‘Glee’ Covers Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” And It’s A Total Dream

Becky Bain | November 5, 2010 12:58 pm

Katy Perry’s “Teenage Dream” gets the Glee treatment in Tuesday’s episode, “Never Been Kissed”, and the pop star’s ode to young love is given an all-guys a cappella makeover. The show’s newest cast member, Darren Criss (rumored to be playing Kurt’s new boyfriend, Blaine) takes lead vocals on what may be our favorite cover to come out of the Glee music machine. Jump below to hear the completely a cappella version of Katy’s love song, and don’t ever look back, don’t ever look back!

[wpaudio url=”//idolator.com/wp-content/uploads/2010/11/TeenageDream.mp3″ text=”Glee Cast – Teenage Dream” dl=”0″] We adore this a cappella arrangement so much. This is what we think every song on Glee should be: a unique, creative spin on a popular song with a focus on the melodies and harmonies of the singers — you know, how an actual, real life glee club might perform it. (Check out these all-male a cappella performances of songs by Lady Gaga and Cee Lo for further examples of what we mean.)

After a season and a half of copycat, over-produced recordings of pop songs, this is seriously a breath of non Auto-Tuned fresh air. And not surprisingly, the song has nothing to do with the crew of New Directions — it’s performed by a glee club at another school. Mr. Schue should be taking down notes.

Also, it looks like Katy agrees with our assessment of her song: “Oh…My…Gosh… this just brought a sweet tear to my eye! Teenage Dream on GLEE makes my heart go WEEEEE!”

If you’ve got a good memory, you may recall that this isn’t the first time the show tackled one of Katy’s hits  — Tina (Jenna Ushkowitz) performed “I Kissed A Girl” while auditioning for the glee club in the show’s pilot:

What do you think of this a cappella recording? Let us know in the comments.

UPDATE: Here’s the scene from the show!