so, back when i was an undergraduate in college, i worked for awhile at a movie theatre. there were these cds that we had to play over and over again, soundtracks for people to sit in theatres and wait for their movie to start to. it’s safe to say in one eight hour shift, i’d hear a song maybe…fifteen? twenty times? and while that pretty much killed a number of songs for me forever, one song did escape my hell-no-i’ll-never-listen-to-that-again cut: a cover of the velvet underground’s sweet jane by cowboy junkies.

remember that one? it was mellow and smooth and so, so easy on the ears. but that’s how the cowboy junkies were – and still are.

the canadian band has just recently recorded an album of vic chesnutt covers entitled demons. according to michael timmins, the junkies’ guitarist:

“We tried to approach Demons with the same sense of adventure that Vic undertook in all of his projects (or at least that is the way his recordings sound). We let happy accidents happen; we tried to invest his songs with the same spirit and the adventure with which they were written, at the same time investing them with our own Northern spin. Exploring his songs and delving deeper and deeper into them has been an intense, moving and joyous experience. I don’t think Vic would have wanted it any other way.”

have a listen to the very laid back and enjoyable wrong piano:

oberheim, yamaha
steinway and the lot
i must’ve played the wrong piano
cause it left me with
i don’t know what
so don’t talk to me about mistakes
yes we all simply have got to take precautions
i must of played the wrong piano
cause now i just feel nauseous

(mp3) wrong piano by the cowboy junkies

and here’s a video of them performing supernatural, another of chesnutt’s songs:

demons volume 2, the album wrong piano is off of, will be available for sale on january 18th. pre-order the album HERE.