How many Beatle cover bands does it take to screw in a light bulb?

Unlike the thousands of Beatle cover bands playing their hearts out every night at Japanese sushi bars, Irish pubs and Holiday Inns all thoughout the Upper Midwest, these guys on the left don’t even pretend to look like John, Paul, George or Ringo. And there’s sure more than four of them unless I’m seeing double. Meet Yellow Dubmarine…probably the best Maryland export next to soft shell crabs and The Wire. 

Wesley Case from The Baltimore Sun wrote last October: It’s a risky concept — does the world need another Beatles cover band, especially one infusing the tracks with reggae and dub influences? Bassist and singer Aaron Glaser says he’s aware of the skeptics and purists, but that his band only wants to celebrate the songs so many people enjoy. “We do all of our arrangements out of a love for the original Beatles songs,” Glaser says. “We like to wake them up with a fun, danceable groove and a different sort of musicianship than what the Beatles offered.”

A reggae tribute band is not unique….think Dread Zeppelin…but while others try to dress, look and sound like The Beatles, the Dubmarines focus more on the tunes and beats. They’ve recorded and toured in support of their album Abbey Dub, and they have more concepts in the works. “We are offering our own artistic vision, and having that ownership of the music makes it much more satisfying than being (just) a cover band.”

Don’t ask me why I’m writing about this, because it was just a random thought I had this afternoon as I was mindlessly web surfing. I decided to Google a computer-aided image of “what if the Beatles were still alive”, and one picture led to another, and another, and another and here I am. Such is the disturbed mind.

But I did find some cool pics to share…so here you go. And remember…all you need is dub.

Please forgive me….