Elle has an online video series they do called “Song Association,” where they get a musician, give them some single-word prompts, and have them quickly sing/rap whatever song comes to mind. The latest participant is Maggie Rogers and her guest spot yielded some impromptu, truncated, a capella covers of Britney Spears, Joni Mitchell, and others.
Prompted by “river,” she sang some of Mitchell’s song of that title and shared a great story: “Last time I heard somebody sing ‘River’ by Joni Mitchell, it was Harry Styles covering it in Joni Mitchell’s living room before the pandemic, and that is what I’m going to think about every time I ever hear that song again.”
When it came to “Wonderland,” Rogers quickly responded, “Obviously ‘Your Body Is A Wonderland,’ but I actually can’t think of how that melody goes [laughs].” After a few seconds of pondering, she got there and offered apologies to John Mayer. She actually had a similar brain-fart experience later in the video with “Gravity.”
The video wrapped with “Baby,” which proved to be especially fertile ground. Rogers started with Ariel Pink’s “Baby” before getting into a bit of Justin Bieber’s “Baby” and Spears’ “…Baby One More Time”
Elsewhere, she offered bits of songs by Lady Gaga, Whitney Houston, Destiny’s Child, Fiona Apple, Billie Eilish, Michael Jackson, and more,