The Complete Stone Roses are now one of the UK’s most well-known, most seen and most successful tribute bands. Selling out venues across the UK and Ireland regularly, they have helped to carry on the music of one of the UK’s most influential bands – the Stone Roses who played a pivotal role in the history of the UK’s indie music scene. Famous hits like Fools Gold, I Am The Resurrection and I Wanna Be Adored are as recognisable now as were the heyday of Madchester and the Hacienda, the cultural icons from which the original band were born.
The Completes, as they are affectionately referenced to by their fans, play to acclaim both from fans themselves, the press, and even original Stone Roses band members. Former Stone Roses bass player Mani, (now currently the bassist for Scottish band Primal Scream) has not only just appeared as a warm up DJ for the band on the odd occassion but has also played onstage with them as their guest bassist playing She Bangs The Drums on more than a few times when he was touring about with the band. Mani says “they do our songs real justice. At times, they play even better than we did. (Mani has toured, and performed on stage with 3 full different line ups of the band through the last 10 years)
They have also performed alongside Clint Boon & Tom Hingley (Inspiral Carpets) and the legendary Bez (Happy Mondays), two madchester legends in their own right and have even created a somewhat celebrity fan-base with artist’s such as Chris Helme, Stuart Fletcher and Andy Watts (the seahorses) Andy Rourke (The Smiths), Rick Witter (Shed 7), Andy Couzens (Stone Roses), Richard Fearless (Death In Vegas), Shane MacGowan (The Pogues) and Peter Hook (New Order) who each, individually over the last few years, have either appeared as a support DJ/Guest for the band, woked with the band or have attended one of their gigs purley as a fan of stone roses music being played to perfection in a live environment.
The Complete Stone Roses have performed on stages with audience capacities spanning from 300 to a staggering 40,000+ people with the later being the 2008-2009 New Years celebrations in Edinburgh at the world famous street party where up to 100,000 party the night away in the streets of the Scottish capital. In the summer of 2002 the band played their first major music festival to a packed dance arena, at the Witness festival in Ireland performing to an estimated 12,000, those who came and saw always remember that gig, and it showed as the band were invited back to the newly renamed Oxegen festival in 2003 and 2004 (a hat trick and surely a first for any tribute band – 3 yrs on the trot and packing them to the rafters in their thousands), It just goes to show how much The Stone Roses music still has a massive effect on people even today. The Completes also appeared at the Get Loaded Festival in Scotland on August 27th 2005. The band was third from headline on the bill, after Domino Bones and before the legends that are THE FARM and THE HAPPY MONDAYS. DJs such as Clint Boon, Alan McGee and the one and only MANI performed in between bands so as to keep the entertainment flowing. Great Night!
Some of the many highlights for the band so far was appearing at Scotlands T IN THE PARK music Festival 2004, where thousands and thousands of Stone Roses fans were united under one roof in the King Tuts tent together performing possibly one of the biggest and maybe loudest sing-a-longs the festival has ever heard!. 10,000 (or thereabouts) stone roses fans took over the vocal duties on opening number I wanna be adored, the excitement was clear to see. Other highlights include the main stage appearances at both Live At Loch Lomond (estimated audience of 20,000+) and of course the Edinburgh Hogmanay show mentioned previously where they played to what must have been the larges audience ever (see the complete video diaries for footage – http://stoneroses.net/TCVD/)
Manchester Academy 1, 2 & 3, Sheffield Leadmill, York Fibbers, London’s Mean Fiddler, the Garage & Islington Academy, Birmingham o2 Academy, Liverpool o2 Academy, Sheffield o2 Academy, Norwich Waterfront, Aberdeen Lemon Tree, Glasgow’s QMU, the Garage & o2 Academy, Belfast Limelight’s & Empire Ball Room, Dublin Olympia, Red-box, Ambassador, Temple bar & Tripod and Edinburgh Liquid Rooms, corn exchangeamongst many, many other top UK and Ireland Venues have all seen sell out shows by the band through the years. The set that The Completes play consists of either the early Roses material with anything from Tell Me and Here It Comes to classics like Waterfall and Fools Gold to the Second Coming era with Love Spreads and Tightrope. The band and their management pride themselves on recreating for the legions of fellow Stone Roses fans, the live sound with the clear and unmistakable sound of the polished studio sound of the Stone Roses.
The Completes have also had their fair share of TV performances, BBC Choice’s The Eleventh Hour seen them play Tightrope and Your Star Will Shine live in the studio, something the Stone Roses never did themselves live on TV. The Complete Stone Roses were also featured on BBC TV (UK) production Liquid News to coincide with a film called Rock-star (featuring Mark Walberg) about being in a tribute band which was due for release in 2004, and have also filmed dramatic reconstruction scenes for a BBC documentary on The Stone Roses (Blood on the Turntable) and their bitter feud with Silvertone Records. UK music publications such as NME, Q, Guitarist and other top music tabloids have either featured, or interviewed the band at some point. Articles in credible newspapers such as The Sun, The Star, The Guardian, Manchester Evening News, Scottish Sunday Mail, Scottish Daily Record, The Evening Times, Irish Star, Ireland on Sunday and The Sunday Herald are not to be overlooked either.
The Completes are perfectionists at their art though and are always improving and have gone from strength to strength after several changes in the line-up – something very few bands manage to do so effortlessly. Of their commitment, Mani says “their attention to detail is amazing. The bass I use a Rickenbacker 3000 which is as rare as rocking horse shit but they have found one”.
The bands recent projects seen them raise a whopping £17,000 donated to “Cancer Research UK” from their show at the Glasgow Carling Academy (renamed the o2 academy) in December 2007 as well as filming and producing a music video (project now complete- see here for final version of the video http://vids.myspace.com/index.cfm?fuseaction=vids.individual&videoid=34613892 ) for worldwide distribution to help promote a charity single release featuring Love Will Tear Us Apart ala Stone Roses style along with the bands own composition song titled Tell Me Moses which was written using ONLY the titles of The Stone Roses catalogue. This is in addition to the band releasing a DVD (formatted on NTSC and playable throughout the world in any region) of their live concert at Glasgow Carling Academy during December 2006 and which also features special guest Peter Hook of New Order performing with the band Love Will Tear Us Apart, securing worldwide distribution via Plastic-head, The Completes are leading the way in regards what good tribute bands can actually achieve out with live performances.
So there you have it, a brief history of The Complete Stone Roses in a few paragraphs, with an obvious great love for The Stone Roses and their music.