Music Notes

500 Miles (I'm Gonna Be) (ID cover)

My twelfth track is a cover from… guess who… yes, Imagine Dragons. Though ID has never officially released any covers, they've done quite a few live ones, as probably most big bands have over the years. 500 Miles (I'm Gonna Be) is originally by the Scottish duo The Proclaimers, from 1988.

I remember hearing the original and looking it up somewhere between 2015 and 2017, and being mildly impressed by the lyrics. Then later on YouTube I watched ID playing it at a live show in Scotland, and because of ID it became a song I grew fond of. I think it was ID's first ever Scottish show, or their first time at the one called T in the Park, in 2014, because lead singer Dan Reynolds spoke about how grateful he was to be there and how he'd never imagined he would be so successful in his career as a musician.

The Dragons handled all parts of 500 Miles quite well, from Dan's imitation of the Scottish accent and the "tra-la-la," to the beats and guitars. I've added their cover to my offline playlist, though sometimes I wonder if it wouldn't make more sense to go with the original and cut the ad-libs. But I think I smile more with this cover. Dan and his bandmates and the crowd all really poured their hearts into it. At the time Dan had not yet publicized his diagnosis of Ankylosing Spondylitis; he was most likely in rather a lot of pain here. But you'd never know.

Words: 260.