Me First and the Gimme Gimmes - "I Believe I Can Fly"

There are days when I really resent the Warped Tour. I used to be fully invested in many of the bands who have appeared on that tour, but the older I get, the more I realize how demeaning it is. It's the biggest, easiest, automatically targeted market you could ever hope for, so much so that it's pretty much exploitative. That being said, I come back to appreciating some of the bands that have participated in the tour.

Of course, now that I appreciate all kinds of music, I don't seem to appreciate the music in the same way that I used to. It all sounds very rudimentary to me now, and that's only considering the recording techniques that most of these bands are using (unless they're produced by Brian McTernan or Steve Evetts). This holds true for almost every band except for Me First and the Gimme Gimmes. I've never stopped appreciating them; in fact, I probably appreciate them more now than when I first started listening to them, just because I know more about music now than I did then.

The idea of a punk rock all-star cover band is pretty kitschy and they play that up perfectly, theming their albums and their stage shows to fit the songs. It's quite impressive, considering that Fat Mike is involved (I've never been impressed by anything NOFX has ever done except for their cover of "Olympia, WA"). Their choice of songs is nothing short of amazing, yet they still keep a sense of humor about their being the best punk rock karaoke act out there (more than a few of their official videos contain karaoke scenes).

What probably amazes me most is that they're somewhat prolific. I understand that there's no songwriting involved, but to have so many albums and singles out there when the guy from NOFX and the lead guitarist from Foo Fighters are in your band is pretty impressive.

R. Kelly's mid 90s masterpiece, "I Believe I Can Fly" was sort of an anomaly. It was written, produced and arranged by the man himself and won three Grammys all while being the theme song for Space Jam, a movie everyone under 25 has seen, but probably doesn't remember (or want to remember). When you think about what R. Kelly has done since then, it's easy to forget that there was a time he didn't seem so insane. Multi-part hip-hoperas and explicit videos with teenagers seem to point in a certain direction, but R. did some things right.

Spike Slawson (of Swingin' Utters) takes R.'s masterpiece to a new level. Usually, "punk" singers don't pride themselves on their vocals, but on their delivery. With Spike, these things are inseparable. He has a way of crooning without being comforting and delivering the lines with intensity without losing the feel of the original songs. To play a truly effective cover, a band has to take it and make it their own without destroying the original, which is a very difficult balance issue; it could easily be too bland or too different. Me First and the Gimme Gimmes are really great at destroying songs outside of the realm of power chords and really building them back up again.