Thursday, 19 June 2025

Cover Charge #17: Peter Gabriel to Vampire Weekend

Cover Charge is simple: A covers B, B covers C, C covers D and so on, until I loop back to where I started, Ouroboros-style.

Last time: Sheryl Crow to Peter Gabriel

A real curio today. In 2008 former Genesis frontman and general pusher of boundaries Peter Gabriel hooked up with Hot Chip to record a cover of a Vampire Weekend track, Cape Cod Kwassa Kwassa. I had no idea how this came about, so ended up searching Wikipedia, which had the following: "Vampire Weekend themselves had reportedly asked Gabriel to cover it, on account of him being referenced in the lyrics ('This feels so unnatural/Peter Gabriel, too'). Ahead of the cover's release, Gabriel told 6Music that he hadn't decided whether or not to sing the line that references him verbatim. He ended up replacing one of the lines with 'And it feels so unnatural/To sing your own name' when the cover was released." I'm still none the wiser as to how Hot Chip got involved but anyway, here's the cover:

And from their eponymous debut album, here's the original from Vampire Weekend. Fun fact - this promo video was directed by the quiet genius that is Richard Ayoade.

Next time: Vampire Weekend bid us farewell.

The Cover Charge "chain" to date.

4 comments:

  1. But Peter, lots of people sing their own name! Check out last week's Snapshots for plenty of examples!!!

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    1. I guess it feels less unnatural to them.

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  2. Peter always comes across so well in interviews, I do like him - and he always seems to retain the ability to laugh at himself (or let others do so, reference 'Brian Pern'!) So I think he's just being sweetly modest about that lyric, and I like him even more for that :-)

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    1. He's a cool cat, no doubt. +3 kudos points for Brian Pern :)

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