Latest punk goes... compilation album tackles the classics.

Punk Goes Classic Rock
Released by Fearless Records
Various artists
Release Date 4/27/10
Grade: B

Over the years, it has become more and more popular for bands to attempt to put their own spin on an old favorite. Songs like Yesterday by The Beatles, or Over the Rainbow By Judy Garland are remade over and over again by new artists, to the extent that covers have become somewhat of a musical genre all their own.

The Punk Goes… compilation album series specializes in covers, and features popular emo, punk, and pop-punk bands rerecording favorite songs from various genres. The most recent album in the series, Punk Goes Classic Rock dropped last week and focuses on covers of 15 classic rock hits from the ‘60s, ‘70s and ‘80s.

The album starts off on a high note with the popular Boston song, More than a feeling covered by pop-punk band Hit The Lights. The band does a great job of staying true to the original song, and melody while still finding the opportunities to add their own modernized guitar riffs in the background. Lead vocalist Nick Thompson does Boston’s Brad Delp justice by fearlessly belting out the traditional high notes of the song. If there is anything wrong with this cover, it is only that the general tone comes off a bit cutesy in comparison to the original, however overall Hit The Lights does a decent job of keeping the integrity of More than a Feeling intact.

Track two of the album is a cover of Paint it Black by the Rolling Stones performed by rock trio, VersaEmerge. Overall, this song is surprisingly good, and one of the best-done covers on the album. The band inputs their own electronic rock vibe to the song, which at first seems a bit gimmicky, however then fades into the background and only adds to the overall ambiance of the song. The back and forth style in which vocalists Sierra Kusterbeck and Blake Harnage take on the verses only enhances the song, especially the raspy shouts of Kusterbeck which allow the cover to have the same edgy feel of the original.

The rest of the album is fairly hit and miss with the next three songs, Free Fallin’, We are the champions, and Rock and Roll All Nite falling flat in the face of some of the other covers on the album. All three start out with definite potential, but then fail to offer anything new or interesting, leaving the listener longing for the original versions.

The We The Kings rendition of Caught up in You by .38 special is by far one of my favorite songs on the album. The band takes very few liberties with the original song, but the few changes that they do only enhance the original song. The vocals of lead singer, Travis Clark stay true to the original vocalist and the band members make themselves at home in this cover, making it sound like it could have been performed by them all along.

The songs that follow are a roller coaster of epic wins and epic fails. A Skylit Drive rocks out a brilliant rendition of Journey’s Separate Ways (Worlds Apart), followed by a fantastic cover by I See Stars of The Outfield’s Your Love that features all the great parts of the original with a few screamo additions. Every Avenue along with the help of Juliet Simms of Automatic Loveletter do great justice to Eddie Money’s Take Me Home Tonight giving the original a great updated feel, and leaving the listener hitting the repeat button.

Don’t Fear the Reaper starts out with definite potential but proves to have to repeat value as the cover lacks any of the imagination of the original, and is overall very boring. Covers of Aerosmith’s Dream On, Ozzy Osbourne’s Crazy Train and Def Leppard’s Pour Some Sugar On Me lack the intensely energetic vibe of the originals, making the songs (Which aren’t horrible in and of themselves) somewhat of a letdown to those accustomed to the originals.

Overall however, the biggest letdown on the album is by far Never Shout Never’s cover of Queen’s hit Bohemian Rhapsody. During the first few seconds of the song, it is already obvious that it will not live up to the original, then as the verses come and go, the suspicion is confirmed.  Christopher Ingle fails to even attempt to live up to the brilliant harmonies displayed Freddie Mercury and his band mates, and his vocals prove to be simply irritating. Even though most of the failure of this song can be accounted to the fact that Bohemian Rhapsody is simply a hard song to live up to, I think that blame can also be put on the producer for allowing a single recording artist to cover a song that relies so heavily on the chemistry of an entire band.

Despite a few hits and misses however, Punk Goes Classic Rock lives up to the other albums in the series and for the most part, features some surprisingly good covers of songs that haven’t been done justice to in the past.