The Rules for Battle: Each week, we pit versions of the same song by two different artists in a head-to-head death match for musical supremacy. (Sometimes it will be the original recording vs. a cover version; other times it will be two different covers.) Then it's up to you to decide: Listen to and vote on which version you think should emerge victorious and which should be sent packing. May the best band win!



The Song: 'Wang Dang Doodle' (original version by Willie Dixon)

The Contestants: Koko Taylor vs. PJ Harvey

In this corner -- Koko Taylor: Willie Dixon's blues classic 'Wang Dang Doodle' was originally intended for Howlin' Wolf but he sure had no complaints when his protege, Koko Taylor, turned the song into a platinum seller, taking it to No. 4 on the R&B charts in 1966 and riding its wails as her first claim to fame. In fact, her version of 'Wang Dang Doodle' has become more than just her greatest hit -- it's become an artifact of American cultural history. It was also, fittingly, the last song Taylor performed publicly before she passed away on June 3rd.

Koko Taylor, 'Wang Dang Doodle'

The current production of 'Hedda Gabler,' at Manhattan's American Airlines Theatre through the end of this month, marks the first time PJ Harvey has scored an entire work for the stage or screen. She told Spinner that only one thing has prevented her from taking on a project like this in her two-decade music career: No one ever asked.

"All my musical life I've wanted to write music for theater or film," she says. "And I'd never been asked, ever. I'd written the odd song for a film, but I always wanted to get stuck into writing the whole soundtrack."

As a fan of 'Hedda Gabler' playwright Henrik Ibsen, she was drawn to writing music for this Broadway adaption, which stars Tony- and Emmy-winning actress Mary-Louise Parker. Harvey notes she had mixed feelings about director Ian Rickson's previous work, but she was happy with the end result. "I'd seen some of the director's other work, some of which I liked and some of which I didn't," she says. "So that was a bit of a gamble -- but enough to think, 'Great! Somebody's asked me to do the whole music score.'"

PJ Harvey's new album with longtime collaborator John Parish, titled 'A Woman a Man Walked By,' doesn't hit proverbial shelves until March 31, but Harvey has already begun working on the follow-up to her 2007 solo album, 'White Chalk.'

"I've demoed my own next record," she tells Spinner. "I'll hopefully be recording that in the spring of next year."

While Harvey was mum on specifics, she did say that she plans to ask frequent collaborators Flood and Mick Harvey, along with Parish, to produce. Harvey also promises that the new material pushes her once again into unexplored territory.

Polly Jean Harvey hit the jackpot in 1988. Back then, she was a small town teenager making trips to nearby Yeovil and in Sherborne, the closest place in her part of England that rock 'n' roll bands came to play. One of her favorites was Automatic Dlamini, led by singer/drummer John Parish. She had even asked them to play her 18th birthday party.

Parish and company never played that gig, but Harvey got something even better -- an invitation to join the band. Harvey still remembers going to Parish's house for her audition, sitting in a room and going over guitar parts she would play if she made the cut.

"I was utterly petrified," she tells Spinner. Parish eventually set her at ease, by drilling her on a riff until she got it right. "After about the third hour of playing the same line, I began to lose my nerve."

PJ Harvey unveiled the tracklist for her new album, a collaboration with John Parish titled 'A Woman a Man Walked By.' The effort, due March 30, is Harvey's first full album with Parish since 1996's 'Dance Hall at Louse Point.'

'A Woman' was mixed by longtime Harvey collaborator Flood, who most recently gave Harvey a hand on her last album, 2007's piano-based 'White Chalk.'

With an opening song titled 'Black Hearted Love,' all we can say is: Welcome back, Polly Jean.

See the full tracklist after the jump.

PJ Harvey will release her new album -- a collaboration with John Parish -- on March 30. The effort, titled 'A Woman a Man Walked By' is Harvey's first full album with Parish since 1996's 'Dance Hall at Louse Point.'

'A Woman' was mixed by longtime Harvey collaborator Flood, who most recently gave Harvey a hand on her last album, 2007's piano-based 'White Chalk.' That effort, a largely overcast affair, garnered the singer-songwriter a bevy polarized reviews. "I find the record quite uplifting and quite tender, and beautiful and expressive of many different emotions," she told Spinner. "Some people find it very difficult and upsetting. It's probably, musically, one of the most beautiful records I've made, and that's offset by lyrics that are doing a very different thing. I like that sort of tension that's there."

'This Mess We're In'
--Thom Yorke and PJ Harvey (2000)

Every rock snob's favorite duet of the past decade is the centerpiece of Harvey's Mercury Prize–winning 'Stories from the City, Stories from the Sea.' This pairing has an air of inevitability to it, from Harvey's trademark guitar strum and the Radiohead frontman's pitch-perfect falsetto to the song's tale of doomed love. It's what you'd expect: profoundly gloomy and impossibly beautiful.