Brandi Carlile covered Alanis Morissette’s “Uninvited” at Newport Folk Festival, which is either an incredible coincidence or proof she has somehow accessed my musical DNA. Either way, I have thoughts.
I understand that Brandi Carlile did not consult my personal musical history before booking her 2026 Newport Folk Festival set. Logically, I know that. Emotionally, I have some questions. Carlile, who is easily in my top ten favorite female artists working today, stood on that stage and covered Alanis Morissette’s “Uninvited.” Of all the songs. I feel seen.
A Song I Bought By Accident
To explain why I am being completely normal about this, we have to go back to 1998 and the City of Angels soundtrack.
I bought that album (on CD!) for one reason: the Goo Goo Dolls’ “Iris.” That decision still holds up. Put it on today, and I will immediately become an emotional wreck as I sing at the top of my lungs. But somewhere along the way, another track on that soundtrack caught my attention.
Morissette wrote “Uninvited” for the film, and it became one of the soundtrack’s defining songs, later winning her Grammys for Best Rock Song and Best Female Rock Vocal Performance. None of that explains why I latched onto it so hard. There are songs you like, songs you love, and then there are the rare ones that get filed away in your brain permanently, the ones where you know every breath, pause, and shift before it happens. “Uninvited” is that song for me. I know exactly where the tension turns, exactly when Alanis is about to push harder, exactly how that eerie, quiet opening gives way to glorious chaos.
So when I found out Brandi Carlile had covered it at Newport Folk Festival, my reaction was roughly: excuse me, what?
Brandi Carlile Was Built for This Song
Some covers are fun because you get to watch an artist reinvent a song from scratch. This wasn’t that.
Her Newport version leaned hard into the song’s rock side: distorted electric guitars, a much heavier and grungier sound than the more restrained, string-backed arrangement she’d performed earlier in the summer. It got louder and rougher as it went, which is exactly where Carlile tends to get a little terrifying in the best possible way.
If you’ve watched her live, you know the moment I mean. There’s singing, and then there’s whatever she does. That voice can be warm and delicate one minute and enormous the next, and “Uninvited” needs both. It starts out cautious and uneasy, then tightens until restraint is no longer an option. Carlile understands that instinctively. When the guitars finally let loose at Newport, so did she. It was spectacular.
This Cover Has Some History
Newport wasn’t actually the first time Carlile performed “Uninvited” this year. Back in June, she and SistaStrings played the song at the Songwriters Hall of Fame ceremony while honoring Morissette, right before Carlile inducted her, telling the room that Morissette’s songs “penetrate our consciousness and pierce the soul.” That version was hushed and acoustic, all strings and restraint.
It turns out the two didn’t even meet until 2025, when they wound up performing together at Carlile’s Mothership Weekend tribute to Olivia Newton-John, singing “Hopelessly Devoted to You.” Carlile has said that’s where they became instant friends.
Newport makes even more sense once you know how much Morissette’s music shaped Carlile long before any of that. She’s talked about growing up in Seattle in the ’90s, when grunge was everywhere, but a female voice fronting that kind of rock and roll wasn’t, and about how hearing Jagged Little Pill felt like a revelation because of it. She isn’t just covering a great song. She’s covering the artist who showed her what a woman in rock could sound like.
When the Right Artist Finds the Right Song
I think that’s why certain covers land differently than others. The best ones aren’t karaoke, and they’re not an artist proving they can belt out someone else’s hard song. They feel like a conversation between two musicians who understand each other.
Morissette has always known how to make discomfort musical. Her songs can be angry, wounded, and darkly funny within the same three minutes. Carlile works in some of that same territory. And “Uninvited” itself is nothing but tension: attraction tangled up with suspicion, someone wanting access to you before you’ve decided whether they’ve earned it. Twenty-eight years later, it still sounds unsettling.
Hand that song to Brandi Carlile with an electric guitar and permission to get loud, and apparently you get a performance I will now be forcing on people indefinitely. Sorry in advance. Actually, no, I’m not.
Watch Brandi Carlile Perform “Uninvited”
There are performers who can sing almost anything well. Then there are the ones who take a song you thought you already knew completely and make you hear it again. Brandi Carlile did that for me with “Uninvited.” Considering she’s already one of my favorite artists and somehow picked one of my favorite songs of all time, I’d love to offer some thoughtful critical distance here. I have none. This performance was clearly just for me. Please respect my delusion.
