‘Satisfaction’ reigns in Rolling Stones touring tribute

Honoring what’s known as the “World’s Greatest Rock & Roll Band” always satisfies Chris LeGrand.

The founder, executive producer and manager of “Satisfaction – The International Rolling Stones Show” also plays lead singer and frontman Mick Jagger’s part. The quintet will play at 7 p.m. Saturday at the Palace Theatre, at Broadway at the Beach in Myrtle Beach. This continues a string of touring tribute shows the venue has welcomed this year, along with “Beatlemania Now,” “Hotel California – A Salute to the Eagles” and “Almost Queen.”

By telephone last week from home in Dallas, LeGrand said “Satisfaction” plays about 150 dates a year, and about 30 cast members have taken turns through the years in playing the other parts. This edition also brings Ron Nelson as Charlie Watts, Jim Riddick as Keith Richards, Kevin Smith as Ron Wood, and John Wade as Bill Wyman.

He said establishing this show 15 years ago “with a driving force from day one” arose from having seen so many Beatles tribute acts, but “never a touring Rolling Stones show,” hence a new market he envisioned.

LeGrand remembered being told at age 15 in high school “I look like Mick,” with a haircut to match at the time.

“I wanted to be my own rock star,” he said, “and after 19 years of not getting a hit record, the tribute chain was the way to go.”

With about 50 songs in this band’s repertoire, including “some rarities,” LeGrand counted about “a dozen you have to do every night,” with “Honky Tonk Women” and “Brown Sugar” among “the big hits.”

Seeing music by the real-life 1989 inductees for the Rock and Roll Hall of Fame and Museum in Cleveland continuing to span “many generations,” LeGrand said besides the folks “65 to 70 years old” turning out for tribute concerts, he’s encouraged by “younger people” embracing various “classic rock” bands such as the Stones and Pink Floyd.

LeGrand said that saluting icons – especially with the Rolling Stones’ “permission to peform in their likeness” – demands putting together the right “look, sound and attitude.”

Of the three priorities, he said sound leads in importance, because with “some smoke and mirrors, and some costuming,” looks are enhanced and improved easily.

“We can transform people a little bit,” LeGrand said. “That’s show business.”

Then, “swagger and moxie” add a final touch, he said.

LeGrand said along with criss-crossing North and South America, a couple of swings through Russia have been memorable.

The fivesome in Satisfaction won’t insert too many ballads into their two-hour show, but with numbers such as “Wild Horses” coming easily to perform, “it never fails” with audiences, LeGrand said.

The body of work generally ranges from 1964 to 1981, through “Start Me Up,” from the “Tattoo You” album, LeGrand said. No room or need for solo material, either, such as respective Jagger duets from the mid-1980s – “State of Shock” with the Jacksons, and a “Dancing in the Streets” cover with David Bowie – for the Stones’ catalog keeps the band coming back to hits “everybody wants to hear,” never leaving “Jumping Jack Flash” and “(I Can’t Get No) Satisfaction” out.

Asked what hooked him on to the Rolling Stones’ flavor among pioneers of the rock era and the British Invasion, LeGrand said was simply “something different,” with such “defining songs” from “rock ’n’ roll as we know it.”

“It didn’t sound like anybody else,” he said.

This story was originally published September 1, 2015 at 1:27 AM with the headline "‘Satisfaction’ reigns in Rolling Stones touring tribute."