The Grimsby Blues Brothers

It's the same the whole world over.

It's a shame, a wretched shame...

That idiots go to "Tribute Shows."

I wonder whose to blame!

Sad but true, from the biggest city in America to the suburban areas of England, and beyond, lame "tribute" shows are being staged. From dead people like Elvis and Michael Jackson to brain-dead people like Adele, "fans" are drawn to this shit.

You wonder, in the tangled web of legalities, if the owners of the "Blues Brothers" trademark can sue some tribute idiots, or demand a share of the profits. Or, are the owners too rich to care? "Eh, let 'em wear the dopey sunglasses and jacket, it'll only make some people buy one of the old DVDs."

The Grimsby Blues Brothers are a pair of drunken fags that David Gest once paid to have sex with him.

Gest paid for the plastic surgery to make them look as close to a Photoshopped version of Belushi and Aykroyd as possible.

Meanwhile, in other venues, yes, there's the dubious concerts featuring almost NO original members of famous 60's bands. Who the FUCK wants to see Herman's Hermits without Peter Noone?? How far from reality do you have to be, in order to cheer THAT?

One assumes that Bacharach or John Williams gets "performing rights" money when some lame Pops Orchestra does an evening of their music. But WHY leave the fucking house when you can put on a "best of" CD?

The Pops Orchestra phenomenon, which goes back to Arthur Fiedler and others, was to play "accessible" BITS of symphonic music, for idiots with no attention spans. The evening would be full of overtures ("William Tell" of course) and short catchy things like "Bolero." Plus "light classics" galore. Meanwhile real symphony orchestra have trouble filling seats even if they run an evening of the most accessible warhorses, like Beethoven's 5th, Tchaikovsky's "Nutcracker Suite" and a grand finale of "Night on Bald Mountain" by Muzzie Zurgsky.

Pops and "Symphonic" orchestras tour doing mostly MOVIE THEME MUSIC, the ersatz classical music of our time. Back in the day, guys like Korngold and Steiner were classically trained, and simply fell short of being taken seriously. So they dumbed down and created some very pretty melodies. That's no different than a best-selling author taking it easy, because nobody would buy if he tried to be another F. Scott Fitzgerald.

But a whole evening of that shit?

It could be worse...there's also the repulsive commerciality of "Symphonic Rock" evenings. Take any pretentious progrock band, and simply create lame orchestrations and do without the braying lead vocalist (that would be YOU, Master Gooker). Dimwits are happy with that.

An astute blogger pointed out that movie music should enhance a film, not overwhelm it. That was back in Steiner's day. That was before the "million selling soundtrack album" got greed-head moguls to insist that a movie AT LEAST have a fucking "theme song." You know: Henry Mancini's "Moon River" in "Breakfast at Tiffany's" and "More" in "Mondo Cane" and all those fucking James Bond movies with three wasted minutes of montage so that Shirley Bassey or Matt Munro could get to a microphone.

Yes, sometimes a theme song is very pretty (Michael J. Lewis's very classical theme for "Theatre of Blood") or stirring (Bill Conti's now over-used theme from "Rocky.") No question, the pathos of the overly long and tear-jerky "Schindler's List" benefitted by the gentile Mr. Williams creating a fake-Jew piece of violin music. He surely added to the annoyance of "Star Wars" with the cornball heroica-theme. BUT...a whole fucking evening of HIM? And only his movie music? Back when he was "Johnny" Williams he wrote some pretty good TV themes. Nobody remembers?

How sad that now, a Pops Orchestra has to create a "theme" for the evening...ALL Williams, and not just a random selection of light favorites.

The bottom line is really, STAY HOME. How horrible is your home that you want to hang around with a bunch of Pale-heads, and rattle a bag of toffee and suck on some sweets while hearing limp renditions of romantic tunes, and maniacal martial renditions of bombastic themes?

IF I'M BEING HONEST, my mind wanders even if I'm at a symphony, or watching a string quartet for 90 minutes, or a solo pianist. My mind would shrivel and exit my ear if had to hear 90 minutes of a "Pops" orchestra and some cheesy vocalists doing the Best of Burt Backache.

Vagabonds? Never heard of 'em. Maybe the Grimsby Blues Brothers will play the Gay Baths of Scunthorpe. Not to mention the Pleasure Dome. One could better understand a concert where the main reason for going was to pick up a like-minded perv. But to go with a date or a family and sit through Greatest Shits by people who weren't even IN Freddie and the Wet Dreamers or Gerry and the Facemakers? Jeeez.

As bad as the economy is, it seems like people still have money to waste.