Album: V/A / Score: The Covers

Artist: V/A

Title: Score: The Covers

A sort of stand-alone cousin to Merge's giant 20th anniversary box set/subscription series, this disc contains specially commissioned versions of tracks from Merge albums by non-Merge bands. A lovely idea, a wealth of potential source material, and they asked some cool bands to throw down.

The good news is that it pretty much works. Milage varies, of course, depending on your opinion going in of the song and/or covering band. Some marriages are inspired: the disc opens with a ripping take of The 3Ds' "Sleep All Summer" by Quasi (better known as Janet Weiss' other band) that's going to have me digging around to figure out where I stashed all those 3Ds MP3's. Some don't work — Bright Eyes kinda bargle up The Magnetic Fields' "Papa Was a Rodeo", though this might just be a reflection of my general antipathy towards Bright Eyes.

Probably more destined to be pulled out for the few tracks that pulled me in that repeat album listening, this is still a reliably solid collection.

Track Picks: 1 - "Beautiful Things" (Quasi — 3Ds cover), 4 - "Sleep All Summer" (St. Vincent and the National — Crooked Fingers cover), 13 - "Drug Life" (The Mountain Goats — East River Pipe cover)