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Hear Mikal Cronin Adorkably Cover the Proclaimers’ ‘I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles)’

mikal cronin, proclaimers

Mikal Cronin just dropped his outstanding sophomore album, MCII, and contributed a fuzzy standout to Adult Swim’s Garage Swim compilation, but the San Francisco singer-songwriter grabbed our attention yesterday (May 7) with a uke- and harmonica-driven cover of Sixpence None the Richer’s “Kiss Me,” an alt-pop tune famously featured on the soundtrack to late-’90s teen flick She’s All That. Well, turns out the Ty Segall associate recorded a sweetly stripped-down version of another movie-soundtrack love song, the Proclaimers’ “I’m Gonna Be (500 Miles).” 

Cronin’s sincere, gentle approach breathes new life into the Scot rockers’ oft-mocked chugger, which came to fame via 1993’s Benny & Joon. He told Aquarium Drunkard, “The trickiest part of recording this song is not trying to sing with their awesome thick Scottish accents (may be my favorite accent of all the world). My favorite part of this recording is when the phone rings right before the break. This is a really really brilliant simple and affective song.” 

Cronin also explained his inspiration: “I recorded these songs a little while ago to send to my girlfriend when we were living in different states. We share an affinity for cheesy ’80s and ’90s pop songs, and since she can play ukelele well we could trade cover songs back and forth. On my computer I titled the album these songs belong to as ‘(F)ukin’ around with Mikal Cronin’… which I stand behind as a mildly funny name for a dumb uke cover album.” We concur.