Nada Surf

Add Date: April 20

Artist: Nada Surf

Album: if I had a hi-fi

Label: Mardev

Genre: Rock, covers record

Comments: Covers records are dangerous business; even when done for the right reasons--bands trying humbly to honor the artists who influenced them and the songs that moved them--it can still seem like the vainest of vanity projects. Fortunately, indie pop superstars Nada Surf go about this the right way throughout if I had a hi-fi. The band covers rock legends like Depeche Mode, Kate Bush and The Moody Blues; indie/underground touchstones like The Go-Betweens, Arthur Russell and Spoon; and even relative unknowns like The Dwight Twilley Band, Bill Fox and The Muslims. Yet they avoid the covers record gimmick of trying to imitate those bands; every number on this record has been tweaked to sound like a Nada Surf song. For me, that's the best way to pay tribute to the artists whom you grew up listening to, and the current bands whose records stay lodged in your player.

Check out "Electrocution" (Bill Fox), "You Were So Warm" (The Dwight Twilley Band), "Love Goes On!" (The Go-Betweens) and "The Agony of Laffitte" (Spoon).