Echoes of the Legends - Real or Tribute Bands?

Echoes of the Legends 

 [Speaker 2]

Hey everybody, this is the Trout, welcome to another show, the Vinyl to Viral podcast right here on the Trout Show. We're starting the year off with some interesting stuff, this is the year 2026.

[Speaker 1]

I live in Texas, North Texas in fact, and one of the things that's very popular here in Texas is the fact that tribute bands have now taken over the music industry. So people don't go and listen to a cover band anymore, they want to go listen to a tribute band, whether it's Stevie Ray Vaughan or whether it's somebody that sounds like Fleetwood Mac or Eric Clapton, it doesn't matter, that's what they want to hear. And I've known people that actually own tribute bands and people go crazy over them.

I had a guy I interviewed a couple years ago that he owned several tribute bands, one of them was a Van Halen band here in the Texas area, and he said they dressed like the 80's Van Halen, they were in spandex and all that stuff. And he said that people would come up to the people that were performing afterwards and ask them for their autographs, even though they weren't any of the people that were in the original band. So it started making me think about what's really going on in the industry right now, why do people like tribute bands?

I think part of it is because a lot of the bands that are out there now, the famous bands, are really virtually tribute bands, because they either have one or no original member left in the band, and you're probably saying, really? Who are those people? And who are the bands that are going out there getting $200, $300 for a ticket, and none of the people in the band are the original members, or maybe just one?

Well, I'm going to tell you, on this episode called Echoes of the Legends, that is next on the Trout Show. Hey everybody, this is the Trout, once again I want to tell you about the gentleman that has sponsored this program ever since we started, and that's David Smith with Everett Jones. Now he's been here because he likes what I do, but also he's a great person when it comes to financial planning.

Now the good news for you is if you're listening to this anywhere in the continental United States, and believe me, I know who listens to this show, a lot of people over 55, you may be contemplating retirement. Well you need an expert that can help you with trying to plan out your financial goals. That's David Smith, he's easy to talk to, he listens, and he's an expert in the field that he does, and that's financial planning.

No pressure, just make a phone call at 469-372-1587, that's 469-372-1587, leave him a message, he'll get back with you, and he'll talk to you about what you want to accomplish when you retire. I'm telling you, he's helped us for years, I know he can help you. David Smith with Everett Jones, give him a call at 469-372-1587.

Hey welcome back to the show. Echoes of the Legends is what I call the show, and that's because there are a lot of bands out there that use the original name, they've been around for decades, but they may not have any members left in the original band, or one or two. Now I can tell you about being in a band, I've been in lots of bands in my life, and it's important to know that bands change a lot.

When you go out to a concert, and you're seeing a band, and you're going, okay this is great, I'm listening to the band I loved when I heard it back in the 70s or 80s, you want to hear the band, you want to hear what I refer to as the original band, not a tribute band. But unfortunately, a lot of these bands have become tribute bands, in my opinion. Now it may not be of interest to you if you go and listen to your favorite band, or your favorite songs that these bands play, and you don't care who's in it as long as you get to hear the great tunes that you grew up listening to.

But to me, it's kind of like a little bit false advertising, because I want to go see the original band, I want to see the people in the band that were there at the beginning. But of course, a lot of times over the time, as we all know, people leave the band, people pass away, I mean some of these bands have been around together for decades. But before you plop down a big wad of money to go see a band, I'm just going to give you a few bands that have one or two original members, or no original members left.

You have to be the judge of whether you want to do this and continue to pay that kind of money. It's up to you, but I think you should know. So let's talk about Foreigner.

Foreigner has been around for a long time, there are no originals in the regular touring band anymore, none. But they do the 2026 shows with a fresh crew belting out Jukebox Zero, Cold As Ice. So you're going to see them, and it's going Foreigner, and you're going okay, where are they?

And you go, they're not here. So that's one of the bands that's out there. Leonard Skinner has no original band members left.

Now if you're familiar with Leonard Skinner, a lot of them passed away in a plane crash years ago, but a lot of them aren't in the band anymore. So they're actually headlining this year with Foreigner, but there are no original members left in Leonard Skinner, none, zero. So when you're going to go see Leonard Skinner, you're seeing a tribute band.

Once again, you have to make the decision if that's something you are okay with or not. One of my favorite bands from the 60s and early 70s was Blood, Sweat & Tears, started by a great musician Al Cooper. But right now, if you go watch the Blood, Sweat & Tears band, there are no founding members anymore.

They still sound great, don't get me wrong, any of these bands I talk about still sound great on tour, but there are no original members left in Blood, Sweat & Tears. One of my favorite songs that they did back then was Spinning Wheel, they still do it. I don't know who the singer is now, but when you go hear them, it's really Blood, Sweat & Tears, tribute band.

Another big band that, well, it's just questionable to me because years ago, their lead singer passed away, and it was never the same again, and that's Queen. Queen's been touring with Adam Lambert, who was on American Idol years ago, for years. They still got Brian May, who's the guitar player, of course, and Roger Taylor, who plays drums, but the bass player left, and of course, Freddie left years ago because he passed away.

Now a lot of people may like going to see them, they still do an epic show, you still got the guy out there, as far as I'm concerned, which made up a lot was between the band was Freddie and Brian May, you still got him blasting out some great tunes. So when you go, just remember, it's not the original band, but a couple of members of the original band. That's Queen, and I don't really think they're a tribute band because they have two of the four still in there, but I just thought I'd touch base on it.

And Journey, apparently this year they've decided to go on their final tour. The only original member in that band is Neil Shum, who's the guitar player. And they've been doing this for a long time, and I don't know whether after, I mean, this band's been together for years, and they had a gentleman by, you know, another singer come in years ago, and they've been touring as Journey for a long time, and who knows, maybe after Neil leaves, another band might take it up, and it might still call themselves Journey.

Some of these things are copyrighted, legal situations are always tough, and that, and you can get into real problems legally. Bands get mad, somebody owns the name, and all that good stuff. But one of my favorite bands, too, from the 70s, started in the 60s, it was originally called the Chicago Transit Authority, and then changed their name to Chicago.

Big band, great sound. They have three members still in the band, from the original band, which is really kind of interesting, because they've been together since the 60s, and all these people are now getting older, and in their 70s, and hitting 80s, and things like that. And you gotta remember, eventually bands do break up.

They may break up because of arguments within the band, they don't want to tour anymore. Touring is not fun, people. You make a lot of money touring, but it's a lot of work.

And some of the other bands that I thought were interesting from the 60s that are still touring, and one of them came across my TV the other day, I was watching a commercial, and it was a band called Trogs, the Trogs out of England, and a lot of people recognize that band from the song Wild Thing, which they did, which is a big hit. But I looked into it, because they're using one of their songs called A Girl Like You on a commercial. And I reached out and looked at them, and I said, there's no original members left, except one, and the guitar player, he still plays with them once in a while, but he's 83 years old.

You can imagine if you're a band from the 60s, most of the people in the band are going to be older. Bands like The Association, Gary Puckett, and Herman Hermits, I'll get that out here in a second, they still tour, but they got the guy that's doing all the singing, like Herman Hermit. If you don't have Herman noon there singing Mrs. Brown You Got a Lovely Daughter, you don't really have a band anymore. I can go on with a lot of these different bands, but you got some bands that are still touring, which I think is incredible, like the Rolling Stones just came off a tour. We know how they've gone, Charlie Watts passed away, but they still have the Glimmer Twins, and one of my favorite bands that I grew up watching, ZZ Top, Billy Gibbons is the original member because Dusty Hill passed away, and Frank Beard sometimes doesn't play drums because of, I think, a physical situation or medical situation, but there's a lot of bands like that out there now. So I go back to my original question, should you drop a lot of money on a band that's really not the real band, or do you care?

It's totally up to you. It's all about the music, but here in Texas we get people that are tribute bands that sound almost as good as the original band, which probably don't cost nearly as much money as the original band, but we still can go out and enjoy them. So what do we do?

We still get to have our memories, and you still get to listen to some great music. So it's up to you to make that decision the next time one of these great bands comes to your area. So for The Trout, this is what I call vinyl to viral on The Trout Show.

So next time, people, remember what I always say, it's only rock and roll, but I love it. See ya!

 Thank you for listening - The Trout Show www.TheTroutShow.com