When Reign formed in 1975, the band played four sets at Los Angeles bars and nightclubs: two sets of original songs, one of Top 40 hits and a set of Beatles songs performed exactly like Paul McCartney, John Lennon, George Harrison and Ringo Starr.

Steve Landes, now a John Lennon impersonator, said the band members quickly realized that audience members were coming to see the one Beatles set. Landes joined the band 20 years ago, and a few years after that, the band turned into a show. They now perform as “RAIN: A Tribute to The Beatles.”

RAIN will bring its celebration of the 50th anniversary of “Sgt. Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band” to Syracuse on Thursday at the Landmark Theatre at 7:30 p.m. Tickets are available online and at the Landmark Theatre box office.

The stage will be filled with lights, props, live cameras, multimedia videos and band members dressed in full Sgt. Pepper’s attire.

“It’s very psychedelic, very colorful, very interpretive because these songs can mean a lot of different things to different people,” Landes said. “We’re up there singing the songs with the lyrics and everything, but the visuals are really painting the picture of what Sgt. Pepper means to a lot of people.”

Landes said one of the hardest parts of figuring out how they would add the whole Sgt. Pepper’s album to their performance was figuring out which songs would get left behind.

The band started to dedicate different acts to different eras, he added. This way, songs weren’t lost, but rather rearranged in other acts. The first set pays tribute to the recording years of 1965 and 1966, featuring the albums of “Revolver” and “Rubber Soul.”

Mark Lewis, RAIN founder and original keyboard player, said in a press release that the show has many highlights — just like The Beatles’ career.

“The Ed Sullivan era, Sgt. Pepper, Abbey Road, etc.,” Lewis said. “It was all a wonderful time in history, and I believe our show does a great job of capturing those times and bringing them to life on stage,”

Landes explained that the sounds of Sgt. Pepper’s are some of the hardest to replicate because of their dense recordings. Not only does the live replication of these songs make performing tough, but the audience expects the performers to sound like The Beatles’ recordings every show.

Paul Curatolo, who performs as Paul McCartney, described in a press release that prepping to perform as McCartney is both a mental and physical process. He stretches to relax, does many vocal warmups and then becomes the Beatle using makeup and his costume.

“Playing Sir Paul is a dream come true,” Curatolo said. “The most challenging part for me would be sounding like him (vocally).”

Curatolo described The Beatles’ catalogue as timeless, explaining that whether someone is a Beatles fan or not, they can relate to the music.

Landes said The Beatles send messages of positivity and togetherness through songs like “Come Together,” “Give Peace a Chance” and “All You Need is Love.”

He said his favorite song to perform is “In My Life” because, while Lennon and McCartney were only in their mid-20s when this song was produced, their lyrics were spoken with a melancholy beyond their years.

Overall, performing The Beatles’ lyrics is a “master class” in songwriting, Landes said. He’s a songwriter on the side himself.

“Embodying that character is a kind of dream come true because when I was growing up, I loved all the Beatles but for some reason John stuck out to me,” Landes said. “Also, his message of peace and love, I think (is) more important than ever these days.”

Whatever effects being on the road may have, Landes and the performers must take the stage appearing and sounding exactly like The Beatles every show. But it’s worth the struggle.

Said Landes: “It’s our passion, so it’s what gets us through.”

Published on March 21, 2018 at 9:30 pm

Contact Connor: cbfogel@syr.edu