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How was your gig last night?

bassninja

By bassninja,
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cheddatom Grand Master

cheddatom

Posted
Posted

Hope & Anchor last night. I'd been on a bit of a bender in London with my brothers and the booze combined with the heat was really getting to me. It turns out all I needed to do was play a sweaty gig to sort myself out!

 

Great to bump into @NancyJohnson . I really enjoyed your set! Great sound from that Warwick (despite the tiny combo). The bottle of red from your singer was very generous! 

 

When we got there to load in at 1:30, we were told we had to wait upstairs until the sound engineer arrives. The guy blamed the "corporate knobheads at Green King". Fair enough but the load-in time was agreed. The soundman turned up at 2:40 and doors were supposed to be 3pm. There was a house kit on stage, even though we'd said we'd be bringing drums and agreed kit share with the promoter. The soundman says "oh, you're not using the house kit? But we're already running so late!". Obviously I wanted to say "yeh, isn't that your fault?" but I smiled and nodded, moved the house kit to the side, set up my kit, and watched as he was still slowly lifting mic boxes out of his store room. I guess the house kit wouldn't have saved any time after all :) 

 

Our 3 guys at the front always take their own mics, it's a hygiene thing, and it's on the tech spec that goes to every gig. For some reason it's 50/50 whether the sound engineers will be happy or whizzed off about it. I don't get it. This guy was in the latter camp. Honestly, the speed he was moving and his general demeanour had me judging him to be the stereotypical horrible soundman and I was expecting a nightmare of a gig. Anyway, it might have taken 3 times as long as usual and delayed the whole gig, but it sounded absolutely fantastic! 

 

We played well to a very small crowd. It looked like 15 people to me, maybe a couple more, but in a small venue like that when everyone's having fun, it really doesn't matter.

 

Flat tyre on the van delayed our departure by almost an hour. Back to bed in Stoke by 1:30 so not too bad. Photo from a fan on facebook

 

ha.thumb.jpg.c7d1be5a841f1febd2c7df7d24c6f4c3.jpg

 

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JapanAxe Veteran

JapanAxe

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Posted
1 hour ago, Downunderwonder said:

No doubt. I guess the MC didn't introduce it properly or the couple weren't fussed about doing the whole 1st dance thing or it was a bunch of rednecks and that's how they do it in them thar parts.

No, I wouldn't have described any of the guests as rednecks, just a lot of love in the room ❤️

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asingardenof Grand Master

asingardenof

Posted
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1 hour ago, cheddatom said:

Hope & Anchor last night. I'd been on a bit of a bender in London with my brothers and the booze combined with the heat was really getting to me. It turns out all I needed to do was play a sweaty gig to sort myself out!

 

Great to bump into @NancyJohnson . I really enjoyed your set! Great sound from that Warwick (despite the tiny combo). The bottle of red from your singer was very generous! 

 

When we got there to load in at 1:30, we were told we had to wait upstairs until the sound engineer arrives. The guy blamed the "corporate knobheads at Green King". Fair enough but the load-in time was agreed. The soundman turned up at 2:40 and doors were supposed to be 3pm. There was a house kit on stage, even though we'd said we'd be bringing drums and agreed kit share with the promoter. The soundman says "oh, you're not using the house kit? But we're already running so late!". Obviously I wanted to say "yeh, isn't that your fault?" but I smiled and nodded, moved the house kit to the side, set up my kit, and watched as he was still slowly lifting mic boxes out of his store room. I guess the house kit wouldn't have saved any time after all :) 

 

Our 3 guys at the front always take their own mics, it's a hygiene thing, and it's on the tech spec that goes to every gig. For some reason it's 50/50 whether the sound engineers will be happy or whizzed off about it. I don't get it. This guy was in the latter camp. Honestly, the speed he was moving and his general demeanour had me judging him to be the stereotypical horrible soundman and I was expecting a nightmare of a gig. Anyway, it might have taken 3 times as long as usual and delayed the whole gig, but it sounded absolutely fantastic! 

 

We played well to a very small crowd. It looked like 15 people to me, maybe a couple more, but in a small venue like that when everyone's having fun, it really doesn't matter.

 

Flat tyre on the van delayed our departure by almost an hour. Back to bed in Stoke by 1:30 so not too bad. Photo from a fan on facebook

 

ha.thumb.jpg.c7d1be5a841f1febd2c7df7d24c6f4c3.jpg

 

Great action shot!

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Greg Edwards69 Mentor

Greg Edwards69

Posted
Posted

Back at the Haystack, Canvey, again. Not our finest hour. Definitely not up to our usual standard. I think the heat got to us all. Even my wife said we've sounded better, and didn't sound as tight as we usually are on several songs.

 

We also had a dep co-lead singer who we've been rehearsing with for a specific gig later this week* that our usual singer is unavailable for, who also wasn't sure if she could do this weekend's one either. In hindsight, we've been so focussed on new material for this next gig, we didn't get around to going over existing material we haven't played for 6 months with the dep signer that we thought was okay. In combination with brain fog and distraction from the heat, there were a number of errors (I even started playing "can you feel it" in the wrong key.

 

It's a tricky-sounding room, and again, with the heat, we just weren't disciplined enough to soundcheck properly, especially the IEM mix, as we were all getting irritable.

 

Although the pub wasn't as full as usual (again, the hot weather probably put a lot of people off coming out and would rather stay at home with a BBQ), the people who came said we sounded great and they had a good time.  Not as many people dancing, but I don't blame them. I was sweating just standing still before we started.  FWIW, the pub had aircon, but it's temperamental at best.

 

In complete contrast, we had a rehearsal on Sunday for the next gig* (even hotter, not to mention aching and tired) and we sounded much, much better. 🤷‍♂️

 

*Next gig is Wednesday evening, for a school prom! Not something we've done before so we've been learning a bucketload of new, recent songs for. And we have two dep lead singers as neither of our usual two can make it. Hence the focused rehearsals for this particular gig and complacency on older material.

 

Oh well, live and learn!

 

PS You wouldn't believe how challenging it's been selecting recent songs for an audience of 16 year old.  What I thought of as recent, some of these kids were still in nappies or weren't even born! - makes me feel old!

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neepheid Grand Master

neepheid

Posted
Posted
3 minutes ago, Greg Edwards69 said:

PS You wouldn't believe how challenging it's been selecting recent songs for an audience of 16 year old.  What I thought of as recent, some of these kids were still in nappies or weren't even born! - makes me feel old!

 

The young 'uns can surprise you sometimes.  On Friday night, a young lass, I'd say under 21 (but everyone looks young to me now) came up to the singer and asked if we could play Pink Floyd's "Brain Damage"!  We can't, but that was certainly an unexpected request!

 

If older songs have been featured on popular TV shows or some viral video then they can work.  And it continues to amaze me how many young folk dance to "Bad Moon Rising"...

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Greg Edwards69 Mentor

Greg Edwards69

Posted
Posted (edited)
43 minutes ago, neepheid said:

 

The young 'uns can surprise you sometimes.  On Friday night, a young lass, I'd say under 21 (but everyone looks young to me now) came up to the singer and asked if we could play Pink Floyd's "Brain Damage"!  We can't, but that was certainly an unexpected request!

 

If older songs have been featured on popular TV shows or some viral video then they can work.  And it continues to amaze me how many young folk dance to "Bad Moon Rising"...

Oh we still have some oldies in the set for these very reasons. Some songs are just ingrained into the public psyche no matter what the persons, or songs age. Living On A Prayer, September, Don't Stop Me Now, Johnny B Goode and Sweet Caroline (grrr) have all made the cut.

 

I have to say though, although we usually try to keep our repertoire up-to-date with recent songs they tend to be from certain 'comfortable' genres'. I've really enjoyed some of the recent songs I wouldn't have necessarily considered playing before. Lizzo's "Juice" and Dua Lipa's "Levitating" are a blast to play bass on, and Calvin Harris' "How deep is your love" is right out of our usual comfort zone, but still good fun to find a way to attack it and make it work for us.

Edited by Greg Edwards69
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Woodinblack Grand Master

Woodinblack

Posted
Posted
59 minutes ago, Greg Edwards69 said:

PS You wouldn't believe how challenging it's been selecting recent songs for an audience of 16 year old.  What I thought of as recent, some of these kids were still in nappies or weren't even born! - makes me feel old!

 

Pff - what I think of as recent (obviously the 80s), their parents weren't born!

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dmccombe7 Grand Master

dmccombe7

Posted
Posted
2 hours ago, NancyJohnson said:

 

image.thumb.png.56ec3339bbb7cdcc605a1dabcc12c15d.png

Please note i was kidding with my earlier comment on who copied who in 80's.

I went with Warwick in late 80's because they were more readily available in Scotland thru Sound Control. I had never seen a Spector bass at that time.

Have to say i like that bass.

Dave

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scrumpymike Veteran

scrumpymike

Posted
Posted
3 hours ago, Woodinblack said:

Highway to hell I just walk around a bit, get a chance to drink, check the mix is fine. Its like Alright now, it is nice to get a bit of a break now and again!

Ha-ha! We do both and I usually try and get the audience started on the overhead clapping thing. With varying degrees of success.

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dmccombe7 Grand Master

dmccombe7

Posted
Posted

Have to admit i was surprised last year when the gym owner who is in his 30's started playing AC/DC and even more surprised when a lot of girls / women knew who they were and told him it was great to work out to.

A classic band never dies :laugh1:

Dave

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gafbass02 Veteran

gafbass02

Posted
Posted (edited)

We just got a couple of videos sent through  from a recent gig. The audio is a bit 'quick 'n' dirty straight off the desk, (had to tweak the bass in post a bit cause of tech issues caused by monitor spill). But anyway, here's a 'Royal Blood' cover. Its almost all bass from my Zoom B9.1ut with a bit of help from a sparrow Di and a graphic EQ pedal. The guitarist does play a few quiet bits, but otherwise its just me doing what I could fuddle together without spending any money when the band said they wanted to cover Royal Blood! 😂😂

 

Edited by gafbass02
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BassAdder60 Veteran

BassAdder60

Posted
Posted
5 minutes ago, gafbass02 said:

We just got a couple of videos sent through  from a recent gig. The audio is a bit 'quick 'n' dirty straight off the desk, (had to tweak the bass in post a bit cause of tech issues caused by monitor spill). But anyway, here's a 'Royal Blood' cover. Its almost all bass from my Zoom B9.1ut with a bit of help from a sparrow Di and a graphic EQ pedal. The guitarist does play a few quiet bits, but otherwise its just me doing what I could fuddle together without spending any money when the band said they wanted to cover Royal Blood! 😂😂

 

We do the same song ( female singer ) but we reversed it in as much our guitarist starts it off and I come in where the bass part starts. 
 

It sounds really full sounding that way and easier too !! 

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