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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.
Looking for something previously featured? Click here.
Wrapping up our four-part Octoberween series of Halloweeny covers, we end with a modern industrial update of what is for those of us so inclined to dwell in the dark our mantra, our anthem, our very way of unlife. It's overdue and yet ever-present because for us, it's everyday!:
Panic Lift – Every Day Is Halloween (Ministry)
Ministry released (Every Day Is) Halloween as the b-side of their All Day single in 1984. The single was done during the band's transition between labels after their first album, With Sympathy, and their second, Twitch, which ending up including a remix of the a-side but not the b-side. The fact that the song is perhaps the band's most popular song hasn't stopped frontman and songwriter Al Jourgensen from long declaring his supposed disdain for it. In his 2013 autobiography, Jourgensen said,."...the track that everyone lost their shit over was (Every Day Is) Halloween. To this day I hate it, but people are still playing it. It's got this gothic vibe, this repetitive hook, and this vocal that goes, 'boppy-bop-bop' that people like. Radio stations always pull it out around Halloween, but it's not even about Halloween—it's about people giving you shit for having a mohawk. 'Why do you look like you're dressed for Halloween, you freak?' In the song I just railed against that. I didn't think it was going to strike a chord with anyone."
Ministry abandoned the song's synthpop style of industrial for a rock-edged industrial sound by their third album. In 2010, they re-recorded the track to fit their current style, but it doesn't seem to have greater appeal to their fans than the original. Last year Ministry performed an acoustic rendition of the song with Jane's Addition guitarist Dave Navarro for the first time in concert in over thirty years following their collaboration on the acoustic version on Navarro's radio show.
The scream heard in the song was sampled from James Brown's Get Up Offa That Thing.
The song's signature bass-line was sampled almost immediately by a lesser known R&B/Soul singer Nicole McCloud and her 1985 single Don't You Want My Love, pretty much marking the height of her career.
There have been a little over a dozen covers of Every Day Is Halloween, one of the most recent released just days ago by Unwoman.
In October of 2014, the industrial project Panic Lift released their version as a free download for fans. Frontman James Francis had called on them to vote on a Halloween-themed song for them to record, the intent was to produce and release it before the end of that week. Earlier that year they did a similar poll which led to Francis releasing a lackluster version of Sponge's 1994 single, Plowed. When the votes were tallied and Every Day Is Halloween was declared the winner Francis announced, "this is one of my favorite songs, so I promise this time I'll do the song some justice."
And so he has! It is both loyal to the original while injecting some original interpretations and a vocal style some may find similar to The Faint. The cover was later included on their 2016 album Skeleton Key but it's still made available as a free download separate from the album. It's an excellent update of the song sure to make you dance with all those things that go bump in the night!:
The Cover:
The Original:
If you want to check out all previous OCTOBERWEEN covers,
click here to filter that tag and scroll down!
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Next week:
We slip back an hour in time on Daylight Savings, and face Election Day... the horror of it all is I have nothing relevant to share so I guess we'll just be juking with another updated version of an industrial classic!
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 reply below, but all replies are screened for spam prevention.
I have two Halloweek gigs left this week and another set up in November! For details about those and other upcoming gigs, please check my schedule!
(And if, after 4+ years and 234 weekly entries, you find this blog of any value, consider leaving me a tip in the form of the gift of music and get me something from my wishlist on Bandcamp if you like. It'll go to good use! Thanks!)
Thanks for reading and keep dancing in darkness,
-Xero
Previous DisCOVERies
Oct 20 - Missio – Zombie (The Cranberries)
Oct 13 - 29 Died – The Addams Family (Vic Mizzy)
Oct 06 - Creature Feature – Grim Grinning Ghosts (The Mellomen)
Sep 29 - Synthetic Division – Somebody (Depeche Mode)
Sep 22 - Sawtooth – Mindfields (The Prodigy)
. 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.
Looking for something previously featured? Click here.
Wrapping up our four-part Octoberween series of Halloweeny covers, we end with a modern industrial update of what is for those of us so inclined to dwell in the dark our mantra, our anthem, our very way of unlife. It's overdue and yet ever-present because for us, it's everyday!:
Panic Lift – Every Day Is Halloween (Ministry)
Ministry released (Every Day Is) Halloween as the b-side of their All Day single in 1984. The single was done during the band's transition between labels after their first album, With Sympathy, and their second, Twitch, which ending up including a remix of the a-side but not the b-side. The fact that the song is perhaps the band's most popular song hasn't stopped frontman and songwriter Al Jourgensen from long declaring his supposed disdain for it. In his 2013 autobiography, Jourgensen said,."...the track that everyone lost their shit over was (Every Day Is) Halloween. To this day I hate it, but people are still playing it. It's got this gothic vibe, this repetitive hook, and this vocal that goes, 'boppy-bop-bop' that people like. Radio stations always pull it out around Halloween, but it's not even about Halloween—it's about people giving you shit for having a mohawk. 'Why do you look like you're dressed for Halloween, you freak?' In the song I just railed against that. I didn't think it was going to strike a chord with anyone."
Ministry abandoned the song's synthpop style of industrial for a rock-edged industrial sound by their third album. In 2010, they re-recorded the track to fit their current style, but it doesn't seem to have greater appeal to their fans than the original. Last year Ministry performed an acoustic rendition of the song with Jane's Addition guitarist Dave Navarro for the first time in concert in over thirty years following their collaboration on the acoustic version on Navarro's radio show.
The scream heard in the song was sampled from James Brown's Get Up Offa That Thing.
The song's signature bass-line was sampled almost immediately by a lesser known R&B/Soul singer Nicole McCloud and her 1985 single Don't You Want My Love, pretty much marking the height of her career.
There have been a little over a dozen covers of Every Day Is Halloween, one of the most recent released just days ago by Unwoman.
In October of 2014, the industrial project Panic Lift released their version as a free download for fans. Frontman James Francis had called on them to vote on a Halloween-themed song for them to record, the intent was to produce and release it before the end of that week. Earlier that year they did a similar poll which led to Francis releasing a lackluster version of Sponge's 1994 single, Plowed. When the votes were tallied and Every Day Is Halloween was declared the winner Francis announced, "this is one of my favorite songs, so I promise this time I'll do the song some justice."
And so he has! It is both loyal to the original while injecting some original interpretations and a vocal style some may find similar to The Faint. The cover was later included on their 2016 album Skeleton Key but it's still made available as a free download separate from the album. It's an excellent update of the song sure to make you dance with all those things that go bump in the night!:
The Cover:
The Original:
If you want to check out all previous OCTOBERWEEN covers,
click here to filter that tag and scroll down!
HAPPY HALLOWEEN!
Next week:
We slip back an hour in time on Daylight Savings, and face Election Day... the horror of it all is I have nothing relevant to share so I guess we'll just be juking with another updated version of an industrial classic!
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 reply below, but all replies are screened for spam prevention.
I have two Halloweek gigs left this week and another set up in November! For details about those and other upcoming gigs, please check my schedule!
(And if, after 4+ years and 234 weekly entries, you find this blog of any value, consider leaving me a tip in the form of the gift of music and get me something from my wishlist on Bandcamp if you like. It'll go to good use! Thanks!)
Thanks for reading and keep dancing in darkness,
-Xero
Previous DisCOVERies
Oct 20 - Missio – Zombie (The Cranberries)
Oct 13 - 29 Died – The Addams Family (Vic Mizzy)
Oct 06 - Creature Feature – Grim Grinning Ghosts (The Mellomen)
Sep 29 - Synthetic Division – Somebody (Depeche Mode)
Sep 22 - Sawtooth – Mindfields (The Prodigy)
. Directory of All Previous DisCOVERies .