Best paying tribute gigs

Caffeine_Vampire · January 2023

Inspired by @Danny1969

Which tribute gig is the best earner? A tribute to an artist? An era? A genre?

Danny1969 · January 2023

Well in my experience you need to be a tribute to a much loved quirky artist who have a dedicated fan base but doesn't play live anymore. Also someone who's difficult to copy.

I was completely new to the professional tribute scene until about 5 years ago. I was in a Thin Lizzy tribute for a few years but it wasn't a professional tribute act. Now I know how the scene works I fancy doing some more.

I have friends in Pink Floyd tributes, The Who, Fleetwood Mac, Thin Lizzy, Queen etc. They all get a good earn out of it but the big money is in selling a lot of tickets for the London venues. If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

DrCornelius · January 2023

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?

roberty · January 2023

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?

You could play at the annual British Dentist Association conference

I was in a Smiths tribute when I was very young and we make a packet. We learnt 53 of their songs in all. It taught me an awful lot about songwriting and chord relationships

DrCornelius · January 2023

roberty said:

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?
I was in a Smiths tribute when I was very young and we make a packet. We learnt 53 of their songs in all. It taught me an awful lot about songwriting and chord relationships

Some lovely guitar parts to play in there I’m sure.

I rehearsed once with a local Oasis tribute band who needed a Bonehead . I couldn’t go through with it after the rehearsal as it would have driven me mad just playing those parts. It’s lovely playing with a band and all but that just wasn’t exciting - now a blur tribute band , that would be a stretch and lots of fun

munckee · January 2023

I've seen some great tribute bands, smiths, stone roses, foo fighters, red hot chilli peppers, the jam, pink floyd etc. I would say they don't have to have stopped playing, I would rather watch a group of 20/30 somethings play the stones than the actual stones considering the cost difference and the fact they have people to mostly play for them anyway.

Caffeine_Vampire · January 2023

Does 'tribute' and 'decent pay' necessarily require wigs and costumes etc?

EricTheWeary · January 2023

Based on quantity: Queen, Oasis, Madness.
Obviously there are some very successful tribute acts like Australian Pink Floyd and Bjorn Again but those are full time pro acts with a lot of investment in their shows, not four blokes down the pub level.

I still get emails from the agency I was with and if I was going to try to put something together that got paid club level gigs probably some kind of Pop Princess thing covering Madonna and Lady Gaga,etc, although if I could find a singer who could make a reasonable fist of all that she probably wouldn’t want a fat old bloke on guitar.

Caffeine_Vampire said:

Does 'tribute' and 'decent pay' necessarily require wigs and costumes etc?

When. I was doing my ska/2tone band there was another local band doing basically the same set but getting paid three times as much. I eventually saw them and they were surprisingly poor at playing songs I knew inside and out. However, lots of dressing up and funny hats. And I saw a Queen tribute around the same time going down a storm to several hundred people and they were quite poor but had the wigs,etc.
So, probably yes.

mrkb · January 2023

Axl rose made millions touring with a GnR tribute act until slash and duff rejoined.

Jonathangus · January 2023

mrkb said:

Axl rose made millions touring with a GnR tribute act until slash and duff rejoined.

WizLOL needed.

lustycourtier · January 2023

Ive been Noel in quite a few top oasis tributes. £250 a man plus expenses is about normal

mudslide73 · January 2023

I've seen a few really poor tributes that relied on the wigs etc. One Free/Badco tribute were awfully bad but the singer looked like a little, chubby Paul Rodgers. They're much easier to promote than a standard cover band, too. I'm forever being asked what material we play but tributes do what it says on the tin. A normal cover band would have to be really well known to pre-sell tickets.

Jalapeno · January 2023

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?

The Illegal Eagles sell out all over the place, and they're excellent

Kebabkid · January 2023

Jalapeno said:

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

The Illegal Eagles sell out all over the place, and they're excellent

I saw the Illegal Eagles before Christmas and the theatre was packed and they were excellent.

The Classic Rock Show (with Pete Thorn and one of our own from here) play decent venues e.g. Wigmore Hall and tickets are £30+ and it's a great evening and a pro show.

Some of the Steely Dan bands knocking around play good venues and sell out as does my mate's AOR & Power Ballads tribute (think Rock of Ages musical) - they're about to embark on a 19 date tour of theatres in Spring with tickets at £18-20+ a pop

west · January 2023

sorry no money in steely dan tributes ... ask me how i know

DannyP · January 2023

west said:

sorry no money in steely dan tributes ... ask me how i know

Plus it's Dirty Work

west · January 2023

plus you never do it without the fez on .....

Danny1969 · January 2023

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?

Ha ha ..... I'm the last person you would see play a PRS. For all the dates so far since lockdown I've used 2 different partscaster's worth less than £400 combined and a Pod Go.
I'm not a believer in using expensive guitars when a well set up cheap guitar will so the job perfectly well.

Going forward I would like to go into something hair metal, like a Van halen trib or maybe a Dire Straits tribute ... Getting the front man for the Van Halen tribute would be tricky though !

roberty · January 2023

DrCornelius said:

roberty said:

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?
I was in a Smiths tribute when I was very young and we make a packet. We learnt 53 of their songs in all. It taught me an awful lot about songwriting and chord relationships

Some lovely guitar parts to play in there I’m sure.

I rehearsed once with a local Oasis tribute band who needed a Bonehead . I couldn’t go through with it after the rehearsal as it would have driven me mad just playing those parts. It’s lovely playing with a band and all but that just wasn’t exciting - now a blur tribute band , that would be a stretch and lots of fun

Coxon's guitar parts are more bonkers than I remember when I listen back now, but also very expressive and appropriate

His autobiography is a good listen (and probably read as well)

roberty · January 2023

west said:

sorry no money in steely dan tributes ... ask me how i know

Lukather cut his teeth on Steely Dan covers. I'd like to study it

roberty · January 2023

It's funny because certain members of our tribute band started taking themselves quite seriously when we got going. In particular the one member who was the least musically gifted. He ended up robbing some money off us. I'm not bitter

This documentary is supposed to be good, I remember hearing about it but not being able to find it, but it's on YouTube now. I was told that they gradually take themselves more seriously, with hilarious consequences

thecolourbox · January 2023

roberty said:

west said:

sorry no money in steely dan tributes ... ask me how i know

Lukather cut his teeth on Steely Dan covers. I'd like to study it

I'm not surprised, they tripped me up as well

west · January 2023

roberty said:

west said:

sorry no money in steely dan tributes ... ask me how i know

Lukather cut his teeth on Steely Dan covers. I'd like to study it

thats the rewarding part , its all down hill after that .....

fastonebaz · January 2023

I was in a Pink tribute for a couple of years. Not professional by any stretch just pubs mainly. Pay was slightly better than classic rock band gig but not by much. It was easier to get bookings though as its so easily defined.

Bod · January 2023

roberty said:

DrCornelius said:

roberty said:

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?
I was in a Smiths tribute when I was very young and we make a packet. We learnt 53 of their songs in all. It taught me an awful lot about songwriting and chord relationships

Some lovely guitar parts to play in there I’m sure.

I rehearsed once with a local Oasis tribute band who needed a Bonehead . I couldn’t go through with it after the rehearsal as it would have driven me mad just playing those parts. It’s lovely playing with a band and all but that just wasn’t exciting - now a blur tribute band , that would be a stretch and lots of fun

Coxon's guitar parts are more bonkers than I remember when I listen back now, but also very expressive and appropriate

His autobiography is a good listen (and probably read as well)

Does he narrate the audiobook? I mean, I adore Graham, but that's quite a challenge if so.

roberty · January 2023

Bod said:

roberty said:

DrCornelius said:

roberty said:

DrCornelius said:

Danny1969 said:
If you can do 600 tickets at £18 a pop then you are on decent money even after paying for the venue, tech, PRS and agent fees.

Surely that would only apply if you were in a John Mayer or a Carlos Santana tribute band ?
I was in a Smiths tribute when I was very young and we make a packet. We learnt 53 of their songs in all. It taught me an awful lot about songwriting and chord relationships

Some lovely guitar parts to play in there I’m sure.

I rehearsed once with a local Oasis tribute band who needed a Bonehead . I couldn’t go through with it after the rehearsal as it would have driven me mad just playing those parts. It’s lovely playing with a band and all but that just wasn’t exciting - now a blur tribute band , that would be a stretch and lots of fun

Coxon's guitar parts are more bonkers than I remember when I listen back now, but also very expressive and appropriate

His autobiography is a good listen (and probably read as well)

Does he narrate the audiobook? I mean, I adore Graham, but that's quite a challenge if so.

Lol yeah, he is quite dispassionate. It is relaxing though

Kebabkid · January 2023

west said:

sorry no money in steely dan tributes ... ask me how i know

Not from what I see and know (I have some mates in some) - there are 3 that I know of that are doing ok, especially two of them. Yep, they are large bands and there's many to pay but if you get into the decent venues e..g. central London Pizza Express gigs, Jazz Cafe and theatres, they do well

A friend's Kiss tribute band was going for over 25 years and played in both the UK and Europe and even got to play a 10,000 seater in Japan with The Bootleg Beatles and a Queen tribute.

lustycourtier · January 2023

Theres a reason theres so many of certain bands but sometimes its just fun to start one and see where it goes. We had a Tom Petty on a few years ago and couldnt buy a gig. Now theres quite a few doing well. We set up a Shed 7 one last year which seems to be going well, more festivals though than clubs for decent money (north of a grand)

thecolourbox · January 2023

I've thought for a while whether tributes for bands like Libertines, Strokes et al from 20 years ago would do well but I'm not sure there's enough people of that age who would actually attend the kinds of venues where they'd need to play. A vested interest as my voice range is quite similar to Pete Doherty's was haha but still. Doesn't look to me like the tribute band world has really progressed past the 90s yet

lustycourtier · January 2023

thecolourbox said:

I've thought for a while whether tributes for bands like Libertines, Strokes et al from 20 years ago would do well but I'm not sure there's enough people of that age who would actually attend the kinds of venues where they'd need to play. A vested interest as my voice range is quite similar to Pete Doherty's was haha but still. Doesn't look to me like the tribute band world has really progressed past the 90s yet

Theres a demand on the summer tribute festivals. A good libertines one would walk straight onto most. We are currently putting together a strokes one. Same line up as Shed 7 one.

What youll notice is most tributes are usually tributes to a number of bands. (Oasish, are also the phonics etc) so when gigging you can have multi band line ups but just one band and costume changes

west · January 2023

Kebabkid said:

west said:

sorry no money in steely dan tributes ... ask me how i know

Not from what I see and know (I have some mates in some) - there are 3 that I know of that are doing ok, especially two of them. Yep, they are large bands and there's many to pay but if you get into the decent venues e..g. central London Pizza Express gigs, Jazz Cafe and theatres, they do well

What are their names , where do they live , how much do they get ££ ?? How often do they gig .... ? show me the money ! lol

it was 15 years ago for me when i did it "the danny steel orchestra " friendly rivals where nearly dan ( gary / rob rolf etc ) still going ... i could regale you with tales of £20 / £25 a gig we did a couple arts centres maybe £35 squid for a 11 piece band .... and folks asking why you didnt play "all around my hat "

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