Songs Reagan Youth Have Covered

Reagan Youth always covered songs, but we never wanted to be known as a band familiar for covering that one song, so we covered many.

(Note: the italics fonts are the band members that played the songs)

1.Right To Work by Chelsea - The first song we covered as Reagan Youth and the only punk song we covered. (Andy Apathy and Charley Tripper)

2.Have You Seen Your Mother, Baby Standing In The Shadows by The Rolling Stones - I remember Jesse Malin, from Heart Attack, telling me he really liked when we did this cover... and telling me that he didn't like the way we covered My Generation. (Andy and Charley)

3.My Generation by The Who - Dave Insurgent changed the lyrics from "Why don't you all just fade away" to "Why don't you all just fuck off". (Al Pike, Steve and Vic Venom)

4.Communication Breakdown, Dazed and Confused by Led Zeppelin - I distinctly remember playing "Dazed and Confused" on a RAR float that went up 6th Avenue on the way to the United Nations. It was so cheesy. (Al, Steve, Rick Royale and Vic)

5.Misty Mountain Hop, Rock N' Roll and Whole Lotta Love by Led Zeppelin - Because too much Led Zeppelin is never 'enuff. We covered these songs back to back to back to back at CBGBS and we didn't care if it wasn't considered punk. (Al and Steve)

6.Ace Of Spades by Motorhead - Dave used to invite Vic Venom onto the stage to sing this song before he was in the band. (Al, Steve, Rick and Vic)

7.Sweet Leaf by Black Sabbath - We did a reggae version of this song. (Rick and Vic)

8.War Pigs by Black Sabbath - Only the greatest war protest song ever. When we opened for the Dead Kennedys in L.A., Jello Biafra told Dave that we couldn't play this song in our set. We did it anyway and after the show I asked Dave "What did Jello say about us playing it anyway?", Dave said Jello told him "I think they got the message" or something like that. It was back in '84 so I don't remember his exact words. (Rick and Vic)

9.NIB by Black Sabbath - What can I say, we really, really loved Sabbath. (Rick and Vic)

10.Over, Under, Sideways, Down by Yardbirds - I remember playing this New Mexico in '84, what a great fuckin' riff. (Rick and Vic)

11.In-A-Gadda-Da-Vida by Iron Butterfly - I actually did a bit of the keyboard intro to start off the song. (Rick and Vic)

12.That's It For The Other One by The Grateful Dead - Dave and I would laugh that punk rockers were actually slam dancing to a Grateful Dead song. If they only knew what they were slam dancing to! And we played this while we toured across the states in 1987, when the Dead were popular as fuck. The punks really hated them and their "I will survive" song (Touch Of Grey) was on the radio constantly at that time. (Javier and Vic)

13.Electric Funeral by Black Sabbath - Reagan Youth did not cover this song, but Lucifer's Imperial Knights of Eternal Schism did. That band consisted of Dave on drums, me on the guitar and Mike Diamond from the Beastie Boys singing while wearing a rasta wig as he perused a rasta bible. Of course it had to be a reggae version.

14. Fire by Jimi Hendrix - We were in between bass players after Al Pike left so we covered this song with the engineer from our first album, Jay Dublee, playing bass or guitar (he and I would switch instruments while on stage) for us. (Rick)

15. Live Like An Angel (die, Like A Devil) by Venom - In the one gig that I did not participate in, Vic Venom took over on guitar and Andy Apathy came back to play on bass. With Vic Venom on guitar, is it a wonder that a Venom song was covered? (Rick)

16.Purple Haze by Jimi Hendrix - We covered it simply because Hendrix is the shit and it's only one of the all time great songs of all time. (Rick and Vic)

17.Rock N' Roll Part II by Gary Glitter - Steve, Al and I learned this song and played it live without Dave knowing that we were going to play it at the end of the show. Dave was a good sport about it and went along with it, Vegas style.

Before we were Reagan Youth, the band called itself PUS. What can I say except we were really young when we came up with the name. I'm talking junior high school here. Back in those days, as PUS, we did practice songs by The Sex Pistols, The Clash, Generation X, The Dead Boys, The Ramones and The Damned. As House Of God, we covered Heaven and Hell by The Who. Lastly, Dave and I always thought it'd be funny if Reagan Youth covered some southern rock classics like "Whipping Post" or "Green Grass and High Tides", but never "Free Bird". Too bad we never got around to that, talk about a contradiction of styles! And Dave really wanted us to cover "If Six Was Nine" by Hendrix so he could change the line "If all the hippies cut off all their hair" to "If all the skinheads grew out all their hair" and of course, because it's a great fuckin' song. Unfortunately, our bassist said he didn't want to bother learning that song, something about it being too hard. If I can remember anymore songs then I'll post them. Sure hope this is some interest to some of you, blah, blah, blah, blah....


DAVE INSURGENT AND ANDY APATHY MY BROTHERS, R.I.P., I MISS YOU AND I WISH YOU WERE STILL HERE.