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Posted by: pippa 27th July 2018, 01:18 PM

From listening to the Greatest Hits recently, it triggered my mind to the fact 5 of their top 10 hits were cover versions with 2 of them achieving Number 1 status.
Which of the 5 is the best one for you?
Please vote and share some comments.

Posted by: Jay ☆ 27th July 2018, 01:57 PM

Definitely Jump!

Posted by: pippa 27th July 2018, 03:04 PM

I Think We're Alone Now and Jump are the best of these 5 and the best by a country mile.
Ill Stand By You is enjoyable.
See The Day i would regard average at best.
Walk This Way is terrible and the worst single they ever released.
I Think We're Alone Now picked up my vote.

Posted by: Feel_The_Fever 28th July 2018, 02:27 AM

Definitely I think we're alone now.

Posted by: Jade 28th July 2018, 01:15 PM

I went for 'Jump' which I find to be very infectious and fun. Nadine kills it on vocals too! 'See The Day' is 2nd though, very underrated. Boo at Cheryl disowning it!

Posted by: JosephAvery 28th July 2018, 06:03 PM

1. Jump
2. I'll Stand By You
3. I Think We're Alone Now
4. Walk This Way
5. See the Day

Considering I was between 6 and 10 when these came out, I actually knew none of them in their original forms so they've never felt much like covers to me. Nevertheless, the top two are my favourites for sure, ITWAN and Walk This Way are both heaps of fun too. See the Day is a clear last but it's a lovely enough song.

Posted by: pippa 30th July 2018, 01:35 PM

Jump truly has jumped ahead of the others and looks safe to say is the winner here.

Posted by: Theo. 30th July 2018, 02:13 PM

I actually don't know for this one because they're all varying shades of cheese. I voted for "I'll Stand by You" because it stands out as one of their (only) heartfelt singles.

My ranking:

1. I'll Stand by You
2. Jump
3. I Think We're Alone Now
4. Walk This Way

5. See the Day (their worst ever single)

Posted by: pippa 1st August 2018, 01:53 PM

I do think they done a good version of I'll Stand by You.

Posted by: Lukuzz 1st August 2018, 02:07 PM

I’d go :
1. I Think Were Alone Now
2. I’ll Stand By You
3. Jump
4. Walk This Way
5. See The Day

Posted by: pippa 1st August 2018, 03:01 PM

See The Day by large, appears very unpopular among fans on this forum.

Posted by: Feel_The_Fever 1st August 2018, 10:50 PM

I prefer see the day to walk this way but both are in the weaker category of their singles.

Posted by: pippa 2nd August 2018, 01:47 PM

Walk This Way i don't like at all, it was a terrible cover version.
It is odd they have so many cover version singles when they have had so many original album tracks that would have served as great singles.

Posted by: Jay ☆ 2nd August 2018, 05:23 PM

I suppose the cover versions were a sign of the times, so it seemed less odd back then, but it was definitely a shame that they amassed as many as five covers!

I'd say that Jump & I'll Stand By You are their most acceptable covers. For starters they both proved to be big hit singles, so in that sense they were certainly worthwhile. I also feel like they became embraced as being honorary Girls Aloud songs - particularly because they were regularly included in their tour set lists and always seemed to get great reactions from the audiences. Other good reasons: Jump had the Love Actually movie tie-in, and also set the tone for portraying the group as having a "more fun" sound / less moody image. I'll Stand By You was their first conventional ballad (Life Got Cold was a bit edgy as far as ballads go, not as accessible as ISBY proved to be), and of course it had the tag of being their first charity single. As songs choices go, both just seemed to make sense and were worthy additions to their discography.

Ideally they'd have stopped with the covers after those two.

See the Day was clearly their label's attempt at trying to play it safe - no doubt they were after another ISBY moment. It's frustrating that they didn't go with Whole Lotta History instead, given that they decided to release it as the next single anyway! Two ballad singles in a row didn't prove to be a good choice in the end, it should have just been one and it should have been their original song. The Chemistry era should have closed with an uptempo song as the fourth single.

Recording a cover for The Sound of Girls Aloud was lazy, as was deciding to release it as a single. Unlike Jump, I Think We're Alone Now really didn't end up being embraced as classic Girls Aloud. Tiffany's version was so big and quite iconic, it's just too associated with her. Girls Aloud's version has an air of being unnecessary.

Following up I Think We're Alone Now with Walk This Way resulted in Girls Aloud releasing two cover singles in a row, which wasn't a situation that should have arisen. At this point in their career, 5 out of 15 singles were cover versions! A third of their output. Imagine bringing the two biggest girl groups of the era together for a collaboration and not coming up with an incredible original song for them to make it "a moment"! Surely Xenomania would have been up for the challenge? Walk This Way was another uninspired choice. It getting to #1 was par for the course for a Comic Relief single, but it falling away so quickly was certainly a strong sign that its laziness prevented the possibility of it being an enduring hit.

Posted by: pippa 2nd August 2018, 06:20 PM

Do you think any original Girls Aloud songs well be covered by other artists in time to come?

Posted by: Hide&Seek 2nd August 2018, 07:54 PM

For me, they're all terrible versions ,but I can just about tolerate Jump so it gets my vote. The Pointer Sisters have a huge back catalogue, it would have been better if GA had gone for something less obvious. When Steps did a cover of Bananarama's lesser known track (Last Thing On My Mind), I was happy , but when they did Kylie's Better The Devil You Know, I just shake my head. So many other gems to choose from.

GA doing a Tiffany song (yeah i know she's not the original but it's the version we all think of), I'd rather they went for one of her others. I would've liked a Tiff cover, just not this one. It's lazy karaoke.

I'll Stand By You - I like the original. GA sound lifeless and limp in comparison.

See The Day - Dee C Lee gives such a wow vocal. It's one of those songs that gives goosebumps. GA = one of the weakest covers I've ever heard.

Walk This Way - I didn't like the original and don't like this. It's just sounds like two groups yelling at each other !

Posted by: inyourroom 3rd August 2018, 11:56 AM

I think it's worth remembering that some of these weren't really choices, they just kind of happened. They weren't sitting around when suddenly one of them went, "hey, let's do a Pointer Sisters cover!", it was offered to them to do that particular song for the movie, and it turned out well. Charity singles are usually covers, and Walk This Way wasn't even a Xenomania production, which seems to suggest that they were asked to join an already ongoing project for a good cause.

Posted by: pippa 3rd August 2018, 12:46 PM

Walk This Way was for a good cause and for Comic Relief popular artists of the time were generally selected so everything fitted.
As a song, its a bad cover but it helped add another number 1 to their credentials nonetheless.

Posted by: Jay ☆ 3rd August 2018, 06:48 PM

True about Jump. I'd say the others were definitely label choices though, and imo they were mostly uninspired picks!


There were another couple of other options on the table, You Got the Love by The Source and Girls & Boys by Blur, so at some point Walk This Way wasn't set in stone. If they had to do a cover, I wished they'd done You Got the Love - would have been more of an opportunity for the groups to show off their vocals, and they'd have got in there before Florence + the Machine!

I wish at that developmental stage they could have organised an original song. McFly's from 2 years earlier was an original, The Wanted went on to do an original, so it wasn't impossible Oh well!

Posted by: pippa 3rd August 2018, 07:00 PM

You Got the Love would have been a much stronger choice than Walk This Way.
It, like you said, was also a better song to showcase the vocals from both groups.

Posted by: inyourroom 3rd August 2018, 08:23 PM

Well, I definitely would have prefered "You Got the Love" (which I would credit to Candi Staton originally, I think The Source added their backing track to an acapella version, in similar fashion to what DNA had done with Suzanne Vega's "Tom's Diner" a bit earlier), and I can also imagine "Girls & Boys" being more fun than what we've ended up with, but I won't lose sleep over it
It seems a bit odd to me how much YGTL was "in fashion" at the time, Kasabian were also playing it live around then (as an intro to "L.S.F."), and Florence's version (which I really like) went from one-off live performance to B-side before becoming a single.

Posted by: HarryEzra 3rd August 2018, 09:44 PM

Jump EASILY

Posted by: AdamAloud 4th August 2018, 02:33 PM

Posted by: Jay ☆ 4th August 2018, 03:09 PM

It could only be them that ended a streak of Comic Relief #1s that started from 1995 :’)

Posted by: Feel_The_Fever 5th August 2018, 12:49 AM

I liked their cover, one of the few songs i like from The Saturdays.

Posted by: Good Old Days 17th August 2018, 06:33 AM

Best - See The Day
Worst - Jump

Posted by: pippa 17th August 2018, 12:38 PM

That is very interesting Good Old Days.
Your opinions contradict the vote by large but it shows how songs appeal to people in different ways.
Although many don't appear to like See The Day it was still a Top 10 hit so many liked it enough to buy it.