The Curious Case of Tribute Acts
Last weekend, I was in Dallas for the very first time. A friend and his wife, who I was staying with, decided to take me to a mall, where we stumbled upon a Taylor Swift tribute act called Reputation.
The first thing I noticed were so many children and grown women alike, wearing Taylor Swift t-shirts, making a whole night of it. Some were even dressed up like Taylor in outfits she has worn in music videos, album covers, or on tour.
This piqued my curiosity, to say the least. Admittedly, I have never seen a tribute act before. Wanting to see what the big deal was, I stayed behind and watched a bit of the act.
It was eye-opening, not just musically, but sociologically as well. But I’m getting ahead of myself.
Firstly, let’s discuss tribute acts and cover bands. Where did they come from, and what is their purpose?
Of course, tours as we now know them, started as early as the late 1950s. They were usually packages, where record labels like Motown would have numerous acts play a few of their hits and move to the next town. They mainly played the biggest markets, however. There was no way The Beatles were coming to small markets like South Bend, Indiana, or Glendive, Montana. But the demand to hear this music was everywhere. Travel was difficult enough as is, so local bands would play covers of hit songs. This logically led to the creation of tribute acts for these small market cities. With the rising popularity of television, you might see acts on The Ed Sullivan Show or American Bandstand, so enterprising musicians decided to put on the acts in those small market regions. They dressed, sang, walked, and danced like Elvis, because the only way to see the real deal was to fly to Las Vegas.
This became an industry in and of itself, especially as package tours died out in the mid-to-late 1960s and bands started to play on their own for over an hour. Some tribute acts have received blessings, endorsements, and permission from the real acts themselves, like Genesis tribute act The Musical Box. They were given permission to use the original images used on the original The Lamb Lies Down on Broadway tour, which they used during their meticulous musical and visual recreations of the tour. David Gilmour even booked The Australian Pink Floyd Show to play his 50th birthday party!
Some tribute acts went even further than that; after a drunken fan pushed Noel Gallagher from behind on stage in Toronto in 2008, which led to the guitarist falling on to a speaker and fracturing three ribs, an Oasis tribute act got someone to recreate that very moment at one of their shows. (Try explaining that one to the local promoters.)
Of course, seeing tribute acts of artists that won’t play small markets is one thing. But another equally important purpose is to see recreations of artists who have passed away or bands who have broken up. The last Beatles tour ended in 1966, but you can find Beatles tribute acts practically anywhere in the world. They not only play the same instruments as the Fab Four, but they dress, talk and banter with the audience like them as well. For many, it’s the closest thing they will ever get to seeing the real thing. With Paul and Ringo, the last surviving members, both in their eighties, this knowledge is made even more tangible.
But the last, and perhaps most interesting, reason for the need for tribute acts is the overwhelming demand to see the real deal.
As we all know, Taylor Swift’s still-ongoing Eras tour is perhaps the biggest tour in music history. Playing five continents, it became the first tour to surpass $1 billion in revenue, making it the highest-grossing of all time. Demand for tickets were so overwhelming that Ticketmaster’s site crashed during the U.S. tour’s first sale, which led to Congressional hearings and censure from lawmakers. The role of bots, scalpers, and price gouging became hotbed issues because of the unprecedented demand for tickets for this tour, and led to the implementation of price regulation and anti-scalping laws in multiple countries.
Swaths of Swifties who did not have tickets to the Eras Tour gathered outside stadiums to listen to Swift performing. This wasn’t mere tailgating. This was “Taylor-gating.” Some fans even went so far as to buy tickets for international tour dates, flying across oceans to see this tour.
Suffice to say, even with Taylor Swift’s concert film, Taylor Swift: The Eras Tour, which became the highest-grossing concert film of all time, that would not do.
Enter tribute acts… like Reputation.
The moment the introductory video started to be played, screams filled the air from everyone in attendance for the show. But who exactly were they screaming for, Taylor, or the person portraying her?
The thought of being Taylor Swift in a Taylor Swift tribute act must be quite the conundrum. At what point does one lose oneself, or sense of self, in singing, acting, talking, and looking like another person? Does one tackle it the way an actor plays a role, ala Austin Butler’s incredible portrayal of Elvis Presley in Baz Luhrmann’s Elvis biopic? (It even made me ponder if groupies for such tribute acts exist. But that’s beside the point.)
The audience at this concert sang their hearts out as if Taylor herself was on stage. At the end of the day, that’s the entire point. What I saw of the show, which included costume changes, backup dancers, and pyrotechnics, was extremely professional; they even had their own merchandise booth! All of my questions and thoughts clearly mattered little to the audience, some of whom were clearly there just to have a good time and enjoy hearing the next best thing… even in a big market like Dallas.
