Muirsical Re-imaginings
Have you noticed just how many classic pop or rock acts have re-emerged since the new Millennium to tread the boards once again, in most cases (but not all) to present what is almost a Greatest Hits nostalgia show for the fans...
The music industry is not just an entertainment industry however, it's a business, and more times than not is also the artists' livelihood, and that has to be respected. It's simply that when any band gets to the (concert) stage of just having the name left as a shadow or label of what was, I become disinterested.
It's simply pushing a band name or, more accurately, a brand name - as Pete Townshend describes The Who in the 21st Century, whilst also making it clear it’s a brand he is proud to be associated with (and rightly so).
Todd Rundgren matched Townshend’s matter-of-factness when he defined his role in The New Cars in 2006 as an opportunity to work with friends and pay the bills more efficiently (the band only featured two of the original Cars with main driver Ric Ocasek declining to take part).
At least they modified the name while acknowledging which band they were a tribute to.
One of the best examples of the brand in action? Take a bow, Thin Lizzy.
However many of these artists want (or need) to play the songs to a live audience, and that’s how (or why) a number of those acts make a living on the circuit.
The audiences are primarily a new, younger generation of fans who, along with the dedicated hardcore, want to see the classic acts playing the classic tracks, drawn by the name of the band and the songs, no matter what the line-up.
But for others it’s as much about the individuals who are/ were part of the very identity of the band, without whom there would have been no signature sound, classic act or classic tracks in the first place, and without whom later versions struggle to recapture past glories or create new ones.
Many of those acts (by choice or circumstance) become almost a tribute to themselves, and to such a degree that many of the official Tribute Bands are their equal. Or, in some cases, arguably better.
One of the best examples of the tribute in action? Take a bow, Limehouse Lizzy.
What is clear in many of these reinventions is if they try to copy or emulate what has gone before (particularly if replacing key-component members) they usually produce just that - an imitation of what was, with poorer copy quality.
However if and when the band decide to continue by adding a little redirection, or try to progress whilst still being true to the style of music that made them a success in the first place, they usually retain that success by creating a new audience whilst holding on to some (but never all) of their original fan-base.
One example of the latter immediately comes to mind...
Queen for many are Freddie Mercury, Brian May, Roger Taylor, John Deacon.
End of story.
But May and Taylor were desperate to revisit that music and get back out and perform for a live audience, and did so very successfully - without Deacon (who has retired from the music business and chose not to participate), but with legendary blues rock vocalist Paul Rodgers.
Brian May acknowledges that Freddie Mercury is another that cannot truly be replaced so Queen it isn’t, but with Rodgers they had another seminal and distinctive vocalist at the microphone.
Known collectively as Queen + Paul Rodgers they more accurately celebrated the music of Queen, whilst acknowledging the front man’s own back catalogue and musical legacy by peppering their live shows with classic Free and Bad Company numbers.
Musical comebacks vary dramatically in how successful they are, but it's hard to beat Journey's return to the news columns and charts in 2008 as regards their own story, the luck involved and the bullets dodged (if you know the whole story).
Not only did they manage to avoid going down with the syncing ship during their on-stage deceptions of 2005 and 2006, they salvaged the wreck, brought it back to dry-dock, fired and hired new crew and by 2008 were charting success on more than one continent with hired hand and YouTube find Arnel Pineda on vocals.
This type of re-imagining isn’t exclusive to Journey of course, or any of the other reinvented bands.
But this is the age of the re-imagining. Not just a buzzword, but also a fact of entertainment life…
It probably originated in Hollywood with the ‘Hollywood Histories’ when interesting or pivotal periods of world history became easy targets for movie making - but ‘re-imagined’ (rewritten and/ or not historically accurate) to make for a better movie. Ironically they usually make for pretty bad movies in my opinion, but highly successful nonetheless as they honed in on their target audiences.
Then classic movies and television series’ got makeovers, with most producers and suits failing to grasp there was a reason they were hailed as classics in the first place.
And of course to the music industry, as the ever growing list of tribute acts, reinvented classic bands and reformed groups all started to realise there’s money in nostalgia.
Meanwhile future ‘stars’ are being discovered and created via talent programmes such as The X Factor which originated in the U.K. and is franchised to more than two dozen countries. The contestants failure or success is dictated by a panel of experts and the viewing publics vote.
In many instances entertainment value is a bigger deciding factor than musical ability or creativity.
What’s in a Name? The answer, it seems, is everything. And nothing…
Tribute acts or singers are becoming interchangeable with the artists they are a tribute to and the musical lines between them are becoming blurrier by the re-imagined month.
An excellent example is the famous progressive rock group Yes, and the decision taken by founder member Chris Squire and long-time classic line-up colleagues Steve Howe and Alan White.
In 2008, after a 40th Anniversary U.S. tour was scheduled, seminal lead vocalist Jon Anderson pulled out due to a very serious respiratory illness.
Rather than cancel proposals and take stock, the band decided to reschedule and continue with tribute singer Benoit David.
Arnel Pineda may have a similar tonality to Journey's classic-era singer Steve Perry, but Benoit David is a true sound-a-like.
Those who are major fans of these acts or have any sort of ear can tell the Perry’s from the Pineda’s, but David has as uncanny vocal resemblance on certain Yes songs and passages.
Anderson seemingly felt "disrespected" by the move, although Squire countered by saying it was an opportunity to "…go out and honour the music of Yes…"
Interestingly, Anderson’s negative comments were later removed from his website and Squire has since stated that the tour has the singers blessings.
Sheer conjecture on my part, but you have to wonder if that’s when performance royalties were agreed (although Jon Anderson relinquished any rights to the Yes name a few years ago, so will have limited involvement in any decisions made).
Band or brand is no longer just a talking point for fans, but a financially viable option for some artists, even if it means reinventing the wheel.
But they usually turn out to be retreads.
Some people will queue/ go online for hours to grab tickets for the latest shows by their favourite name bands and pay almost any price, while others who would have once done exactly the same wouldn’t walk to the bottom of their street or pay a penny/ cent to see that same performance.
Both choices should be respected.
In this new musical Millennium era of iPods, iTune downloads, latest fashions (where look is more important than sound), X Factored stars and the latest idol production lines, the nostalgia/ greatest hits/ ‘anniversary’ tours are the way to survive for most of the classic or reinvented rock genre.
Double head-liner classic rock tours are a lucrative market and Triple Bill shows attract attention.
The big top world is where most of these re-imagined acts now live because new material and chart success are not viable, or highly unlikely, respectively.
But there are exceptions to every rule…
Queen + Paul Rodgers, mentioned earlier, made an impact on the U.K. charts when their album 'The Cosmos Rocks' made #5 in September 2008 but their name/s, pedigree, highly successful live shows and earlier live product almost guaranteed it.
And of course Journey’s 'Revelation' and its chart success.
But their new songs were intentionally written in the style of the classic material, the band are attempting to recreate that ‘legacy sound’ and they haven’t sounded this close to their classic era since…their classic era.
Yet they are a different beast in so many ways from Journey (and the many similar bands) of the '70s and '80s, and in this era of buzzwords and acronyms many people usually refer to the current version as JRNY to differentiate between the classic and the reinvented.
And the reinvented version is a success primarily because of the computerised times we now live in. Who would be singing now and how much of a story would the band be if there had been no lip-syncing expose by those in the know, or no YouTube to hunt down potential singers?
And where would they be now if Arnel Pineda never became the story because the hard drive had?
Syncgate actually put the subsequent journey in motion.
Journey is dead… long live JRNY.
And the rest of 'em.
Ross Muir
February 2009
Have you noticed just how many classic pop or rock acts have re-emerged since the new Millennium to tread the boards once again, in most cases (but not all) to present what is almost a Greatest Hits nostalgia show for the fans...
The music industry is not just an entertainment industry however, it's a business, and more times than not is also the artists' livelihood, and that has to be respected. It's simply that when any band gets to the (concert) stage of just having the name left as a shadow or label of what was, I become disinterested.
It's simply pushing a band name or, more accurately, a brand name - as Pete Townshend describes The Who in the 21st Century, whilst also making it clear it’s a brand he is proud to be associated with (and rightly so).
Todd Rundgren matched Townshend’s matter-of-factness when he defined his role in The New Cars in 2006 as an opportunity to work with friends and pay the bills more efficiently (the band only featured two of the original Cars with main driver Ric Ocasek declining to take part).
At least they modified the name while acknowledging which band they were a tribute to.
One of the best examples of the brand in action? Take a bow, Thin Lizzy.
However many of these artists want (or need) to play the songs to a live audience, and that’s how (or why) a number of those acts make a living on the circuit.
The audiences are primarily a new, younger generation of fans who, along with the dedicated hardcore, want to see the classic acts playing the classic tracks, drawn by the name of the band and the songs, no matter what the line-up.
But for others it’s as much about the individuals who are/ were part of the very identity of the band, without whom there would have been no signature sound, classic act or classic tracks in the first place, and without whom later versions struggle to recapture past glories or create new ones.
Many of those acts (by choice or circumstance) become almost a tribute to themselves, and to such a degree that many of the official Tribute Bands are their equal. Or, in some cases, arguably better.
One of the best examples of the tribute in action? Take a bow, Limehouse Lizzy.
What is clear in many of these reinventions is if they try to copy or emulate what has gone before (particularly if replacing key-component members) they usually produce just that - an imitation of what was, with poorer copy quality.
However if and when the band decide to continue by adding a little redirection, or try to progress whilst still being true to the style of music that made them a success in the first place, they usually retain that success by creating a new audience whilst holding on to some (but never all) of their original fan-base.
One example of the latter immediately comes to mind...
Queen for many are Freddie Mercury, Brian May, Roger Taylor, John Deacon.
End of story.
But May and Taylor were desperate to revisit that music and get back out and perform for a live audience, and did so very successfully - without Deacon (who has retired from the music business and chose not to participate), but with legendary blues rock vocalist Paul Rodgers.
Brian May acknowledges that Freddie Mercury is another that cannot truly be replaced so Queen it isn’t, but with Rodgers they had another seminal and distinctive vocalist at the microphone.
Known collectively as Queen + Paul Rodgers they more accurately celebrated the music of Queen, whilst acknowledging the front man’s own back catalogue and musical legacy by peppering their live shows with classic Free and Bad Company numbers.
Musical comebacks vary dramatically in how successful they are, but it's hard to beat Journey's return to the news columns and charts in 2008 as regards their own story, the luck involved and the bullets dodged (if you know the whole story).
Not only did they manage to avoid going down with the syncing ship during their on-stage deceptions of 2005 and 2006, they salvaged the wreck, brought it back to dry-dock, fired and hired new crew and by 2008 were charting success on more than one continent with hired hand and YouTube find Arnel Pineda on vocals.
This type of re-imagining isn’t exclusive to Journey of course, or any of the other reinvented bands.
But this is the age of the re-imagining. Not just a buzzword, but also a fact of entertainment life…
It probably originated in Hollywood with the ‘Hollywood Histories’ when interesting or pivotal periods of world history became easy targets for movie making - but ‘re-imagined’ (rewritten and/ or not historically accurate) to make for a better movie. Ironically they usually make for pretty bad movies in my opinion, but highly successful nonetheless as they honed in on their target audiences.
Then classic movies and television series’ got makeovers, with most producers and suits failing to grasp there was a reason they were hailed as classics in the first place.
And of course to the music industry, as the ever growing list of tribute acts, reinvented classic bands and reformed groups all started to realise there’s money in nostalgia.
Meanwhile future ‘stars’ are being discovered and created via talent programmes such as The X Factor which originated in the U.K. and is franchised to more than two dozen countries. The contestants failure or success is dictated by a panel of experts and the viewing publics vote.
In many instances entertainment value is a bigger deciding factor than musical ability or creativity.
What’s in a Name? The answer, it seems, is everything. And nothing…
Tribute acts or singers are becoming interchangeable with the artists they are a tribute to and the musical lines between them are becoming blurrier by the re-imagined month.
An excellent example is the famous progressive rock group Yes, and the decision taken by founder member Chris Squire and long-time classic line-up colleagues Steve Howe and Alan White.
In 2008, after a 40th Anniversary U.S. tour was scheduled, seminal lead vocalist Jon Anderson pulled out due to a very serious respiratory illness.
Rather than cancel proposals and take stock, the band decided to reschedule and continue with tribute singer Benoit David.
Arnel Pineda may have a similar tonality to Journey's classic-era singer Steve Perry, but Benoit David is a true sound-a-like.
Those who are major fans of these acts or have any sort of ear can tell the Perry’s from the Pineda’s, but David has as uncanny vocal resemblance on certain Yes songs and passages.
Anderson seemingly felt "disrespected" by the move, although Squire countered by saying it was an opportunity to "…go out and honour the music of Yes…"
Interestingly, Anderson’s negative comments were later removed from his website and Squire has since stated that the tour has the singers blessings.
Sheer conjecture on my part, but you have to wonder if that’s when performance royalties were agreed (although Jon Anderson relinquished any rights to the Yes name a few years ago, so will have limited involvement in any decisions made).
Band or brand is no longer just a talking point for fans, but a financially viable option for some artists, even if it means reinventing the wheel.
But they usually turn out to be retreads.
Some people will queue/ go online for hours to grab tickets for the latest shows by their favourite name bands and pay almost any price, while others who would have once done exactly the same wouldn’t walk to the bottom of their street or pay a penny/ cent to see that same performance.
Both choices should be respected.
In this new musical Millennium era of iPods, iTune downloads, latest fashions (where look is more important than sound), X Factored stars and the latest idol production lines, the nostalgia/ greatest hits/ ‘anniversary’ tours are the way to survive for most of the classic or reinvented rock genre.
Double head-liner classic rock tours are a lucrative market and Triple Bill shows attract attention.
The big top world is where most of these re-imagined acts now live because new material and chart success are not viable, or highly unlikely, respectively.
But there are exceptions to every rule…
Queen + Paul Rodgers, mentioned earlier, made an impact on the U.K. charts when their album 'The Cosmos Rocks' made #5 in September 2008 but their name/s, pedigree, highly successful live shows and earlier live product almost guaranteed it.
And of course Journey’s 'Revelation' and its chart success.
But their new songs were intentionally written in the style of the classic material, the band are attempting to recreate that ‘legacy sound’ and they haven’t sounded this close to their classic era since…their classic era.
Yet they are a different beast in so many ways from Journey (and the many similar bands) of the '70s and '80s, and in this era of buzzwords and acronyms many people usually refer to the current version as JRNY to differentiate between the classic and the reinvented.
And the reinvented version is a success primarily because of the computerised times we now live in. Who would be singing now and how much of a story would the band be if there had been no lip-syncing expose by those in the know, or no YouTube to hunt down potential singers?
And where would they be now if Arnel Pineda never became the story because the hard drive had?
Syncgate actually put the subsequent journey in motion.
Journey is dead… long live JRNY.
And the rest of 'em.
Ross Muir
February 2009
