MAY-A performed a banger and left. The 24-year-old singer entered the Like a Version studio with a reworked cover of Stevie Nicks’ 1981 classic “Edge of Seventeen”.
But this one felt different, delivering a hefty take built around grunge textures and live-guitar intensity. And her silky slip-style top, torn stockings and dark leather wristband only added to the aura.
The Sydney artist opened with a softer arrangement before pushing into a louder, distortion-led second half, trading the original riff for a more layered rock progression.
Watch it below.
The song came together through experimentation in rehearsals, MAY-A said, with guitarist, collaborator, and girlfriend Chloe Dadd helping reshape the arrangement. “When we started playing around with the idea of this song, we just played it in so many different ways.
“And my guitarist Chloe, she sort of built out the tracks. And I was like, ‘You have fun playing with this today, I’m gonna go away’ because she does all the production stuff.”
She said the final direction landed after Dadd introduced a heavier breakdown section. “Then when I came back she was like, ‘I did something crazy and you might hate this or you might like it’.”
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While this version drops the guitar figure most closely tied to the original, it builds gradually before tearing into a bombshell final section shaped by live instrumentation. The performance also featured a bonus guitar solo from Dadd, giving the cover a sharper live edge than the original.
MAY-A’s Like a Verison session follows the release of her debut album Goodbye (If You Call That Gone) last month.
The album didn’t arrive with a neat bow. Instead, it shape shifted – with pop dissolving into rock, rage softening into sweetness, and sadness clawing its way out from under anger. It’s messy, cathartic, and thrillingly alive. Which is, unsurprisingly, exactly how she wanted it.
“It was active processing,” MAY-A, aka Maya Cumming, told Rolling Stone AU/NZ of the album’s creation. “It was just different stages, getting to different emotions. You think you’re through something, you’re feeling better, feeling worse, feeling better, feeling worse. Then it comes back in a different way – and that can make you so much stronger.”
