Regardless of which niche corner of rock music you most frequently inhabit, it’s been an exciting week for collaborative singles. Following in the footsteps of the new nu-cabin-core track from Bon Iver and Ethan Gruska, the New Weird Australia EP from leaders of the movement Tropical Fuck Storm and King Gizzard, and a worthy contribution to the power pop group chat courtesy of Dazy and Militarie Gun, Ducks Ltd. are now pushing forward with their jangle-pop renaissance agenda by covering renowned not-jangle-pop outfit The Jesus and Mary Chain’s “Head On” with the help of illuminati hotties.
Recontextualizing the track from its very-’80s noise-pop origins to another movement from that decade, Ducks replace the original track’s massive weight with the tight, breezy sounds of last year’s debut Modern Fiction, with Sarah Tudzin’s vocals underlining those of Tom McGreevy. “Every time we do [a cover] we feel like we learn something about songwriting and arranging that makes us better at making our own music,” he shared in a press statement. “This project is kind of an extension of that exercise, and as a band who obviously wear our influences on our sleeve a bit, it’s a fun way to share some stuff we’re into.”
After continuing on to make the bold claim that Trompe le Monde is the best Pixies album (obviously incorrect—it’s Bossanova), McGreevy says of the collaboration: “Sarah Tudzin has an immense and powerful production/mixing mind and one of my favourite singing voices of anyone doing stuff right now, so we asked her if she’d be down to work on it with us and she helped us figure out how to make all the pieces fit together. Truly a high honour! She also persuaded us to record our guitars through actual amplifiers for the first time ever, rather than going straight into the box like we normally do which feels momentous! Amplifiers! Who knew!”
Hear the cover below, and check out Ducks’ imminent U.S. tour dates here, and illuminati hotties’ upcoming UK dates here.
