Project 41: Cover an artist we lost in 2025
Sadly, we've already lost some amazing musicians this year: Ozzy Osbourne, Brian Wilson, Sly Stone, David Johansen, Sam Moore, Roberta Flack, and more. Let's honor them by covering their music.
The Danforths (Neil Fasen, Tom Kemmer and Chris Danforth): Planet Caravan
Reunited and it feels so good! Neil, Tom, and Chris create their own twist on this Black Sabbath spaced-out classic. Featuring Fozzie Osborne on vocals, Tom on timpani, and Chris on 3.2 beer.
Neil Fasen, Colby Heston, Randy Dever and Tom Stromsodt: Paranoid
We thought it’d be fun to do a relatively straight forward rendition of Paranoid. We started out with Colby’s ripping guitars. Randy and Tom layered on their thumping bass and drum tracks, and finally I took a few cracks at the vocals. Lots of fun.
Bill Fricke: Love is the Law, Waiting and Living on the Ceiling
We lost a lot of talented artists this year so far, it was difficult to pick one or a few. There were a lot of major artists lost, but as I scanned the lists, I found one that I wanted to honor.
Beej Chaney–The Suburbs
He passed away in January. Although I was too young to see them back in the day, I only saw The Suburbs once live, and that was a reunion in 1995 at Grand Old Day. Legend has it that the Suburbs and the Replacements played at my high school (Hopkins High School) in 1983, or thereabouts, and got booted for drinking. Another notable local artist, John Munson, was part of a New Wave band at Hopkins High School, called the Particles in 1983. He was not a student there, however.
Love is the Law
This is pretty much a straight cover with a poppier arrangement.
Waiting:
I had a conundrum with this one. I have a version I did around 2012 or so, that was a mash-up of Waiting and Life During Wartime, which, the Suburbs have heard and enjoyed. However, I went with a Chris Isaak “Wicked Game” style version instead. If you want to the hear the mash-up let me know and I’ll send it to you or post it at some point.
Late Entry–Stephen Luscombe–Blancmange
After we got the extension on the submission deadline, Stephen Luscombe, from the UK synth -pop duo, Blancmange, passed away on September 13th. It gave me the chance to cover “Living on the Ceiling” which is one of my favorite 80’s synth-pop songs. Also, I’m a sucker for anything with an Indian music influence. The faux sitar sounds were done by running my Telecaster through an acoustic simulator and stacking my Mosaic 12-string simulators.
Cory Docken (Chairplanes) - Bark at the Moon
This is my first solo Basement Sketches submission, a punk/black metal take on Ozzy’s Bark at the Moon. I played all the instruments, and the drums were recorded with one mic. I cut the solo to keep it simple. This was a blast to work on.
Mike Bettison: In Heaven/Lady in Radiator
I remember first seeing Eraserhead in high school and thinking, "I don't want any part of this". :-) But the song really stuck and I came back to it because of this project. RIP David Lynch. He just had a way about him. :-)
The song came together very quickly. It's a pretty simple repeating chord pattern so I messed around with different beats and tempos and landed on this tasty little grove. I used NI Empire Breaks "Bunny Kit", Icon Bass and Electric Mint. I messed around with a sad acapela voice as I was just getting over a cold so that seemed to fit. Finally, I used a Rhodes patch from NI's Electric Phoenix for the solo at the end.
Pete Foss: I Shall Be Released:
I have been crazy busy over the past month and did not think I would have an opportunity ot submit a song for this one. But with the one-week extension, suddenly I had some free time last weekend. I had made a playlist trying to find a song that would work - I thought about and discarded several - but there was one song by The Band that resonated with me and it didn't seem too complicated and I figured I could do something if I had a little time. So, this was recorded in under 24 hours in 2 different sessions last weekend. It's also the first time I've ever incorporated acoustic guitar into a home recording, I think?
I did a super quick levels mix before wrapping up the 2nd recording sessionand added a limiter to control the volume - I held off on sending because I thought I might be able to go back and do a mix/edit/master session with fresh ears - but I don't think that will happen before tomorrow so I'm submitting now before I forget.
This is my version of the Band's version of "I shall be released" - originally written by Bob Dylan but it was the Band's version on their first big album that popularized it.
Anyway, I'm pleased with how it turned out as a quick mixdown. If I ever do a final mix that I think is better I may forward that on.
David Cox: Subway Train
For this project I covered a New York Dolls song, since David Johansen passed earlier this year. They have a lot of terrific songs, and I went with Subway Train, as it’s just so NYC, which I love. Thanks to Neil for laying down bass. I hope folks enjoy the direction I took on this.
Grant Eull: NIB
We lost a lot of great musicians this past year. While I certainly considered covering songs from Sly & the Family Stone, The Suburbs, The New York Dolls and Gang Of Four to honor those influences in my life, I ultimately settled on a much bigger influence. The death of OZZY Osbourne hit me hard. His music from Black Sabbath and his OZZY solo career is part of my life blood. Both Tony Iommi and Randy Rhodes as guitarist found ways to compliment Ozzy’s vocal stylings in melodic ways that just stuck with me in a big way. The death of Randy Rhodes and it’s deep effect on Ozzy was also humbling and pure. Ozzy was one hell of an entertainer regardless of if he intended to be or not, both on camera and on stage he just found ways to lift my spirit. I feel lucky to have attended the 2012 reunion tour for Black Sabbath and to be able to see him perform live and induce a stadium of fans into a deep heavy metal trace. He lived a completely full life and shared so much of it with us. His lyrics to Crazy Train to this day still reflect a deep scar of humanity. I’ll stop rambling and leave you with that 1st verse as quote:
“Crazy, but that's how it goes
Millions of people living as foes
Maybe it's not too late
To learn how to love and forget how to hate”
I believe BasementSketches is a community of love and it is a blessing to participate in these projects. Please enjoy my take on the Black Sabbath classic NIB and I look forward to hearing your contributions.
Brian Eveslague, Randy Dever and Colby Heston: Black Sabbath
Brian, Randy and I all got together last week at the BS practice space to record a "live" version of Black Sabbath. Kelly Duclose was there to help with the recording process. After two takes, we received a text from the person below us who was also recording. They asked us to "take a break" for a bit but we decided to go with what we had.
The bass and drums remained from that session and I came home and recorded the guitars and vocals. It's pretty nasty sounding, but in a good way.
Enjoy!
Colby
Legacy Basement Sketches Black Sabbath
A note from Andrew Charon
I was hoping that I would be able to contribute this time around, but I wasn’t able to deliver. Black Sabbath has been an incredible influence to me and the loss of Ozzy Osborne was heavy. There have been a number of great Basement Sketches Black Sabbath/Ozzy submissions in the past and wanted to resurface them. Grant had challenged me awhile to do a version of Fairies Wear Boots a couple years ago which was super fun. Eric Scott did a cover of Children of the Grave which was the song that inspired me to join in on Basement Sketches. And, Tom’s version of Mr Crowley is simply amazing.