Eltonesque tribute band gains national attention after impressive Glastonbury performance and TV appearance

Elton John’s triumphant Glastonbury show last month gave an extra leg-up to Eltonesque, the five-piece who have already been booked in by the Cutlers’ Arms in Rotherham, the Birdwell Venue and Holmfirth Picturedome to name a few.

Following Elton’s two-hour debut at the famous festival’s Pyramid Stage, they found themselves booked onto Channel 4’s The Last Leg, where they played a medley of the chart topper’s hits reworked to poke fun at disgraced former prime minister Boris Johnson.

Virgin Radio listeners also had the chance to hear frontman Pete Gallagher and his bandmates in action as Chris Evans played the soundtrack from their medley on his Saturday morning show.

Drummer Michael Lumb said all the stars aligned after the Partygate report emerged and Elton went down a storm at Glastonbury.

“The puzzle just fitted together,” said Michael.

The band could have missed out on the national spotlight, he added, explaining: “I was just getting ready to come down to a union meeting at work and my phone rang.

“I’ve been getting a lot of spam calls lately so I almost ignored it.

“Something told me to pick it up and it was a researcher from The Last Leg and was this Eltonesque.

“I initially thought it was a wind-up but she said could we come and play live on Channel Four tomorrow night if we were free, as Adam Hills had done a parody of Elton John songs about Boris Johnson.

“The keyboard player was in Turkey and I didn't get back until Friday morning, and I had to try and get get in touch with them all.

“Thankfully, we were all available.

“We did wonder if it was going to make us look cheesy and not serious about what we’re doing but I said to the lads: ‘I think we're best off going doing it and regretting it and not doing it and regretting it.’

“They sent us the words and when we got down to London, we just put it all together.

“We hadn’t played together for a month and we had all these people watching us put it together.

“I think it worked really well and we were really happy with it.

“The researcher said she had found us on Facebook and she’d looked at a few Elton tributes and we were as good as it got.”

The band is made up of Pete as Elton, Michael on drums, Tony Roebuck on guitar, Stewart Haycock on bass and John Evers on keyboards.

They are all  from Greasbrough and Kimberworth and have “normal” jobs - Michael works at Beatson Clark and John has his own roofing company, while Pete can be found among the LPs and CDs at HMW – but they also have a shared love of playing live.

Michael said: “Tony, Stuart and John have been in a band before and I've stepped in every now and then to drum for them.

“Me and Pete have known each other for 20 years and about 17 years ago we started a band doing Elton John stuff.

“Pete used to go around doing karaoke competitions and used to win every one he entered.”

The pair eventually parted ways but 18 months ago, they decided to get back together and hit upon the idea of focusing on Elton’s songs.

“We said let's have a jam and we'll see how it goes, and it all just seemed to click.

“Before we knew it, we were getting gigs and and it's just escalated from there.”

Thanks to their extra exposure, Eltonesque are seeing their diary, which already had plenty of concerts booked in, getting even busier.

“It's just been a bit of a whirlwind since,” Michael said.

"I was bombarded with phone calls and text messages saying that Chris Evans had played us on his breakfast show and he said they’d had to double check it wasn’t Elton, which is just a massive compliment.

“We had quite a lot of bookings for next year anyway, but we've had a lot of agents phone up about potential bookings, and also venues I've spoken to in the past, and been unable to sort anything out, who are now keen to get us on.

“There are Elton John tributes that have been going for many years, and they basically go to the same theatres every single year, so it’s really difficult to try and worm your way in.

“A lot of these tributes have really good singers but there are a lot of session musicians, so it sounds very ‘studio’, if you know what I mean.

“With Elton retiring, if people can’t go and watch him anymore the next best thing is a tribute act.

“What we've got in our corner as well is that Pete sounds so much like him.”

“We are also fully live and have that live band sound, which I think the audience can appreciate.”

Eltonesque can be seen in Rotherham on October 7 as they play a fundraising night in memory of a late friend of the band, Sue Chadbourne.

Limited tickets are available for the concert, from which proceeds will go to the Motor Neurone Disease Association.

Details of further gigs, including one next year at Doncaster Dome, can be found at https://www.facebook.com/groups/stillstanding.band/.