Tribute Bands

By Neil Schloesser
Contributing Writer

Fighters of Foo and Lithium recently played the Venue and both did a rather impressive job of covering the bands to which they are paying tribute.

Tribute bands are by reputation an odious category and often thought to be filled with failed musicians. This may be true but it doesn’t matter if the bands put on a good show.

A tribute band needs to do one thing: play covers note for note. There is no room for interpretation because they aren’t selling themselves as real artists. One doesn’t pay to see original material, one pays to pretend, and deviation from the songs destroys this illusion. They may be artists but when a person is on stage as part of a tribute band they are (or had better be) the best karaoke singers in the world. Fighters of Foo, a Foo Fighters cover band and Lithium, a Nirvana cover band, accomplished this feat very well.

Fighters of Foo played the songs mostly note for note. There were times when the lead singer struggled with singing the same way as Dave Grohl but considering Grohl often screams and not sings his vocals, the tribute lead singer did a fairly good job at capturing Grohl’s voice, even on the toughest, screamiest parts. What Fighters of Foo did not do was imitate the style of the Foo Fighters but this isn’t really possible since Foo Fighters don’t have a distinctive fashion style. Grohl has a lot of muscles and the drummer has blond hair that goes everywhere when he drums but beyond that there was nothing stylistically for Fighters of Foo to imitate.

On the other hand Lithium’s lead singer did dress like Nirvana’s front man, Kurt Cobain. He wore faded blue jeans, an oversized and faded green sweater, and black Converse sneakers. He also at times imitated Cobain’s stage presence in some of the ways he moved on stage and played guitar. He did a good job of capturing Cobain’s voice. He wasn’t able to capture some of the tortured notes that Cobain infused his vocals with, but that can be excused as he still captured his likeness.

The band as a whole captured the sound well, especially for the drummer, as Grohl is not known for simple drum playing. 

Lithium ended their set by “destroying” their instruments. They tipped over the drums and slammed their guitars down in an unexpected burst of showmanship. 

Each of the bands played the hits but Foo Fighter’s longevity has given them a more recognizable catalog for the casual fan. Lithium played songs from all the Nirvana albums and even threw in the slightly unknown “Verse Course Verse.”

Fans, as evidenced by the number of people dancing up front, enjoyed Lithium more but Nirvana is arguably a more important band for a lot more people. Either way, both tribute bands did a good job of paying homage to the real thing, and the fact that the show was free just made things that much better.

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