How's about the drummer kicking off the wrong song 4 times,
And INSISTing we change the song we are doing to match his beat...

And then not having enough english to tell us
WHICH song he is starting...
we should just recognize the drum beat.

This has happened to me in 3 different languages and 3 different bands.

Some gigs can only be ridden out with 2 things :
Big Balls ; rubber ones, to take the ricochets

How about
1 player's ex, from a year past, who left on her own idea,
meets his new lady who's pregnant
Realises, inspite of her 5 intervening boyfriends, "It's over".
Blames him, but more blames the pregnant lady,
who she thinks is faking pregnancy...
and dope slaps her in front of the stage and 400 people.

Her nutter girl friend then backs her up,
when another band lady nicely asks them to chill
for embarasing the band, on stage 10 feet behind them, playing at the time.

Nutter then decides she is shamed, and has a go at the quiet one,
for not backing HER up verbally.
My friend's enemy's friend is my enemy.
What is her name again?

Of course the cat fight then involves the nut girl's boyfriend
tryng to pull them apart, and it spills onto the stage.
He gets some gentle help doing separation duty, yeah sure...
"Don't you touch my lady with your hands"
(even if you're only trying to get her hands off of another lady's hair to get them apart.)

Oh yes,
now knock the guitar out of the singers hands,
then yell at him for not helping beat up the pregnant lady...

The ex. then takes off to trash her ex's house during the set,
leaving a wake of chaos.
So he takes off to protect his house,
leaving a trio, with a broken guitar.

No the pregant lady didn't go into labor,
but might as well have.

Then there is an enforced truce for 2 hours,
but nut girl is conspiring to give some one
a girl group beating for not being on her side about anything.
Her boyfriend isn't on her side, but no matter.

And then one band member decides it's your fault,
he's not having a good time at the gig,
because you stopped playing to help stop
the fight going on between the monitors,
2 feet from your face. So starts bitching at you for bumming him out....

Yeah right, this is a life style choice : Musician.

What DOES it take to play a bad gig?
I still wonder.

[This message was edited by David L. Donald on 21 January 2006 at 07:31 PM.]

I say let him, and in most cases it's an abysmal failure.

Ricky...

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Emmons LeGrande - 8x4
Session 400 Ltd, Nashville 112,Hilton Volume pedal, Peterson VS-II Tuner
Dan-Echo, E-Bow, Ibanez Distortion, Bo-Bro, Ibanez Auto-Wah, Regal Dobro

Are you sure you didn't mean John Wilkes Booth, not Lee Harvey Oswald?

-Travis

but I have a slightly different take on the BIG Picture..

I VIDEO as many gigs as possible..not just for the music but to actually SEE whats happening..

I don't try to get the best shot, or the best angle's so I can win awards and get on Larry King as an odd ball Indy producer..

I just wanna see and hear what the heck we..no, make that..I..look like and sound like...

Generally I have a good feel of how things are going in REAL LIVE time..and the video's usually confirm...

this past weekend I shot all 3 sets..my wife and I watched the first set the next morning..

hey..not bad ..usually I rate them as a 2 or 3 on a 1 to 10 scale..this one was a 6 ! I felt pretty good..Steel was in tune..some of the stuff I have been working on came right out..good flow..in tune..Tele and Steel not stepping on each other..mostly on pitch..good tone..even looked pretty good..WOW..what a shock !! How can this be.? Things are getting better even in the opinion of me, the most criticle of reviewers...

but..

later that day I stuck in set 2 and set 3..

back to the normal rule of things..

and all this while the crowd is cheering and dancing and begging for more !( and filling the tip jar too)

EJ....maybe it's us ? Cuz' I know it's me !

t

[This message was edited by Tony Prior on 22 January 2006 at 05:24 AM.]

The last year has found me needing the money a little less, and totally coincidentally, finding a good group of guys to play steadily with. We've all been in bands together off and on for 20 years. We play as loud as we want, and any kind of music.

TP/ I liked when we taped everything, but I ended up not listening to them, cause the bad, I remembered well enough and the good was only good when I was actually doing it.

Ray. If I slip "that way" in the slightest I have a couple good friends that will shoot me right between the eyes for my own good...

Home from yet another one tonite.

I'll bet most if not all of us that gig with regularity have had plenty of "bad" gigs. I know I have, and I'll have more. I also have good ones. Like Tony, I try to tape them sometimes, and others tape us from time to time. Sometimes it's cool, sometimes not. If a band begins to feel bad consistently, I give it some time to fix itself, and move on if it doesn't. I'm not making a living at this right now, so I do what I please. But with some adjustment, to make sure I have my ducks in a row, I take that approach either way.

For me, this is about bottle half empty vs. bottle half full. Sorry to always be the mathematician, but I'm always looking to optimize the experience. For me, what it takes to play a "bad" gig is that

1) It fits into that bigger scheme somehow.

Ernie Pollock http://www.hereintown.net/~shobud75/stock.htm

quote:

---

Hi Dad,

I played the violin for an audience last night, sort of by accident. I initially agreed to play with a few of Brian's friends, like, without anyone around, and then they sent us an invitation by email to jam with them at this party, which I thought was going to be, like, everyone playing something, but when we got there, this guy says to us, "You've got instruments! You must be Dave's friends!" Which gave me the most horrible feeling, because I then realized that we were like, THE BAND! YIKES!

So, we ended up playing with Brian's friends for about thirty people who were playing board games. Actually, I had a really good time, for about an hour I played duets with another violin player, who was much better than me, and we sounded all right.

But then we all got together in a "band," which consisted of a fiddle(me), a bass player(the other violin player played bass), a harmonica, a banjo (Brian), a synthesizer (a girl who only played chords), and a really good guitar player. We sucked so bad! It was awesome. We played, among other things, the twelve bar blues, ole lang sine, and Louie Louie. You can imagine.

There was a huge drum set there, but inexplicably, no one played the drums. Oh, and the bass player went and played ping-pong half-way through. What an abomination this all was. They paid us in brownies, but I think they were just offering us brownies so that we might actually STOP PLAYING!

My first paying gig. Does it count when they pay you to leave?

Love,

Shoshanah

---

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Bobby Lee (a.k.a. b0b) - email: quasar@b0b.com - gigs - CDs, Open Hearts
Williams D-12 E9, C6add9, Sierra Olympic S-12 (F Diatonic)
Sierra Laptop S-8 (E6add9), Fender Stringmaster D-8 (E13, C6 or A6)   My Blog

[This message was edited by Bobby Lee on 22 January 2006 at 09:20 AM.]

Sounds like she did OK, especially if they were the "right kind" of brownies.

And the "Getting paid to leave".

That's what "Getting Paid" is all about!

EJL

[This message was edited by Eric West on 22 January 2006 at 11:29 AM.]

quote:

---

...any gigs where there are uncontrolled children running around

---

Speaking of other people's uncontrolled children, I recently got to play with what may qualify as the worst band in the world when my production company was asked to provide sound system services for a concert following a benefit bull riding contest at the Molalla Buckaroo grounds. The benefit was arranged by Ross Coleman and featured the best riders to be found anywhere in the world, champions all. The band was sent out from the east coast by the PBR and I thought this is gonna be a blast and so I offered to bring my steel out to the show. The band jumped on it and invited me out the night before the big show to sit in with them at a gig they were doing in a small bar.

I showed up to find one guy standing on a beer-drenched floor in a corner of the room playing guitar and singing (shouting?) parts of old songs we all know and love, interspersed with some sort of rap stuff that I did not recognize (although all the very young and VERY drunken girls on the "dance floor" seemed to know every word of it). When he ran out of verses that he actually knew he would simply segue without skipping a beat into some other song that he thought he knew a verse or two of. He continued like this non-stop for about two hours at a time, then took a pee break while one of his band-mates got up and sang the only song that HE knew (as it turned out, they only owned one guitar between them anyway).

I knew I was in trouble when - as I was setting up my steel - aforementioned band-mate excitedly exclaimed "wow, I've ever actually SEEN a steel guitar before, COOL!"

The guys were in truth really nice young fellows and since at this point I was in far too deep to back out I took advantage of the opportunity to work my fingers real hard for hours at a time (did I mention that the entire PA was one Mackie speaker set up right beside my head running at a painfully loud level?) - to his credit the lead guy knew almost all the words to "You Were Always On My Mind" and played it gently enough that I could hear myself for most of that song.

At the end of the night he explained that the benefit concert would feature the whole band and be much more together and "you're bringing your steel again, right?" so okay, sure, why not, it's good practice for my hands at the very least.

The next day we set up a big sound system and met the rest of the "band" - lead guy playing his acoustic-electric, pee-break bandmate had a little eight-pad synthesizer that made curious swooshing sounds when he hit it and a young drummer that looked and sounded like he should be playing sambas at Julliard. As the only black guy in town he was a bit nervous and so he hung out most of the day with my mix engineer and myself.

Naturally, the big post-rodeo show was every bit as artistically excellent as the one the night before, so my mix guy just cranked up the steel in the house so that SOMETHING would sound like country music so as to minimize complaints from the actual cowboys in the crowd - no matter that, they all soon ditched for the bars downtown and left the scene to the inebriated younger set, who soon managed to spill beer (and other mystery liquids) all over the amp racks and AC power breakers. I literally worked my hands raw trying to cut through the stage volume and after two hours of non-stop din the show was over but the show's organizers were too drunk to find our check so I had to drive down the next day to get paid.

I had to pay the mix guy a bunch extra for sitting through it all without shooting someone. In retrospect it was maybe not the worst gig ever, but quite possibly the worst BAND ever. So far, anyway....

------------------
Dave Grafe - email: dg@pdxaudio.com
Production
Pickin', etc.

1978 ShoBud Pro I E9, Randall Steel Man 500, 1963 Precision Bass, 1954 Gibson LGO, 1897 Washburn Hawaiian Steel Conversion

[This message was edited by Dave Grafe on 22 January 2006 at 03:34 PM.]

Like Dave G said, kids are fine with me.

When I played bluegrasss in NYC we would judge a good gig in the park or anywhere,
by the number of empty baby carriges around the band.
Our record was 32, with 3 twin units.

And toddlers fraidily coming up to throw a dollar
in the case out front, and RUNNING back to mom giggling.

Totally random children boucing of instruments no.
but kids around, sounds good to me

[This message was edited by David L. Donald on 30 January 2006 at 07:43 PM.]

Once while with the Merl Lindsay band, we were booked for a week in Monte Vista, Colorado to play for the dances after the rodeo performances. Due to a contract dispute, the orchestra hired to play for the rodeo riding events, did not show up for the last day of the rodeo.

They asked Merl if his band could fill in at the rodeo so Merl sent me and the guitar player, the bass player, and the drummer with only a snare drum, over to the arena to play. We had never done that before and had no idea what to do, so the snare drum and the guitar ended up doing most of the playing during the 'timed' riding events. It probably sounded more like "Yankee Doodle" at a July 4th parade than it did a rodeo!

You would have had to have known the guitar player to appreciate the rest of this story. He was so embarrassed from having to repetitively play the "William Tell Overture" (the Lone Ranger theme was the most appropriate song we could think of) during the riding events, that when it was over he covered his face with a bandana, like a mask, and literally crawled on his hands and knees along the fence to the bus pushing his guitar before him so that no one would know he was with the band.

We may have sounded even worse than we thought, because a group of "fun seeking" cowboys threatened to beat up the band at our regular dance that night. Fortunately for us, that was our last performance of that job so we managed to load the bus in a panic and get safely out of town.

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WEBSITE

[This message was edited by Gene Jones on 23 January 2006 at 05:05 AM.]

There is the usual assortment of farm animals and stuff but down on the Midway amidst all the shooting galleries and fortune tellers they had a strip show.
One of these tractor trailer deals with a stage in a tent hung off the back side.."Looky Looky Nooky Nooky" the guy's screaming out front.

Course we had to check it out.

The strip show owners give the girl in our band a really hard time.
She makes a huge fuss and they finally let her in.
She ends up talking and casualy invites the lesbian strippers to the club.

We didn't think much of it till Sunday nite when the circus has the night off.
Damn if they don't all show up. Yahooo!! Fire eaters and everything.
Well needless to say after a few "cordials" things start to liven up.
We're about halfway through our "50's" set with the girl in her poodle skirt and us all greased back.
A piece of glass goes whizzing past my ear.Here we go!!

A huge fight breaks out. One of the strippers,in a jealous rage, goes after her lover with a busted ashtray.
Turns out the lover was starting to get it on with the Mechanical Man.He gets into the middle of it and gets cut.
All the Stilt Walkers, Side Show barkers and Pony Wrestlers must of had some beef with each other cause they all start sluggin'.
What a mess.
The Carnival owners and cops had to be called to come and break it up.

[This message was edited by Mark Vinbury on 23 January 2006 at 07:46 AM.]

I think it's more "If" you play.

There are a million reasons to "give up", or "direct your attention to more important things, but you are not doing it..

Some people aren't cut out for it, and some have a "good long run that had to end some time".

Some are content to have a hundred gig "career" that they blow up into a life long mastery status.

Some are content to sit home and listen to recordings of "what they usd to do".

No person's motivation, or satisfaction level is "wrong". It's a personal thing.

I wonder sometimes if people like Mr Emmons, Franklin, Green etc really have been "minus" all these "bad gigs", and it's really tempting to think that they'd "quit" if "things got that rough".

I don't think so.

Probably Mr Emmons didn't let himself spend a couple years in a moose lodge behind drunken singers, or wear a scanty summer dress in a freezing mule barn at a halloween party, but I think they've always "had to play", or chose to in the light of sitting home.

I can't imagine travelling in a bus for either ET, RM, LJD, or others for years on end was a total walk in the rose garden.

I look back and try to get some semblance of "accomplishment" once in a while. I gould dig through old "playbills" check out old calendars that showed years on end of 5-7 nite gig schedules and records, or loosen up old cassettes of live shows, CDs I've done for local dummies with an extra hundred bucks for steel tracks, and remember 'how cool I was', when I did this tour or that, but it just doesn't seem to do any good for my self esteem, or really "get to" where I need to be with my playing self.

No. It's what's coming up "next week", or at the longest, going over my next three months, and finally looking at a couple "empty weekends" as "time to rest" and remembering the last gig that was good. At least last Saturday Nite..

Maybe I'm plagued with self doubt, that only lifts itself when I'm out in public making money with a couple good musicians in whatever gang I've hooked up with, and is subject to the risk of having a "Bad One", or a less than perfect "friday nite" in hopes of having a better "saturday nite".

If I have a rotten gig, and a tree falls on me Monday morning, then I've been a failure. If I have a good one, and a train runs over me monday, I've been a success.

It's a fearful addiction to a type of russian roulette, at worst, and reminds me of the movie with Steve McQueen and the little guy minus a couple fingers with a Zippo™ lighter sometimes. They usually don't light ten times in a row...

At best it's the knowledge that I'm willing to risk a string of bad ones to do a good one with my entire reputation (such as it is..), self respect, and satisfaction "at stake" for the irreplaceable good feeling of having a "Good One".

Usually with the odds agin' it.

It's been worth it for a quarter century and a few thousand gigs so far..

Next Weekend, "The Safari Club" and three weeks of Vancouver Moose after that with the Ferrante Brothers, etc. etc. etc...

I think I understand some of your "off topic" posts a bit better now.

Hope it's looking up for you this year.

Mixer lights up, yes flames, and smokes for 3 minutes AFTER the plug is pulled....
Power amp blows 8 amp fuse, gets a 5 amp replacement,
but never seems to send sound out of speakers again.
Another PA comes in from somebody's house. Stolen from the 16 year old sons band.
No monitors, no power to speak of...

An hour later another Marshall shows up. yeah!

The rented Peavey Transtube amp runs for most of
the 1st 2 hours of the 4 hour set,
but then nods off.

Fortunately a 15w Fender Champ came uninvited with the PA system.
It becomes the lead amp for around a hour.
The Austrailian sound engineer can't be paged from the stage,
seems he was too cold in the room,
so he is called on the portable phone.
"Please come inside and mic this mini amp." click!
Later the Peavey starts running on it's own. Back into service.

We were playing for the president of Haliburton,
VP's of Unocal, and several more of this level.
My estimate of the net worth in the room was at the "Forbes" level...
All dressed down for a 60's beach bum theme party.
Nice to have working tools for show like this.

Seems someobdy rewireded a stage outlet, VERY, VERY wrong....
Fried 3 amps in 5 minutes flat,
and then venue management tries to blame the band for the damage,
AND wants to charge $60 to RENT the house mixer so that the show can go on...
THAT didn't fly...

Our host, paying the tab, is CEO of a $600 MILLION medical equipment company.
Wants us back "every quarter."

Mostly I'm grateful not to have taken a job that prevents weekly gigs and in two years, I'm at the top of the 12 man "seniority list".

There's an "Off Topic" section?