By: Mackenzie Lambert
Not long before Rochester’s
Led Zeppelin tribute, The Sound Remains the Same (SRtS), was to take
the stage at the Tralf this past Saturday, the guitarist’s $10,000
guitar was knocked over and the neck broke. A second guitar wasn’t
on site and there was no word as to whether or not a replacement could be located. The
band was on the verge of calling the show off.
Thankfully, after a
few phone calls, the local Guitar Center was able to provide a replacement for a mere
$2,000. An hour after they were scheduled to begin, the band appropriately
opened with a faithful rendition of “Good Times Bad Times.” To
make up for the lost time, the Tralf allowed the group to play past their cut-off.
Before the show, I had a
great conversation with SRtS drummer, Frankie Quaggs, who also drums for
the metal band, Fallen Angel. He mostly illustrated the length of
detail the band takes in recreating the Zeppelin sound with the same
exact equipment Led Zeppelin used. The drumset–from the toms, the hats, and the gong–were positioned at the same degree
as Bonham’s set. The $10,000 Les Paul was tuned and set to the same
modifications as Jimmy Page’s. Equipment-wise, they were
dead-on. It would all come down to the performance at that point.
Contrary to other Zeppelin
tributes, SrtS doesn’t go the full mile with costumes. In my
opinion, that’s for the best. I’ve see pictures of these tributes
and the last thing I think of is Led Zeppelin. They come off as
looking closer to Spinal Tap. Plus, most of these acts play more loosely than SrtS. They often add fills and other such wankery that
takes away from the music. After hearing SrtS, these guys are the
closest sounding Zeppelin tribute I’ve heard.
A plus with paying tribute
to a band like Zeppelin is that there are no bad songs. Also,
everyone has their own favorite songs. My personal favorites would
have to be “Hey Hey What Can I Do” and “In the Evening.” To
my dismay, they didn’t play either of them, but I still enjoyed the
show. The crowd was shouting requests at the stage, but if they
had played every person’s favorite Zeppelin song they would be playing
straight on till the morning. The whole night, a guy kept yelling
“In My Time of Dying.” The band did end up playing it near the end of the show.
Overall, the songs played
over the course of the two hours were the deeper cuts of the Zeppelin
catalog that one wouldn’t normally hear on the radio. “Dancing
Days,” “Over the Hills and Far Away,” “The Ocean,” “Ramble
On,” Nobody’s Fault But Mine,” “Bring It On Home,” “What Is
and What Should Never Be,” and “Achilles’ Last Stand” accounted
for half of the songs of the evening. In addition, they played
“Heartbreaker” and immediately followed it up with “Living
Loving Maid (She’s Just A Woman),” just as it should be played.
All four members of SrtS
fulfilled their parts to the tee. The bassist was great at the
keyboards, as was seen during “Kasmir.” I wish we had a chance
to see more of the keyboards and songs from In Through the Out
Door to showcase the keyboarding
skills of the bass player. The lead singer was eerily
accurate to Robert Plant’s vocals, right down to the subtle details.
The guitarist was skilled in getting that exact Page sound from the
replacement Les Paul. Quaggs showcased his skill on “Moby Dick,”
having the stage entirely to himself for 5 minutes.
An amazing display of
skills and devotion to the mighty Zep was on-hand that evening. Despite a
low turnout, the band played for 20 people as they would for 2,000. You would never have known that this band has only been
together for six months and that their stop in Buffalo was only their third gig. They play as if they had been playing together for six years. If you missed
their show and don’t mind the drive, The Sound Remains the Same will play at the German House Theatre in Rochester on October 15th.
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Mackenzie Lambert is a Buffalo-based columnist. He has been
featured in such publications as Penny Blood and Pantechnicon. He is
also a movie columnist for The Men’s Room Today (www.themensroomtoday.com).