Covers & Worse

 

I heard the Offspring on the radio recently. I really like the Offspring, so hearing them for the first time in years was a treat. However, I immediately thought about them as the group that gained popularity by ripping off a song by Nirvana; Self Esteem by the Offspring, sounds just like Smells Like Teen Spririt by Nirvana. I don't remember anybody in 1994 complaining about the Offspring ripping off Nirvana. I did a search on the Internet to see if anybody has commented on Self Esteem in the last 21 years, and found lots of posts about the Offspring ripping off Nirvana. OK, I was bothered a little by the Offspring not crediting Nirvana for their first big hit (the first one I remember), back in 1994; I'm not bothered now.

I'm currently working in a call center, and the call center manager seems to think that rap is a good form of "music" to play as background noise. A lot of the rap songs "sample" from old rock songs; e.g., I just heard a rap song today that "sampled" In A Gadda Da Vida. I'm not into rap, so I haven't looked up to see if this rap group credited Iron Butterfly on their album, but I doubt it. I get the impression that these rap groups look at old rock songs as public domain material. In a way, today's rap groups are elevating the status of old rock songs. E.g., Beethoven's Fifth Symphony is looked at as the property of mankind. However, Ludwig van Beethoven hasn't been alive for nearly two centuries; Krist Novoselic and Dave Grohl (the surviving members of Nirvana) were still alive in 1994 (Kurt Cobain died in 1994). The Offspring could've given the survivng members of Nirvana a verbal hug.

On the other hand, nobody thinks Whitesnake needs to credit Deep Purple when they perform Burn. The lead singer of Whitesnake, David Coverdale, was the lead singer of Deep Purple when they put out their Burn album (Burn the song was the title track of Burn the album). When Whitesnake performs Burn (the original song - Whitesnake hasn't written a song that sounds like Burn), people have it in their heads that Burn is being performed by it's orignal "group"; David Coverdale is the "group". Nobody thinks David Coverdale should be saying on stage, "I want to thank Richie Blackmore and David Coverdale for writing this song.". ...but somebody with a litigious mindset might think David Coverdale should be crediting Deep Purple on stage.

I just put Self Esteem, and Burn on my website. They might look like just two songs on my music list, but I look at them as a thematic set.

 

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