Rhino’s Got You Covered: Robert Palmer, Tin Machine, Green Day, and Rahsaan Roland Kirk

It’s Wednesday, so it must be time to take another dip into the Rhino catalog and trot out a new quartet of cover songs that you may or may not have heard before. Let’s get started, shall we?

•    Robert Palmer, “Girl U Want” (1994): Palmer had a gift for reinterpreting songs by other artists, including a particularly successful T. Rex cover he recorded while serving as frontman for The Power Station, but this Devo track is damned near the most rockin’ thing he recorded during the course of his entire career. Seriously, Palmer tears it UP!

•    Tin Machine, “Working Class Hero” (1989): It’s well known that David Bowie and John Lennon had cultivated a friendship over the course of the ‘70s, one best represented by the single “Fame,” so when Bowie decided to tackle this angry track with his angry band, Tin Machine, it made perfect sense.

•    Green Day, “So Tired of Waiting” (2002): Millions of people have a copy of Green Day’s greatest-hits compilation in their collection, but not nearly as many made a point of picking up their 2002 rarities collection, which is where you can find this Kinks kover.

•    Rahsaan Roland Kirk, “I Say a Little Prayer” (1969): Although the album on which this song appears – VOLUNTEERED SLAVERY – looks like it’s a live LP, that’s only half-true. In fact, only the second half of the album was recorded at the 1968 Newport Jazz Festival. The rest, including this epic-length Bacharach/David composition, was recorded at Regent Sound Studios in New York City a little over a year later.