Coverbands

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Coverbands

Postby roachie » Fri May 02, 2008 3:09 am

A lot of us seem to have opinions about music in SJ... let's start a friendly discussion about it... I'll start with Coverbands...

discuss...
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Postby Mathieu Benoit » Fri May 02, 2008 10:07 am

Cover bands like us? :-P

For me, the term "cover band" is quite broad. No matter what sort of cover band we're talking about, one can generally rate them by song selection and musical ability.

Personally, I don't get out much. It's rare you'll ever see me at a bar unless I'm payed to be there. So a cover band would have to be quite exceptional to pull me out of my personal distaste for leaving my house. That also being said, a lot of my good friends are in cover bands (hell, I play in one), and I'll go out to support them from time to time as well.

In SJ I find personally that they start to sound alike after awhile. A lot of them share the same set lists (or seem to) and a lot of them even have a rotation of the same musicians. There's nothing wrong with that, but it kind of take away from the diversity, and diversity is a nice thing to see too. It's like eating the same meal for supper every day for 5 years, it could be food that you like but you'll likely get sick of it eventually. It keeps things fresh to the audience to be unique and to stand apart. I've yet to see an original cover band in a while (I realize the irony in that.)

Personally Roachie, I like the fact that we won't play anything that anyone else does. Not because we are some sort of elitists, just because we have no intention of re-inventing a wheel that a lot of bands around here have invented over and over again... The only thing with us is that we are lazier than most, or at least I am, and in the past we never practiced enough. But now we are starting to make it a habit to practice on a weekly basis. I think this will help things not get stale for the audience, and most importantly not get stale for us either. If we aren't having fun, no one else will...

All in all, so long as we continue to evolve, I couldn't be happier playing with you boys in the city's most underground cover band.

PS - I'm not a big fan of going out, drinking and dancing, and having fun in general so I may already be biased agaisnt cover bands anyways... ;-)
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Postby roachie » Fri May 02, 2008 12:00 pm

I asked the same question to giraffecycle... I'm being half "ars", and half "curious"... just trying to get a dialogue going...
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Postby Mathieu Benoit » Fri May 02, 2008 12:25 pm

Well... I for one am trying to help this dialog along. Do you have any more specific comments and/or questions?
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Postby Malcolm Boyce » Fri May 02, 2008 1:20 pm

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Postby roachie » Fri May 02, 2008 2:18 pm

I have zero taste in music apparently. Too bad I do it for a living, must really be missing my call-center opportunities... (sorry, I didn't mean that) I write songs too.
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Postby Malcolm Boyce » Fri May 02, 2008 2:45 pm

I like good bands. Cover or other.

Coverbands aren't necessarily "tribute" bands either. The two seem to get lost in one another by name sometimes.

Abbamania anyone?
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Postby roachie » Fri May 02, 2008 3:21 pm

No thanks... I've had my ABBA fill for my lifetime...
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Postby Malcolm Boyce » Fri May 02, 2008 4:34 pm

An interesting thing I learned recently was that Sarah McLachlan, who has become know as a writer of influence, was strictly a performer of the cover variety when she was originally signed by Nettwerk.

I believe the way the story was told was that she was encouraged to write material at that point.

A thing I like about her is that she has done an excellent job of marketing herself as a heartfelt, socially conscious artist, and while I'm sure she's a sincere person, it's all done with a great degree of business and calculation, and has since she got started as a performer. Very reminiscent of Lennon from what I understand.
Last edited by Malcolm Boyce on Sat May 03, 2008 9:12 am, edited 1 time in total.
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Postby roachie » Sat May 03, 2008 3:38 am

Lilith fair probably made a couple of $$...
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Postby clinton » Tue May 06, 2008 12:57 pm

roachie wrote:I have zero taste in music apparently. Too bad I do it for a living, must really be missing my call-center opportunities... (sorry, I didn't mean that) I write songs too.


this was kind of a lame post brother....
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Postby roachie » Tue May 06, 2008 1:20 pm

You're right, I didn't mean it... just a poor reaction.
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Postby clinton » Tue May 06, 2008 1:23 pm

roachie wrote:You're right, I didn't mean it... just a poor reaction.


I definately know what ya mean though, some of the GC opinions are laughable ...I cringe daily.
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Postby Mathieu Benoit » Tue May 06, 2008 1:47 pm

clinton wrote:
roachie wrote:I have zero taste in music apparently. Too bad I do it for a living, must really be missing my call-center opportunities... (sorry, I didn't mean that) I write songs too.


this was kind of a lame post brother....


I think Roach is just venting a bit of frustration... and I doubt it's aimed at you specifically.

The thing is, is that's it's easy to get narrow minded about the whole thing. I tend to let others do their thing when it comes to their art. I can't expect the same treatment out of others though, because I can't control them.

It just seems to me that the there may be a lack of respect from both camps. Maybe the local original artists are pissed because they don't get compensated nearly what they should for their art. Maybe the cover bands are upset because they'd rather be writing music and creating something wonderful of their own. I don't have the answers...

I have not noticed however, as much disrespect from the cover bands , as from the original artists. It seems that one side spends way more energy of this matter than the other. For that I say... Does it really matter what others are doing? The important thing is that you are fortunate enough to have the ability to continue what you are doing. If you are a songwriter, then be exactly that, there's no reason you have to waste precious energy disliking someone else because they have chosen to do something different.

We're all artists in our own way, and some of us are closely related than you think. None of us really know that much about each other.

Some people would actually be surprised to know that I've been playing piano for years, and that most of the work I do isn't live gigs, it's composition for film/TV/corporate video. So yes, I'm a cover band guy when it comes to playing in the city. But to the producers I work for, they probably have no idea that I even play the drums. So what catagory am I in? Also, since I technically write music to custom specification on commision does that somehow lessen my creative legitimacy?

I love playing music that makes people happy to be out. We happen to have a very successful cover band that has had the good fortune of having a house gig for the past 3 years. People always come out we haven't had a dead night in over a year, and the summer time gets pretty crazy. People love us, and we also offer the opportunity for other to get up and cover songs or perform originals. Bottom line though, it pays, it's fun for us, and the rest shouldn't matter.

Sometimes I find that songs written by others are the perfect expression of what I want to let out, a cover band allows me express (through the ideas of an other) my own feelings too. That's why we all listen to music to begin with, because it envokes certain emotions in us. Playing a cover of that song is just the next step in evolution. Composing ideas that give you the same feeling is yet another step in evolution, but the big thing to remember here is that musically you'll never have all of your own answers, you'll never say "I have enough material, so I don't need to listen to anyone elses music," Thus cover bands will always have their place for two reasons: The general public still likes to hear the familiar, and musicians like to re-create the works of the artists they respect.

Can't we all just be musicians... no labels? It's not a contest or anything. No matter how many award shows we end up having telling us otherwise, music is not a fucking olympic sport that we play to get recognition. It's an expression of self. It's that simple. Everything else that we create around it is completely irrelevent.
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Postby Jef » Tue May 06, 2008 2:23 pm

Good cover bands are great to watch and listen to. I've seen many original artists who don't (can't) do their stuff live nearly as well as a cover band has done them (Rush is one of the exceptions).
I also know a great many musicians who can sing and play extremely well but can't write for shit. These people make great cover bands and probably wouldn't be playing otherwise.
I say if they are good, I'll go see them, the material they play is irrelevant as long as it's done well.
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Postby Malcolm Boyce » Wed May 07, 2008 12:37 am

So, I mixed monitors for "Classic Albums Live" at Imperial Theatre tonight, with them performing The Beatles' "Abbey Road", as well as many other Beatles classics in the second half. Some of the finest musicianship, singers, and performers with presence that stage has ever seen, and the audience reacted accordingly. Several spontaneous reactions and applause, as opposed to the standard polite reactions at shows, including huge response to the introductions of certain members of the band.

I'm sure if you asked the group of serious music fans that were there to see this event, they would tell you that was one of the finest groups, cover or otherwise that they have ever seen.

It certainly doesn't hurt that the material is pretty decent. ;-)

Those guys must all be songwriters, otherwise it would never have been that good... :roll:
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Postby clinton » Wed May 07, 2008 9:01 am

great post Matt, makes a lot of sense to me and pretty much echoes how I feel personally. When I said Roachie's post was "lame", it was because he's better than even engaging in that shit and he knows it. I think that's why he agreed with me if I may speak for Sean). It was certainly no slight to Sean, we're friends and have been for years.

I'm not sure why people are so offended by this topic, like Malcolm you seem completely put out by the opposing opinions, I don't get it.
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Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed May 07, 2008 9:39 am

I'm glad we seem to be on the same page Clinton. I don't really bother other people so long as they don't bother me. You guys do your thing I'll do mine, no biggie...

I think where I'd see people getting frustrated is not by the topic but how some people approach the topic. I'll admit, it's frustrating to see some adults discussing this topic with such generalizations such as "On a more controversial note, I will absolutely defend the position that people who play covers exclusively are lesser musicians than those who write." That kind of comment seems less than well thought out and depicts the very essence of what we as a musical community should avoid. Those type of comments in turn bring forth more of those types of comments, and tthat's where the cycle starts.

I think that first people should look up the classic definition of the term and go from there...

A musician is a person who plays or writes music. Musicians can be classified by their role in creating or performing music:

An instrumentalist plays a musical instrument.

A singer (or vocalist) uses his/her voice as his/her instrument.

Composers, arrangers and songwriters memorize and orally teach, or record their compositions in the form of traditional notation or audio recording.

Conductors lead a musical ensemble. A conductor can simultaneously act as an instrumentalist in the ensemble.


From there we can agree that there are various roles that can be defined under the title of musician. So you can't get away with making a statement about who is the better musician. You may be a better singer, I may be a better drummer, she may be a better composer, and he may be a better arranger. You can compare an apple to an apple saying that this apple is better/worst than the other apple... But you can't sit there and tell me it's a better fruit. Apples and Oranges folks...Apples and Oranges.

At the end of the day so long as through music we get to express what we want to express, I can live with that. That is, after all, what we all know to be the real truth behind the egos...
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Postby clinton » Wed May 07, 2008 9:46 am

Amen
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Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed May 07, 2008 9:50 am

I'll revise my last statement a bit. I'm not going to say that you "can't" argue the point of better overall musicianship. But maybe that decision should come with the list of merits to back up the opinion. Sort of the way judges make decisions in sporting competitions.

That gives me an idea... Does anyone have any thoughts as to the what we'd be using as criteria to determine such an outcome?

I'm thinking:

Technical Ability
Creativity
Diversity

...and stuff like. Is there anything else we'd throw into the mix of how we all judge musicianship?
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Postby clinton » Wed May 07, 2008 9:57 am

sounds like fun.....I'll say that creativity counts for about a billion times more cred than technical ability. My favourite musicians are the ones who find new and exciting ways to make music. I could care less about a "rippin' solo".....
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Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed May 07, 2008 10:24 am

clinton wrote:I'll say that creativity counts for about a billion times more cred than technical ability.


Interesting, so perhaps we should give certain items more weight. I'm not sure that it should be "a billion times" more though.... ;-)

May I make a suggestion though? If I was a musical director and the music being performed was music already recorded and written ("covers" as you folks would call them.) I would likely prefer someone with exceptional technical ability to be able to re-create the part perfectly over someone that was very creative and could come up with different parts but couldn't execute any of them well.

I also want to note that to me "ripping guitar solos" is not high on my list of technical merits. For me, things like the quality of the execution and the ability to be consistent in that execution are far more important than speed when we are speaking of technical criteria.

I think we can all agree though that when the creator and the performer are both hot, and happen to be the same person. That's the shit right there.

I say always seek to improve your self in all aspects of musicianship. Don't hide behind a veil of ignorance just because you're lazy. If you aren't a good composer then work on that, if you aren't a good performer then woodshed a bit. These are both skills that can be improved through hard work. Only a foolish person would leave this in the hands of fate or luck. Take your own responsibility and be the very best musician you can be. Then you'll likely leave everyone else alone, to do the same. Because that kind of dedication takes too much time for one to worry about what everyone else is doing.

But do it because you want to. For example, I am a terrible guitar player. I can play chords and stuff, and my theory background allows me to understand it, but my piano fingers just can't do it well. However as a composer I understand that I create differently on a guitar than I would on a piano. So this year I've decided to learn hwo to play the guitar well enough to accomplish my needs.

Playing in cover bands is a great well to develop performance chops, playing in an original band is a great way to develop creativity. I say spend time in both! :idea:

Thoughs?
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Postby clinton » Wed May 07, 2008 10:27 am

hahaha, you're starting to sound like one of those motivational books....
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Postby Mathieu Benoit » Wed May 07, 2008 10:29 am

:shock:

I better dial it back then... :-P
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Postby Jef » Wed May 07, 2008 12:15 pm

Drumwaiter wrote:I'll revise my last statement a bit. I'm not going to say that you "can't" argue the point of better overall musicianship. But maybe that decision should come with the list of merits to back up the opinion. Sort of the way judges make decisions in sporting competitions.

That gives me an idea... Does anyone have any thoughts as to the what we'd be using as criteria to determine such an outcome?

I'm thinking:

Technical Ability
Creativity
Diversity

...and stuff like. Is there anything else we'd throw into the mix of how we all judge musicianship?


Why would you even put 'creativity' as a criteria for musicianship?
If you're ever looking for a job as a musician with a symphony, creating your own riffs just won't fly.
You had better be playing the parts exactly as they were written or else.
Technical Ability and Diversity are both qualities of musicianship, but creativity?
... nope, that's another category altogether.
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