The Worst Cover Songs, Ranked By How Much They Butchered The Originals
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Vote up the cover songs the devil would play to torture you.
It can be very difficult for an artist to put an original spin on someone else's song. If the musicians sticks too close to the original, they risk being compared to the original performer, getting labeled as karaoke, or being questioned about why they even bothered to record the song. But if they go in an entirely different direction, maybe making significant changes to the lyrics or production, they risk alienating the original performer and fans.
On occasion, a cover song gets recognized as being better than the original, but it's more common for the cover to be dismissed as an inferior version. No one is immune from this criticism. While there are a lot of WTF covers from people not known for their singing - William Shatner's version of “Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds,” for example - many well-respected musicians have also been blasted for the way they covered a particular song. Here are some of the cover songs that have been called among the worst in history.
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1185 VOTESHilary Duff - 'My Generation'
Who She's Covering: The Who
Why It's Cringey: Duff was a 16-year-old Disney TV star with a squeaky-clean image when she released this song. Supposedly she covered it at her manager's request, but that begs the question of why her manager thought that, out of all the songs she could have possibly covered, this was the one that made the most sense. Then, either Duff or someone else involved in the recording session decided to change the most iconic line in the Who's song - “I hope I die before I get old” - to “I hope I don't die before I get old.” This lyric change erased the anger and disdain about the older generation that drives the original version. Likely in order to appeal to Duff's core tween fan base, they completely sanitized the song's original intent.
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2287 VOTESMadonna - 'American Pie'
Who She's Covering: Don McLean
Why It's Cringey: McLean's original folk-rock version of this song runs for more than eight minutes and is “a big song about America” that suggests the shift in mood from the optimistic 1950s to the more turbulent 1960s, beginning with the death of early rock 'n' roll stars Buddy Holly, Ritchie Valens, and the Big Bopper in a plane crash in early 1959. When Madonna covered the song for the soundtrack for her 2000 film The Next Best Thing, she cut the running time down significantly, keeping only the first part of the first verse, all of the second verse, the last verse, and the chorus.
By taking out all the cultural references, the cover version fails to provide the same connection to a specific place and time and lacks the melancholy and cynicism of the original. What’s left is a rather bland synth-driven dance-pop song with an unusually mellow vocal by the pop star.
Many critics have called this one of the worst cover songs in history. But according to a press release put out by Maverick Records, McLean approved of Madonna's version, calling it a “a gift from a goddess” and “sensual and mystical.”
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3155 VOTESMGK (Machine Gun Kelly) - 'Misery Business'
Who He's Covering: Paramore
Why It's Cringey: MGK began his music career in the hip-hop world, but with his 2020 album Tickets to My Downfall he abandoned hip-hop for a pop-punk sound. That album was released in September 2020, but a few months earlier, he had released a series of recordings while being locked down due to COVID-19; one of these releases was a cover of Paramore's 2007 pop-punk hit “Misery Business," which he made in collaboration with Blink-182 drummer Travis Barker.
Reaction to the cover was mixed; Billboard hailed it as a “high-octane banger” while pointing out that MGK had switched up the pronouns in the lyrics to tell the story from a male point-of-view, while others criticized MGK for having “the vocal range of a turtle” or compared his singing to ”microwaved lettuce." Some listeners felt that the song simply didn't work being told from a male POV.
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4202 VOTESBritney Spears - 'I Love Rock 'n' Roll'
Who She's Covering: The Arrows/Joan Jett and the Blackhearts
Why It's Cringey: While originally written and performed by British band The Arrows, “I Love Rock ’n’ Roll” was popularized by Joan Jett and the Blackhearts. Jett's version was a No. 1 hit in 1982. Twenty years later, in the 2002 film Crossroads, the character played by Britney Spears performs “I Love Rock ’n’ Roll” with her two friends at a karaoke bar. Spears told interviewers she chose the song because it was one of her favorites to sing whenever she went to karaoke bars in real life.
This version strips the song of its heavy, driving guitars and pounding backbeat. Combined with Spears's less-than-powerful vocals, what's left is a cover song that suggests she has never really listened to rock ’n’ roll, let alone loves it.
Jett admitted to NME that she was confused by why the pop star had chosen this particular song:
I’ve never even heard Britney’s version. I mean, I’ve obviously heard about it, but I never understood that whole idea. I mean, people usually cover a song that says something about them, but I doubt she loves rock ’n’ roll. Maybe she likes songs.
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5172 VOTESWilliam Shatner - 'Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds'
Who He's Covering: The Beatles
Why It's Cringey: In 1968, William Shatner, who was then starring in Star Trek, released his debut album, The Transformative Man. The concept for the album was to combine spoken-word readings of great pieces of literature and have them segue into songs that conveyed an opposite feeling or message to the piece of literature. One of the songs Shatner chose for this concept album was the Beatles' “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds. He paired the song with a dark, apocalyptic poem, “Spleen.”
Against what sounds like a karaoke instrumental track with low-tech science-fiction sound effects and female background singers repeating the “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds" hook, Shatner does a wildly over-the-top dramatic reading of the lyrics, complete with emphasis that seems to fall on the wrong words. It's unclear how serious Shatner even was about this recording - he claimed he had tried to record it in the voice of someone tripping on LSD - and critical opinions vary widely, with some calling it “campy,” “cheesy,” or a “travesty,” while others see it as some sort of outside-the-box genius.
During an appearance on Friday Night with Jonathan Ross in the early 2000s, Paul McCartney discussed his reaction to Shatner's version:
I think [Shatner] was on drugs when he did that. But it was good. It's still one of my favorite versions of “Lucy in the Sky With Diamonds.”
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6225 VOTESJessica Simpson - 'These Boots Are Made for Walkin''
Who She's Covering: Nancy Sinatra
Why It's Cringey: When Jessica Simpson covered “These Boots Are Made for Walkin'" for the 2005 film The Dukes of Hazzard, she turned Nancy Sinatra's 1966 female empowerment song about walking away from a toxic relationship into an odd celebration of using her physical attributes to get what she wants.
Simpson rewrote nearly all the lyrics, and for some reason, she and/or her producers decided to add a bridge and a weird quasi-rap section to the song. Musically, while Sinatra's version is folk rock with a dance beat, Simpson's version mixes country instrumentation (banjos, fiddles, guitars) with a hip-hop beat. In the end, while Sinatra's fierce vocal is all about taking control of a toxic situation, Simpson's version comes off as forced sexiness.
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776 VOTESDuran Duran - '911 Is a Joke'
Who They're Covering: Public Enemy
Why It's Cringey: Here's one that seems to make no sense: a white pop-rock band from Birmingham, England, covering iconic American hip-hop group Public Enemy's track criticizing the lack of emergency response calls, especially by paramedics, in a Black neighborhood.
First, while most Americans know 911 is the phone number to call to report an emergency, that number means nothing in England. Second, Duran Duran isn't exactly known for its social commentary. Yet the band still decided to cover this track and put it on their 1995 album Thank You.
Sonically, the band replaced the hip-hop beats with rootsy Southern-flavored guitars, which provides some interest, but Simon Le Bon's delivery of the hard-hitting lyrics is just confusing, and the result makes one wonder if Duran Duran understood the point of the original song.
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8171 VOTESSheryl Crow - 'Sweet Child O' Mine'
Who She's Covering: Guns N' Roses
Why It's Cringey: “Sweet Child O' Mine” is the rock band Guns N' Roses' lone No. 1 song in the US, and its opening was named as the greatest guitar riff of all time by readers of Total Guitar magazine. But when Sheryl Crow covered the song for the soundtrack of the 1999 film Big Daddy, not only did she remove the riff that made the song instantly recognizable, but she also turned the song from rock into country folk with strings, an organ, and an acoustic guitar replacing the heavy electric guitars of the original. Add in a bland vocal, and the result is completely forgettable.
In 2011, readers of Rolling Stone named this the fourth worst cover song of all time.
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9157 VOTESKelly Osbourne - 'Papa Don't Preach'
Who She's Covering: Madonna
Why It's Cringey: Upon release, Madonna's original was controversial because it addressed teen pregnancy. Some criticized it for encouraging teen pregnancy, while others praised it for what they saw as its anti-abortion message. Madonna herself claimed it was simply a song about a girl who was facing a very hard decision and who simply wanted her father's support no matter what decision she ended up making.
When Kelly Osbourne's mom, Sharon Osbourne, asked the teenager to cover it for the soundtrack album for the reality show The Osbournes, she turned it into a pop-punk track. But her vocal delivery just powered through the lyrics without displaying much understanding of the serious topic they addressed.
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10108 VOTESScissor Sisters - 'Comfortably Numb'
Who They're Covering: Pink Floyd
Why It's Cringey: In 2004, Scissor Sisters gained notoriety by releasing a radically rearranged cover of Pink Floyd's prog-rock classic “Comfortably Numb.” The New York-based group stuck mainly to the original lyrics (though they did change the line “a distant ship's smoke on the horizon” to “a distant ship floats on the horizon”), but turned it into a quirky disco song with pulsating synth lines, a dance beat, and a falsetto vocal.
Jake Shears, one of the co-founders of Scissor Sisters, told The Washington Post that Pink Floyd's Roger Waters and David Gilmour both approved of this cover version of their song.
When [the song] charted in England, [Waters and Gilmour] both contacted [the record label] Polydor and gave us their blessing… and asked for albums and pictures. We never asked permission or anything, we just put it out. I think they appreciated the fact that we did something to their song that they probably never expected.
While the original song's co-writers might have liked Scissor Sisters' version, that opinion was not shared by all of Pink Floyd's fans; in fact, the Scissor Sisters allegedly received some death threats after covering the song.
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11174 VOTESLimp Bizkit - 'Behind Blue Eyes'
Who They're Covering: The Who
Why It's Cringey: On their debut album in 1997, rap rock/nu metal band Limp Bizkit included a cover of George Michael's “Faith.” Perhaps because the band's live performances of that song had helped build the group's following, six years later they decided to cover yet another iconic song: “Behind Blue Eyes” by The Who.
For the first two verses and choruses, they stick to the original's melody and lyrics. But then, they inexplicably replace The Who's original bridge with a new spoken-word one (through a vocoder?) promoting the band by repeating the line, “Discover, L.I.M.P., say it.” They then add an unnecessary original third verse and an additional chorus.
In 2011, a poll of Rolling Stone readers ranked this as the second worst cover song in history. And Pete Townshend seemed to agree with the magazine's readers, recalling:
Suffice it to say that when I first heard it I thought of the time I clubbed Abby Hoffman. It was an embarrassing effort, and one that discredits a fine song.
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12126 VOTESUncle Kracker - 'Drift Away'
Who He's Covering: Dobie Gray
Why It's Cringey: In 1973, Dobie Gray had the biggest hit of his career with a country-soul version of “Drift Away”; it peaked at No. 5 on the Billboard Hot 100. Nearly 30 years later, when Uncle Kracker decided to include a cover version of this song on his second studio album, No Stranger to Shame, he invited Gray to perform the song with him. Gray provides background vocals, sings the song's bridge, and duets with Uncle Kracker on the final verse. This cover version was a big hit, peaking at No. 9 on the Billboard Hot 100 and spending a whopping 28 weeks atop the Billboard Adult Contemporary chart.
The main issue is that while the original has Gray's distinctive vocal and mixes soul, R&B, and country, this cover has an uninspiring vocal by Uncle Kracker (Gray's performance of the bridge is easily the highlight of the song) and a soft rock production that doesn't sustain much interest until the very end.
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13148 VOTESCounting Crows - 'Big Yellow Taxi'
Who They're Covering: Joni Mitchell
Why It's Cringey: In 2009, the Village Voice named the Counting Crows' cover of “Big Yellow Taxi” the worst song of the decade. It was suggested that Adam Duritz had completely missed the point of the song, with its anti-industrialization, anti-commercial, pro-environment lyrics. Mitchell's original version is a carefree, folky version driven by an acoustic guitar and her quirky vocal, which drops from very high to very low at the end. Duritz's vocals are less carefree, and he adds unnecessary flourishes, which add about a minute and a half to the song's original running length.
He also made a slight change in the lyrics; instead of the taxi “took away my old man,” he sings that it “took my girl away.”
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14134 VOTESMick Jagger And David Bowie - 'Dancing in the Street'
Who They're Covering: Martha & the Vandellas
Why It's Cringey: Mick Jagger and David Bowie might be two of music's biggest icons, but that doesn't mean everything they did was a good idea. One of their biggest misfires was their campy cover of the Motown classic “Dancing in the Street.” Maybe if they had never done a music video, the reaction wouldn't have been as harsh?
The argument has been made that the two music icons were just having fun performing a beloved song for charity (the music video premiered during a Live Aid benefit show in July 1985). The video consists mainly of Jagger and Bowie improvising their moves, playing up to the camera. A 2011 episode of Family Guy poked fun at the video, with Peter Griffin commenting, “That happened, and we all let it happen.”
In a 2016 interview with Rolling Stone, Jagger discussed collaborating with Bowie on this song:
My favorite memory [of his friendship with Bowie] was the time we did “Dancing in the Street” together. We had to record the song and film the video all in one day. We walked straight from the studio onto the set of the video. At the end of the day, we were saying, “See, it can be done! Why are [we] spending years in the studio?”… We enjoyed camping it up. The video is hilarious to watch. It was the only time we really collaborated on anything, which is really stupid when you think about it.
