Paying tribute is not a bad thing. It all depends who does what and how!

Legends to me is a great way to pay tribute. My feeling is that this is a real tribute band but with the added, and important bonus, of having the original singers singing the songs.

As far as bands are concerned, I will take the example of my favourite band Whitesnake.

Is the band still WS? I think in their case, I would not call them a tribute band today, although I really do not care for their music anymore. To me Whitesnake died in 1984. This said, Coverdale built up a brand new band after that. OK it is not a band, it is him with hired guns but they recorded new music, and played less and less music from the classic line-up. To me, as the set consists mostly of songs written after 1984, this WS is not a tribute band: it is a band of its own.

I would agree that a band that retains some original members, or at least those who wrote the songs, cannot be considered a tribute band: Foreginer, AC/DC, Kiss, Black Sabbath, Toto, etc. were never tribute band. They are living entities that continued developing, writing, recording and touring.