I've never practiced enough to have my accompaniment to my favorite cover songs come out fluently.

And I think having to look at chord charts during a performance takes a bit away from the performance.

For those of you that feel the same, and have mastered the accompaniment to a large number of cover songs....how do you go about it ? How do you
- practice and memorize them,
- review them,
- how many times do you think you have to play/practice them before they are forever sealed in your memory for the future ?
- if you have to memorize the words too - how do you go about that ?
- how often do you have to review ? e.g. until they are forever in your brain ?

Do you think some techniques work far better than others, and you could contrast them and share why ?

As always, thanks.