Ryan Adams Proves That He’s The World’s Greatest Covers Act With His Take On Radiohead’s ‘Karma Police’

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What kind of artist Ryan Adams is depends on who you talk to. He’s gone through enough stylistic shifts throughout his career that fans can pick and choose which Adams they want to hear and focus on that while cancelling out the rest. And if you happened to come to Adams at this late stage, you could be forgiven for thinking he’s the world’s foremost covers musician.

After famously releasing a song-by-song cover album of Taylor Swift’s 1989, Adams is back at it again with a cover of Radiohead’s “Karma Police.” Adams played the song as part of a mini-set on BBC Radio 2, where he also played “Doomsday” off of his upcoming album Prisoner. Unlike the blown-out pop of Swift, Adams doesn’t have to do much finagling of the OK Computer track to make it fit into his wheelhouse. Listen to both performances below:

In the name of defying expectations, Adams told EW that his upcoming album is inspired by AC/DC and the big guitar sound of Bachman-Turner Overdrive and ELO. Jacksonville City Nights, this ain’t.

“When I run, I listen to [an iPod] Nano that I have,” he said. “I put all the AC/DC records on from back to front, or I’ll listen to the best of stuff from the ’80s: Springsteen, or [Bruce] Hornsby, and I’ll listen to what is going on there. I was listening to AC/DC’s Fly on the Wall and that’s when I realized what I had to do for the record.”

Prisoner is out on February 17 via Pax Am.

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