No room for the bass player

[Lozz196]

I read all of this and realise the fortune of playing in a 3-piece band. Sure on some gigs it’s been cramped - when the “stars” wont move their backline so you have to set yours up wherever it will go (and it’s never the top bands that do this, only the nearly-made-its, who think they’re bigger than they really are, but where all that is actually big about them is their ego) - but in general being in a 3-piece makes it much easier.

[Krysbass]

This only happened to me once, when due to being late home from work;  I was last to arrive at the gig.  But as the p.a. had only just enough power for vocals, it was essential I used my rig, so the drummer had to move his kit.

Other than that, I'm usually one of the first to arrive and make sure the drummer leaves enough space for me.   And it's not as if I need much space, as my rig is two 2x10 cabs stacked on the small ends - so arguably the smallest gear footprint in the whole band.

But some venues are just impractically small for anyting more than a duo so there have been situations where my 4 or 5 piece band has had to cram into a venue minus our usual guitar changes, effects boards, lights, number of drums etc and I've had to play my bass pointed at the ceiling all night.  Curiously, one of those cramped, stripped back gigs remains one of the best received we ever played....😐

 

[Stub Mandrel]

2 hours ago, Krysbass said:

But some venues are just impractically small for anyting more than a duo so there have been situations where my 4 or 5 piece band has had to cram into a venue minus our usual guitar changes, effects boards, lights, number of drums etc and I've had to play my bass pointed at the ceiling all night.  Curiously, one of those cramped, stripped back gigs remains one of the best received we ever played....😐

One of the best gigs I've been to was over a pub in Brighton. Dave Swarbrick and Marting Carthy looked round and decided not even to bother plugging into their amps and did a genuine 'unplugged'...

[Dubs]

On 29/07/2019 at 11:47, musicbassman said:

Some people need to b****y well grow up. You're supposed to be making music together, not having ego wars.

This.

I've been in the same band for 10 years now, I was the last one in and they've been together for about 15 years. We've had our moments but there's a lot of mutual respect and we're good mates. We gig a lot and it just wouldn't work at all if we were only thinking of ourselves rather than the band as a whole.

I hope some of the stories in this thread are exaggerated because I'd not only not put up with that sh!t but there's also no way I could be in a band that didn't respect me enough to remember that I exist and need to stand on stage somewhere.