Posted by Andrew Unterberger on 02/15/2012 at 5:19 PM News

The Popdust Files: covers, gotye, kimbra, p.s. 22, somebody that i used to know

Yeah, yeah, we know. Enough with the “Somebody That I Used to Know” covers. We feel you—we already watched that Walk Off the Earth video enough times that sometimes we get confused about which version was the original, and now it seems like every schnook with a guitar and a xylophone is giving it a workout on YouTube. Still, we know you love Staten Island-based childrens’ choir P.S. 22′s adorable and occasionally revelatory covers of contemporary pop songs as much as we do, and they do a damn cool version of Gotye and Kimbra’s song. As is rarely the case with P.S. 22, there’s actually a kid taking the lead this time, and he’s fantastic—he doesn’t perform the song as if its subject matter is totally out of his grasp, which is tough for a kid his age and a song with subject matter this adult.

One minor complaint, though—they couldn’t have found a duet partner for the kid to handle Kimrbra’s part? Not that the kid does a bad job of doing both singers—his pre-pubescent voice is ambiguous enough that he can pull off either—but c’mon, throw another one of these kids up there. This isn’t the majors yet.