Watch a guy “Give It Away” (give it away, give it away now) in 22 different styles
Look, you probably do not need to hear Red Hot Chili Peppers’ “Give It Away” ever again in your life. Maybe you are a huge RHCP fan; even so, their 1991 hit has been played so many times and in so many contexts that it has entered that hall of once-great “classic rock” songs that only contain shreds of its primal power.
All of which makes it a very fitting track to be covered in the style of 22 different musical artists, as it is here. Statistically speaking, you are bound to gravitate toward at least one of them: Depeche Mode, ABBA, Slipknot, Sam Cooke, the Beastie Boys, ’80s Bowie, Twenty One Pilots, and many more. Some of them seem like covers of other songs with Chili Peppers lyrics over top—the Nine Inch Nails version sounds an awful lot like “Closer,” and Rage Against The Machine is pretty much just “Killing In The Name”—but even that becomes part of the genre-hopping fun. And it goes without saying, but the guy performing all of these in a single cut has a hell of a voice, able to shift from a rap-rock bellow to a throaty croon instantly.
Please now enjoy having the original song stuck in your head for the remainder of the day.