Seattle radio station KEXP started a hashtag during the COVID-19 crisis: #PlayingAtMyHouse, and each week asks people to post links or names of songs on a particular theme. The theme the week of 27 April is Best Covers. I love covers and recommending them. Here’s three good ones.

The Music

• The Pains of Being Pure at Heart, Laid (YouTube) - A cover of James’ classic about obsession and messing about with gender roles
• Hot Chip, Dancing in the Dark (YouTube) - There’s a lot going on in this video: the Public Access TV clips, revisiting a Bruce Springsteen hit, the segway into LCD Soundsystem, and the mention of The Eudaemonic Pie, a book about a bunch of UC Santa Cruz hackers taking on Vegas
• Amber Mark, Heart Shaped Box (YouTube) - Mark recorded this lush, R&B version of the Nirvana track at home while sheltering in place during the outbreak

The link

That clip about the Eudaemonic Pie in the Hot Chip video? That was SF writer Rudy Rucker, in Public Access TV in Virginia in the 1980s (and damn, he had the southern drawl back then, didn’t he?)

The hackers in the book had to build things we take for granted such as microcontrollers with WiFi and/or Bluetooth small enough to fit in a shoe, and not get detected by casino security goons.