Nobody Does It Better

In the early days of illegal file-sharing, the glory days of Napster unhinged, I did a mother-truckin’ shitload of downloading.

I created my own two-disc set of Ben Folds Five rarities that’s worthy of bootlegging. I found obscure tracks based on random videos I saw on Fuse on Sunday afternoon.

And somehow, I discovered not one, but two unbelievable cover versions of “Nobody Does It Better,” the James Bond theme and Carly Simon hit.

One was by Aimee Mann, from an incredible album of James Bond song covers that I am saddened to STILL not own. I did, however, find this admirable lip sync performance to the track on YouTube.

There’s something amazing about the way Aimee tosses off the “…whenever you hold me…” line right after the whacked-out “A Day in the Life” style instrumental bridge…it’s like she knows he’s a fucking asshole who will ditch her in a second or even kill her if he needs to, but she can’t help it, because HE’S THAT GOOD.

The other cover, by Radiohead, has more of an ironic slant to it, but Thom Yorke can’t help but get into it. It’s that kind of song. There’s a studio cut and a live cut; I prefer the live one, if only for his one-sentence spoken intro. I also love the way he leans into “the thaaaangs yaou dooo” the first time he sings it, with that Yorke-ian way of turning every vowel into some other vowel.

Everyone’s a Douchebag

Both musicians…

Prince moves to sue fan sites for online content

…and fans.

Most fans paid $0 for Radiohead album

(And, of course, the media, who seemed to have jumped all over the “OMG DOWNLOADING IS TRULY EVIL AFTER ALL” side of the Radiohead story, but didn’t give quite as much attention to the “OMG RADIOHEAD MADE $10 MILLION IN A DAY MAYBE THERE IS SOMETHING TO THIS WHOLE INTERNET THING AFTER ALL” side of things.)