Ranking the five greatest covers by Galaxie 500
In the 1960s, The Velvet Underground gave an antidote to the shiny happy people of the hippie generation, or, rather, gave the poison. With dingy, salacious avant-rock and depraved odes to hard drugs – yes, ‘Heroin’ and ‘Venus In Furs’, I’m looking at you – the Velvets deftly reflected the realism of New York in sonic form, aligning the tracks for the solid iron locomotive that was punk. The complexity of composition wasn’t important; it was about the feeling, and few of The Velvet Underground’s keen disciples understood this better than Galaxie 500.
The central artery of The Velvet Underground’s lineage swept through the likes of The Stooges, The Modern Lovers, Joy Division, Spacemen 3 and The Jesus and Mary Chain, among many others, arriving at Galaxie 500 and their contemporaries in the late 1980s.
Although these artists’ approaches vary wildly in places, the common DNA holds strands of grit and realism that stand at odds with the sounds and themes associated with pop music. These are musicians that would sooner see beauty in soil than glitter.
After punk, post-punk gave birth to a plethora of genres, including noise-rock, shoegaze, grunge, and the hippie hangover sound of neo-psychedelia. Galaxie 500 found their own little nook in rock history that drew strongly from the downbeat experimental blues of Spacemen 3’s 1987 album, The Perfect Prescription, one that frontman Dean Wareham deeply admired.
Galaxie 500’s distinctive sound is recognised for simplistic mellow and dreamy excursions layered with spacious rhythm guitar and prominent lead solos. Wareham’s vocals appear on most of the band’s material and further the trio’s identity with their strained, anxious intensity.
Wareham, Damon Krukowski and Naomi Yang traced the aforementioned Velvet lineage with some well-placed covers over their four years of existence between 1987 and ‘91. Below, we rank the five greatest Galaxie covers, which also include obscure nods to the immortal authority of the Beatles.
Galaxie 500’s five greatest covers:
5. ‘Here She Comes Now’ – The Velvet Underground
As these covers attest, Galaxie 500 were grateful for a diverse swathe of prominent artists, but few were as important to the trio as The Velvet Underground. The towering influence of frontman Lou Reed, founding multi-instrumentalist John Cale and the Velvets’ artistic manager Andy Warhol often take centre stage, but for Galaxie 500, it was all about Sterling Morrison.
Wareham wrote ‘Tugboat’, the popular single from 1988’s Today, as an ode to the late Velvet Underground guitarist, who spent the latter years of his life as a tugboat captain. In a later tribute to The Velvet Underground, Galaxie 500 recorded a cover of ‘Here She Comes Now’ during the This Is Our Music sessions, which was released on a 1997 reissue of the album.
4. ‘Isn’t It A Pity’ – George Harrison
Galaxie 500’s three albums housed one cover a piece upon their initial releases. Making the cut for the 1989 album, On Fire, was a well-sought cover of George Harrison’s ‘Isn’t It A Pity’. The dour cut from the late Beatle’s solo masterpiece, All Things Must Pass, is a perfect match for Galaxie 500’s pensive, plaintive sound.
Although they couldn’t have chosen a better Harrison composition to cover, I personally would have just about chosen the cover of Joy Division’s ‘Ceremony’ over this one, assuming Galaxie had a “one cover per album” rule in place. However, that’s not to say this isn’t a stellar piece of music – in my eyes, Galaxie 500 could do no wrong.
3. ‘Listen, The Snow Is Falling’ – Yoko Ono
In 1971, just over a year following the break-up of The Beatles, John Lennon issued his immortal Christmas hit, ‘Happy Xmas (War is Over)’, which came with a poignant humanitarian message sandwiched with festive jubilation and the vocals of 30 children from The Harlem Community Choir. On the single’s B-side appeared a lesser-known Yoko Ono composition that clearly struck a chord with Galaxie 500.
Ono discussed her beautiful festive gem in a 1993 interview with The Tennessean. “The first pop song — if you can say pop song — I ever wrote was ‘Listen, the Snow Is Falling,’” she said. “I did that before [Lennon and I] got together. Then, when we got together, I made it into a real pop song.”
2. ‘Ceremony’ – Joy Division
During the On Fire sessions in 1989, Galaxie 500 offered their sonic DNA to a cover of Joy Division’s ‘Ceremony’. The track marked one of the final lyrical contributions of frontman Ian Curtis before his tragic suicide in May 1980. Apart from a couple of live/soundcheck versions, Joy Division only recorded one studio demo of ‘Ceremony’ in a session four days before Curtis’ death. The song was subsequently re-recorded and popularised by the surviving members of Joy Division. This became New Order’s first-ever release in 1981.
New Order’s Substance version of ‘Ceremony’ would take some beating, but Galaxie 500 gave it a more than admirable shot. Although this slowed-down, dreamy cover didn’t make the cut for On Fire, it was included as a bonus track in a 1997 reissue and has since become one of Galaxie’s most adored hits.
1. ‘Don’t Let Our Youth Go To Waste’ – The Modern Lovers
At the top of the list is this mesmerising cover of The Modern Lovers’ song ‘Don’t Let Our Youth Go To Waste’. Released in 1981, the original live version was written and performed by Jonathan Richman a capella, with no instrumental backing. Although it appeared on The Modern Lovers’ posthumous album, The Original Modern Lovers, ‘Don’t Let Our Youth Go To Waste’ and its neighbouring material was recorded in the early 1970s.
In 1988, Galaxie 500 honoured Richman’s lyrics with a more textured cover for their masterpiece debut album, Today. In the characteristic Galaxie style, Wareham offers his anguished vocals to give the song a fitting reprisal of youthful uneasiness as drums tumble and bluesy guitar licks interject.
