Second Hand Songs - Wiki - Guidelines

A cover is a song that is performed by a performer different from the original performer. A cover must be released on a medium.

Example: I Just Don't Know What to Do With Myself by The White Stripes was originally performed by Tommy Hunt. The cover was released on the White Stripes album Elephant.

An artist however can use different performer names during his career, we call these performer names aliases. Under the above rule an artist can thus cover the same song twice, as long as it 's under a different alias. Also, we add the condition that both covers can't be the same tracks.

Can an artist cover himself?

As we defined a cover as a song redone by a different artist than the original artist this is rather problematic. However, we allow some exceptions:

An artist can cover himself if he translates one of his own songs, under the condition that this translation is also covered by another artist.

Example: Antonio Carlos Jobim translated his Portugese song Águas de março into English and renamed it Waters of March. The new version was covered by many artists.

An artist can also cover himself if the new version is clearly different from the original, under the condition that this new version is also covered or sampled by another artist.

Example: In 1973, Herbie Hancock covered his own song Watermelon Man from 1962, making substancial changes to it. This new version got sampled by Ultramagnetic MC's You Got to Feel It.

Note also that the definition of a cover implies that if an artist sings one of his songs in duet with someone else, we also consider this to be a cover.

Example: Looking Out My Window by Tom Jones with James Taylor Quartet was originally performed by Tom Jones. Note that "Tom Jones" and "Tom Jones with James Taylor Quartet" are different artists.

Cover Hierarchy

If one considers a "cover cluster", i.e. a group of covers based on the same song, there is a cover hierarchy, not a flat structure. Say cover C covers original O, but makes substantial changes to the concept of the song. (This usually implies there are additional credits given to C) If later a cover D is made, which copies the song as altered in C, then it is a cover of C, not of O.

Example: Comme d'habitude by Claude François was translated into My Way by Paul Anka. The version of My Way by Frank Sinatra is a cover of the Paul Anka version, because it uses his translated lyrics.

What is the difference between covers, partial covers and samples?

Use the following table to find out what type of cover song you are dealing with:

		Does the new song use the original track of the original?
		Yes	No
Does the new song copy a part of the original or the entire song?	A Part	Sample	Partial Cover
	The Whole Song	Remix	Cover

Special cases

Backing tracks

For some labels (think of Motown for example) it was quite common to record a backing track by the label home band, and have different artists sing over this backing track. Technically these songs are both covers (because of the new singing) and samples (because of the use of the backing track). However, keep things simple we index these as covers, explaining the sample relation in the comment box.

Virtual duets

A virtual duet is the type of song where an artist A covers a song by an artist B, but with using samples of the original song, presenting it like a duet. Technically this is both a cover and a sample. However, to keep things simple we will index this as a cover, explaining the sample relation in the comment box.

< What is an original? | Guidelines index | What is a partial cover? >