bruce springsteen

Last week, we kicked off the beginning of Cover Wars March Madness by announcing our first ever “play-in” game. We took ten covers that had not previously participated in a Cover Wars and let the readers select up to three for automatic entry into this year’s tournament.

The winners of the play-in round are:

1) Live and Let Die (Paul McCartney) as performed by Perpetual Groove
2) Across 110th Street (Bobby Womack) as performed by My Morning Jacket
3) FM (Steely Dan) as performed by 2D (Gorillaz) featuring Nathain Haines

The other 29 entries already gained entry into the tournament the conventional way – by winning a Cover Wars in the past year. Now that we’ve got our 32 covers selected, let’s take a look at the matchups…

Matchup #1 (Bob Dylan Covers):

The Black Crowes – Rainy Day Women #12 & 35

In addition to performing the song live, The Black Crowes also contributed a studio take to this 1995 disc for NORML that also includes Gov’t Mule performing Don’t Step On The Grass, Sam, and Widespread Panic’s studio take of And It Stoned Me, amongst other tracks. Source: Hempilation: Freedom is NORML

[audio:https://glidemag.wpengine.com/hiddentrack/wp-content/uploads/2010/04/rainydaycrowes.mp3]

VS.

The Black Keys – Wicked Messenger

There are some real gems from the 2007 I’m Not There soundtrack and this is one of them. Previously on Cover Wars, Stephen Malkmus and the Million Dollar Bashers contributed a cover from the same release for Ballad Of A Thin Man. Source: I’m Not There (Music From The Motion Picture)

[audio:https://glidemag.wpengine.com/hiddentrack/wp-content/uploads/2010/05/bkmessenger.mp3]

READ ON to vote in the remaining seven matchups for the the first half of Cover Wars March Madness Round 1…