I do like a different take on a song, I think it's invidious to say they're "better", but these are some I enjoy, even if some are guilty pleasures :
Little Roy takes Nirvana's Lithium to Jamaica :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yy9y1uxpgrM
The Wombats cover Bleeding Love whilst not entirely sober :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=r0myiDYa2PQ
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XjIOlZVRzd8 (tidied up for an awards show and not as good)
You're The One That I Want from the Golddiggas, Headnodders and Pholk Songs album, which saw The Beautiful South covering everything from the Ramones to S Club :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bXKwBvhd-ww (studio version)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-TYhezTvDGY (with Jools, I'm less keen)
Talking of the Ramones, there's a 1995 album of covers of cartoon themes which includes Liz Phair doing the Tra La La song and one of the Ramones' last recordings, of the Spiderman theme :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-JvB5AL59fM
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8RUxRgM ... nK&index=9
Frisky & Mannish prove "that when you slow a piece of music down, it means... (profoundly, with quiver in voice) everything" with Whigfield's Saturday Night (and a bit of 2 Unlimited)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jrNpt-_Yybg
Plus Eternal Flame (and others) as sung by a stalker :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WESu1bbMR9k
I like the arrangement of Gnarls Barklay's Crazy for Charlotte Church & Nelly Furtado even if I'm not so bothered by their singing :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MDkOAcADSaM
I definitely prefer Emma Stevens bouncing her way through Riptide over the Vance Joy version :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mBk5VoH2BQs
Whereas Elise Trouw's sparse arrangement of Enter Sandman for the Sound of Metal is not necessarily "better" than the original, but does what a good cover should do, taking the song in a very different direction and yet it still "works" :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K6CTpN6UMKQ
Talking of versions for films, Marilyn Manson definitely didn't do the best version of Tainted Love but it was on the soundtrack of Not Another Teen Movie about the time a relative was dying of cancer, and it always seemed to be on the radio as I was driving back from the hospital so I have this weird association for it. Quite like his Personal Jesus though :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Tlf8Aq5edgo
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rl6fyhZ0G5E
Scott Bradlee has made a career out of arranging pop songs into old styles, here's a 1920s Gangsta's Paradise with Robyn Adele Anderson :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Rve03u7oEvI
He's done a ton of others under the Postmodern Jukebox moniker, including Barbie Girl :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4ReSV3CCRzg
Although, video aside, that's not my favourite version of Barbie Girl, which is by Ben l'oncle Soul at Radio Twizz (sic)
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=keUxhIPf5Zs
Where to begin with Ice-T/Jay-Z's 99 Problems when you can choose between Hugo's bluegrass version, Barry Chuckle's and the Prodigy remix :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=swnudbCnccs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bz4CGa52UHw
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=-SkLKSj9lrc
30 Seconds to Mars do Gaga's Bad Romance and Rihanna's Stay :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7lpuHL11rxs
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IqPATbDhrb4
I've got a soft spot for Sophie Ellis-Bextor's version of Pulp's Do You Remember The First Time? from a "20 years of Britpop" thing the BBC did
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s3jbx0L5-88
I wouldn't say it's the best version ever but file under "a curiosity that's much better than you'd expect even allowing for whatever they did to it in the studio afterwards", Gwyneth Paltrow's Do You Wanna Touch Me :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=a3aMRxHS0sY
And technically not a cover, but Kylie's slow versions of Lucky are so different that effectively they are :
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=vTSRa6QFk8Q