In case you were ever wondering about the people responsible for your favourite pun-based radio segment...

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The year was 2005. Jean waistbands were ridin' dirty somewhere south of the hip bones, Gorillaz were Feeling Good Inc. and Mel Bampton was on the triple j Mornings shift. It was Mel who first introduced the segment, and SPOD who was the first-ever act to do something Like A Version. He covered Madonna’s ‘Like A Virgin’.

Nowadays, putting together a LAV can take months of prep and a team of producers, engineers, videographers, presenters and musicians. So here’s Like A Version behind-the-scenes, in their own words:

What does a good Like A Version look like?

Obviously it would be great if talented musicians just turned up to our studios and nailed a cover and we didn’t have to do anything to facilitate that. Instead we have Nick ‘Sweet Baby Gerbs’ Gerber, who has been producing the segment for over two years — meaning he does “everything from dealing with pitches from bands to, months later, helping load their equipment into the studio on the day”. Because it can sometimes take months to line up. Popular musicians are not known for their abundance of availability and those LAV slots start filling up fast. In the case of A.B. Original, Paul Kelly and Dan Sultan's eventual cover of ‘Dumb Things’, Gerbs remembers emailing back and forth for seven months. (And then “being too nervous to say anything to Paul Kelly when he arrived.”)

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With that being said, it’s a great pay off no matter how long it takes to pull together. And for Sweet Baby’s money, what makes a great LAV is “PRACTICE AND PASSION!” He says that it does really show when an artist has been working on perfecting their cover for a few weeks, instead of smashing it together the day before coming into the studio.

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Whatsapp Gerbs revelling in the chaos and the triple j corridor on a typical Like A Version day.

But why ask a baby (albeit a sweet one), when you can talk to the man who has done more Like A Versions than anyone (either as part of One Day or Spit Syndicate or as Joyride): Rowan Dix. After all that, the King Kong of sing-song reckons he’s got the formula down pat.

Joyride’s Secret LAV Sauce: “Rule one is to pick a well-known song by an artist no one cares about. Everyone will be familiar with it but no one will have such a strong relationship with the song that they’ll be like, ‘how dare you touch that!'” This works best, he says, if you choose a song most consider a ~guilty pleasure~ because people love nostalgia and familiarity. He gives the example of Cher's ‘Believe’ covered by DMAs.

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Otherwise, Joyride says if you do “a song by someone of one of the other genders that you are not a part of, it provides distance from the original, so it’s harder to compare and people go ‘oh wow, what an interesting take on that’ because it sounds different. But realistically it’s just a different timbre of voice.”

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Whatsapp Joey Bada$$ and Tove Styrke for Like A Version. Photos @jesshallay.

What does Like A Version mean to artists?

Over the years, Like A Version veterans, Angus and Julia Stone have done everything from Chumbawamba ‘Tubthumping (I Get Knocked Down)’ to Drake’s ‘Passionfruit’. They’ve temporarily adopted the tracks and loved them like their own.

This latest time they were in recording for LAV, Julia says they were mucking around during soundcheck and trying out their own versions of ALL the songs. “It’s amazing how many songs you want to cover,” says Julia. “We were talking about doing that Cypress Hill song [singing] ‘So you wanna be a rock superstar? And live large?’. You start to do it and you think every song that you’ve grown up listening to would be so fun to do (in the style that is fun for us to sing in). I’d love to do Like A Version every week. It’s a good challenge and makes for good artistic ideas.”

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Whatsapp The many adoring Like A Version faces of Ben and Liam.

For a band like Thundamentals, Like A Version represents “a penny drop moment”. “Some people get it with their own songs and some people get it with a publicity stunt,” says Tuka. “But really, our flint moment was that cover of ‘Brother’ [in 2012].” Before that they’d released an EP and two albums, and Tuka had released solo material; “so, like, heaps of material out there with no radio play.” But the band credits that performance with leading people to check out their back catalogue and “investing into what we had to say about things.”

“Honestly, when I ran into Matt Corby I gave him a hug and said thank you for basically changing [the path of] our career.”

Tuka says they approached that cover the same way they would any of their tracks: with samples in hand. They took the trademark Corby ‘woOoOO!’ and the drum beat and turned it into this:



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What are some of the common misconceptions about Like A Version?

“You end up doing a remix, more than a cover," says Tuka. "But that’s what Like A Version is, right? It’s whatever you want it to be… It’s basically what we would do with samples if it wasn’t so illegal. It’s a free pass [laughs].”

Firstly, that the musicians aren’t in a musical hot box with very little room to move. Just ask the people who make it look so damn good every week: the video producers.

Tim ‘Passy’ Pass — whose name Liam Gallagher once misheard as ‘Party’ and complimented, whilst shooting this interview — has been filming LAV for over five years. Jess Hallay has been doing it for two years and does not yet have a surname-based nickname. “Artists are always surprised by how small the Like A Version studio is,” says Jess. “It’s a very tight space, so when there’s a lot of people, it gets stinking hot.”

The newest member of the LAV team, Jaz Huggins, has been the Assistant Producer for almost three months. “You really get the sense that everyone involved is really proud to be a part of it, including the artists,” says Jaz. “I think people at home often think that it all ‘just happens’ but if you get the opportunity to watch the sound techs at work, it’s really amazing how much goes into getting it to sound as good as it does.”

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Whatsapp From L to R: Jess and his beautiful camera babies, Jaz and Phil Jamieson's Visitor Pass.

How do the BTS crew know if they’re on to something special?

Our live music engineer, Greg ‘Walesy’ Wales, is the one making everything sound so good. Walesy has been doing the Like A Version segment since 2007 and says, first and foremost, it’s about creativity, restraint, and reinterpretation: "Historically, the best and most successful Like A Version performances have been smart reinterpretations of great songs. It's definitely not about throwing everything you can think of at the song, so stripping things back is often the way that's achieved - people get a real connection to your performance when you let the songwriting shine. Ben Folds did a great one early on in the series: he made 'Such Great Heights' by The Postal Service totally his own."

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Whatsapp Party Passy filming Grinspoon Like A Version.

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Whatsapp Like A Version live music engineer Greg 'Walesy' Wales.

And that creativity shouldn't just be limited to the cover: "When artists approach their original song in a unique way, it can be really special," he says. "It's a huge opportunity for them to showcase their own music in a different way. Look at what Bon Iver did to 'Calgary' or what Amy Shark did to 'Adore'. Doing your own song in a different way really highlights great songwriting and lets the audience form a connection that they didn't have previously."

And after over a decade of being the ears in the headphones for Like A Version, what's his standout memory of it all? That would be #1 Dads covering FKA twigs ‘Two Weeks’. “It was so amazing watching all those wonderful musicians focus and deliver on that performance,” says Walesy.



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If all this talk of Like A Version has made you want even more Like A Version, you can watch our top ten most viewed covers: