Cover bands thrive on parody theatrics, built-in fan base

WINNIPEG (CUP) – Artist Andy Warhol ripped off, reproduced, and re-contextualized his way to immortality, yet most self-respecting artists will dismiss anything even vaguely scented with unoriginality. What is it about the rip-off artist that inspires such over-the-top rhetoric? And, moreover, how can they defend themselves from these charges? What about the cover band? Justin Deeley gets paid for playing other people’s songs.

WINNIPEG (CUP) – Artist Andy Warhol ripped off, reproduced, and re-contextualized his way to immortality, yet most self-respecting artists will dismiss anything even vaguely scented with unoriginality.
What is it about the rip-off artist that inspires such over-the-top rhetoric? And, moreover, how can they defend themselves from these charges? What about the cover band?
Justin Deeley gets paid for playing other people’s songs. By night he is Hot Karl, lead singer of popular local cover band, Hot Karl and the Steamers.
The band tastefully sticks to a set of ’80s pop fare, replete with period costumes and props. For Deeley, Hot Karl is equal parts character and coping mechanism.
“It’s absolutely a mask, a character, for me. I think that’s the only way I could actually play other people’s songs, by creating a character,” he said. “I come from a theatre background and never thought I would ever play in a band. The idea is just to get up and perform and do other people’s songs our own way and have a big party.”
Yet, even in the midst of this party, Deeley retains a keen awareness of the ethical conundrum at hand.
“I would almost feel bad if I had a ton of respect for the artists that I was ripping off,” Deeley said. “But the artists that we’re ripping off, they’re Toto or A-ha. The songs aren’t amazingly written or untouchable things. It’s nostalgia; it’s the songs that everyone sang as kids. That’s why we do them.”
The way Deeley explains it, covering music is rather a subtle reframing of the utility of song – less an individual expression, and more an invitation to communal experience.
The tribute band, arguably the next level of the cover band, takes this idea even further.
Kelly Fairchild, an otherwise established original artist, plays in two of Winnipeg’s most visible tribute acts, the Paul Stanleys, a Kiss tribute band, and the Maroons, a Ramones tribute band.
For him, playing other people’s songs in this context is all about the communal experience.
“When you do a tribute, you sort of have a built-in crowd. All the Ramones fans, for instance, come out to see you,” he said. “You don’t have to work to win over new fans, because the Ramones have already done it for you. And there isn’t one musician who doesn’t like to play to a packed room, regardless of what you’re playing.”
Like Hot Karl, there is a definite sense of self-parody permeating the band. The Paul Stanleys reproduce the Paul Stanley face-paint on all four band members.
But for Fairchild, it’s all just fun hero worship tempered with a good sense of humour.
“The Peter Crisses wouldn’t work. The Ace Frehleys would just stumble around stage all night,” he said. “We’re all super die-hard Kiss fans so we just want to have fun and poke a little fun at Kiss. It’s for them. We just know how to play the songs, and we love the music, so we’re in the band.”

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