Morrissey - The Mark Latham Of Mopey Rock

The cover version remains an infinitely variable beast. Depending on the coverer and coveree things can range from the note-for-note copy respectful in tone - and probably too safe in approach - to remakes and remodels where the source material is all but lost in translation. Covering various basis as they celebrate the ten-year anniversary of their very-cathartic-at–the-time Con album of troubled relationships, Tegan & Sara invited an interesting range of friends of various generations to put their take on the Quins’ back catalogue. Thus, from a list including Bleachers, Ryan Adams, Paramore’s Hayley, and Cyndi Lauper among others, they choose Chvrches’ take on their Call It Off (Vapor) as the previewing sample, maybe because in a slightly more spacious style than might be expected, as Lauren’s voice wafts up into the cathedral ceiling, they manage to make it sound like neither the original or themselves. That’s rather clever. 

Of course, some want their artist of choice to provide exactly what’s expected of them. After a couple of years of non-label wilderness, some illness, and an ongoing tendency to opening his mouth only to change feet, it’s the return of Morrissey. And a generation of still-grumpy former university students who never quite hung on long enough to get their Bachelor Of Arts degrees rejoice. Spent The Day In Bed (Etienne/BMG) is the man who sometimes veers dangerously close to being the Mark Latham of mopey rock pulling the covers up, and cautioning of a world where ‘…the news continues to frighten you’ with a slight sneer at the working stiffs who can’t take the option of the title. But somehow, you don’t get angry, or even thoughtful, it’s just sort of here waiting for a reaction. 

In absolutely the opposite corner our venerable lords of the beergut, Cosmic Psychos. Guitars, yelling, tinnies. #Straya, fuck yeah! Better In The Shed (Desperate) is a sensitive confession of their creative process – the hint in the opening lyrics of ‘It’s fucked!’ giving you an immediate idea of the mindset. And the challenge is there to come up with a better cans-aloft yellalong chorus than ‘It’s a cunt of a riff, and the chords don’t even fit…’ All together now. Motors and then roars along like a 1971 Monaro kept in good nick by one of those guys in a Shannons Car Insurance ad.

Among the Psychos obvious spiritual children in the ‘Yob Rock’ paddock, Dune Rats come at you in slightly more buzzy way - but still nasally in the best Australian manner Demolition Derby (Ratbag) has the guitars rattling away somewhere near feedback, while the visuals might veer a little too much toward the bodily fluids being rather too liberally applied. It would be just pointless to play this at low volume, so please fang in until your mum knocks on the door telling you to shoosh. 

But you can’t say this country doesn’t offer variety. No Mono is the newest band guise for Tom Iansek – Big Scary, #1 Dads – but making his collaborations with Tom Snowden a little more formalised and electronically based. Butterflies (Pieater) comes on a bed of synths that are stabbing, insistent, and woozy at once. Taking it somewhere else from that basis, Snowden’s vocals weep and sweep in with an almost Anohni-like hymnal manner. Whether considered novelty or something more enduring probably depends on what happens next, but on its own merits this is quite a thing.

And if that’s various views of this wide brown land, you couldn’t believe that QTY could be even more New York than their already-released little bits of Brooklyn and lower-rent areas of Manhattan. Michael (Dirty Hit) has all the Strokes-ish guitars, but adds some respectful Lou Reed-style offhand laconic street-corner observation and maybe even some Ramones unison whininess in the chorus harmonies. Oddly, they actually a little more engaged with what they’re doing, perhaps realising they’ve got a real shot at the brass ring with what they’re becoming. Pretty damn good. 

If you’re seeking another generation’s familiarity and quality, REM’s 25th anniversary edition of one of their most commercially successful albums, Automatic For The People, has allowed them some second thoughts and to pull some leftovers from the back of the kitchen drawer. Mike’s Pop Song (Craft Recordings) is pretty much what it says on the tin. Presented here as a slightly polished up demo, it’s a sourly-sweet melodic thing as they wander around, puzzling about…something. Its neat apparent simplicity when compared to some of the lusher layers and more existential moods of the album might be why it didn’t quite fit at the time, but it’s of the style that will make many R.E.M. enthusiasts most happy. Shiny and happy, even. 

And there’ll near always be a place for the folkie kinda guy taking some hints from the way Dylan used to do it. Particularly when done as well and sincerely as James Bennett does on Giants (Independent). His strummed thought process is puzzled rather than troubled, laidback but engaged, with a patience as he waits for her to come back and knock on the door – which she may or may not do. It all tumbles in the prescribed manner, and is presented in a craftsman-like manner.