According to the Guinness Book of Records, the song Yesterday by The Beatles holds the record for having the most cover versions of any song ever. More than 3,000 versions of the song are available, but none of them could be better than the original!

Given the rise in popularity of the cover song, many becoming huge hits for the covering artists, what does make a great cover song? Is it a seamless rendition? Is it in seeing how far you can twist it from the original while still maintaining the original intent? Is it about sincerity? Irony? Perhaps putting that unmistakable personal stamp on it? The truth is that there is no formula for a great cover but we’ve found our favourites and put them on Video Hits: The Greatest Covers.

It’s three CDs packed with everything from Faith No More, Jeff Buckley, Red Hot Chili Peppers and UB40 to Florence + The Machine, Lily Allen and Katy Perry. My personal favourite is a little gem from our very own Paul Dempsey covering the MGMT smash Time To Pretend.

It’s in stores today, so grab yourself a copy!

This is RAD.

Faith No More opening up Chinese Arithmetic with Lily Allen’s Fuck You - live at the Hurricane Festival at Scheeßel in Germany.

In Wes’s (of Wes’s Music Soapbox fame) immortal words: “One of the greatest band that ever was, and greatest singers of our generation.”

Who’s up for a big old awards party? The esteemed Brit Awards are celebrating their 30th on Tues Feb 16 and we’ve just received the nominations which were picked out by the 1,000 strong BRITs Academy. The lovely and tenacious Ms Lily Allen (currently in Oz!) is top of the pile, with three noms for British Female Solo Artist, British Album (It’s Not Me It’s You) and British Single of the Year (The Fear). But we always knew she was a clever kid… The seriously exciting news is that our homegrown legends Empire of the Sun are taking on well… the world. The Empire has been nominated for both International Album (Walking On A Dream) and International Breakthrough Act. Emperor Luke Steele will fly to London to attend the Brits on behalf of the band, and by the looks of the Empire of the Sun site forums, the British Empyreans are super-excited to have him in their home town, sharing their oxygen supply (Empire fans are hardcore… but they’d better still themselves, because The Empire is heading to the UK and Europe for an assault on the summer festival circuit!) If Empire wins either of the Awards, they’ll be the first Australian band to win a BRIT Award since Crowded House in 1994! The only other Australian band to have previously won a BRIT Award was INXS, and outside of Kylie Minogue, no other Australian artist has won a BRIT Award in the past decade! Empire’s competition this year is Jay-Z (on whose album Emperor Steele is a guest artist), Lady Gaga, Animal Collective and Black Eyed Peas.

Amongst the excitement about the nomination Emperor Steele said, “The dream was the king for this record and it is becoming wilder and wilder as the sandman keeps cooking. This is a great honour, we are walking on a dream.”

In a déjà vu moment, Robbie Williams and Empire of the Sun will be sharing the Awards Ceremony limelight (think ARIAs ‘09), as Robbie Williams presented with the highly coveted Outstanding Contribution to Music Award. Robbie will close the 2010 show with a stunning live performance – here’s to more self-confessed Dad dancing!

Riding off the back of the biggest ARIA Awards since Ben Hur (please don’t mention that ARIAs didn’t necessarily operate during the time of Christ), it’s difficult to let the party die down. After all, it’s only 3 weeks til Christmas!

So indeed the good times continue with the news that we (that’s EMI worldwide, not my band) have FIFTY SIX Grammy Award nominations in the whopping one hundred and nine categories – far too many to list, but here are our EMI highlights!

Multiple nominees include our favourite shaggy-haired, bikini-babe-surrounded Frenchman David Guetta (who also produced The Black Eyed Peas’ Grammy nominated album and record of the year), Coldplay, Depeche Mode, Keith Urban and American Classic legend Willie Nelson.

Katy Perry announced the Best Rock Album nominees and discussed the Black Eyed Peas nominations – watch the videos.

And yes, the reason why the Grammy artwork is so cool this year is no other than Shepard Fairey – the man behind THAT Obama / Hope and Obey / Giant artwork – is responsible. OBEY (great music)

Best Female Pop Vocal Performance
	Hot N Cold – Katy Perry
Best Dance Recording
	When Love Takes Over – David Guetta & Kelly Rowland
Best Electronic/Dance Album
	One Love – David Guetta
	Yes – Pet Shop Boys
Best Traditional Pop Vocal Album
	American Classic – Willie Nelson
Best Rock Performance By A Duo Or Group With Vocals
	Life In Technicolor II – Coldplay
Best Hard Rock Performance
	Check My Brain – Alice In Chains
Best Alternative Music Album
	Sounds Of The Universe – Depeche Mode
Best Country Album
	Defying Gravity – Keith Urban
Best Rap Performance By A Duo Or Group
	Too Many Rappers – Beastie Boys & Nas
Best Male Country Vocal Performance
	Sweet Thing – Keith Urban
Best Country Album
	Defying Gravity – Keith Urban
Best Pop Collaboration With Vocals
	Baby, It’s Cold Outside – Willie Nelson & Norah Jones
Best Boxed Or Special Limited Edition Package
	Lost In The Sound Of Separation – Deluxe Edition (Underoath) Jordan Butcher, art director
Producer Of The Year, Non-Classical
Greg Kurstin It’s Not Me, It’s You (Lily Allen) Ray Guns Are Not Just The Future (The Bird And The Bee)
Best Remixed Recording, Non-Classical
	The Girl And The Robot – Jean Elan Remix (Röyksopp) Jean Elan, remixer
	When Love Takes Over – Electro Extended Remix (David Guetta ft Kelly Rowland) David Guetta, remixer
Best Short Form Music Video
	Life In Technicolor II – Coldplay (Dougal Wilson, video director; Matthew Fone, video producer)
	Wrong – Depeche Mode (Patrick Daughters, video director; Jonathan Lia, video producer)
Best Long Form Music Video
	Love, Pain & The Whole Crazy World Tour Live – Keith Urban Chris Hicky, video director; Blake Morrison, video producer
	The Beatles “Love – All Together Now” - Adrian Wills, video director; Martin Bolduc & Jonathan Clyde, video producers

It’s been a bumper year for our gal Lily. The Special Edition CD/DVD of It’s Not Me, It’s You is out now. And we thought we’d set up a competition in honour of it – because, well, that’s one of the things we do at a record label.

Whether you have INMIY or not (we won’t judge), you should enter to win a signed poster by Lily and a Special Edition CD/DVD of the album.

If you don’t already have Lily’s Album, why the heck not?

Or, if you own It’s Not Me, It’s You, are you going to keep the CD/DVD for yourself or give it to someone else, and why?

Go to the page where we are hosting the competition and post your answer in the comments.

But in order for a bit of inspiration, we’ve posted Lily’s amazing cover of Womanizer. And, yes, it’s on the Special Edition!
Lily Allen – Womanizer (Acoustic) by theinsound

It’s that time of year to idly ponder “Where did 2009 go?”, especially when you realise Lily Allen’s massive album It’s Not Me, It’s You has been out since February! Oh, we’ve been through a lot with Lily this year: dancing presents, treasure hunts, pounding remixes, Chanel fashion shows (darling), and the odd gossip item or two.

So, as we close out the year and look forward to Lily returning to Australia for Big Days Out and headlining gigs, we present the very Special Edition of INMIY. The CD/DVD and digital offering includes loads of remixes, acoustics, B-sides (WOMANIZER!), concert footage and more.  Hitting TV screens in the next couple of days is a 15 second commercial with plummy voiceover by none other than Lily herself.

The concept of the ad is based on the F**k You video. And one day last week inbetween tour dates, Lily dropped into a studio to do a few reads of the script.

The Special Edition is out November 13 and oh look, you can pre-order it now from JB Hi FI.

How cool is this – Lily Allen and Duran Duran are taking part in Kofi Annan’s innovative digital music petition taking form as the ‘Time for Climate Justice’ campaign! This campaign is to ‘demand climate justice’ at the Copenhagen Summit happening on 7th December 2009 bidding for a binding global climate change agreement to be signed by EVERY Country leader.

60 odd artists in total (including Lily and Duran Duran) have pledged their support for the Time For Justice campaign by participating in a cover of the Midnight Oil song Beds Are Burning which has been rewritten for this cause (props to Peter Garratt for this one!).

In support of this we are holding a rather fun event at EMI HQ but more on that later…

Now this was some good news to wake up to. The lovely Lily Rose Beatrice Allen will be doing sideshows in addition to her Big Day Out appearances. And, hello, Brisbane what did you do to get the VERY SPECIAL show featuring Lily AND Dizzee Rascal AND Calvin Harris? Maybe it’s all that musical goodwill from that bridge you named after the city’s own The Go-Betweens?

And, hey, Miami Horror supports on all of the dates!

Head over to Big Day Out for ticketing details.

So we knew Lily Allen and Elton John have been at odds in the past, but who’d have known (no pun intended), she’d end up kidnapping Elton and forcefeeding him pizza!?

We present the new Lily Allen video, Who’d Have Known… a sweet and syrupy ode to telly, couches, bottles of wine, and crazy stalking love / hate relationships.

Chanel designer Karl Lagerfeld, he of the black leather fingerless gloves, white ponytail, and perma-sunglasses, has taken more than a shine to Lily Allen.

At yesterday’s barnyard-themed Chanel show at Paris Fashion Week, not only did Prince pop up in the front row but Lily literally popped on a stage that emerged amongst the haybales and wan models. She performed ‘Not Fair’, her hit single with the video that also takes place down on the farm.

Lily comes in at 1:24 all glitz and glam.