Curtain Call

Remember the Beatles tribute band that was supposed to perform in a small room at the Tropicana last summer? That contract belongs to yesterday.

The Fab Four sound-alike band known as Yesterday was originally signed last year to headline for 13 weeks — Memorial Day to Labor Day — in a 150-seat showroom at the Trop.

But the show, which attempts to re-create the sights, sound and set-lists of some historic Beatles live concerts and TV appearances from the early and mid-1960s, has been such a hit that it’s been extended several times.

The latest contract extension takes the band straight through New Year’s Day 2009 in the tiny room that’s been renamed The Liverpool Club since Yesterday set up shop there in May 2007. The club, the former home of the Comedy Stop, has been decorated to resemble the legendary Cavern Club of Liverpool, where the Beatles got their start in the early 1960s.

The show works on several different levels, not the least of which is the superb musicianship of the cast — Bob Graham as John Lennon, Adam Joel as Paul McCartney, Jon Perry as George Harrison and Bob Potter as Ringo Starr.

Unlike some Beatles tribute or cover bands, Yesterday doesn’t try to cover the entire Beatles songbook in one show. It took the Beatles nearly a decade for its sound to evolve from the band’s earliest and almost primitive recording of a song like “My Bonnie” to the more sophisticated sound from the 1970 album Let It Be.

It’s clear as they cruise through Beatles classics from 1963 to 1966 — that they’ve spent hours studying the musical subtleties of many of the band’s songs.

“We’re not trying to present a musical history of the Beatles,” says Yesterday founder Don Bellezzo, who formed the group out of college in 1986. “We’re trying to capture the raw energy and excitement of a live concert.”

That they’re able to replicate the music with almost note for note perfection also has a lot to do with their hardware. Many of the band’s Gretsch and Rickenbacker guitars, its Ludwig drum kit and even the Vox amps are vintage instruments, and there doesn’t seem to be any audio trickery involved, like hidden tracks or clandestine synthesizers.

Purists might note that the band performs some songs, like “Please Please Me” or “She Loves You,” in a slightly faster tempo than the original recordings. But Bellezzo says even that is an attempt at authenticity.

“We play some of the songs in a slightly faster tempo because that’s what the Beatles did when they performed live,” he says.

While the cast of Yesterday is nearly twice the age of the Beatles during the era they’re highlighting, they still bare a physical resemblance to the original group, especially when they slip into the collarless cardigan jackets. And Joel, the McCartney clone, keeps the illusion alive when he plays the bass left-handed.

The cast is so confident in their abilities to capture the look of the real band that they dare the audience to compare when they show video clips of the real Beatles — on The Ed Sullivan Show, or in concert at the Hollywood Bowl — as they’re performing.

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Casual conversations with the stars. Watch the Emmy-winning Curtain Call with David Spatz, Saturdays at 6pm on WMGM-TV NBC40.