Got a reminder recently, that some people find cover bands, in general, to be bogus.
This guy I used to be in a band with, one of the last times I saw him, gave me a rough time--as if I was supposed to be ashamed or apologetic--because playing in a cover band was "all" I was doing musically at the time.
Wish I'd had the presence of mind to point out it was more than he was doing. But that was essentially his contention, that he'd rather not play music than play cover music.
Certainly, if I had my preference, I'd rather always play music that I've written. And I consider myself very fortunate, not to mention atypical, to have had a band that played nearly as many of my original songs as it did covers, for a couple of years.
The fact is, for most of we amateur, part-time musicians, if we want to perform for anyone other than ourselves, we either play cover songs or we play to ourselves. By and large, folks who go out to a club or bar to hear live music want to hear live music they're familiar with.
So the choice for most of non-pro rock and rollers is not whether or not to play someone else's songs, but whether to play in public or not.
Along with being reminded of this smug former band mate, the other thing that brought the cover music issue to my mind was hearing Dwight Twilley's album, The Beatles.
It's a 2009 release whose cover emulates "The White Album," although the set covers material as old as "I'll Be Back" from A Hard Day's Night.
And it's . . . ok.
None of Twilley's arrangements are going to supplant the originals as anyone's favorites. His signature tremulous vocals sound to be in top form, and his voice and ear for harmony certainly lend themselves to this material. I question the need for another version of Come Together; the Aerosmith cover was all it took to convince me that the song is ridiculous, even unbearable, without Lennon's vocal. Several of Twilley's selections--Helter Skelter, Everybody's Got Something to Hide Except Me and My Monkey, Bungalow Bill, Tomorrow Never Knows--would make most short lists of the most challenging Beatles songs to attempt, which may have been the point. But there's no excuse for a cover version of the sniggering throwaway Why Don't We Do It In the Road, especially one that runs longer than the original.
Listening to Twilley's The Beatles is not unlike, oh, going to hear a really solid cover band.
You will enjoy it while it's in your ears, and you will never yearn to hear these versions again, over the originals. That's about the most good cover bands can aspire to.
(Also demoralizing, my discovery that he also released another all-covers album last year, Out of the Box, which includes five Beatles songs--at least some of them overlapping his all-Beatles album--among selections as inexplicable as Good Golly Miss Molly and, lord help me, Old Time Rock & Roll. The disappointment of learning about this has been somewhat mitigated by news of Green Blimp, apparently a new album of original material, due out yet this year.)
Twilley is a novice, though, compared to The Smithereens, who have released two albums composed entirely of Beatles material, including a complete cover of the Meet the Beatles album, essentially. a note-for-note rendition, only with DiNunzio's distinctive lead vocals. Which, after hearing it on two consecutive albums of the stuff, I can only conclude isn't all that well suited to stand in for either Lennon's or McCartney's.
To their credit, the 'reens' second album of Beatles covers, B Sides the Beatles, features some more-rarely covered material--Cry for a Shadow and Ask Me Why, in particular. Like Why Don't We Do It In the Road, it's just possible these songs aren't recorded that often because, in comparison to the rest of the Beatles' catalog, they just aren't that great!
(Ask Me Why, in fact, often makes "worst of the Beatles" lists. Bing that phrase and see what I mean. While I'm at it, Revolution #9 is not their worst song--it's a sound collage, not a song at all--and Ob-La-Di isn't the worst song ever, polls to that effect notwithstanding, although it sure is lame and annoying.)
Even more-worthy contributions to the vast Beatles tributes, such as Cheap Trick's live Sgt. Pepper's-with-orchestra, nice as they are to listen to, and impressive as they may be as performances, seem rather pointless. Yeah, you can play an entire album's worth of challenging songs extremely well . . . lots of people can! When are you going to turn out another album as good as In Color? You know, really contribute something new to rock and roll?
What disturbs me about this isn't hearing, sometimes buying more versions of songs I already own, dozens of times over. Or even that most of these renditions are imminently unnecessary.
It's that these bootleg Beatles could be performing their own songs, and that's a choice that's largely denied to we amateurs. Dwight Twilley and Cheap Trick, and to a lesser degree, The Smithereens have all written substantial amounts of original material, to the extent that, if tribute albums to them don't exist, they could.
Since when is it a legitimate career move for immensely talented songwriters to poach on the cover bands' turf? These are artists of the same caliber as those whose material we cover!
Maybe everyone wants to play Beatles' music, which is understandable, and who am I to claim that as exclusively the amateurs' province? Maybe I'm just sour because these pros play cover band out of choice, and I do it out of necessity.
Maybe I'm just ashamed of never having made it any further than the local cover band.
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