Bands who sound like ELO sounding like the Beatles

Don't you just love bands who sound like ELO sounding like the Beatles. I've just been listening to the new Panic At The Disco ditty Nine In The Afternoon, which is at the higher end of this new classic old genre and not to be confused with its close relative - bands that sound like Oasis sounding like The Beatles. Don't get me wrong, I love this more raucous and boisterous earlier Beatlesque genre too, especially Lilys, XTC, The Redwalls, Elliot Smith, Spoon, The Real People (who probably started off the genre) and The La's.

Actually, pretty much all Liverpool-based scally bands sound like Oasis sounding like the Beatles, (unless they are in bands that sound like The Bunnymen sounding like The Velvets). However, their material is just not as subtley stolen as that of bands that do tunes that sound like ELO sounding like The Beatles. When I say stolen, I don't mean stolen - as in a postmodern amalg of unique and unauthored meaningless-ness-ness signs that one can't avoid or lay claim to. I mean lazy, uninspired pastiche, or thievery, which just so happens to sound quite good and jaunts us back to happier, more imagine-ative times of fields of red fruit and yellow margarine. These new old songs amuse and bemuse, and we smile and we cry and we LAUGH. Though not with these quasi-Quarrymen but at them - even if it is at an unconscious level which in my case it isn't. I don't necessarily mean these bands are out and out tribute bands - but they are, but I'm not saying that. What I mean is that having become successful bands, having gained such privileged positioning, in that their audiences are keen/desperate to hear unique and thought-provoking, fresh, new and not appropriated music, we are oft left deflated. We want and demand more from artists which we and they and I admire and look up to for guidance, rebellion and some shock of the new. Therefore we would like some reciprocation of effort in return for our endless hunting through record shops and Woolies bargain bins (substitute with music interwebsites) . I'm not saying that all these bands are Tribute bands, which they're obviously not, but probably are; and as such have thrown in the dirty wet towel of originality and sold out, (which they have done), by copying and paying "homage" to The Beatles, whose music is the best-selling music of all time. I'm not saying that at all, in fact these "covers" bands, for want of a better phrase, are more than probably best described as new and improved, nee better than The Beatles, in that they have evolved by mixing, copying, fashioning and stealing the style and formula of the Beatles and ELO and to a much lesser degree Oasis. Not that they deliberately do steal from the Beatles (who have sold over 500 million records) in the hope of gaining financial rewards, this is just the coincidence that all tribute and non-tribute bands alike have to perilously negotiate on their journey toward evolution. These bands are greater than the Beatles, or at least the sum of their parts adds up to more than The Beatles and ELO (and Oasis to a lesser degree) put together. They bring to the table re-newed vigour, re-invention and music reminiscent of made-for-TV movies; re-runs of last weeks soaps and late night sporadic, episodic repeats of The Avengers and The Professionals. Critics may and should call them "clever" as they not only sound like The Beatles but also ELO sounding like The Beatles at the same time. A marriage made in Heaven, a bargain for the 2 for 1 generation. These bands are both the future and the past. They are deffinately not Tribute acts, (maybe), though especially not Oasis, who even hail from a different town than The Beatles, (literally miles away). Oasis by the way, are now officially by law, ackowledged "greater" than the Beatles as proved by Deffinately Maybe being voted the best album of all time in a recent poll by the NME. No finer testement, nor merit of achievement, could be awarded to the only band who sound like themselves sounding like the Beatles.

Enjoy the coming together of a chance occurrence of brilliant songs, carefully crafted and manipulated by bands paying tribute to the hugely popular, respected and financially successful Beatles, whilst also sounding like ELO sounding like The Beatles.

My favourite top tunes that sound like ELO sounding like The Beatles are:

Panic At The Disco obviously with Nine In The Afternoon.
The Hoosiers' Goodbye Mr A.

Brendan Benson - I'm Drinking Tea.

Jet - Look what you've done.

The Wannadies - Things That I Would Love to Have Undone.

The Shins - Phantom Limb.

The Feeling and Sewn.
Tears For Fears with Sowing The Seeds Of Love.

Simian - La Breeze.

Crowded House Not The Girl you think you are.

Klaatu - Sub Rosa Subway.

The Dukes of Stratosphear - You're a good man Albert Brown.
Ween - The Mollusk.

Tally Hall - Good Day.

Emitt Rhodes - Somebody Made For Me .

MGMT - Time To Pretend.