Tragedy

We’ve blogged about cover bands before on TWBITW, so we won’t repeat our general observations about the general suckage of cover bands. We’ll just say that, when your whole career is based on somebody else’s songs, it’s a fine line between having a clever gimmick and being truly weird–and it’s one Tragedy manages to strut along with more attitude than John Travolta wolfing down two stacked slices of Lenny’s thin crust during the opening credits of “Saturday Night Fever”.

In Tragedy’s case, the clever gimmick is pretty simple: they’re a metal band that does Bee Gees songs (or, as they like to say, they’re the tri-state NYC area’s greatest all-metal Bee Gees tribute band…got that?). But as with most truly weird bands, it’s all in the execution, people. Instead of a one-note gimmick, they actually manage to be a pretty solid metal band, with a knack for finding all the right headbanging analoges to the Gibb bros’ disco touches. And they do it without, as far as I can tell, ever resorting to “I Was Made for Lovin You”-style disco/rock cheese. So… “How Deep Is Your Love?” becomes the lighter flicking monster ballad, “You Should Be Dancing” turns into a Spinal Tap/Iron Maiden-style epic…and so on. It’s all sort of brilliantly stupid, in the way most good metal is.

Tragedy’s signature song, of course, is “Stayin’ Alive.” This video features that song and also introduces the band…including my personal favorite, bass player Gibbous Waning. With that name, he could moonlight in a Morbid Angel cover band while he’s at it.

Links:

• Tragedy official site (letsmaketragedyhappen.com)
• Tragedy on MySpace