I saw the Rick Astley-Blossoms tribute show in London and it was beyond euphoric. They could tour this all over the UK-USA, both festivals and theatres, as a profitable side project.
I wonder if Rick Astley is also a fan of Morrissey's solo era material? If he is, he might be open to doing a similar homage fronting Alain Whyte's new band. I'd love to hear Rick Astley belting out 'Everyday Is Like Sunday' and 'First Of The Gang To Die'. If he cherry-picked the gems from Morrissey's solo era it would make for an awesome show that would give folk the set-list they crave instead of the random batch of bangers, flops and deep cuts that Morrissey throws out.
Most of Morrissey's core audience are soon going to be in 'God's Waiting Room', moving to retirement flats in Eastbourne and Morecambe so a seaside tour of venues each summer by Astley and The Blossoms, from Bexhill to Scarborough, would probably be hugely popular and profitable. As I said on the Alain Whyte new band thread:
'I mean, after a few pints, how many people really care who's singing so long as they can hold a tune and throw shapes?'
Most of the revellers at Glastonbury are intoxicated to the point that it's kinda irrelevant whether the tiny figure on the distant stage is the 'real' Morrissey, Rick Astley, or Alain Whyte using Vocal AI software to impersonate Morrissey.
I saw the first 3 opening 'Avatar' ABBA 'Voyage' shows in London last year. It was an epiphany. 'Even Better Than The Real Thing'...
People are tired and bored of 'premium' events costing an arm and a leg to see a supposed 'star' icon in their dotage topping up their pension fund singing decades old 'rebel yell' ditties and meh obscurities. Most people don't care about that crap anymore, they seen through the sham.
Morrissey and Marr never resolved the issues that prevented a reunion of The Smiths and now that Andy Rourke has sadly passed, it's too late. A reunion of The Smiths would've been offered a headliner slot at Glastonbury or at least the Sunday 'legends' one.
Whoever owns the rights to the music of The Smiths is surely going be supportive of any initiatives that re-sell those songs to new generations of consumers? If Morrissey still profits from 'The Smiths' I guess the only real issue could be 'almost real' tribute bands cannibalising his live touring business model.
It would certainly be 'interesting' to monitor public reaction and ticket sales if Rick Astley and The Blossoms were to announce a pre-Christmas tour featuring 'The Greatest Hits' of Morrissey And The Smiths'...
As you age and approach that 'date with an undertaker', you're mostly listening to a nostalgic memory bank of the 'songs that saved your life' and there isn't cognitive or emotional bandwidth to process any more bizarre 'art' about 'terror trolling' or Jack Kerouac's taint-ed arse'n'all.
Even Madonna has accepted all this and is flogging her Greatest Hits pantomime after her last decade of ignored recordings. I'm sure the music industry record labels have told her bluntly that nobody gives a toss about any more of her 'reinventions' just as they have now told Morrissey that they can't market his latest 'terror trolling' magnus opus because there's no audience for 'that kind of thing' these days.
With AI innovations in audio-visual entertainment it's going to be interesting to see how far this 'tribute act' phenomenon can develop. Get ready for an Alain Whyte Band show featuring avatar simulations of Rick Astley impersonating Morrissey...that kind of craziness. The software that creates the ABBA Avatar show will soon be more widely available, customisable to any parameters. Someone could create a 'Morrissey Sings Vegas-Era Elvis At Gracelands' show...
Whoever controls the audio-visual, photographic & video-image rights to The Smiths could, in a few years time, launch an AI generated reunion of 'The Smiths' unless, of course, Morrissey and Marr take legal action to ensure they control that legacy, assuming they own their own identities as half of 'The Smiths'
A vitual, eternal Glastonbury Festival featuring Prince, Elvis, Led Zeppelin and The Smiths coming soon on Apple VisionPro?...it's gonna be a wild ride...
Kind regards
BrummieBoy
These digital representations of deceased artists have been met with a mixture of wonder and revulsion. Before his death in 2016, Prince called them ‘the most demonic thing imaginable… and I am not a demon’. Reviews of the Orbison and Houston tours, meanwhile, drew mixed reviews, with one critic describing ‘An Evening with Whitney’ as ‘a ghoulish cash-in’ by the late singer’s estate.
'I bought the apple vision pro to watch adele concert'
How ABBA’s 2022 virtual concerts could change the face of live music. Will this exciting digital technology allow musical icons to live for ever?
https://www.timeout.com/music/how-abbas-virtual-concerts-could-change-the-face-of-live-music-in-2022
Although many bands still tour nowadays, ticket prices can be extremely expensive depending on the musician that you want to see. Some people just really love live music, and with cover and tribute bands, you are able to see that in local establishments rather than at large music venues....
...The major connection between tribute bands and music therapy is that there is an aspect of psychology behind the reason that these bands bring people so much comfort and nostalgia. Music that you have known for a long time is stored in the deepest parts of your brain, so nothing can ever take that away from you– even Alzheimers or some sort of damage to the brain...
...Cover bands can trick the brain into thinking that they are hearing an old song for the first time when it is played by a cover band, which can evoke the same emotions that you felt when you heard your favorite song that first time, so long ago. It creates a combination of the new and the old, which brains love.'
https://www.incadence.org/post/what-are-tribute-bands-and-why-are-they-so-popular
www.nme.com
