Bands You Should Know: Haim

By Justin Cates

As you may have noticed recently in addition to our now trademark woeful lack of posts, I've ceased posting our somewhat popular recurring feature "Cover Tuesday's".

Essentially, I ran out of good versions of cover songs and stopped temporarily for fear of pushing mediocre content on the world–not to say that's stopped me before.

I don't really mind posting a rant that no one cares about—that puts me in company with about 15,000 other bloggers—but pushing mediocre music suddenly turns me into MTV and I WILL NOT become TRL 2.0 (unless MTV or some other network wishes to pay me an exorbitant fee, in which case I will quite quickly "sell out").

At any rate, I'm going to start posting about mildly obscure bands because there a few greater joys than discovering new music. 

To start with, I present Los Angeles rockers Haim (rhymes with lime).

The group features the Haim sisters sisters Este, Danielle and Alana along with drummer Dash Hutton.

Haim's first album Days Are Gone doesn't drop until September, but they've created plenty of buzz with their debut Forever EP released in 2012.

The songs are an interesting brand of funky, offbeat indie pop that makes for an excellent summer soundtrack.

Most articles about the band seem to try and paint them as some kind of modern take on seventies pop. I can't really comment on that specifically as apart from Zeppelin and Little Feat I've always been mortally terrified of that decade from a musical (and cultural) standpoint*.

The EP's title track, "Forever" is the catchiest cut on the record and the performance below from their appearance on Late Night with David Letterman was how I stumbled upon the group.



"The Wire" is a track from their new album that is incredibly catchy. Admittedly, the drum track is borrowed quite directly from The Eagles which does not please The Dude.

*For the sake of full disclosure, I did at one point own a Bee Gees Greatest Hits cassette and I quite enjoyed it.  

Cover Tuesday: Celluloid Loves Got A John Frusciante

Full disclosure, I have a soft spot for the Bee Gees. I obtained some kind of greatest hits compilation as a child on cassette tape and while disco music is generally detestable, I found a lot of their songs to be quite good.

"How Deep Is Your Love" would have to be up there as far as the group's best work is concerned.

It's a song that transcends the perception that many people have of the Bee Gees as the disposable soundtrack of the seventies. They should be known for more than being the soundtrack for John Travolta and that terrible Sgt. Pepper's movie they made.


This is a very touching song and this rendition by the Red Hot Chili Peppers' John Frusciante is stark and lovely. Also, you can't miss Flea performing a bizarre take on "If You're Happy and You Know It" during the first five seconds.

Next is a rather hilarious version of Elton John's classic "Tiny Dancer" as interpreted by rocker and sometimes comedian Dave Grohl.

This performance comes from the now thankfully defunct Late Late Show with Craig Kilborn–current host Craig Ferguson is infinitely funnier. Dave appears to have just wandered in off the street, not even bothering to spit out his chewing gum before leading the crowd in a rousing rendition of this cut.

This isn't a cover, but it is awesome. As if you needed more reasons to love Dave Grohl, here he is teaching Tenacious D's Kyle Gass how to write a hit.