So basically all of the lip service is your way of disclosing that you secretly aspire to one day "when you grow up" play in a COVER BAND? Even though you would never compromise your "artistic creativity" by admitting it,,,, Oh wait you just did.
Enjoy the benefits of a premium membership!
Upgrade Account
-
TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
Join free Log in
Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.
I have a problem with cover/tribute bands.
- Thread starter T-Forty
- Start date
- Status
So basically all of the lip service is your way of disclosing that you secretly aspire to one day "when you grow up" play in a COVER BAND? Even though you would never compromise your "artistic creativity" by admitting it,,,, Oh wait you just did.
So, has anyone other than me gone out to the This Blue Heaven MySpace? The songs there are pretty good. You should check out the Groove Addiction link I posted. I seem some similarities.
This whole cover/original thing brings out the worst in people. And lump it with the whole art/business argument, and we could go on forever (as if we already haven't). There are different levels of what we call "cover", too. Blues/jazz/orchestral musicians have been interpreting other people's material forever, and nobody seems to hold it against them.
Playing music, and expressing yourself in whatever manner pleases you is really all that matters in the long run.
This whole cover/original thing brings out the worst in people. And lump it with the whole art/business argument, and we could go on forever (as if we already haven't). There are different levels of what we call "cover", too. Blues/jazz/orchestral musicians have been interpreting other people's material forever, and nobody seems to hold it against them.
Playing music, and expressing yourself in whatever manner pleases you is really all that matters in the long run.
Hmm, I didn't know that about the Beatles. I mean, I assumed they learned covers when they formed (like most bands), but didn't know they gigged as a "cover" band for a while. Interesting!
I see what you mean, and it may simply be a matter of geography. In Boston, if you want to see live original music, you DON'T want to hear covers; the people at the show are people who (for better or for worse) pride themselves on discovering new music. People who want to just go out with friends and have a good time with a live band have plenty of places to go. In a more rural setting, when one band plays the whole night to a very diverse audience, playing covers absolutely makes sense. When you have 35 minutes to play in front of a high music-IQ/hipster crowd, you'd better not play more than one cover (and it better be a fairly large departure from the original song!) Our music is targeted at a very specific audience, and to make the most of our time/effort/cash, we limit ourselves to playing gigs where the audience is, essentially, hipsters. Its a simply targeted marketing approach.
This is a great thead!
I see what you mean, and it may simply be a matter of geography. In Boston, if you want to see live original music, you DON'T want to hear covers; the people at the show are people who (for better or for worse) pride themselves on discovering new music. People who want to just go out with friends and have a good time with a live band have plenty of places to go. In a more rural setting, when one band plays the whole night to a very diverse audience, playing covers absolutely makes sense. When you have 35 minutes to play in front of a high music-IQ/hipster crowd, you'd better not play more than one cover (and it better be a fairly large departure from the original song!) Our music is targeted at a very specific audience, and to make the most of our time/effort/cash, we limit ourselves to playing gigs where the audience is, essentially, hipsters. Its a simply targeted marketing approach.
This is a great thead!
Not only did the Beatles gig as a cover band, but 12 out of the 28 songs on their first two albums were covers.
So, let's see if I'm understanding you...
Cover bands are for the drunk, local yokel hicks that just want to go out and party until they throw up, and the Originals bands are for the "high music-IQ/hipster" crowd that prides themselves on "discovering" new music?
You, my friend, are going to go very far. Your business sense and artistic integrity will take you places you never dreamed you'd end up. I mean that.
The Beatles first few albums had a lot of cover material, including:
Roll Over, Beethoven (Chuck Berry)
Please, Mr. Postman (Marvelettes)
Act, Naturally (Buck Owens)
Roll Over, Beethoven (Chuck Berry)
Please, Mr. Postman (Marvelettes)
Act, Naturally (Buck Owens)
Grevagabond - wow... just wow... I am starting to think you're doing all this on purpose.
In Boston... people want and don't want.... rural areas... people do want and don't want...
Do you honestly believe what you are saying? That you know what all the people at all the shows you attend in Boston are thinking and their motivation for why they're at that gig?
Did you poll them on the way in the door with a questionnaire, "How do you feel about original bands? How do you feel about cover bands?"
You KNOW what all those people pride themselves on?
Honestly... aren't you doing just a little projecting here? Aren't you assuming that because those people happen to be in the same place at the same time as you, that they all think and feel like you as well?
In Boston... people want and don't want.... rural areas... people do want and don't want...
Do you honestly believe what you are saying? That you know what all the people at all the shows you attend in Boston are thinking and their motivation for why they're at that gig?
Did you poll them on the way in the door with a questionnaire, "How do you feel about original bands? How do you feel about cover bands?"
You KNOW what all those people pride themselves on?
Honestly... aren't you doing just a little projecting here? Aren't you assuming that because those people happen to be in the same place at the same time as you, that they all think and feel like you as well?
Sounds like you play for alot of stiffs and snobs. Besides getting to play your own songs...for a half an hour, what satisfaction do you really get from an audience that would turn its back on you for sounding "too much" like another band?
I think you've just described a situation that I would pay to not be in musically.
P.S. Add The Who for one of history's most important bands that performed and made bank on covers. You want cover band glory? Listen to "Young Man Blues" on Live at Leeds or watch a youTube video of John Entwistle singing "Twist and Shout" while thundering away on the bass.
Actually, yeah, that's pretty much what I meant. I said it a little more diplomatically, but...go to the cover bars in Weymouth or Quincy, and you'll see what I mean! And the second part sounds like a fortune cookie I once got...
I checked out your profile. Now I understand...
The ignorance of musical history, the lack of experience, the idealism, elitism, separatism, as well as the passion.
I'm sure your ambition will one day meet it's final, fruitful end, as it smacks headlong into a reality you loathe to embrace right now.
Best of luck to you! You will need it.
Its a pretty simply fact of the genre and location we play at. We play in Rock Clubs. They have shows. Shows are for original bands. Its just a fact of life in Boston. I'm not projecting onto the audience. Its large city and, like I said, if you want to see covers, there are plenty of bars to go. A band playing at The Paradise or the Middle East would never get asked back if they played a bunch of uninspired covers to get 15-yr-past-their-prime women to dance like they are in college. You'd just see a sea of hipsters wondering who the hell this Mustang Sally person is, and why you remind them of their Dad.
Well, maybe I will run headlong into reality, but at least I tried! Or, that's my thinking...
Anyways, thanks for the good luck. I'm sure I'll need.
There is more (already written and recorded) music out there than you could ever digest. My band could play an entire night (4 hours) of covers for you and your friends and simply tell you we wrote them, and you and your snob friends would never know the difference.
The Beatles played as "The Beatles" (or "The Quarrymen" depending on how far back you go) and they had a small but growing number or original songs but certainly not enough to fill the gigs they had to play or for that matter good enough that they could eschew doing other popular songs and still get by as gigging musicians.
It's an odd circumstance that I find myself arguing this side of things as I have very rarely found music nerds (or earlier in my life music snobs) any bigger than me and I there's very little that I enjoy more than discovering new original music that I really dig. But I've commented because there's a degree of condescension in the majority of your posts that is quite frankly unwarranted.
Everyone should be playing music because they enjoy it and playing gigs because the people there enjoy the show. And if you can't get into a cover band putting on a great show, that's fine - different strokes and all. But the decision to play all original music in and of itself certainly doesn't automatically elevate you above the ranks of a "cover band" in my estimation.
For every great as-yet-undiscovered original band I've come across there are 10 miserable ones, not to mention those bands who obviously have some talent but simply do nothing for me personally. On the other hand, for every three or four cheesy cover bands I've heard, I find something like Link Removed who I saw when I was in Montreal, From a technical as well as an entertainment standpoint they were better (by far) than any of the "original" acts I saw on that trip.
And though it seems anathema to your personal musical ethos I've never once thought less of an original band that did covers simply because they did them. Now if they did terrible versions, that's a whole different story.
While I fully recognize the irony of me saying something so seemingly condescending as the following, I'll still leave you with this sentiment: You haven't done enough to earn the right to indiscriminately look down your nose at other musicians solely because of what they choose to play.
I seriously do wish you luck (I checked out your myspace and it does sound good).
But I also seriously wish you would play (while you continue with your current project) in as many cover bands with as many musicians as you possibly can, just to get some perspective on life in general.
I hope you get to take your band across America sometime...on a self promoted tour of your band's music, in a bus or van. There just isn't another experience like it in the world.
Guys..this is a good thread
A really good topic
I hope none of us get too carried away so it stays open and allows everyone to engage and enjoy in this conversation.
A really good topic
I hope none of us get too carried away so it stays open and allows everyone to engage and enjoy in this conversation.
The Beatles didn't become the revolutionaries they were until they broke away from those rockabilly covers. Yes, and anyone else mentioned as "starting as a cover band," didn't become the band they were until they stopped playing covers. Playing music is fun, no matter what you are playing. But cover bands and "original" bands are two different things and should be treated as such. Why don't you all stop getting so offended at every little jab at what you take so seriously and have the fun that you keep talking about. Oh yeah, and make money, because as we all know that's what life is all about 
Oh and another thing. What's with all the bashing of the struggle? It's hard to get anyone to care about your music, no matter how good it is, why use that as a point of contention? It's a lot easier to have an audience when your intention in the first place is to pander to them.
Oh and another thing. What's with all the bashing of the struggle? It's hard to get anyone to care about your music, no matter how good it is, why use that as a point of contention? It's a lot easier to have an audience when your intention in the first place is to pander to them.
The Beatles didn't become the revolutionaries they were until they broke away from those rockabilly covers. Yes, and anyone else mentioned as "starting as a cover band," didn't become the band they were until they stopped playing covers. Playing music is fun, no matter what you are playing. But cover bands and "original" bands are two different things and should be treated as such. Why don't you all stop getting so offended at every little jab at what you take so seriously and have the fun that you keep talking about. Oh yeah, and make money, because as we all know that's what life is all about
The Beatles didn't become revolutionaries until they started seeing the Maharishi...but that's a whole 'nother topic.
I play in both cover and original bands and I really don't see much of a difference between the two at all.
The biggest difference I see is writing/playing originals and writing bass lines for originals is much easier to do, yet extremely more difficult to sell.
- Status
