10 Amazing Cover Songs You Need To Hear

Most people have at least a passing familiarity with Nellie The Elephant, a fun, jaunty tune about a wanderlusting elephant... named Nellie. The original was written in 1956 and first recorded by child actress Mandy Miller, the song went on to be used to demonstrate rhythm in CPR training and school music classes. This is due to the song's simple, consistent marching tempo, like that of a walking elephant... named Nellie. But if you were told to give CPR to someone using Nellie The Elephant as a rhythmic guide, and were more familiar with the Toy Dolls version, you would be liable to kill someone, and that includes the inanimate CPR dummy... named Nellie.

The Toy Dolls are an English punk band founded in 1979, during punk's golden age. The Toy Dolls, to their credit, do nothing to take away the innocence of the song, they don't add any profanity or references to drugs or sex (in stark contrast to the infamous Sid Vicious cover of My Way); but what they do add is a glued-up, frantic, joyful vibe to the rather simple pachyderm-themed tune. At first it seems odd to have excitable British punks covering a children's classic, but the whole theme of Nellie The Elephant is freedom, a constant theme running through a great deal of early punk rock.