Hit Covers Of Classic Rock Songs That Fans Actually Hate

A good artist can perform a competent version of a cover song. A great artist can cover a song and make it their own. For example, Johnny Cash's version of "Hurt" by Nine Inch Nails is one example of a cover song that sounds nothing like the original, stripping down the guitars and slowing down the tempo, making the song even more melancholy. From Jimi Hendrix's electrified version of "All Along the Watchtower" to Amy Winehouse's R&B take on "Valerie," some cover songs are better than the original version. Then there's the other side: Some cover songs are just bad.

When an artist covers a popular classic rock song, they might get a lot more scrutiny and criticism than if they released a lackluster original song. For example, reviews of Britney Spears' 2001 album "Britney" tended to single out "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" for particularly harsh critique. Even though the album as a whole also received generally mixed reviews, none of the original songs drew the same kind of ire. To put together this list, we drew from critical reviews, fan comments on social media sites such as Reddit, and user-submitted reviews to music sites such as RateYourMusic.com. We also checked the chart and/or social media performance of each song to verify that it could justifiably be called a "hit." Without further ado, here are five hit covers that classic rock fans actually hate.

Pop star Jessica Simpson recorded a cover of Nancy Sinatra's "These Boots Are Made for Walkin'" for the 2005 "Dukes of Hazzard" movie, featuring her co-star Willie Nelson. The lyrics and melody were drastically rewritten in order to pack them with references to the movie, adding lines like "Tick-tock, all around the clock, drop it/ Push ya tush, like that." Simpson simply does not sound convincing, crooning lines like "Yee-haw" and "Come on, boots" while Nelson's backing vocals are almost mumbled, and the added banjo is not a good fit. 

Still, the cover peaked at No. 14 on the Billboard Hot 100, becoming one of Simpson's best-performing hits. In 2006, the song was a ​​People's Choice Award winner for "Best Song from a Movie," yet also a Stinkers Bad Movie Award for "Worst Song in a Film." One RateYourMusic.com commenter writes, "This is the single worst cover song of all time. You want a real cover of 'These Boots'? Go literally ANYWHERE ELSE and you've got it."

Britney Spears' cover of Joan Jett's version of "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" (itself a cover of a song by Arrows) was the fourth single from her 2001 album "Britney, and it was also prominently featured in her 2002 movie "Crossroads." While not a hit in the U.S., "I Love Rock 'n' Roll" reached the Top 10 in Germany and Austria. Similar to Spears' 2000 version of the Rolling Stones' "Satisfaction" (which was not a single), music critics and classic rock fans alike immediately hated the cover. 

It's easy to see why: The song features a spoken-word intro saying, "Hey, is this thing on?"; the background voices (intended to sound like a crowd at a karaoke bar) sound jarringly out of context, and Spears' signature breathy vocals aren't a good fit for the lyrics or the theme. "Memo to Britney: You do not rock. Repeat, you do not rock. Leave it to Joan Jett," wrote one RateYourMusic.com commenter in 2004. Decades later, even Britney fans rank it as one of her worst singles.

2020 was a weird time for music. Along with Verzuz battles on Instagram Live and dozens of livestreamed concerts, the COVID-19 pandemic brought us Puddle of Mudd's infamous acoustic cover of Nirvana's "About A Girl." After being filmed as part of a SiriusXM session in late 2019, the song went largely unnoticed until April 2020, when clips of the performance were posted to Instagram and the original YouTube video quickly went viral, racking up over a million views despite being unlisted. Top-voted YouTube comments include "This literally sounds like something South Park would do to imitate Nirvana" and "When you think 2020 couldn't get any worse... You find this exists."

The off-key vocals and undecipherable lyrics can still give the listener secondhand embarrassment, and Puddle of Mudd's decision to add bongos to a Nirvana song was definitely questionable. Some members of the band even look concerned as they watch lead singer Wes Scanlin strain as he tries (and fails) to hit the notes. 

Limp Bizkit frontman Fred Durst is not a vocal powerhouse like The Who's Roger Daltrey, and that's very evident when you listen to his cover of The Who's "Behind Blue Eyes" (a song with an interesting backstory). While Durst's vocals don't compare to Daltrey's range, power, or emotion, the thing that really stands out is Limp Bizkit's decision to add a digital Speak & Spell voice saying, "Discover, L.I.M.P., say it" over and over again on the bridge, immediately dating the song in a very bad way.

In 2011, the song was voted the second-worst cover of all time by Rolling Stone readers. One Redditor writes, "Limp Bizkit's Behind Blue Eyes made me hate them on sight." Nonetheless, the single performed moderately well in the U.S., reaching No. 71 on the Billboard Hot 100 and No. 11 on the Billboard Hot Rock Songs. However, it was a bigger hit in much of Europe and even reached No. 1 in Sweden.

In 2015, Disturbed released a slowed-down, orchestra-ed up cover of the Simon & Garfunkel hit "Sound of Silence." Disturbed's version extends the vocal range of the song, moving certain lines to a lower or higher register, while Lead singer David Draiman crisply enunciates the lyrics to the verses and basically screams the chorus. Combined with the piano and strings, this makes the cover sound incredibly overdramatic and over-produced when compared to the simple, timeless nature of the original. 

Disturbed's cover topped the Billboard Mainstream Rock Songs chart and racked up over 1 billion views on YouTube, becoming not only one of Disturbed's biggest hits but also the most popular hard rock song of the decade. However, not everyone enjoyed the song's dramatics, with one Redditor writing: "It's like some child is trying to be edgy, but all it comes off as is incredibly immature and cringey."