Listen to Kurt Vile cover Lou Reed on ‘The Best Show’
It’s hard to predict what will happen each week on “The Best Show.” Tom Scharpling’s internet radio show/podcast goes live every Tuesday night and travels down a path somewhere at the intersection of music and comedy, but the conversation can stray to really anything. This week, that path took us to Philly’s own Kurt Vile, a frequent “Best Show” guest, covering Lou Reed, Steve Gunn intertwining his own tunes with one of John Mayer’s and plenty of Jersey Shore chatter.
Right around the 3:10:00 mark, Vile’s urged into an old cover of Reed’s “Sword of Damocles.” Considering it’s been a while since he last played it — he mentioned the cover goes back to his teenage days — he can’t remember the whole thing, but what he does recall is worth the listen. Vile calls it “dark,” but “beautiful.” The conversation then flows into a debate of which Lou Reed album is best.
If you’ve got the time, the rest of the show contains a few other performances scattered throughout its three-hour length. Vile broke out his own “Smoke For My Halo” that morphed into a new version of an old track called “Blue Cheese.” At one point, he even supplied some not-so-serious impersonations of Bob Dylan and Neil Young. Gunn also gave an in-studio rendition of his tune “Wildwood,” which ended up including the chorus from Mayer’s “Your Body Is A Wonderland.”
Listen to the latest episode of “The Best Show” here.
(h/t Pitchfork)