Beatles covers: better than originals?

In the Boston area there's a band named "Beatlejuice" that was headed up by Brad Delp ( of "Boston" fame). Great covers live. You could close your eyes and swear you were listening to the Beatles live, right there. They are still giving limited performances (pretty good), but it's just not the same without Brad doing the vocals. I don't believe there are any recordings out. Maybe they have material that can be issued in the future!!!

"Better" than originals? Nothing comes immediately to mind. But I do very much like Rufus Wainwright's cover of "Across the Universe," from the soundtrack for the movie "I Am Sam," which features lots of other covers of Beatles songs.

As for the new movie, "Across the Universe," directed by Julie Taymor -- sorry but I have to disagree with the previous post in favor of this movie. I found it charming for about ten minutes, then it started to take itself too seriously and lapsed into wretched excess. The director kept trying to force the Beatles' songs to fit her concepts, and too often it just didn't work. The cover of "Come Together," transformed into a hallucinogenic "Uncle Sam wants you" recruiting fantasy, went so far over the top that it hit bottom.

801 does a version of Tomorrow Never Knows that IMHO surpasses the original. Then again, also IMHO, the original was hardly the Beatles' shining moment.

Marty

Gfroman,

I did see "Across the Universe". I liked the musical performances very much. The cast was very talented and put some nice different twists/edges on several songs. I would like to get the soundtrack.

The story line left a bit to be desired, I thought. These were clearly 21st century kids pretending to be in the 1960's. I thought they should have just gone with a more contemporary story line rather than trying to put a different edge/spin on the 1960's. That did not work for me.

MadHF,

I've seen several leading BEatles cover acts including "Classical Mystery Tour" (with symphony orchestra doing the fills, wonderful!), Rain (twice), 1964 (very good, early BEatles stuff only, simple arrangements), and others. All were most enjoyable and I would recommend each. Classical Mystery Tour, in particular, may appeal to many on this site due to the use of symphony orchestra.

All these acts do a good job reproducing the BEatles recordings live using modern techniques to great affect.