If you fancy watching a live performance of Fleetwood Mac’s hits, there’s plenty of choice in tribute band land: Fleetwood Shack or Fleetwood Bac, McFleetwood or Rumours of Fleetwood Mac – or perhaps Tusk, Tell Me Lies, Fleetwood Macrame or Gypsy Dreams. Or you could wait to see if the real Fleetwood Mac tour again, minus keyboard player Christine McVie who died two years ago and guitarist Lindsey Buckingham who is currently ostracised from the band in true Fleetwood Mac falling-out tradition. Ultimately… you can go your own way.
But are tribute acts – no matter how good or authentic – ‘real’ music, or are they cheating? Are they a harmless piece of nostalgia, or clogging up small- to medium-sized venues and preventing the new acts of tomorrow from performing today?
My musician cousin brands tribute bands the bed-blockers of music venues, preventing up-and-coming artists from having an opportunity to play live
I hadn’t really given it much thought until I mentioned I was going to see Fleetwood Bac to my cousin Philip, an accomplished musician and a band member. He is vocal in his disdain for them, branding tribute bands the bed-blockers of music venues, preventing up-and-coming artists from having an opportunity to play live. He cited one venue in Norwich where original bands once reigned supreme but now half the attractions are tribute acts. They’re killing music, he says – lazy and predictable like Hollywood remakes or endless film franchises.
I saw Fleetwood Bac at the Eric Morecambe Centre in the leafy commuter town of Harpenden, Hertfordshire. After a slow start, the mainly 40-plus audience slowly started to tap feet, nod heads and quietly sing along to the classics – a kind of live karaoke night of the transatlantic group’s best hits and good-ish impersonations of the original band members. A small number of the audience even got up to dance at the stage front only to be ushered to the sides by ever-so-polite security guards.
The band were pretty good, but Philip’s criticisms did strike a chord. He argues that the abundance of tribute acts has led us to abandon the habit of seeking out new groups in favour of seeing the ‘tried and tested’ mimic their heroes and their hits. Nothing adventurous and edgy to see here. He has a point.
Look at the middle- to lower-size venues and they are full of tribute bands. It’s clearly big business – money which some venues argue keep them afloat. At my local music venue, the modest Ipswich Regent, there are a lot of tribute bands or artists coming up: The Marvin Gaye Songbook; Big Girls Don’t Cry – a tribute to Frankie Valli and the Four Seasons; New Purple Celebration – the Music of Prince; the Bootleg Beatles; Rumours of Fleetwood Mac 2025; The Illegal Eagles; The Australian Bee Gees… I think you get the picture. Back at the Eric Morecambe Centre, there’s An Evening Without Kate Bush; Buddy Holly and the Cricketers; Oasiz; Money for Nothing; Celine: My Heart Will Go On… and on, and on and so forth. I’m sure they’re all coming to a venue near you.
I’ve seen a handful of tribute bands. I saw a dreadful Queen one at the Regent a few years ago, bad enough that I had to apologise to my children as we left early chuckling. I’ve seen the Australian Pink Floyd who, musically, were every bit as good as the original. It’s one of my life’s regrets that I never saw the authentic (minus Syd Barrett) line-up in concert and now never will, but the Antipodean version were very good.
In recent weeks I also saw Oas-is in Bristol. Musically, like Fleetwood Bac, they were very good – but the lead singer impersonating Liam with a Ramones-type haircut, dark glasses, strut and Manc accent was a bit cringey. There’s certainly plenty of demand, though – Definitely Mightbe, which claims to be the longest established Oasis tribute band, has reported a surge in bookings since the announcement that the real Oasis would be reforming for a series of gigs. (I am actually seeing the real version for a third time this summer after striking lucky in the ballot, if the brothers can keep it cordial.)
So what do I think about tribute bands? On balance I kind of get going to see a tribute version of a singer or band who are no longer complete or with us so can’t perform the music I like or grew up with. Prince, Roy Orbison or Elvis aren’t drawing up a tour soon. But maybe tribute acts who are ‘cashing in’ on bands who are very much alive and well – Coldplace/Ultimate Coldplay, for instance – should be avoided, even if they offer an affordable alternative. Or better still, go and see a new and original band at your local pub, music venue or theatre instead.
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