Tax day was last Thursday. I’ll be getting a decent refund, but for all the wrong reasons. Since I’m self-employed I make quarterly payments based on what my accountant estimates my income will be. My business did really badly last year and so I ended up overpaying on my taxes. On the whole I would rather have had a more profitable year and no tax refund.
Much has been made about the “Tea Party” yabbos complaining about their tax burden, among other things. As far as I can tell they haven’t offered any constructive ideas about how to pay for George Bush’s off-budget war without raising tax revenue now that those bills are coming due. But they’re hardly the first people to complain about paying taxes. George Harrison was a fabulously wealthy man when he wrote a song complaining about how much he had to pay in taxes. Over the years that song has been reinterpreted by many people in many styles. Here are a few examples.
Hideki “Taxman” (Beatles)
I really like the big hollow drum sound on this one. It’s a little downtempo and makes the taxman sound pretty menacing. Pretty much in line with everybody’s opinion of the guy.
Stevie Ray Vaughan “Taxman” (Beatles)
Stevie Ray does his signature loud Texas white guy blues thing all over the Beatles. I know that SRV is a guitar god tragically cut down in the prime of life and all that, but every one of his songs sounds the same to me. While I like loud Texas white guy blues and I willingly admit that SRV was very talented from a technical perspective, I’ve never found him to be particularly original or creative. I’m sure I’ll get lots of grief for saying that.
Black Oak Arkansas “Taxman” (Beatles)
I was surprised at how well this song works as a 70s-style Southern rock workout.
Doug Pinnick “Taxman” (Beatles)
This song is from the album Butchering The Beatles, which is a heavy metal tribute to the Fab Four. The album cover is a really disgusting takeoff on the famous “butcher boy” album cover.
Xenon Light “Taxman” (Beatles)
This comes to us from the late lamented Cover Fight website. It’s very percussive and driven by a glitchy keyboard.
Check out the writeup on Frusciante I think on allmusic.com about his “grimey” guitar sound vis a vis SRV’s virtuosity. He says for him it’s all about feeling/emotion being the thing since technical playing to him is boring and nobody’s gotten anything more out of it since hendrix did his thing — how much faster can you play notes? who cares how fast if it’s meaningless? no grief here…
Q: How many guitar players does it take to cover a Stevie Ray Vaughan song?
A: All of them, apparently.
My favorite is Junior Parker’s slow and slinky version: http://www.versusgoliath.com/upoads/taxman.mp3
My favorite by far is the version by Ben From Corduroy.
first time I’ve found every song on CF unlistenable. Guess I hate “Taxman” even more than I knew. I tried them, but couldn’t get through more than a few bars of any of them. (nothing personal . . . I just really hate that song).
Un listenable is what make CF so great. Keep up the good work.