Ted Leo's Cover of "Everybody Wants To Rule The World"

The A.V. Club, the semi-serious pop culture offshoot of the Onion, started their Undercover project a few months ago. Inviting bands into their office to play cover songs from a predetermined list of tracks. The first entry in the project, my favorite so far, was Ted Leo And The Pharmacists doing a cover of the Tears For Fears song "Everybody Wants To Rule The World." As corny as it sounds, Ted Leo's cover more or less redeemed the song in my mind. I recommend checking it out along with most of the other tracks from the Undercover project. There's even a Depeche Mode cover, if you're into that sort of thing.

Rating: 85%

(Image from adage.com)

Fender Samarium Cobalt Noiseless 5 string Jazz Bass Pickups

Fender is the Ford of guitars--you either hate to love them, or love to hate them. My old Mexican Jazz bass pickups had a nice snarly, nasal sound, but the 60 cycle hum was bad enough to make your teeth hurt and the poles were kind of rusty. So I put in these fancy American custom pickups, which are aren't nearly as noisy but also seem to have less balls. I'm sure there's an ironic and/or racist metaphor here somewhere, but digging it up just seems like so much work.

RATING: 78%

(Image from pro-music-news.com.)