The five best covers of Mazzy Star song ‘Fade Into You’
When Mazzy Star released ‘Fade Into You’ in 1993, they could never have imagined the life which their creation has endured over the last 30 years. While the song was a minor hit when it was initially shared, its status as a cult classic has only grown stronger with every passing year.
Although Mazzy Star never became the biggest band of the 1990s, ‘Fade Into You’ helped their second album, So Tonight I Might See, go platinum. However, the group never sought fame and instead focused exclusively on their art. Despite the unexpected commercial success of their hit single, which has been streamed over 300 million times on Spotify alone, Mazzy Star never capitalised upon their moment in the spotlight.
“It came almost at the same time,” the late David Robuck said of the song’s creation in 2018 to News Australia. We weren’t trying to write a hit song – we were just writing a song. I think we had a melody and a feel and we just followed that feel. And that became the song… It was acoustic guitar and both of us singing and after we’d written the song then we arranged it for other instruments – piano and slide guitar and drums. But it started out as an acoustic song.”
Since Robuck tragically died of cancer in 2020, there’s been renewed interest in the band and their magnum opus, ‘Fade Into You’. While there were a couple of covers of the track before Robuck’s death, the number has multiplied, and all of the entries featured below were recorded since his sad passing.
The best covers of the Mazzy Star song ‘Fade Into You’
Mallrat – ‘Fade Into You’ (2022)
Australian musician Grace Shaw, better known as Mallrat, stripped ‘Fade Into You’ down to its core for her take on the shoegaze classic. Shaw’s version of the track has an intimate feel, and her gentle voice carries the song beautifully. Admittedly, it’s the most inventive cover to exist, but when the nucleus of ‘Fade Into You’ is already so perfect, why mess around with the formula?
During an interview with Rolling Stone, Shaw explained why she picked the cover as a bonus track on her debut album, Butterfly Blue, and revealed it was “recorded for fun one day”. She added: “It’s on my list of songs that I wish I had written. I feel very connected to [it]… So I wanted a bonus track on the album and it was the perfect candidate.”
American Football – ‘Fade Into You’ (2022)
Math-rock veterans American Football took a different approach to ‘Fade Into You’ and used their cover as the soundtrack of a short film, adding a new dimension to the track. The seven-minute video follows a series of lost souls who don’t know each other but are united by a sense of yearning. American Football restructures the track to bring it into their strict sonic realm. Once you combine the recording with the visuals, their take on ‘Fade Into You’ is a tearjerker.
Of the release, the band’s Nate Kinsella said: “I loved the concept of taking a bunch of strangers’ mundane moments and literally fading them into each other, creating a sort of visual game of telephone where everyone’s personal experience disappears into someone else’s completely different experience of the same situation.”
Inhaler – ‘Fade Into You’ (2020)
During the Covid-19 pandemic, Irish indie band Inhaler recorded a cover of their choice for the broadcaster Radio X and picked ‘Fade Into You’. At the time, nobody could mix. Therefore, their first attempt at the song was shot on an iPhone and featured frontman Eli Hewson with his acoustic guitar.
A few months later, Inhaler officially released their own version of the Mazzy Star track, which featured the entire band. Their spacey take on the song lets the lyrics breathe and let the atmospheric nature of the recording wash over the listener. A solemn sense of desperation infects Inahler’s version of ‘Fade Into You’, and it feels very much like a product of the pandemic.
Muzz – ‘Fade Into You’ (2020)
Muzz is the side-project of Interpol singer Paul Banks with Matt Barrick and Josh Kaufman. They shared their debut album in 2020, and in the same year, they shared their EP, Covers, which included a rousing take on ‘Fade Into You’. Banks’ monotone vocals add an extra layer of bleakness to the already heartbreaking track.
He explained to the Daily Star: “I was really into that song when it came out. I was probably 13-14. It hit me like a truck. I’ve always been a big fan. We were mindful of the fact it was mainstream. It’s indie, I guess, but everybody knows that song. It’s not exactly a deep cut to go for. It was interesting to not baulk at that. Why not? Just because it’s a popular song is not a reason not to do it. As long as you have a true emotion in your song, it doesn’t matter how popular the original is.”
Paolo Nutini & BBC Concert Orchestra – ‘Fade Into You’ (2022)
When Scottish singer-songwriter Paolo Nutini recorded a session live for the BBC at the legendary Maida Vale studios in 2022, he needed to produce something extra special and chose to cover Mazzy Star’s ‘Fade Into You’. The backing of the BBC Concert Orchestra elevates the track to a new level thanks to the heavenly string section.
To begin with, Nutini’s take on ‘Fade Into You’ sounds like an ordinary cover. However, it gradually becomes more grandiose as the song develops, but the Scotsman’s vocals stay delightfully gentle throughout it all. With the support of an orchestra, Nutini finds a way to impossibly make the line, “I think it’s strange you never knew,” even more painful for the listener.
