"You're you going to the Australian Pink Floyd Show that's coming to Ruth Eckerd?" my buddy Justin asked.
"You mean that tribute band?" I shot back, rising from my barstool in righteous indignation (and almost spilling my beer). How dare he suggest such a thing?
Justin and I have been losing ourselves in the spacey psychedelics and neurotic prog-rock of Pink Floyd since we were in our early teens. Experimenting with illegal substances during high school and college only deepened our affection for the band — the real band, that is. Or at least something with Roger Waters or David Gilmour in the lineup, which is as close to the real band as we're gonna get since the two prima donnas refuse to bury the hatchet and bless us with a proper Pink Floyd world domination tour.
Justin experienced the band's mid-'90s show at old Tampa Stadium. He was part of a large group of us that attended the recent sold-out Roger Waters gig at Ford Amphitheatre. How could Justin, of all people, settle for a gang of impostors? I mean, does it get any less rock 'n' roll than sitting next to a bunch of baby boomers inside Ruth Eckerd Hall, watching some guys ape our music heroes?
"I saw them on PBS," Justin countered. "[Australian Pink Floyd] do the whole Pulse-style light show. They sounded just as good as the band Waters put together."
Like any self-respecting music critic, I've always taken a strident anti-tribute-band stance as a matter of professional pride. But the conversation with Justin got me thinking — plus, I'd just attended WMNF's "Set the Night on Fire: A Tribute to The Doors" at Skipper's Smokehouse and found myself liking it more than I'd expected. With tribute acts selling out Ruth Eckerd and Jannus Landing, how long before the best of them start playing big arenas like the St. Pete Times Forum and us snobby music scribes are forced by the will of the masses to pay attention to the clones?
I decided to expand on our beer-fueled debate and started asking around, talking to some of the area's top tribute bands. What's the appeal — not just for audiences, but for the musicians who perform?
UNCLE JOHN'S BAND: Grateful for the crowds
While attending the University of South Florida, I lived down the street from Skipper's Smokehouse and regularly attended the Grateful Dead night on Thursdays featuring Uncle John's Band. Good times. A couple months ago, I went to one of their shows with friends, and we had a blast: no surprises, just spirited versions of songs I've dug since childhood.
Uncle John's Band formed in Clearwater in 1990. That means they were playing while Jerry Garcia was still alive and the Grateful Dead were touring on a regular basis. Co-frontman Rich Whiteley joined UJB in the late '90s, several years after Garcia's death led to the end of the Grateful Dead (although the surviving members have since toured as The Dead).
"I don't think it matters" if a tribute band coexists with the actual band, says Whiteley. "People who really love a band, their band is not gonna be on tour all the time, even the Dead.
"A [tribute] band is only as good as the musicians who play the music," he continues. "People go to see [Uncle John's Band] love the [Grateful Dead]. But, at least with us, people also love what we're doing with it. We have a bunch of improv musicians who are able to put their own stamp on the material."
Unlike many tribute band artists, Whiteley is a respected solo act (he also plays original music with Earth Bombs Mars); his 2000 album A Dog or a Bicycle includes a clutch of self-penned beauties. He performs several of those songs — "Raise the Roof" and "Stargazer" come to mind — with UJB.
"We bring originals to Uncle John if it fits in context in any given night, if it's in a groove the Dead could've done," Whiteley says. "My songwriting is influenced by what I listened to growing up — and that includes the Dead."
Does Whiteley prefer performing under his own name or as part of UJB?
"Look, with Uncle John, the gratification of that gig is playing in front of 200 to 300 people, very enthusiastic people," he says. "The best original acts in town aren't drawing those numbers — and me either. I love doing my own stuff, but I also love playing in front of the crowd Uncle John's Band has every Thursday."
BOGUS POMP: For Zappa, with love
Like Uncle John's Band, the world-class Frank Zappa tribute band Bogus Pomp is based in Tampa Bay and has been around for more than a decade. I saw BP at WMNF's recent birthday bash, and they nearly stole the show with their spot-on renditions of Zappa faves like "Montana."
Recreating Zappa's complex, classically influenced pieces takes a lot more chops than learning the chords to, say, "Truckin'" — but it's still imitation. Basically, Bogus Pomp plays Zappa's music note-for-note with improvisation reserved for the solos.
"We take the same liberties that Zappa and his players took," says Bogus Pomp co-founder, frontman and guitarist Jerry Outlaw. "There are keyboard and guitar solos that vary from player to player — just like Zappa would allow certain star players to do."
When Whiteley sings, one doesn't hear Garcia or Bob Weir. But in the case of Outlaw, who is primarily a guitar player (one of the best in Tampa Bay), there is more than a hint of Zappa in the voice and phrasing.
"Of course there's an effort to sound as authentic as possible," Outlaw says. "I try and do justice to the material without doing a blatant imitation of Frank.
"I'm not trying to have my mustache trimmed like his," Outlaw chuckles. "We're just trying to recreate the music — that's what make us different than most tribute bands. These KISS acts dress up and try to recreate the whole experience. We're regular musicians — jazz, orchestra, rockers — just getting together to play this insane stuff we love. The tribute thing doesn't factor in when people discuss an orchestra that plays Mozart or Bach. No one calls them a tribute band. I think Zappa is the most important composer since music and electricity got together."
VENUS IN FURS: Underground cool
HIGHWAY TO HELL: Serious cheese
The recently formed local act Venus in Furs is a self-described "all-girl Velvet Underground tribute band." Its roster is much-heralded singer/songwriter Rebekah Pulley (guitar), Karen Collins (bass), Sandy Grecco (drums) and Laura Taylor (vocals, Theremin, violin).
The gals play VU's music as faithfully as possible, even adopting a disaffected stage presence that recalls the preferred demeanor of Lou Reed and company. But that's as far as they will go in terms of aesthetics. After the band debuted at the Tampa Museum of Art in June, they had their breakthrough gig at WMNF's Birthday Bash in September and were met with warm reviews.
Venus in Furs is careful to avoid to avoid the tribute-band traps.
"A strict adherence to appearance is cheesy," Taylor says. "There are very obvious things to do to make it corny. [Like] making people wear wigs or me dying my hair platinum to be a Nico. I'm not going that far."
Tampa's Highway to Hell: The Ultimate AC/DC Tribute Band goes "that far." The band, which recently headlined before a big crowd at Jannus Landing, apes AC/DC in every detail, right down to the schoolboy costume famously worn by guitarist Angus Young — or, in the case of Highway to Hell, "Jangus." Welsh lead singer Martyn Jenkyns wears jeans, black T-shirt and sleeveless denim jacket with a cabbie cap that recalls the outfits sported by AC/DC singer (and Sarasota resident) Brian Johnson. When Jenkins sings a song from AC/DC's Bon Scott era, he simply removes the cap.
"When I was in a Queen [tribute] band, no one dressed up," Jenkins says. "If I had dressed up like Freddy Mercury I would have looked ridiculous — my body does not look good in Spandex. I just go on stage in a T-shirt, pair of jeans, jacket and put on the hat. It's not a big leap of faith. … When we stop playing, I don't talk like Brian Johnson. Or copy [his stage banter] in between songs. Then, it's my personality. I couldn't do it otherwise."
Jenkins explains that he and the rest of his bandmates have day jobs and only do Highway to Hell for fun. He says Brian Johnson approves of what they're doing and that Johnson's wife, Brenda, has watched them perform on several occasions.
"We even had [Johnson's] mother-in-law up on stage with us," Jenkins says. "We do a lot of charity gigs, and I think he respects that. We're not trying to make a bunch of money off his back. … Brian and Brenda know we're doing it for fun, because we love the music."
What about the cheese factor?
"As long as people say 'I had a bloody good night'," he says, "I got my job done."
AUSTRALIAN PINK FLOYD: If Gilmour likes 'em …
And then there's that Australian Pink Floyd Show.
Bogus Pomp's Outlaw told me they're the real deal, guys with serious chops. Last year, the Australian Floyd show at Ruth Eckerd Hall sold out. This go-round, the Aussie Floyd has two dates booked: Nov. 27 and 30. A PBS special on the band aired over Labor Day. Oh, and it turns out they performed for none other than David Gilmour at his 50th birthday party in '96. In fact, Aussie Floyd's elaborate stage show, which features laser lights and inflatables, also features one of the pigs used on the Pink Floyd's mid-'90s Division Bell tour. So, yeah, it seems Gilmour's cool with the whole tribute band thing.
I ask the Aussie Floyd keyboardist Jason Sawford what it was like meeting the Pink Floyd singer/songwriter and guitarist.
"Me being quite shy a bit, all I did was shake his hand," Sawford says from a tour stop in Kansas. "He did say hello and seemed very gracious. The last time he came to see us was when we were at Royal Albert Hall [in London]. The girl who does our merchandise met him. She said he ordered a T-shirt and said how he liked our Australian take, that's what I heard."
But just 'cause Gilmour approves of the tribute thing, does that mean I should, too? Maybe I'll have to go to the Australian Pink Floyd Show and find out.
Pay tribute: a list of upcoming tribute-band gigs in the area
Read Wade Tatangelo's music blog at tampacalling.com.
This article appears in Nov 21-27, 2007.