Let’s get back to the albums. Awhile back I wrote a post about the 90’s alternative rock band Sponge. When I was looking into what they had been up to since their heyday, I found out their most recent album was a very interesting collection of songs. Today I’ll have a look at that.

Sponge – 1994

Released October 18, 2024 via Cleopatra Records

Sponge made their mark starting in 1994 with their song Plowed, and 30 years later they decided to pay tribute to the music of that year with a covers album. Everything here is a song from the alt-rock heavy year and the vast majority of these were either hits or well-known cuts. A few are deeper cuts and there’s at least one that seems to be an unusual pick.

Finding Sponge’s line-up for this album was a bit of a chore, as 1994 does not have a Wikipedia entry and the liner notes from the album are psychotically hard to read. But I was able to ascertain that the line-up on the album mirrors the band’s currently listed roster, not a massive surprise since this album is only a year old. Vinne Dombroski is the group’s lone original member and the singer. Kyle Neely and Andy Patalan provide guitars, Tim Patalan is on bass and Dave Coughlin is on drums. The Patalan brothers also produced the album.

This is the first time I’ve ever handled a covers album on the site. They aren’t normally something I really get into, but this one did grab my attention. I will be grading on a bit of a curve, covers albums are kind of things for curiosity’s sake and need a different measuring stick than an album of originals. Though this album was obviously interesting enough for me to write about, so there has to be something here.

Savory – originally performed by Jawbox

We are out of the gate with a song I’m not familiar with. Jawbox is a vaguely familiar name but I don’t recall the song or the band at all. The original is a pretty heavy, noisy and interesting cut. Sponge always have had a heavier backbone to them so this isn’t some wild, out of pocket song for them to cover. Sponge goes at creating a pretty faithful version of this song. It is a lot smoother in what I guess passes for a chorus, though similarly harsh in the verses. It’s kind of hard to grade since I have no familiarity with the source material but this is a good listen.

Grade: B

Supersonic – originally performed by Oasis

Up next is one I know extremely well, one of the many singles from the debut Oasis record. Sponge go a bit into a lower register here, the song isn’t as “bright and shiny” as the original, which is totally understandable. I can say that it does lack the swagger that Oasis had, but that’s not really a knock against Sponge since no one really had that. This cover is suitably hard and a fair bit noisy, it suits the song well and Sponge did a good job on this one.

Grade: B+

Girls And Boys – originally performed by Blur

And now we jump straight into the other darlings of 1994 Britpop. This song hails from Blur’s seminal album Parklife and is one of the more interesting cuts from the album. The original is a bright and poppy sort of almost dance track, which belies the snarky look at party life that the lyrics were examining. Here Sponge sound almost a hair out of tune but it’s in a way that’s honestly endearing. The cover is performed with more straightforward guitar and drums, though they do throw in a few of the noodly embellishments that made the original pop. I think this is a really good cover version and when I heard this it was the impetus to actually write this post.

Grade: A

Morrissey – The More You Ignore Me, The Closer I Get

We’ve arrived to another track totally unfamiliar to me. Before I looked up the original version of this song I had not heard a note of Morrissey’s solo career. While he can be kind of a clown at times, I haven’t purposely avoided him so much as I just haven’t given enough of a shit to try him out. I can say that the original sounds fine, I wouldn’t knock it at all but I also still don’t really give a shit about it.

Sponge pick up the beat a bit for their cover and honestly their version pleases my ears more than the original. This song kind of doesn’t really go anywhere but it’s pleasant and Sponge work very well with the source material. Also, Sponge chose this one for a music video.

Grade: B

Girl, You’ll Be A Woman Soon – originally performed by Urge Overkill, sort of

And now we’re in Cover Inception, as this song is a cover of a cover. It was originally recorded by Neil Diamond, not a name I ever intend to really feature on my pages. But in 1994 the song was performed by Urge Overkill for the soundtrack to Pulp Fiction. I spent a good part of my senior year in high school in a theater watching that movie, so I am quite familiar with this version. And now 30 years on we get Sponge’s cover of this 1994 cover of whatever Neil Diamond was doing in 1967.

Sponge’s cover is more brash and noisy than Urge Overkill’s and does lack the atmosphere that their version invoked, but this is still a quality cover tune. It’s perfectly acceptable and nice to listen to. I won’t compare it to the original because I’m not putting Neil Diamond into my algorithms.

Grade: B

Interstate Love Song – originally performed by Stone Temple Pilots

Up next is a song from Stone Temple Pilots, though that’s vastly understating things. This isn’t just a STP song, this is quite possibly the greatest song they ever wrote. For my money it is, though it’s an argument we can save for another day.

With cover songs, the covering act often doesn’t sound much, if anything, like the original performer. But that’s kind of out the window here. In this case the vocals are especially where things get looked at. No one is going to mistake Vinnie Dombroski for Liam Gallagher, or Morrissey or Damon Albarn, and certainly not Hope Sandoval who is coming up soon.

But, you know what? Vinnie is in the same general operating space as Scott Weiland. They aren’t clones of each other by any means, but Vinnie does work in that raspy grunge department. And STP was more grunge while Sponge was more alt-rock, though again the bands were not worlds apart.

And what we get here is a faithful, in-pocket rendition of the STP masterpiece. I can’t say there’s anything “added” to the song but this cover is an in-style cut of the original. This feels like one of two of Sponge’s most “at-home” song on the album, and I’m sure it will shock any reader to find that the next one is the other one. While often the best cover songs are far outside the scope of the covering artist, it doesn’t hurt to crank one out that is in the wheelhouse. And that is the case here.

Grade: A

No Excuses – originally performed by Alice In Chains

From one 1994 grunge titan to another, we go right into a cut from the seminal acoustic Alice In Chains EP Jar Of Flies. Very simply, Sponge are again operating in their element and do a bang-up job on another song in their wheelhouse. The original is an immortal AIC performance and Sponge do complete justice to it.

Grade: A+

Fade Into You, originally performed by Mazzy Star

This is one of the more interesting cuts from the album and it appears listeners agree with me, as it’s the third most-streamed track (behind Supersonic and Interstate Love Song). Mazzy Star had an unlikely hit with this atmospheric dream-pop ballad back in the day and Sponge have provided a rendition of it here. Sponge tackle the song very faithfully, with the only difference being the obvious one in vocals between Vinnie and Hope Sandoval’s original performance. But Vinnie does a deceptively good job of fitting his voice with the song and this is another outstanding cover.

Grade: A

Bull In The Heather, originally performed by Sonic Youth

This is the second to last song and also the final song that I’m not familiar with. I honestly never really checked out Sonic Youth, I had other stuff to do I guess. I definitely wouldn’t have liked this song in 1994 but I think it sounds fine today. Sponge’s cover goes a bit more conventional and driving than the original and it’s a version I can appreciate. And I can say I probably would have liked this cover more than the original back then.

Grade: B+

Cantspeak, originally performed by Danzig

While the other picks here do align with the same circles Sponge ran in through 1994, this last choice is a true curveball. This track hails from the fourth Danzig album, cleverly titled 4. This was the final shot from the classic Danzig line-up, things got way different after this.

Cantspeak is a quieter but not quiet song. It was one of the highlights of the Danzig album and is a very interesting and welcome choice here. Sponge handle the song largely like the original. The cover is more clear, Sponge did not use the distorted effects Danzig did. But it’s a very nice cover version, one that seems outside the box but Spong worked with very well.

Grade: A

1994 was a fun romp through the sounds of the day that came along just as Sponge were breaking out. The premise of covering songs from a specific year is way more interesting to me than a band simply offering up a series of covers that inspired them, sound fun or whatever. And Sponge picked a whale of a year with all of the alt-rock floating around, a scene they themselves were part of. This was all nicely chosen and well executed, nothing felt like it was there as a gag or a waste of time. It was fun to revisit these songs through the lens of Sponge, or in a few cases hear them for the first time.

Album Grade: B+

1994 is a great look back at one of music’s more significant years. Sponge do a fantastic job curating and playing these cuts from the time period they also helped shape. Covers albums do not have to be idle curiosities or one-listen throwaways when someone thinks a bit outside the box, and Sponge did that here.