I was reminded of a version of this holiday classic this morning at spin class.
We might all be familiar with the original, and we should be, by Chuck Berry. It’s a fantastic tune that works not only as a Christmas tune, but also a great example of early rock and roll. The song “Rudolph the Red-Nosed Reindeer” was written by a man named Johnny Marks in 1949 (becoming a hit for Gene Autry). He would return to write this sort of sequel along with a man named Marvin Brodie. Originally “Run, Run, Rudolph” was recorded and released by Chuck Berry in 1958, who would attempt to take some of the songwriting credit – and he might actually deserve some since the guitar work is unmistakably his own.
There have been a number of cover versions over the years, many if not most, just don’t hold a candle to the original. Kieth Richards’ version is pretty damn good though.
What I was reminded of this morning however was the heavy metal version. At first I thought it was Motorhead who recorded the cover, but it only took a few seconds of searching to reveal that it was indeed Lemmy on bass guitar and vocals but not his normal group who did the recording.
This one off recording also featured Dave (Foo Fighters, Nirvana) Grohl on drums and Billy (ZZ Top) Gibbons on guitar. The project was from a 2008 compilation of various hard rock and heavy metal stars coming together to record various tunes of the season.
I need this album.