Covering Your Tracks

Classic Rocker JP discusses the great music divide.

JP (center) flanked left and right by guitarist Man Shou & bassist Wang Lei

It’s not a cover song if the cover band owns it. The Man Who Sold the World was a minor hit in David Bowie’s quirky opus, until Nirvana covered it on MTV Unplugged. In three and a half minutes, Kurt Cobain invested enough of himself in the song to make it his, or at least to make him a major stakeholder, much as Eric Clapton co-opted I Shot the Sheriff.