Exploring The Rise of Tribute Bands
- Cheryl Alterman | The Music Soup Editor
- 20 hours ago
- 11 min read
When this publication began, I thought I'd (probably) never bring tribute bands into The Music Soup. Not for any specific reason, but there are so many great original bands out there....why would I? However, recently I've noticed a reason to write about tribute bands, and I've decided to over ride that decision. The reason is that tribute bands are definitley on the rise and I've been examining what could possibly be the reason for this.
I've had numerous conversations with friends that are musicians, both in tribute bands and in original bands, and also with my fellow live music going non musician friends, discussing what is possibly causing the increase in tribute bands vs original music. I should also add that the conversations I refer to have been mainly with people in the second half of life, aged 50+, because that matters.
The obvious reasons that I can see, (in the older demographic of music lovers), is that our rock stars are slowly retiring and/or dying off. Some of the seasoned well known bands are now doing gigs with only one or very few original members. So the fact that life is only so long, is a real reason that the tribute bands may be so plentiful.
Last year I got to be in the presence of 80 year old, Robby Kreiger, the original Doors guitarist and composer of much of their music. It was like he was in a Doors tribute band as he was the only original member. I sat in the photo pit during the entire set, a few feet from Krieger, thinking to myself how honored I am to be able to experience one of the original Doors members, right in front of me, playing this iconic catalogue of The Doors. I got to experience it, up close. The entire sent was all Doors and all epic!
Nostalgia is a reason weighing heavily into this question as to why the increase in tribute bands. And nostaligia is a beautiful thing when it comes to music. Waking up those brain cells that only light up when music that we know from our teens is heard. And this is a scientific fact, says the many studies that emerged from Stanford research. This is due to the physiological signals our brains react to. I'm not saying we don't get joy from listening to new and/or original music. I'm speaking only from a physicological/biological POV from numerous studies that Stanford conducted about our brains' relationship to music. And how a small part of our brain reacts only to music from our childhood/teens. From the demographic of a music lover in the second half of life...hearing music from my teens physiologically sparks my brain with an added impact
that feels different to listening to newer music. It's purely biological. And, I can actually feel the difference.
I lived a recent perfect example of how nostalgic music works, at a gig with two tribute bands. Both tribute bands were excellent....really, as good as they get next to the originals. First on was a Yes tribute band called, Shine Delirious. The whole set was great. I listened intently, enjoying the music of Yes as I did when I was a teen. In my teens I had a friend who was deeply into Yes and he turned me onto them. And as I am a prog rock fan anyway, their music was easy to like. Since my friend at the time was immersed in Yes, I found myself listening to them whenever I was hanging out with him. So the music of Yes embedded into my teenage brain.
After the (Yes) Shine Delirious set, was a Rush tribute band called, Fred Barchetta. They are one of three Rush tribute bands that I've seen. And in my opinion, they are by far the very best. Both of these bands are female fronted. Both lead vocalists are amazing. Karla Downey is lead for the Yes band, Shine Delirious, and Darby Gould is the lead singer for Fred Barchetta, the Rush band. Karla gives Jon Anderson a run for his money and Darby is almost a better Geddy Lee than Geddy Lee himself! Seriously excellent bands, both with insanely talented badass musicians.
Just like in my teenage days, being turned onto Yes by my childhood friend, and listening to a lot of Yes in my teens....A friend in the last decade of my life was really into Rush. Although I've heard and always liked Rush, they were never one of my most listened to bands whilst I was young. Rush is definitley a taste that I aquired more as an adult whilst spending a lot of time with someone who really loved Rush. He loves Rush as much as I love The Who. When Rush was played, we'd both find ourselves singing to it at the tops of our lungs. Even though it wasn't in my rotation as a kid, I still knew all the lyrics.
Whilst watching these two bands...I was very much in touch with noticing how they made me feel. 'They' being the body of music that each band played. And I really noticed a difference that was probably being driven by the brain connections from the published Stanford studies they conducted on music and the brain. The 'teen brain' whilst listening to Yes music felt like it hit a deeper place of 'joy', (or whatever word best describes this). The Rush music gave me the same amount of 'joy' but I felt it at a different level. I think the 'levels' of joy were driven my brain, and those receptors publicized in the Stanford studies. But I did feel it as I was super aware of this during both sets. I'm not saying I liked the Rush music more or less than the Yes music...I'm saying that they hit me differently. And to me, it was very apparent, probably because I was trying to notice if there was in fact any difference. Both music gave me that heightened live music joy that one gets at a gig, but there was something slightly different, maybe a tad deeper, with the music of Yes.
According to the studies at Stanford, it's probably to do with my listening to so much Yes when I was a kid, vs the more recent appreciation of the music of Rush as an adult. Just due to when in my life, my brain was hearing it. This doesn't make the music less enjoyable but it does give a different feel to the nostalgic music, and what may be the possible reason we see the wave of tribute bands today. Just my guess.
There are a couple of excellent films depicting the effects of this on our brains, especially in people who suffer from brain trauma. If you are at all interested in this, I suggest two films by Oliver Sacks...."Alive Inside" and "The Music Never Stops". Both of these films are beautiful stories about how music reaches our brains and the effects on us when we hear the songs that are embedded into our subconscious in our teens.
For me, seeing live music from bands/artists that I've adored as an adult like, Foo Fighters, Robbie Williams, Rival Sons, Pearl Jam, Rush and so many others still evokes excitement. But when I see live shows of my favorites from my teens such as The Who, Elton John, Springsteen, etc the 'musical happiness' feels weirdly deeper and slightly different. A couple great examples of this was when I photographed The Who in September 2025. (My favorite childhood band).
I still feel the surge of excitement when I recall the two hours of standing in front of Daltrey and Townshend at Shoreline, hearing them bang out tunes that I've known and loved for nearly my entire life. There is something extra special in my brain from that show, as opposed to the immense joy after seeing Pearl Jam. I love them both. But The Who felt different. And the joy I felt from The Who show or Springsteen in April will always remain unmatched to any other band I see today that I have grown to love in my adult years.
Which brings me back to seeing this huge wave in the past few years of tribute bands, I feel like a big part may be the nostalgia factor. The Boomers and Gen X, that are live music lovers, may be feeling that extra depth of joy when they experience live music being played from their youth.
The music sparks those memories, like an especially fun time spent with certain childhood friends, a first kiss, a memorable moment in your teens etc. And look around in the venue and notice everyone knows every word to every song. That's such a heartwarming experience we can all share in a venue full of strangers experiencing the joy of reliving the music that we've loved for decades. The nostalgia combined with the convenience of small local venues and the vastly reduced expense to see tribute bands vs the big original bands also plays into it.
Nowadays there are so many tribute bands...from Beatles to Oasis and everything in between. There are tribute bands I know of for just about every band we can remember. You name it - there's a tribute band for it! And these bands work a lot! They usually have little to no problem filling venues. And people always leave the gigs with huge smiles on their faces.
After talking to many people about this, the reasons I hear are that the real bands are charging hundreds of dollars lately for tickets, which is a real problem for many people especially in these tough times when petrol/gas has increased so it costs more to get there. Once you're at the venue, there's parking which has also gone through the roof, all these expenses added onto the fact the tickets are hundreds of dollars and add the service charges and it's quite an expense at the end of the night. I remember the service charge being fifty cents on each ticket! And some older music lovers are now experiencing health and/or mobility problems which prevents them from attending. I noticed this when I covered the Neil Young show last year. I looked around and saw so many people were mobility and health compromised. I saw a lot of wheelchairs and oxygen machines. I also saw a lot of joy on the faces of those who have obviously loved Neil Young all their lives, they knew all the words to all the songs and were probably over the moon to be able to attend the show. I bet they aren't able to make the effort very often. The joy to simply be present was obvious, and very infectious. At the Paul McCartney show back in 2022 I noticed so many attendees being assisted on walkers and wheelchairs...but, hey, they got to the show! And they left with huge smiles! And I bet that some of them were those young girls we all saw on so much Beatles footage from the 60's.
I have many friends in great original bands, but sadly I see a lack of attendance to support them as much as I do the tribute bands lately. I'm refferring to the demographic of 50+ only. And there are even bands that don't have a specific tribute band they perform, but rather a whole genre of tribute music such as Yacht Rock like the band, Yachtley Crew.
And the band, Surf Monster which plays a familiar collection of fab tribute surf music.
Young people have their favorite bands, getting popular and playing large venues and festivals. Like the Swifties, Benson Boone, Teddy Swims, Sombr, Olivia Rodrigo etc.
I do see the older demographic flocking to see their favorite tribute bands. The music that lives on in popularity and loads of nostalgic tunes. Some tribute bands have been making a living for decades and continue to find their audiences are growing. As far as specifics...There have always been many Beatles tribute bands. The oldest being, "Beatlemania" and then, The Fab Four, The Fab Faux and Rain. And a friend of mine that has had his own Beatles band, now in their 27th year, Drew Harrisons' The Sun Kings, was telling me about a band when he was a kid called Papa Do Run Run. Apparently this band played a lot of Beach Boys music when the original Beach Boys music was diminishing in popularity. They actually created a resurgence of Beach Boys popularity. By Papa Do Run Run playing Beach Boys songs, it actually sold more Beach Boy music!
As for The Sun Kings - they work a lot! Drew also has a couple other spin offs, two being Lennon bands, "The Spirit of Lennon, "and "The Fauxno Ono Band", as well as a duo with Scott Southard, another member of The Sun Kings. Drew also writes and plays his own original music and has had two bands, New Religion, and Ted 302. I'm a fan of Ted 302. Personally I love his original music. I know he does too, but as far as making a living, he says he's lucky because being the Lennon guy gave him a second chance at doing music as his day job. We always discuss how grateful we are that we do what we love and love what we do. And as far as I'm concerned, that gratitude is the root of happiness. This seems to be the consensus of many musicians whether they play cover tunes or original music...they continue loading a ton of expensive equipment into venues to set up and play shows for a pittence, just to be able to play music for people and bring joy. For the love of doing what we love. I do the same here, with The Music Soup. No one is paying me to write and publish these articles, but I do it for the love of doing what I love to do. I do it for the many people who cannot get to go to a show for the reasons I've mentioned above. I see them at local events and I do this for them. They get to experience live music through these articles, and my photos. A year ago, a friend prompted me to add a donation button to these articles. He said it's like a tip jar at his gigs. So that music lovers like you, that read this publication can help me to continue putting out content.
Tribute band or not...loving and attending live music is one of the purest joys in life! And I am so very grateful for all those musicians that get to a gig several hours before showtime to carry the heavy equipment in, set up, sound check, play the show and load out after the performance only to do it all again the next time. Live music is one of the best things in life and I do beleive it keeps us young! Please contribute to those tip jars whenever possible! As always, be kind to each other. Love with your whole heart. Forgive and apologise easily. Make amends. Connect with each other. Greet each day with love in your heart. And never regret anything that made you smile. Remember...life is short. With love and gratitude, (and always turn up the volume on that music!) Cheryl at The Music Soup❤️✌🏻🎵
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