Heavy metal fans are often protective over their favourite bands and rarely like hearing other artists covering their work. Yet the best cover is one that differs drastically from earlier versions, incorporating new ideas in such a way that it almost becomes a new song in its own right, yet still paying homage to the original recording.
Richard Cheese, the self-proclaimed “hardest working Dick in show business,” has gained considerable acclaim and a loyal following through his work with his backing group Lounge Against the Machine, adding swing, soul and jazz elements to a variety of well known tunes.
“What they appreciate is that their songs are being recognised as songs,” explained Cheese back in 2004 regarding his re-interpretations of many rock and pop classics which, over his decade-long career, have included artists as diverse as Nine Inch Nails, Britney Spears, Queen and Limp Bizkit.
10. CREEP
First released to little effect in 1992, Radiohead‘s debut single, the morose classic Creep, was reissued the following year and soon launched the English group into the mainstream. Catering to the grunge crowd with its raw production and melancholy lyrics, twenty years later and it still remains their signature tune. The track was featured on Cheese’s debut album, Lounge Against the Machine, which was released through Oglio Records in 2000 and also included covers of U2, Prodigy and Papa Roach. As a contrast to the original version, Cheese reworked the song to make it more upbeat, while also making various other references to Radiohead, such as the albums Pablo Honey and OK Computer.
9. BUDDY HOLLY
Perhaps more known for its iconic music video, a homage to the vintage show Happy Days directed by newcomer Spike Jonze, Weezer‘s geek classic Buddy Holly gave the band their breakthrough hit and remains one of their most famous songs. Featured on his second album Tuxicity (the title was a spoof of the System of a Down album Toxicity, released a year earlier), Cheese’s version was piano-driven and saw the frontman singing at his most emotional and sincere, even with lyrics like “I look just like Buddy Holly, and you’re Mary Tyler Moore.”
8. PEOPLE = SHIT
One band that seemed unlikely to receive the Cheese treatment was Slipknot, who first burst onto the metal scene in 1999 with their eponymous debut that took the industry by storm. When their sophomore effort, Iowa, followed two years later, it cemented their reputation as a force to be reckoned with. One of the highlights from Iowa was the charmingly-titled People = Shit, commencing with the line, “Here we go again, motherfucker!” Another bleak song that was revamped to something more cheerful and funky, People = Shit was included on Cheese’s fourth album, Aperitif for Destruction, which surfaced in the summer of 2005 and ran at just half an hour.
7. ARE YOU GONNA BE MY GIRL?
Australian rockers Jet first appeared in 2003 with their debut album Get Born, but it would be the following year that their single Are You Gonna Be My Girl? became a major hit. Also featured on I’d Like a Virgin, Cheese opted to record his version of the song relatively straight-faced, adapting it into a sweet and melodic acoustic number, in which he demonstrated his vocal abilities, before ending his performance by asking, “Are you gonna be Dick’s girl?”
6. GIRLS, GIRLS, GIRLS
Mötley Crüe‘s fourth studio album, Girls, Girls, Girls, was recorded during a difficult period for the band, in which bassist and principal songwriter Nikki Sixx was struggling with heroin addiction, while his bandmates indulged in their own kinds of debauchery. The title track was the first single released from the album and was acccompanied by an explicit promo video which saw the band in a strip club. Cheese decided to cover the song for his 2004 album I’d Like a Virgin and gave it his trademark lounge spin, while also mocking the spoken dialogue from Mötley Crüe‘s 1987 classic.
5. LONGVIEW
When Green Day issued Longview, their first single for major label Warner, in early 1994, few could have predicted the impact the band was to have later that year with their breakthrough hit Basket Case. Yet Longview, their ode to teenage masturbation, served as their introduction to the mainstream and boasted such dubious lyrics as, “Bite my lip and close my eyes, take me away to paradise. Some say quit or I’ll go blind but it’s just a myth.” Cheese’s version was a laid back acoustic number that catches the singer at his most sublime, masking the sexual overtones of the song.
4. HOLIDAY IN CAMBODIA
Following on from their debut single, California Über Alles, the Dead Kennedys followed it up with another punk classic, the politically-charged Holiday in Cambodia. Former frontman Jello Biafra opposed the chance for the song to be featured in a 1997 commercial for Levi’s Dockers, explaining years later in an interview with The Progressive, “I got pretty frightened because it became obvious that my former band members, who should know better, seemed to be all for the idea. And the motivation turned out to be sheer greed.” Cheese’s version, which opened with Christmas-style sleigh bells, was first released on Lounge Against the Machine.
3. INSANE IN THE BRAIN
With their second album, 1993′s Black Sunday, Cypress Hill became a regular fixture of the CD players of students around the world, who would listen to the chilled out classic while getting stoned, particularly the appropriately-titled I Wanna Get High and Hits From the Bong. Another memorable tune from the record was Insane in the Brain, which became the group’s first hit single. The genius of Richard Cheese has often been his attempts to emulate the artists that he is covering, copying many of the hip hop and rap phrases that were used in the original versions, yet it seems bizarre to hear a lounge singer saying “A n*gga like me is going insane.”
2. WAR ENSEMBLE
Thrash legends Slayer are not known for their sense of humour; on the contrary, they are one of the most intense and brutal metal groups of all time. Their politically-charged music resonates so strongly with their fan base that some of them have famously carved the band’s name into their skin as a mark of respect. Yet somehow Cheese managed to rearrange Slayer‘s 1990 classic with a tongue firmly in his cheek for I’d Like a Virgin, somehow singing “The final swing is not a drill, it’s how many people I can kill” with conviction.
1. DOWN WITH THE SICKNESS
Disturbed‘s success came seemingly overnight, with their debut single, Stupify, bringing them to the attention of the rock charts and giving them a supporting slot on Marilyn Manson‘s Guns, God and Government Tour. Their follow-up single, Down With the Sickness, was even more of a success and landed their at number five in the US Mainstream Rock Charts. Cheese’s version, which was featured prominently in the 2004 zombie flick Dawn of the Dead, incorporated elements of swing and jazz and, despite the many expletives, was somehow upbeat and remains a fan favourite.
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