When someone like Sting covers a song like "Ain't no Sunshine" what does it mean?

Yep to all three.

Oh, and it means writer’s block, but need cash – and hey, check out my new compilation album and older stuff – kids.

That’s a great song.

It used to be that someone would write a song, say, They Can’t That Away from Me (written by George and Ira Gershwin), and many singers recorded it in short order. Performers weren’t required to be able to do anything but sing until the mid-1960s.

I blame Bob Dylan for this “cult of authenticity”. Or rather, I blame his fans for propagating the idea that a pop musician had to sing and write and arrange and produce and engineer and play all the instruments and…

Who knows?I do like his version of Little Wing and his version
and of course the original

I like to think they just like the song ;)

Why, in particular, does it have to mean anything? Are you sure hat your list of three reasons are the only possible ones? How could anybody presume to know what motivates another person?

I don’t presume, that’s why I ask. Maybe someone here met Sting and asked him, maybe he lectured at Princeton on the topic… I don’t know, but I’m curious to find out. That’s why people post questions, not theses.

I’ll give you a little insight, as a musician. I sing and play guitar and write all my own music. When I cover a song, I’m pretty much saying, Hey! This song is so kick-a*** *that I want to sing it and I don’t even care if I’m viewed as a no-talent poseur since someone else not only wrote it and sang it already, but made a hit out of it!!! If that’s not a tribute, man, I don’t know what is.