Life after cover bands - 6 months in...

[drbassman]

Yeah, my old band that I quit 6 or 7 years ago went all original and now they could bore a dead person.  But they are happy telling everyone how great their new stuff is, even though no one will pay them to gig it live.  Supply and demand!

I love doing covers and playing occasionally.  The best of both worlds for me.   

[Father Gino]

I've mostly been in blues/soul bands for 30 years or so. Are those cover bands? We certainly did nothing note for note and often strived for more obscure tunes even in that genre. .

For the last 6 years I've been in a ... ?? Classic Rock Band?? I'm not sure what that even means anymore. I never used to think the 80's was classic anything. Our repertoire consists mostly of stuff from the 60's to 70's. It's not my favorite music to listen to but it is stuff I grew up with on AM radio. This band doesn't play anything note for note either (I sure don't). We argue sometimes about wanting to add more "modern" songs and I always fight it. I don't like that stuff at all and I don't remotely know it or connect to it in any way. No way would I study them either.

We try to be pretty eclectic and we do no originals but we throw in some fairly obscure tunes and do some different versions/arrangements of some of the more popular ones. Used to play out almost every Fri/Sat but now it's down to 3 Saturdays/month by choice (of some members). Don't make a fortune but enough to support the habit and then some. It's a good balance for me. I think we sound pretty good and most importantly, I enjoy doing it.

[patman]

3 Saturdays a month sounds like a good plan to me.  Enough work so that the band is tight, but not too much...

[Pilgrim]

3 Saturdays a month sounds like a good plan to me.  Enough work so that the band is tight, but not too much...

Even though I don't have that much time, that kind of frequency would indeed contribute to having a nice, tight sound.

[Granny Gremlin]

 Sturgeon's law (90% not 95 BTW) is often overused and misused beyond the point of it's original intent.  Music being 'good' is not something that can be objectively measured and therefore which 90% is the crap portion varies by individual (there is not even consensus among 'qualified' persons).  The more accurate way of putting it, within this context (which has nothing to do with the original intent) is something like: everybody thinks 90% of anything sucks; it's which 90% we disagree about. Not quite as succinct and nihilistically cool (which is why it gets so much use), but miles more clear and logically airtight.  The original intent was to defend the newish genre of Sci Fi literature from critics who were dismissing the entire genre as without merit based on the 'worst' examples of it.  His point is that any category of work (not just art forms, but consumer goods etc) has approximately the same proportion of poor quality examples and therefore those critics were logically incorrect in drawing conclusions from a few examples, selectively chosen. It does not work to use this 'law' in isolation to one particular form to show how most of it is crap  (i.e. originals vs covers - 90% of those suck too, as previously mentioned).

Going further, there may be some examples that seem "universal" (such as the Kinks tune mentioned above - hell, I dig it, not sure I'd want to cover it, maybe in a reinterpreted way, but not straight up) but even this is not the case.  There is no definitive 'good music' category, nor even selected undisputed members (unless your sample, as regards those you are asking, is biased in some way*).  There are people out there who still don't acknowledge Rock in general as potentially good music. ... and then there are others who can't grasp how anyone could dispute the divinity of Led Zepplin.

I'm not even sure one can even classify works definitively the other way - worst; sucks.  No matter how bad something is, some asshole out there digs it and often what experts or more discerning persons might consider pap, is in reality the most popular and well-liked; e.g. pop tarts and boy bands.

* all the above said, a skewed sample can be relevant in that it could define your target market.  Drunk single middleclass 30-somethings down the pub for example.  I'd give you 1:1000 odds that your grunge cover band would be a hit.

[Pilgrim]

In the thread with David Clayton-Thomas, he refers to his latest CD as "standards".  I like that term better.

IMO the rock hits of the 60's and 70's are now "standards."  Let's face it, everyone who hears them knows every note, every lyric.  House of the Rising Sun, Hey Jude, Sympathy for The Devil are all essentially standards now.

[patman]

It's all about having fun with a big room full of people....

The dancers (God love 'em) still want to dance when you play "Run Around Sue" ... been playing it 40 years (or more), and it will still get a room full of people moving.

Same with "Gimme Some Lovin/I'm a Man"...it's kind of like a communal celebration when you get a big room full of people moving.  Gotta admit it is still fun to drink a few beers and go out and honk out some Rock 'n Roll...if it is gone, I will miss it.

[Father Gino]

he refers to his latest CD as "standards".  I like that term better.

That sounds about right. We've played just a few weddings and a few parties for old coots (like ourselves). Our fearless leader is always warning that we need some old-timers music for these occasions. I argue back that if they were too much older than us, they'd be dead.

[TBird1958]

It's all about having fun with a big room full of people....

The dancers (God love 'em) still want to dance when you play "Run Around Sue" ... been playing it 40 years (or more), and it will still get a room full of people moving.

Same with "Gimme Some Lovin/I'm a Man"...it's kind of like a communal celebration when you get a big room full of people moving.  Gotta admit it is still fun to drink a few beers and go out and honk out some Rock 'n Roll...if it is gone, I will miss it.

I may play different songs but yes, it's very gratifying to have people simply enjoy the music - even better if you're making music with good friends.

[Blackbird]

I've been feeling the opposite of the original post...after being in a hard rock original band, it's more money pit and shows in my town are hard to find and have been thinking of selling my soul to the cover band or more of an East coast project..where money might actually come my way..

Not giving up the first one, but maybe supplementing the first with the latter.. 

[Basvarken]

Yesterday at the rehearsal of Definition Of Madmen we made a decision to reintroduce the use of covers to our repertoire. We've been working on original compositions for about two years now. Made an EP and full length album that got us some good reviews. We made two video clips that got a good bunch of views on YouTube and Vimeo. But reality is that we've hardly been getting any gigs since we've stopped doing covers. And the band is suffering from that. We get frustrated and disappointed. We can't seem to be able to make the next step to a larger audience / decent gigs with 100% originals.

So we will add a bunch of covers to the setlist that go well with our own material. It is going to be a challenge to find the right covers ( not too cliché or worn out, yet still enough familiarity).

[slinkp]

It takes a while to find the stuff that sounds good covered by your band too!  It took me years to figure out it's not always the same as "stuff we all like".

[wellREDman]

back when I was in an original  band we had a cover policy, which worked really well.

we always did a cover third song in to reel back in those who weren't digging new-to-them material.

it only stayed in the set for the amount of time it took to get the next one worked up so it helped keep things fresh without having to drop any original songs

some of our regulars enjoyed the "whats it gonna be?" aspect.

we took it in turns to choose the next one, and the chooser got to be boss of the arrangement, so sometimes it would be a direct homage, and some times it would be as far from the original as we could twist it. I have fond memories of a RATM style "Its all over now Baby Blue "

[uwe]

Yesterday at the rehearsal of Definition Of Madmen we made a decision to reintroduce the use of covers to our repertoire. We've been working on original compositions for about two years now. Made an EP and full length album that got us some good reviews. We made two video clips that got a good bunch of views on YouTube and Vimeo. But reality is that we've hardly been getting any gigs since we've stopped doing covers. And the band is suffering from that. We get frustrated and disappointed. We can't seem to be able to make the next step to a larger audience / decent gigs with 100% originals.

So we will add a bunch of covers to the setlist that go well with our own material. It is going to be a challenge to find the right covers ( not too cliché or worn out, yet still enough familiarity).

It might be your 20/20, Rob, ever thought of that driving people away? 

Just joking, I think a split between covers and own material is the sensible thing to do.

[nofi]

my deal with playing covers was that i felt like i was cheating somehow. playing someone else's stuff when i should be writing my own songs. it never felt legit to me. still doesn't. oh well.