FinnDave

One as-new Hercules stand just advertised on the 'other stuff for sale' part of the forum.

The only time I have had to miss a gig was when I was involved in a bike accident and was in a wheel chair for a month or more. I missed two gigs, but it impossible for me to leave the hospital for the first one, and the house the day after discharge but still in the chair and with my right arm in plaster from above the elbow to the fingers for the second. Last week I postponed a planned & booked trip to Devon with my wife to celebrate my birthday because we got offered a gig for the same weekend. I didn't even consider letting the band down, just moved the holiday to the next weekend instead. If we get a gig for that weekend as well, then I'll cancel the holiday. Just what your priorities are.

Just went up and checked mine, clean as a whistle (strange saying, whistles are full of saliva and other muck!) and no stickiness to the plastic. I reckon it's about 4 years old, and has been out of the house 2 or 3 times, just been in its box the rest of the time.

I've got one that holds two guitars/basses but haven't used it much, and not at all for the last year or two. I'm just too lazy to faff about with too many things! I really ought to get it on the for sale section, it's upstairs in its box just getting in my way.

I do now - only had the car a few weeks at the time and it was one AM in a campsite - I wasn't popular!

Worst accommodation I've had at a gig was my own fault - we were playing two nights in Dorset last year, three of the guys had grabbed rooms (the only ones available), on borrowed a camper van and brought his wife along, two brought tents and I decided to just bring an inflatable mattress and sleep in the back of my car (it was summer and I have a Mitsubishi Outlander, plenty of room). What I hadn't considered was that the alarm auto-armed, so every time I moved, it went off. After about ten minutes I took myself, mattress & sleeping bag and slept under a tree. I didn't feel too great for the second night!

They had seen us play before, but I suppose people with no involvement in music might not understand the significance of amplifiers and PA, with cables trailing everywhere. As you say, a good lesson in never assuming anything is obvious!

Same band, another outdoor gig couple of years later, we turned up to find that the trailer provided as a stage was parked 2 or 300 meters from the audience and the only available power supply, an extension lead plugged into a burger van! We finally tracked down the truck driver, and the owners of the bikes parked where the stage should have been (it was an event for Harley Davidson) and just about managed with the extension lead from van to stage. A memorable gig, but not really for the right reasons.

A band I used to be in was booked for an outdoor event 3 months in advance. Various emails passed between band and booker, until less than a week before the event we were asked whether we needed any electricity. Having replied in the affirmative, they suddenly pulled the gig!

It's Schrodinger's bass - it's only wrong if you play it and it's wrong.

My next gig is a week from tomorrow, at Cockfosters football club. An unlikely sort of venue for us, but we played there earlier in the year and got a decent crowd in, so we're doing it again. Being at the end of one of London's tube (subway) line helps, I think. After that, I'm doing a one-off dep gig with my old band in Marlborough, then two more Grateful Dudes' gigs in Camden, October and December, and apparently the first Saturday of every other month thereafter.

My band was recently offered two more London gigs before the end of the year. One we will play minus one of the guitarists unless his other band can get a dep for him, for the other I have postponed a holiday with my wife that we had booked. Gigs come first - especially if they're already booked. For years, my wife has been used to the fact that we can only book holidays at fairly short notice for times when it is clear I won't be gigging.

When I moved back to the Uk a few years ago, I joined two bands through JMB. One was hopeless, a blues band run by someone who thought he was a guitarist but quite plainly wasn't, the other was one I stayed with for five years and am depping with in a couple of weeks - and looking forward to it! My band now I was asked to join, and have had the best couple of years playing and gigging I've ever had - and next year is looking even better. JMB is a good starting point, I reckon.

Don't matter what colour the scratch plate is, it'll still sound the same!

There was a time when that was true, but not anymore!

I think mine is about six or seven, anyway, it's time for a new one soon. Oh wait, mistesss….I thought you said mattress

The Grateful Dead tribute band I play with has three more shows to play this year - all are in London. On September 14th we are in Cockfosters, at the football club for the second time this year. In October (12th) and December (7th), we are at the Fiddlers Elbow in Camden. All of these dates promise a good night out whether you are a committed Deadhead or merely curious. Watching the audience is usually as much a part of the show as the band!

Best colour for a bass made of wood is no colour, just natural wood. Obviously!

I was just sitting here, looking forward to my dinner. Now, I'm just sitting here.

I usually change them in the New Year. I have two similar basses, both Ibanez sixes, one is used for gigs (not many, a dozen or so a year) and rehearsals (maybe 6 a year) and the other is my back-up but is played at home on average 2-3 hours per day, 5 days per week. Both basses are strung with D'Addario rounds.

To be fair, I don't interact much, if at all, with the audience while I'm playing, but focus entirely on the music we're playing (which as it contains a fair amount of improvisation requires concentration. I am aware of them from the energy they give us, but if I start looking at individuals in the audience, it distracts me. It is a fact that my current band plays far better in front of an audience than at a rehearsal, obviously a gig encourages greater concentration, but to me, the energy and enthusiasm of the audience is the main reason. I rarely experienced this when playing blues etc in pubs where the audience usually tolerated the band at best, but with current band, where we only play ticketed venues, the audience has travelled a fair distance and paid to hear us, so the band and its music are the main focus for them. When the entire audience starts cheering at the first notes of a song they love, that makes sure we do the song justice.

Probably quite a heavy touch!

I reckon we all need a touch of narcissism to want to stand up in front of an audience.

My old band were playing a Saturday night in central Swindon when and obviously well-oiled punter climbed on the to stage and worked his around the band trying to ask us something while we were playing. He eventually tripped and fell off the stage, hitting his head on the PA and knocking himself out. We played on..and on…as first the pub's security tried to get him up, then they hailed in a couple of passing coppers (there were several pairs of them walking around the town centre - but that's Swindon for you) who finally managed to get him sitting up. They asked us to take a break while they got him into an ambulance. Turned out he was known by the drummer and guitarist (they are all from the same south Atlantic island) and he was trying to ask us what we wanted to drink so he could buy us a round!