from the album, Need You Tonight, was released three weeks before in September. The central riff of the song was composed by guitarist Andrew Farriss while he was waiting for a cab. When it arrived he reportedly made that cabbie wait an hour while he ran back to his hotel room to record a demo of it. That hook driven riff, along with the addition of Michael Hutchence's lascivious lyrics, led to the band's only #1 hit on the Billboard Hot 100 chart. The track has been used a few times in film and television, most recently in 2016 on San Junipero, an episode of Black Mirror centered around the interracial homosexual romance between two women that develops inside a virtual afterlife. It's been covered over a couple dozen times in formats ranging from smooth jazz to country to rap to death metal.
Speaking of rap and death metal, interestingly, the director of the Black Panther animated series and a writer/director of Adult Swim's Metalocalypse, Mark Brooks teamed up with vocalist Emily Kavanaugh to form their dark electronic project, Night Club. They included their cover of Need You Tonight on their third self-released E.P., Black Leather Heart in September 2014. They had already released the track on the web in June and its video in July. In one statement the band said their motivation for the cover was, "because we both think it's a captivating and sexy pop song. Even though the song is seductive and seedy, there is a desperate loneliness and longing for love that is relatable. This is the mental space from where our own pop songs originate. For this record we've been exploring a darker, funkier sound and it seemed like a perfect companion to all the other songs we've been writing..." They added that they also, "thought it'd be cool to hear the song with only synths and a female singer."
The influence of the 80's on their work is evident in a lot of their sound; at the time of this release they had simultaneously been working on the synthwave soundtrack for Comedy Central's animated series, Moonbeam City (also directed by Brooks), a spoof on crime-dramas from that era.
Night Club will join three other acts opening for Combichrist on their upcoming "Everyone Still Hates You" North American tour this spring (and are apparently the only band on the line-up with any female representation.) Their edgy synth version of Need You Tonight is a crowd pleaser you can fully expect to enjoy live if, of course, you're one of their kind!
The Cover:
The Original:
Next week:
April Fool's Easter! So far from format... or... not? This should be fun!
Feel free to tell me what you think about today's cover! Comments, suggestions, discussions, etc... welcome!
(You do NOT need a Dreamwidth account to comment, but all comments are screened for spam prevention.)
I'll be spinning a goth/industrial PJ party later this week in Western Mass. If you're able to join, check my schedule for details, the RSVP link on Facebook, and other upcoming events and news! ↼‿ಠ
Explore the darkness,
-Xero
Previous DisCOVERies
Mar 18 - Eva O - The Killing Moon (Echo and the Bunnymen)
Mar 11 - Grypt(w/Myrrh Ka Ba) - Naughty Girl (Beyoncé)
Mar 04 - Ayria - Headhunter(Front 242)
Feb 25 - The Alpha Complex - #1 Crush (Garbage)
Feb 18 - Assemblage 23 - Love My Way (The Psychedelic Furs)
Directory of All Previous DisCOVERies