Songs You Really Don't Like Playing?

[yorks5stringer]

It's gone a bit quiet on the gigging front as one Band I'm in has a guitarist who spends most of his time on holiday in Italy in his cottage.....

So I decided to look around for another Band and there are auditions soon. The Set List is the usual fare "Stand By Me" and "Road to Hell" but also includes one of my all- time least favourite songs: "Living Next Door to Alice" (you know the rest).

Should I suck it up, a song is just a song and am I being a total musical snob or should I say, before the audition "I'm really not happy about playing that song"?

Discuss....

[Nicko]

Lyin' Eyes by the eagles was the one that I really hated in my last band. Cant stand the song.

We currently have Are You Gonna Go My Way (Lenny Kravitz) which I dont mind as a song but really dont like playing.

[BobVbass]

There's lots of songs I don't particularly like but so long as the audience do then I'm happy to play them. It's when you like them but the audience don't that there's a problem

Sometimes find I play songs I don't particularly like pretty well as I tend to be more detached and scientific about them rather than getting carried away - I concentrate on the bassline rather than enjoying the whole I suppose..

[Hobbayne]

[quote name='Nicko' timestamp='1431683017' post='2773882']
Lyin' Eyes by the eagles was the one that I really hated in my last band. Cant stand the song.

We currently have Are You Gonna Go My Way (Lenny Kravitz) which I dont mind as a song but really dont like playing.
[/quote]


Nice little bass line over the guitar solo in the Kravitz song. I play that one in my band and improvise it.

[stuckinthepod]

Word Up by gun. So so boring. I play other simpler songs that I enjoy far more. Can't quite work out why exactly, it just feels more monotonous. Unfortunately our singer loves it so it's staying.

[Japhet]

Living Next Door to Alice. Ouch! I feel your pain

[chris_b]

The only songs I hate to play are the ones that the band can't do justice to, or numbers the audience hates.

I'll enjoy anything the audience likes and we can play well.

Word Up not a good song? You're listening to the wrong version. Try it by Cameo.

[Meypelnek]

I think on each band's setlist are some songs you like more or less. If the rest of the set is okay for you and you feel well among your new bandmates - why not give it a try? Perhaps one day you will see the song kicked out of the program. A bunch of people playing music together always goes along with compromises, I suppose.

(Most boring song I ever had to play: Michael Jackson - Give in to me)

[Graham]

Been depping in a hard rock band recently and they play POW by Bullet For My Valentine, christ that's dull. Fortunately the guitarist agrees and it's being dropped soon.

[yorks5stringer]

Ironically just had an email from the contact with this band saying (as the list was provided by a new vocalist), that he is not happy with the Set-List and suggesting other less low-hanging material. Issue solved, thanks for the feedback.

[barneyg42]

[quote name='Japhet' timestamp='1431687835' post='2773952']
Living Next Door to Alice. Ouch! I feel your pain
[/quote]

Oh no, you lived next door to her as well???
Nightmare!!

[ChunkyMunky]

I used to utterly detest playing 'Signed, Sealed and Delivered' until I saw a video of James Jamerson Jr. ripping into it.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=rR9dppCuUBU

[PaulWarning]

We tried Alice for a while, didn't have the audience reaction we'd expected so dropped it, Nellie the Elephant still in there, which always goes down a storm, but as someone else said, if the audience like it, it's good enough for me

[TheGreek]

I refuse to play any 12 bar blues - how many times can you play the same riff over and over (and over again). Another hate is "Hey Joe" - was one of the first things I learned to play - done it to death...

Edited May 15, 2015 by TheGreek

[ChunkyMunky]

[quote name='TheGreek' timestamp='1431709101' post='2774230']
I refuse to play any 12 bar blues - how many times can you play the same riff over and over (and over again). Another hate is "Hey Joe" - was one of the first things I learned to play - done it to death...
[/quote]

Even the Jazz variety?

[discreet]

Most cover band sets have too many songs in them I don't like, which is why I'm not currently in a covers band. And I really can't be bothered with all the pain involved in starting up my own covers band so I can put together a set I like playing. But I suppose if you're joining an already-established covers band you pretty much have to suck it up and play what they want you to play, no matter how crappy.

My particular bugbears are 500 Miles, All Right Now and Sex On Fire. Particularly All Right Now, as I played it in a covers band in the mid-seventies and it was tedious stale buns then, so I'm sure as hell not going to be playing it forty years later! Jesus, there [i]are [/i]limits!! And as for The Proclaimers - well, obviously they must be lashed. Over and over again. Until they drop.

Edited May 15, 2015 by discreet

[paul h]

I've recently realised that the number of songs I hate and hate to play, massively outnumber the songs I like and am allowed to play.

So now I just don't bother

[discreet]

[quote name='paul h' timestamp='1431713099' post='2774306']
I've recently realised that the number of songs I hate and hate to play, massively outnumber the songs I like and am allowed to play.
So now I just don't bother
[/quote]

Well that's it, isn't it? Do you want to play for the benefit of drunken people who go to cover-band venues... or not?
In my case it has to at least be a function/event band, as I find pub covers bands just don't get paid enough for me to put on my black covers-band outfit, grit my teeth and play a couple of hours-worth of songs I don't like. It's work, basically.

At least this time of year is good for tipsy, scantily-clad women dancing and jiggling about so that makes it more bearable. So to speak.

[tonyquipment]

Don't do it

You'll end up resenting lol

[PaulWarning]

[quote name='paul h' timestamp='1431713099' post='2774306']
I've recently realised that the number of songs I hate and hate to play, massively outnumber the songs I like and am allowed to play.

So now I just don't bother
[/quote]guess you're in the wrong covers band then

[Kiwi]

Jewish wedding tunes. Mind numbingly tedious root fifthing.

[mike257]

I make a big chunk of my living from playing weddings, so have to suck it up and play all sorts of rubbish, but Chasing Cars by Snow Patrol is the one song that makes me want to hang myself from the lighting rig every time. Can't abide it.

[ChunkyMunky]

[quote name='discreet' timestamp='1431712880' post='2774301']
Most cover band sets have too many songs in them I don't like, which is why I'm not currently in a covers band. And I really can't be bothered with all the pain involved in starting up my own covers band so I can put together a set I like playing. But I suppose if you're joining an already-established covers band you pretty much have to suck it up and play what they want you to play, no matter how crappy.

My particular bugbears are 500 Miles, All Right Now and [b][font=comic sans ms,cursive][u]Sex On Fire[/u][/font].[/b] Particularly All Right Now, as I played it in a covers band in the mid-seventies and it was tedious stale buns then, so I'm sure as hell not going to be playing it forty years later! Jesus, there [i]are [/i]limits!! And as for The Proclaimers - well, obviously they must be lashed. Over and over again. Until they drop.
[/quote]

Hated that one from the first time I played it! I thought I was the only one.

[steve-bbb]

i like them all

even the song about the car and the girl

but i draw the line at chumbawumbas tubthumping

[lojo]

500 miles (not the Flora Purim version which I'd love to play)

I've a few one off covers gigs coming up and have agreed to some pretty sad set lists, but I have another project where I'm really into what we do, I guess you can't have it all always, at least in the weekend warrior covers functions world

Edited May 16, 2015 by lojo