acidbass Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 (edited) LONG POST ALERT! Full video at bottom of post! So I had a pretty big thing last week that I thought I would share with you all, as it’s probably not something that happens every day for most of us! I always love reading these sorts of posts/gig blogs myself for the insight into other people's musical lives so hopefully it will be interesting to someone My band made it’s first live TV appearance on St Patrick’s Day on one of Ireland’s biggest shows – The Late Late Show. Not to be confused with the US equivalent – this is a talk show which has been running since 1962 and is broadcast on Friday nights on Ireland’s largest TV channel – RTE. On a usual week, the audience viewing figures would be around half a million, but this week, the host of 14 years had announced he will be leaving, and so the figures were expected to be in excess of one million. Cripes! We got the call a few months back following quite a successful few years and pretty exponential growth on the usual social media channels. The band plays Irish folk rock, and so St Patrick’s day seemed like a fitting opportunity to showcase our music, which by the way consists mostly of covers of traditional Irish songs arranged in a rockier context. I don’t usually get nervous before gigs – in fact, the last time I recall was before a show in 2003 – but from the day before the show I began to feel the anxiety. What if a string breaks mid song (as happened a few weeks ago at a live gig)? What if my pedalboard gives up the ghost at soundcheck? What if I play a bum note that gets broadcast online for time immemorial? The list of artists who have performed on the show over the years reads as a bit of a ‘who’s who’ of Irish and international artists – most notably U2, Westlife, Sinead O’Connor and The Boomtown Rats all made their debut TV performances on the show. Naturally, the great pedigree that the show has hosted over the years only served to heighten the apprehension even further! I arrived at RTE Studios in Dublin on Friday at 1pm and was taken to a largely unimpressive dressing room by the floor manager, who was lovely and really helpful. Our soundcheck was called for 2.30pm so had loads of time to take in the surroundings, learn the layout of the backstage (which was like a maze) and watch the fantastic house band soundcheck with an amazing version of ‘Signed, Sealed, Delivered’. These guys are all pro session heads and the discipline and chops were clearly evident, all guided by a great MD. I managed to grab a chat with a couple of the guys who were only too happy to oblige, which was nice. The bassist was using an active US Jazz into HX Stomp and GK backline with in ears – not so far from my usual setup, and his tone was HUGE! Our soundcheck happened at exactly 2.30pm which was great. What really struck me throughout the day was just how ‘on time’ everything was. The production itself was super slick, and I got the impression that a delay of even a few minutes would have majorly impacted the schedule, with the show due to go out live at 9.30pm. For someone with borderline OCD – I appreciated this immensely! Rig-wise, I brought my new (to me) Gibson SG Bass which I just took delivery of last week. It’s my first ever short scale, at 30.25”, in nitro Olympic White which was a limited edition finish for 2012. The first thing I did when I received it was put on a Hipshot Supertone bridge. I use one on my Jack Casady bass and it’s a huge improvement over the stock Gibson bridge. String wise, I went for my usual La Bella 760FS flats, medium scale. A bit of a setup later and she was singing like a bird! It is truly a lovely instrument. From there, I ran it into my flyrig board which consists of a HX Stomp and Peterson Strobostomp tuner, all powered by a Cioks DC7 power supply. On the HX Stomp I use a custom patch which consists of: - Low and High Cut (set at 50hz and 7khz respectively) - Rochester Compressor (set at 4:1 ratio) - Zeroamp (Sansamp clone) set pretty flat with a slight drive boost - Bass Octaver (for octave down doubling) - Pitch Shift (drop tunes 2 semitones for Drop D songs) - Ampeg Chorus (self explanatory) I didn’t need to use any of the effects at all and relied simply on the first three blocks for my basic tone. From the Stomp I ran straight into the house DI and had the signal sent back to me via Sennheiser wireless to my JH Audio Roxanne earphones. I have to say that I was a little worried about how the short scale/mudbucker would sound in the mix, but when I heard my monitor mix, I was simply blown away! What a tone! So round and plummy. It has such a different character to my other basses – I’m mainly a Fender guy but love the aforementioned JC bass too. I play mostly fingerstyle but the plectrum tone is simply sublime also. I was also a little worried about muscle memory on the shorter scale bass, but I had absolutely zero issues on the gig and found it super easy to get around the neck. We were aided by a great house monitor engineer for our mixes, although it did take 2 or 3 runs of a tune to get the auxes spot on. Once soundcheck was complete, we had a few hours to kill before being back on location for 8pm. There was a wonderful canteen where we ate, as well as a great green room with plenty of food and drink for all the guests. All of the above was complimentary and we were encouraged to help ourselves. Some of the other guests on the show included Liam Neeson, James Martin and Ross White (from Oscar winning short ‘An Irish Goodbye’), Patrick Duffy from Dallas, Vera Pauw (Irish Ladies Soccer Manager) and Irish Rugby Grand Slam winners Jamie Heaslip, Fiona Coghlan and Dan Leavy. It was great to meet all of the guests in the green room and what really struck me is just how nice everyone was. These guys/girls all rose to the very top of their individual professions, and yet were so warm and humble. I don’t think this is a coincidence at all and reaffirms my belief in people! It was great just to sit and chat with ‘celebrities’ to assuage the nerves a bit before our performance. The performance itself went smashingly. Before the show itself, the music supervisor had asked for a copy of our setlist so that he could decide which tune(s) we would play. This was strange as the tunes that he picked were possibly not what the band would have picked, if given the choice, however it did take the debate out of our preparation. We were expressly told at soundcheck that as soon as we were cued, we had to begin without any delay. We were ushered on set during a commercial break and introduced by the show host, then immediately started into the song – the ubiquitous ‘Whiskey In The Jar’. The show music supervisor had advised us that the track was to last no more than 3.5 minutes, and so we had to play it a bit faster than usual to fit it all in! But it worked perfectly in the end. When it was over, we were quickly ushered off again and the performance area was repurposed for the next segment by the stage hands. One of our band members in particular gets nervous before every gig, but I think we all delivered when the red light was on (see video at the bottom of the post) We also had one more tune to play to close out the show at around 11.30pm. It had been a long day at this point, but we were all keen for a taste of the live performance again after the success of the first tune. The second tune had to last no more than two minutes however! We ended up played a sharply truncated version of another one of our tunes – ‘McAlpine’s Fusiliers’, which consisted of only two verses, an instrumental and a chorus. It seemed to work well however and we got to the end without any fluffs! I was really happy with my tone on the final performance and it sounded especially good in the car when I played the Youtube video! It was an experience I will never forget. I was hugely grateful for the opportunity and humbled to be asked to be part of such an occasion. I was absolutely overwhelmed with all the messages with well wishes before the gig, and afterwards was exactly the same with everyone enjoying the show. A major tick off my bucket list and I’m excited to see if any more doors are opened for us following the appearance. It has been a busy few years and it’s really nice to get recognition for our graft. It took a few days to really appreciate the gravity of the performance, but now that I’m back down to earth I am feeling very grateful for every opportunity music has presented to me over my lifetime. It’s been great and I can’t wait to see what the future holds! Feeling inspired. I walked into my day job today to a round of applause which was embarrassing, but again everyone was so full of kind words and praise. I think in 10 to 20 years there may no longer be such a thing as 'live' TV, so it's really nice to have this as a memory and something to look back on. Sorry for the long post but I hope it gives a bit of insight into the workings of live TV performances that might some day be useful to someone else 😊 Danny Edited March 20, 2023 by acidbass 41 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jean-Luc Pickguard Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Congrats - it looks like you were really enjoying it on the video. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
acidbass Posted March 20, 2023 Author Share Posted March 20, 2023 12 minutes ago, Jean-Luc Pickguard said: Congrats - it looks like you were really enjoying it on the video. Thank you! Yeah it was great fun! I loved every minute really, once I got past the nerves! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Mickeyboro Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 (edited) 16 minutes ago, Jean-Luc Pickguard said: Congrats - it looks like you were really enjoying it on the video. Blimey - I hope you didn’t need a chiropractor! My neck twinged in sympathy… Great story, thanks for sharing. Edited March 20, 2023 by Mickeyboro 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
bassace Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Great, inspiring story. Congrats! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lidl e Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Too cool. How was Tubbers? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
uk_lefty Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Loved reading this! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Daz39 Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Awesome! What an achievement, well done all of you! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Pat2019 Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Fair play to you! Looked like you made the most of a good time. Thanks for sharing the experience. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
acidbass Posted March 20, 2023 Author Share Posted March 20, 2023 3 hours ago, lidl e said: How was Tubbers? He was a total gent man. Took the time to come and talk with us pre show, then remembered each of our names after. A cool guy and a lot taller than I imagined for some reason! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Waddo Soqable Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 Sounds like you had a blast ! Top job 👍 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lidl e Posted March 20, 2023 Share Posted March 20, 2023 10 minutes ago, acidbass said: He was a total gent man. Took the time to come and talk with us pre show, then remembered each of our names after. A cool guy and a lot taller than I imagined for some reason! Nice one. RTE is just a few Km from my gaff. Did you go out into town after? 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
acidbass Posted March 21, 2023 Author Share Posted March 21, 2023 (edited) 1 hour ago, lidl e said: Nice one. RTE is just a few Km from my gaff. Did you go out into town after? Yeah we had an afterparty at The Barge Bar. It was pretty cool, the rugby guys joined us but town was pretty quiet by that point (after midnight). A great day! Edited March 21, 2023 by acidbass 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
naxos10 Posted March 21, 2023 Share Posted March 21, 2023 Really excellent acidbass well done to you and the band. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
lidl e Posted March 21, 2023 Share Posted March 21, 2023 7 hours ago, acidbass said: Yeah we had an afterparty at The Barge Bar. It was pretty cool, the rugby guys joined us but town was pretty quiet by that point (after midnight). A great day! Awesome. Barge is basically my local. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
mr4stringz Posted March 21, 2023 Share Posted March 21, 2023 Amazing work! Congratulations! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Simon C Posted March 21, 2023 Share Posted March 21, 2023 Top stuff. You guys rocked and really looked like you were enjoying it. That's brave using a new bass. I agree it's important to get your new basses into your playing arsenal (I think I've used all 3 of mine at the 1st live opportunity, all of which were live streamed on YouTube), but I'm not sure I would have done for a live TV show going out to a million people. Kudos. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
asingardenof Posted March 21, 2023 Share Posted March 21, 2023 Nice work, sounded awesome. I assume that was a hammer-on when your sunglasses fell at around 1:30? If so nice save! 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
acidbass Posted March 21, 2023 Author Share Posted March 21, 2023 13 minutes ago, asingardenof said: I assume that was a hammer-on when your sunglasses fell at around 1:30? If so nice save! Lol! Yeah I thought I had them tightened enough but clearly not! I guess a hidden benefit of the compressor 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
acidbass Posted March 21, 2023 Author Share Posted March 21, 2023 1 hour ago, Simon C said: That's brave using a new bass. I agree it's important to get your new basses into your playing arsenal (I think I've used all 3 of mine at the 1st live opportunity, all of which were live streamed on YouTube), but I'm not sure I would have done for a live TV show going out to a million people. Kudos. Yeah I was worried but I sort of bought the bass to use on TV as I wanted something a bit esoteric! It worked out great Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Crusoe Posted March 21, 2023 Share Posted March 21, 2023 Well done Danny, congratulations. Sounds like a great time. 1 Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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