While MySpace hosts plenty of original artists doing original music, there’s room for a lot more than that. Yeah, we’re talking about cover bands. Or “tribute bands,” as these tireless warriors of dollar beer weeknight gigs at every damned dive across America fancy themselves.
And who’s to argue with these groups? Their work ethos, their dedication, their initiative to set up MySpaces, for gosh sakes, is not to be denigrated. Not here. Really, if you’re that into Depeche Mode so much that you’d devote your leisure time to covering their music, we’re not going to dump on that.
It’s really pretty easy to find cover bands on MySpace that you can make fun of yourself. Or, if you’re into the oeuvre, seek out a nearby show because you wanna be rocked. Here’s the process, using AC/DC as an example: First Google “MySpace AC/DC cover band.” If that gets you nowhere, just hit a fan MySpace. Then look at their friends. The cover bands will be there. In the case of AC/DC, you get groups like New Jersey’s Dog Eat Dog, or Kansas City’s finest–KC/DC, naturally.
Happy hunting. Really, get into this. Listening to the music is a fascinating study in musical anthropology, addictive stuff. Once you get your fill, jump over to YouTube and not just hear the stuff, but watch things like dueling Journey cover bands interspersed with actual Journey videos and the latest incarnation of Journey with the original members and the myriad lead singers they’ve found to replace Steve Perry, some of them found on–you guessed it–YouTube, as Schon confessed here. As Perry once put it, it goes on and on and on and on-n-n.
