One band nailed the notes. The other nailed the soul.
Last week, I went to two concerts I wouldn’t normally have been interested in –
But my buddy Rob wanted to go.
And Rob rules.
In fact, he wanted to see Ex-TC so much that he flew from Florida to Nashville to catch them. Only after he booked his flight did he find out that Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening would be playing during his visit.
We went to both shows.
I’ve known Rob for 49 years.
We were college roommates and in a band together in 1976. He was always a bigger Led Zeppelin fan than I was and he was truly excited to see Jason Bonham’s Led Zeppelin Evening
(Hereafter called JBLZE for brevity’s sake).
Rob promised JBLZE would be “the best Led Zeppelin tribute band you’ve ever seen.” That struck me as faint praise, but he was totally into it – so I went. That’s what good friends do, spend time with each other.
Besides, they were playing at the historic Ryman Auditorium, and I’ve never seen a disappointing show there.
The acoustics are perfect.
And the only bad seats are in the back of the first floor, if you get stuck behind a post holding up the balcony.
We were in the balcony.
I never saw the real Zeppelin. But JBLZE is the closest thing to it.
Jason Bonham is, of course, the son of the late Led Zeppelin drummer John Bonham. He’s put together a group of musicians who sound like the original band.
Singer Jason Dylan has Robert Plant’s screech.
And Jimmy Sakurai has obviously spent hours practicing Jimmy Page’s guitar parts and stage moves.
From the balcony, he even looked like Page.
They performed all of Physical Graffiti, Zeppelin’s double album, but in a different order.
They started with “Custard Pie” and ended with “Kashmir,” before playing an encore of four tunes from other albums. They finished with “Stairway To Heaven.”
The Ryman’s reputation for great sound is intact. It was loud but not obnoxiously so, and Bonham’s drums were clean and powerful, but intentionally forward in the mix. His playing is, unsurprisingly, exactly like his father’s: strong, complicated, and brutal.
A few times during the night, Bonham spoke to the audience between some songs.
He talked about preserving the music, and that brought cheers. The audience was fully on-board and got more involved as the night went on.
Bonham mentioned becoming a grandfather. And that put it all in perspective, just how long it’s been since the 70s:
Physical Graffiti is now 50 years old.
I enjoyed the songs but felt like an outside observer.
Yes, they were, in fact, the best Led Zeppelin tribute band I’ve ever seen, but something felt a little off.
The band’s focus was on replicating the songs exactly like the records. They’re great technicians, so there was no room for self-expression.
People want to hear the songs the way they remember them. so self-expression wasn’t the point.
I was the outlier.
The audience loved it.
I later told a friend I saw them and he said, “Oh. A cash grab.” That’s harsh and not entirely true, but the show did feel a bit corporate. Preserving music is admirable, which is part of why I’m involved with the Blues scene.
But Zeppelin’s music is already well preserved. I don’t think there’s much chance of it fading into obscurity any time soon.
Other bands from decades ago have faded into obscurity except among their most fervent fans.
There’s an industry of touring nostalgia acts with few, if any, original members.
It always struck me as sorry and, sure, a cash grab. On the other hand, musicians have the right to make a living and if that’s where the cash is, grab it.
With all that in mind, I didn’t have high hopes for Ex-TC.
Especially after we walked into the City Winery and were directed to the small venue upstairs.
It was more like a hotel conference room than a theater, and only half the seats were filled.
It felt a little sad. But that changed quickly.
Ex-TC is an offshoot of XTC, the New Wave band from the 80s and 90s.
The only original member is drummer Terry Chambers.
“Ex-TC” is not just a pun on “XTC,” it has his initials, too. The band is a trio with singer/guitarist Steve Hampton and singer/bassist Terry Lines, neither of whom were in XTC, but have long résumés.
Rob bought a ticket to see them in 2022 and had a photo of Chambers that he wanted autographed, but caught COVID and couldn’t go to the show.
He somehow found Hampton online, and wrote explaining how he had missed the show.
He asked if he could mail the photo to England for Chambers to sign. When the photo came back, Hampton had written a letter thanking Rob for being a fan. They started an online correspondence.
So when we walked in, Rob knew that Hampton’s wife Jax would be running the merch table. She knew who he was as soon as he introduced himself. Almost immediately, we were like family.
I’ve been an XTC fan since the 80s.
But, honestly, I had low expectations. When it’s only the original drummer, how good can it be?
I’m happy to report that I was wrong. While the sound was a little muddy at first, the sound man had it dialed in by the third song and they sounded great from then on. Their material was all XTC songs, of course, and they were fired up about it.
Where JBLZE was concerned about playing every note perfectly, Ex-TC were more interested in having fun, and still managed to play every note perfectly. When the band has a blast, the audience has a blast.
I’ve covered XTC songs in a couple bands.
And those bass parts are tricky.
I’m sure the same is true of the guitar parts, yet both Hampton and Lines made it look easy. And fun.
Starting with “This Is Pop” and ending with “Life Begins At The Hop,” they covered all the highlights of XTC’s strong career.
Hampton was the de facto front man and was engaging and funny. It took a while for Lines to loosen up. Chambers never did.
He seemed a little embarrassed when Hampton introduced him and spent most of the night looking at his hi hat.
They took a break an hour into the show because, as Hampton said, “We’re men of a certain age and have to go to the toilet.” They were back shortly for another hour.
While Chambers has a modest stage presence, I noticed something interesting about his drumming. Like Ringo Starr, his parts usually aren’t technically difficult, but they’re very well conceived. He thought outside the box when he wrote them and rarely plays a cliched backbeat.
Listen again to his playing on 1979’s “Making Plans For Nigel.”
He made it look easy, and maybe it is, but it’s unlike anyone else’s playing. It’s uniquely his.
Where Bonham’s playing is all bombast, Chambers’ is smart, distinctive, and passionate.
It’s the artistry I had hoped for.
We hung around after the show and talked with all three members. They were as nice as could be. Lines and I talked about bass. Chambers and Rob talked about Respectable Street, a venue in West Palm Beach named after an XTC song. Jax hugged us both on our way out.
I get why people like nostalgia acts. It’s familiar music in a new setting.
And it reinforces that the music of our youth really was great stuff.
The thing is, there’s a lot of new music that’s great stuff, too.
So the question is, why limit myself to one or the other? I look forward to seeing current performers like, say, Benson Boone or Die Spitz.
But I’d go see Ex-TC again in a heartbeat.
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This is a great article.
Since you’ve written a lot about your love for hard rock here, how do you feel about Sleep Token bringing it back to popularity after a couple decades? They were a “T-shirt band” for a while but now it looks like they’re breaking out with the streaming audience like hard rock never has done before.
Thanks!
I’ve only heard a couple of their songs and don’t know anything about them. I guess they’re building a following, so I’ll have to listen to more. Where should I start?
Hats off to our fearless publisher, mt58. Making our nonsense look good is hard enough but a thousand times over? Atta webmaster.
I second that emotion!
You painted an interesting picture of the difference between the two bands, one a tribute band and the other a nostalgia act. These days, it can be a very thin line, or no line at line, as you pointed out. A serious tribute band that gets steady work is under a lot of pressure to sound and look exactly like the album, down to every note. Like you said, it’s what fans want, especially the hard core fans that want to hear live recreations of the original recordings. A nostalgia act is selling the relationship people had with the band in its heyday, with hopefully at least one person from the glory days still in its line up. The original members are obviously not in their prime and most people don’t care. It’s not only about the music, so maybe not as workmanlike and paint by numbers, though most of the time still proficient. They tend to play a lot local town festivals, where few people are there because they expect to hear an exact duplicate of the band’s hits. Those kind of shows are less about an on-the-dot performance and do tend to be more fun, in my opinion. That said, I confess that I wouldn’t have minded being at that Jason Bonham show.
I don’t know a ton of XTC songs but I like most of what I’ve heard, particularly the reggae and ska influenced tracks. My roommate in college had the Drums and Wires album and I really liked it. “Real by Reel” is still a frequent listen for me. It sounds like you had a great time at the show, and the band seems really down-to-earth. Very cool photo.
Congrats tnocs and mt for 1,000 articles! Thrilled to be a part of it!
The distinction between tribute and nostalgia acts is a good one to remember. You’ve put your finger on why I preferred Ex-TC. It did indeed feel like a relationship. I played one of those small town festivals years ago. The headliners were Brownsville Station. They played OK but the camaraderie with the audience made all the difference.
JBLZE is on the road now, maybe they’ll be near you.
Smokin’ in the Boys Room… 🎵 🎶
1,000 articles old! Well done mt for the many hours you’ve put into it. It’s much appreciated.
I don’t mind tribute bands. They’re giving people the chance to hear music they love by acts that they’re probably never going to be able to see live. It’s not the real thing but its the next best thing and there’s the heady rush of nostalgia plus camaraderie of being amongst fellow fans. Knowing what you’re going to get is a big draw for many. Tribute acts are likely going to concentrate on the songs everyone knows.
I’ve only ever seen two tribute bands and both times they were incidental to the day. The Bootleg Beatles opened the day for Oasis at Knebworth back in 1997. They were fine, it was a one day festival, they kicked off proceedings at midday with a set everyone could sing along to and get in the mood. Sat in a field with 125,000 with the sun shining helped get the good vibes going.
The other was a U2 tribute, randomly in Guadalajara 2004. We escaped from turtle conservation for the week, visited the big city and a local from the volunteer organistion we were with took us along to a club. I’m not sure they even knew it was a U2 tribute that night. They looked nothing like U2 and there were 5 of them but they sounded OK. They were though of secondary importance to being back in civilization after 6 weeks living on a beach with no access to alcohol.
A U2 tribute band should never be of secondary importance in any situation. Just kidding. It’s fine.
They probably needed two guitarists to duplicate all The Edge’s effects pedals.
That would have made sense except the interloper was playing keyboards.
So cool that TNOCS has hit 1,000 articles!! Thanks for all the hard work mt58!
I saw the LZ tribute band “Get The Led Out” a year ago and had a great time. They too are reproducing the records but I did not mind. I recommend them. (They do not try to look like the band – instead they kinda dress like whatever classic rocker that they natually look like. The lead singer looks like Howard Stern!)
There’s an all female tribute band called Lez Zeppelin that I’ve heard are pretty good. They don’t really look like Led Zep but they’ve got the clothes down.
Years ago, we saw a Polish singer that went by Ted Zeppelin, but I don’t remember if he was actually singing Zep songs.