Mates of State Take On Belle and Sebastian, Death Cab for Cutie, Tom Waits on New Covers Album

BY Alex HudsonPublished Apr 7, 2010

On Mates of State's most recent album, 2008's Re-Arrange Us, the husband-and-wife duo ditched their goofy organ-and-drums pop in favour of a more restrained mix of piano and strings. If you're wondering what inspired this stylistic shift, look no further than the tracklist of the band's upcoming covers album, which includes versions of songs by Belle and Sebastian, Fleetwood Mac and Vashti Bunyan.

Entitled Crushes (The Covers Mixtape), the ten-track collection is due out this summer. However, there is no word on whether the disc will be released by the group's previous label, Barsuk Records.

The band revealed the reasoning behind their cover choices, which also include Death Cab for Cutie, Tom Waits and the Mars Volta, in a press release, explaining, "There are so many artists we considered, some for the mere fact that they wrote a perfect song, some for nostalgia's sake, some because more people need to hear them, some for the challenge, and some to shed a whole different light on a song: Our light... make it a duet, more optimistic or maybe less traditional."

If you head over to Mates of State's website, you can listen to the decidedly un-faithful cover of Girls' "Laura," which reinvents the rocking original as a slinky pop tune with hip-hop drum loops and DJ scratching.

The press release also hints that a new album of Mates of States originals is in the works, as the band say, "When we were finished, we couldn't wait to write our own songs again... In dissecting these songs, taking out the biggest creative component - actually writing the song - we were more thoughtful of other musical aspects."

Crushes (The Covers Mixtape):


1. "Laura" (Girls)

2. "Son et Lumiere" (The Mars Volta)

3. "Sleep the Clock Around" (Belle & Sebastian)

4. "Technicolor Girls" (Death Cab for Cutie)

5. "Long Way Home" (Tom Waits)

6. "Love Letter" (Nick Cave)

7. "Second Hand News" (Fleetwood Mac)

8. "17 Pink Sugar Elephants" (Vashti Bunyan)

9. "Roller Coaster Ride" (Dear Nora)

10. "True Love Will Find You in the End" (Daniel Johnston)

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