How was your gig last night?

[Bluewine]

18 hours ago, hiram.k.hackenbacker said:

I love all the bands I'm in and all the people in them, but I regard the drummers as my wing men. Fortunately across the four main bands (excluding dep stuff) it only involves two different drummers.

They are both committed, learn the stuff and play excellently. My enjoyment of gigging would take a huge knock if this wasn't the case.

I really don't think I could carry on with drummers I couldn't rely on. @ahpook - hope you get it sorted.

Thanks, I'm 70 and gigging more than ever in my life. Even with our drummer issue, I have it pretty good. 

 

If you've got good gigs and good health you've got it made.

 

DaryL

[Bluewine]

On 06/12/2024 at 04:17, ahpook said:

 

The singer is very aware...he was visibly angry last night on stage.

 

The guitarist not so...he's good friends with the drummer, they share a flat, so he's ignoring it tbh.

 

Some serious thought required.

 

The only emotion I let anyone see at a gig is the huge smile on my face.

 

Daryl

[zbd1960]

Orchestra gig tonight in Carlisle with the cello. A première of a new work, Holst's Perfect Fool ballet suite then the Lieutenant Kijé suite by Prokofiev and the Carol Symphony by Hely-Hutchinson. Decent audience around 200. Survived despite the H-H being very tricky....

[tauzero]

Last night's gig was the Black Bear in Tewkesbury. A very old pub which was renovated a little while ago, car parking was 500 metres away but we could park outside for load in and out. We were originally told the pub would do our sound, the manager who told us that subsequently left and then we were told we'd be using their speakers for FOH but needed everything else. So I just put everything in the car.

 

It turned out that they have active speakers attached to the beams along the pub - I just needed to plug the main outs from the mixer into the wall. We only put vocals through the PA (I'm going to start putting a bit of bass drum through too). And as I was most of the way through setting things up, I realised that my mic stand was in the stands bag, which I'd left in the car as I didn't need the speaker stands, and parked in the car park. Damn. Still, the staff were very nice and gave us free drinks (and the Hopfather was rather nice).

 

The white things on the beam above the guitarists (also just about visible above me) are the speakers.

 

 

The gig itself went very well. Very enthusiastic audience, although one who had (judging by the state of his shirt) been doing a lot of quaffing [1] let his exuberant dancing exceed his coordination and collided with a monitor a couple of times - the first time, it pulled the mains lead out (must start feeding it through the handle) which Mrs Zero saw and quickly rectified. There was also an old bloke with a harmonica who just kept blowing it (mostly inaudibly). I kept thinking "Not now, Arthur" - quite appropriately as it happened, the Roses Theatre is just around the corner and that's where Eric Morecambe died.

 

We came home as the wind was getting up - a sixty mile drive for us and the drummer, much less for the singer, somewhere in between for the other guitarist. At least the M42 closure had been cancelled so it wasn't too bad a drive. The journey down had been rather worse - rush hour traffic on a Friday and a crash on the M42 so we went round the M6/M5 instead.

 

[1] Quaffing is like drinking but messier - T. Pratchett

[Norris]

24 minutes ago, tauzero said:

There was also an old bloke with a harmonica who just kept blowing it (mostly inaudibly). I kept thinking "Not now, Arthur"

😂

[StingRayBoy42]

TODAY! AND TONIGHT!

Two very different gigs! I use the term loosely.

Up at unacceptable for a Saturday o'clock to drive to Tamworth (through Storm Darragh, mind you... pelting rain, high winds and yet *still* bellends (mostly in Audis, Beamers, Mercs and Teslas) screaming down (up? (actually, let's not get into that again)) the M6 at about 90, undertaking, tailgating some idiot fop (me) in a Hyundai who's just trying to stay alive... arseholes) for 11am to play carols in the Ankerside shopping centre with the mighty Tamworth wind band. (Em (the TWB Euph player and JJO (more about them later!) trumpet player) asked me to stand in so I couldn't say no).

Imagine a depressed shopping centre in a modest regional town (with much to be modest about) with lots of closed units and not many shoppers around (it was supposed to be the christmas lights switch on but they cancelled it due to the weather) actually no, imagine dawn of the dead (is it dawn of the dead? Or day of the dead? The one where they're all stuck in that godforsaken mall with the zombies outside?) and you're probably closer to it.
It was *feezing* cold (Em bought me some fingerless gloves in the break, which helped) and a pretty grim experience... we played loads of stuff from 'The Red Book' (not the Mao Zedong one), which anyone who's been near a wind band in December will know - they're all beautiful arrangments and in horrible keys - six flats, anyone?!

We were supposed to play until 4 o'clock (!), but by about 2 we'd all lost the will to live, so the conductor suggested we just knock it on the head about half two (we all eagerly agreed) so we did.

We played and sounded OK all things considered but it wasn't an experience I'm in a rush to repeat. Unless Em asks really nicely again, which she probably will.

Then it was hotfoot to Brum for a quick pitstop at my Pa's place and to pick up Birmingham's finest Japanese non-binary morris dancing jazz trombonist and off to the Cameo Suite in Coleshill for the JJO Black Tie James Bond/Christmas (first set Bond themes, second christmas stuff. No idea why.) concert!

It took ages to get there due to horrendous weather and a couple of roads blocked by fallen trees (!) but we made it in time for a quick top 'n' tail rehearsal.
The first set (Bond) sounded fantastic - The main theme sounds great, Goldfinger was mint, Skyfall was really good, Writing's on the wall (how a man can sing that high is beyond me) sounded superb and Live and let die (the Stan Kenton big band arrangement) was a particular highlight, the trumpets reach notes that are far too high to reasonably exist. Oh and nobody does it better is an absolute belter - the flute in the intro which I'd never really been able to hear before was the glaze on the cherry on the icing on the cake. I drop D (Hipshot) on that one for extra phatness.
Five differnt singers!
Couple of minor flubs, but overall we sounded great.

A friend of the BL who's a pro player (West End type stuff) said some lovely things about my playing at half time, which was nice.

Second set was all the christmas stuff, not as exciting to play as the Bond themes, but a couple of good'uns in there... The opener was It's the most wonderful time of the year, which is ace to play, my part in Jingle Bells is bonkers - four pages of relentless FAST crochets... I even hit a couple of the right notes (purely by accident), we did a weird Latin style arrangement of God Rest Ye Merry Gentleman which is a taste I have so far failed to acquire, we did a lovely (Tom Kubis) arrangement of O Holy Night which is really weird and tricky but it all came together (Soprano sax solo by Sarah and Flugle solo by Steve) and a cracking playout/mashup which cracks along at about 800 bpm.

Sold out audience of about 90-100 people (all friends and family, we're a 'community' band) who were all dressed up to the nines in black tie/dinner jackets/posh frocks and were very appreciative.

Played the 70s (reissue mex) Precision -> small board (VTDI -> Thumpinator (the secret weapons!)) -> MB 802 which sounded cracking! I was at the front for some reason and the BL commented how good the Bass sounded which is always nice to hear.
Full on suited and booted affair (Midnight Blue 1460 DMs with orange laces (the band logo is orange on black)).

Packed up, dropped Brum's finest JNBMDJT off, The Wondermints on the way home, back about 1230 (avoiding more downed trees) for a *very* stiff V&T and the remains of yesterdays Jambalaya.

And so to bed, and looking forward to a Sunday of doing absolutely NOTHING.

 

Edited December 8 by StingRayBoy42

[tubbybloke68]

Just home from a great gig up at the stables in Milton Keynes with the Phil Collins tribute’ no jacket required’. Fantastic audience as usual and always such a pleasure and privilege to play at this wonderful venue. Some guy donated £1000,(yes £1000) to our charity the bridge house trust for the homeless. Another kind person gave £100! Never ceases to amaze me , our audiences appreciation and generosity .Decided to use my status empathy 5, it’s been a while since it’s had an outing but really enjoyed playing it.A lovely thing indeed. 
‘Appy days!😊

[SumOne]

Played at on old slightly run down independent country pub last night.

 

Didn't look promising to start: Stormy weather, small space, not many people, dogs, skittle alley and billiards table and open fire sort of real ale pub - didn't seem like the place for quite a loud lively 7 piece ska band.

 

....but it turned out great, almost entirety down to the landlords and small crowd of about 30 people (it can't have been profitable paying us) who were all really friendly, welcoming, all knew each other (the pub closes when the landlord couple go on holiday as there are no other staff, and 10 customers went on holiday with them this year!), a proper boozy (lots of good cheap beer, no food served) community pub. Not the sort of country pub you see many of nowadays, they mostly seem to basically be restaurants in a pub building.

 

The music was all good, but that kinda felt secondary - mostly it was good to feel part of a communal party where everyone wanted (and therefore had) a fun evening.

 

On the Bass playing side - I didn't use a compressor, and I missed it. I could tell the slight lack in punch and consistency.

 

Edited December 9 by SumOne

[Jackroadkill]

7 hours ago, StingRayBoy42 said:

Birmingham's finest Japanese non-binary morris dancing jazz trombonist

 

Just when you think you've seen it all, eh?!

[dmccombe7]

BLOCKBUSTARZ Glam covers at The Auld Gambling Hoose in Alloa last night.

An old Bingo hall that they are now trying to convert to a decent sized live music venue.

Biggest problem last night was their heating system was down and they were using 2off propane space heaters at front of stage facing audience so the stage was freezing cold at the start. Changing room had no heating whatsoever and we didn't hang around too long in there but they are trying hard to make it work and all credit to them.

Average audience size at the moment is 80-120 which is smallish in such a large venue but we reckon we had 100 ish in all sitting down front end so it looked ok from stage area.

Load in was great from their private car park at rear straight thru to front of stage area and then a lift onto stage from there. We hired a PA for this one because of its size which was a good decision.

Kick off 8pm to 10:30 limit due to their licence restrictions to be closed by 11pm. We ran on to 10:45pm due to encore requests. To be fair the female staff were top notch and offered us free drinks, coffee or tea and even offered to help load the cars at night. No pressure to get packed up for 11pm at all 

Few mistakes on the night which is unusual for us but the cold was having an adverse effect. 

Good night tho and everyone was shouting for more at the end. They definitely want us back and will contact us again in January to arrange dates.

Usual rig of Sandberg VM4 into Shure Wireless, Mesa TT800 and Mesa SW210/115. Sound on stage was generally good altho 2nd set vocals in monitors seemed to get louder and i struggled to hear my on stage amp but struggled on. Guitarist said he noted same. ? Odd  one. 

Anyways a stop at McDonalds on way out of Alloa was a def. Then a wee 1hr and 20min drive home for 1:30am ish.

All in all a good night.

Dave

 

[Woodinblack]

Not my gig, the drummers gig with his other band. He played the pub we are playing new years eve on, only when he got there he saw posters for another group at new years eve. So he asked and they don't remember booking us (we do, and confirmed it), a whole year ago. Also the gig that we had the week before christmas contacted us to say they didn't have enough ticket sales for their event so they are cancelling it, so there is Christmas gone as well as a non trivial amount of money!

Going to be a quiet Christmas, have nothing to the end of January now

 

[neepheid]

Last night, a new venue for Nine Lives - the St. Olaf Golf Hotel in Cruden Bay.  It was a bit blowy driving up to the place - thought this might limit attendance.  Place is nice though, we got to set up in the lounge bar which felt like playing a gig in someone's living room (albeit with a bar at the opposite end.  Setup was a doddle - small room, levels were easy to dial in.  In the first half, it was surprisingly busy - a group of 6 or 7 ladies determined to dance the night away made for a great time.  Unfortunately, they had to leave to go to another social engagement (for which one of them apologised - that was nice).  Second half was a bit dead, unfortunately and annoyingly there were quite a few folk through in the main bar but barely any of the effers came through, despite me going through a couple of times in an attempt to shame them into it.  Honestly, you can take your second hand "enjoyed the band" comments delivered later by the staff and stick them up your holes sideways as far as I'm concerned.  Props to one lass who kept coming through when she heard a song she liked, you're alright!

 

Gear was the G4M "rat" bass, then the Epiphone/DiMarzio Les Paul into the Markbass cubes.  One plus from last night was finding the culprit for some recent pedalboard nonsense - my old 80s Yamaha compressor is getting cranky and making humming sounds which change when you wiggle at it.  I removed it from the signal chain last night and played without it, but it looks like its time may be up.

 

 

[dmccombe7]

51 minutes ago, Woodinblack said:

Not my gig, the drummers gig with his other band. He played the pub we are playing new years eve on, only when he got there he saw posters for another group at new years eve. So he asked and they don't remember booking us (we do, and confirmed it), a whole year ago. Also the gig that we had the week before christmas contacted us to say they didn't have enough ticket sales for their event so they are cancelling it, so there is Christmas gone as well as a non trivial amount of money!

Going to be a quiet Christmas, have nothing to the end of January now

 

thats pretty poor double booking. 

Sorry to hear about the Xmas gig but surely at Xmas venues get a decent amount of foot-fall sales.

Dave

[Simon C]

Friday was our (In Progress) 1st gig outside of Jam Night.  So 17 songs rather than 4.  We weren’t as tight over the 17 as we are for 4, and the error to song ratio probably went up a bit.

 

It was my company’s Christmas Party and I’d agreed to pick up and drop off the hired PA gear (a faff).  We had 2 hours to set up and soundcheck and took 1h52mins of it 😀.  The high / lowlight was finding out that the only monitor we’d managed to position an hour into set-up to be feedback free (space restriction in the restaurant), didn’t have the jack plugged in properly and was indeed feeding back😖. So we had no foldback.  The singer couldn’t hear herself.  Luckily a couple of us had in ears with us and a long connector that reached the desk so we sorted her out ok.

 

People seemed to enjoy it, some dancing and plenty of singing.  
 

Overall we enjoyed ourselves and were reasonably pleased with how it went.

[martthebass]

Not posted for a few weeks but our new named ‘Glam Viva!’ Band has been fairly busy as is typical for this festive time. Last Friday was at a nice private social club in Dronfield. Takes a bit of sorting as the sec likes the volume on the low side for a band but we’re happy to cater and just adjust fold back to give us a decent feel on stage. Vox was happy with sound out front though when he ventured out for his normal audience participation. We were pretty tight, my Sandy Lionel has a few gigs under its belt now and we’re bonding nicely. Ended up doing an extended encore set and promise of gigs for next year. Felt odd when we were asked for NYE 2025 but had to decline as we’re booked…..so we’re in the diary for NYE 2026!

[Stub Mandrel]

Go back a few months, we got booked to play for the South Wales Liverpool Supporters at the Tramshed (epic venue). Out rythym guitarist is a member.

 

Then instead of 10% of their 9,000 members, it looked like less than 1% were interested. So it got moved to Taffs Well Football Club (essentially a portacabin with a capacity of about 70 with a band in).

 

So yesterday I braved the tail end of Storm Darragh to turn up at a locked gate. Saw the drummers van disappearing down a narrow country lane to one side in the dark...

 

Rang the vocalist. The rest of the guys were at the Rugby Club, trying to see if it was the venue. No. I suggested trying the local Ex's club, but the RG eventually got on the blower and discovered we were five miles further up the valley in Treforest. Much wending up narrow hillside terraces. Turned out the RG had got a message montsh ago saying it WOULDN'T be in Taffs Well and he misunderstood it...

Anyway usual valleys audience, really great and helped us set up. First set was great, about 80 people all in a good mood, we did classic rock. I was using my Harley Benton kit bass with a Squier neck and it sounded great. I also wore my "Temu Stylish Pig T-Shirt (Style: Sexy). In the break a large chap in the loo looked at my t-shirt and said "F- me! It's a mirror!"

 

We were doing two sets, one either side of Liverpool legend Andy Hodgson, who was driving all the way down and arrived 15 minutes before we finished our first set. He was meant to do an hour but did over an hour and a half and even though I'm not a Liverpool fan, he was excellent entertainment and the supporters went crazy. He used our PA and was very generous to us. Poor had about half an hour of endless selfies etc. before hitting the road for Liverpool again.

 

Second set I used my Flea jazz. It was 10:45 before we went back on and people were slowly fading away so we just did a thirty-minute set focusing on what we knew people would like - Dakota, Motorcycle Emptiness (brilliant non-naff song for Welsh venues!), Saturday Night, Heroes./and some up-tempo songs like Rock and Roll. Lots of great comments but not the reception Andy had!

Got back to Penarth in time for a couple of swift Penderyn Madeira cask whiskys at the Bear's Head.

 

Photos in next post as will be from my phone.

[Stub Mandrel]

Pics...

 

 

 

 

[Mudpup]

I played my final gig with Yellowhouse last night at a packed out Cow and Telescope in Southend. That's me now taking at least 6 months off now to get over the last year and concentrate on family and personal stuff without weekend gigs and doing all the booking and social media getting in the way. I lost my dad a few months back, my mother in law 2 months before that and my closest uncle at Xmas last year. It's been a difficult year for many reasons and I want to totally switch off from band commitments. I handed my notice in to the guys in July and they wanted to fold the band rather than replace me so we cancelled all the gigs apart from 6 of our favourites. 

 

The gig was awesome. We filled the place and they were ready to party! People travelled to Southend from all over the place in the storm to say goodbye. We had some from the West Midlands, Guildford, Margate. Some friends and family turned up unexpectedly as well. I was truly humbled by it and the love from the locals was overwhelming.

 

I have a little tendon issue which flared up in the last 4 songs which was fun - it means I can't actually lift my fretting index finger off the board. It just locks down solid and I can't lift it off. You sort of stare at it willing it to move and it doesn't. So that was fun trying to work round it but I got through it ok. And then to add to the excitement some d##khead in a whizz bang BMW M5 decided to floor it outside the pub on the wet road as we were loading out. He narrowly missed us but managed to hit 5 other cars and nearly ended up in the 24hr shop that I was walking towards to get some milk shake and choccies for the trip home.

 

You've probably seen my typical gig pics and videos so here's some of Carlos Fandango instead... 

 

 

Edited December 8 by Mudpup

[dmccombe7]

Few pics appeared from our Alloa gig.

Dave

 

 

 

[Muzz]

A late one for last weekend, a decent night at a place we like playing; it's a fair trek, being up in Barrowford North of Burnley, but always worth it for the lively crowd; it's one of those 'last place open in town' pubs, which is middling till about 10:45, then someone flicks the Crowd switch, and instantly the place is rammed. Played it as a trio, which meant more room onstage and more money - I mean, seriously, what's not to like? The drummers situation is settling down now, it's a choice of #1 or #2, and I love playing with either of them, so all good. Only fly in the ointment is that was apparently our last gig there, down to some hoohah between the agent, the landlord and the BL - he didn't go into detail (he controls all the gig arrangments (his choice)), so I just shrugged and loaded up.

 

I did have an interesting conversation afterwards with a girl in her 20s who'd liked the band, and introduced herself as 'Brooke Nutter'. Given where we were (in the deeps of Pendle) I asked the inevitable question about Alice, and she said yeah, she was related on her Mum's side. Good job she liked the band; it's hard to load the gear out if you've been turned into a newt...

 

Lightweight Cheapo P, Stomp, inears and, erm, trainers*.

 

* I'm not very shoe-focused; they might be Asics or something? I've had them years. Sorry.

 

Edited December 8 by Muzz

[mep]

Back in Brixham last night for our last gig of the year. Our drummer brought his electric kit as a test for a couple of small pubs we play. At first it didn't really work with a mono out to the desk, but with a L & R output into 2 channels it was OK. Our modest PA and monitors just about delivered the drums, but he'll look at other options next time. It was bit quiet at first  possibly due to the weather, bit filled out for the second set.

Edited December 8 by mep

[tauzero]

18 hours ago, StingRayBoy42 said:

Up at unacceptable for a Saturday o'clock to drive to Tamworth (through Storm Darragh, mind you... pelting rain, high winds and yet *still* bellends (mostly in Audis, Beamers, Mercs and Teslas) screaming down (up? (actually, let's not get into that again)) the M6 at about 90, undertaking, tailgating some idiot fop (me) in a Hyundai who's just trying to stay alive... arseholes) for 11am to play carols in the Ankerside shopping centre with the mighty Tamworth wind band. (Em (the TWB Euph player and JJO (more about them later!) trumpet player) asked me to stand in so I couldn't say no).

 

If I'd known, I might have considered coming out to see you. OTOH, Mrs Zero went out yesterday morning and reported back that it was dreadful weather, so maybe not, and I hadn't got to bed till about 3 with a long drive home and post-gig buzz. Ankerside has been gradually bleeding out for years since Ventura Park (the big just-out-of-town shopping centre) opened, hence all the closed shops.

[Boodang]

3 minutes ago, mep said:

Back in Brixham last night fir our last gig of the year. Our drummer brought his electric kit as a test for a couple of small pubs we play. At first it didn't really work with a mono out to the desk, but with a L & R output into 2 channels it was OK. Our modest PA and monitors just about delivered the drums, but he'll look at other options next time. It was bit quiet at first  possibly due to the weather, bit filled out for the second set.

I use an ekit when volume is an issue. I bought a LD Systems Icoa 15a (about £350) to put the kit through and I have to say it's awesome. It gives a full sound at low volumes but is capable of being pushed, I did a small open air gig, about 200 people, going just out the LD and it worked fine. We even put the bass through it as well for the small gigs to save on gear carrying and it works fine. One thing I finds that helps, is editing the ekit sounds. I have different eq settings in the brain for each of the kits I use that take into account the type of speakers it's going through.... there's a big difference between going into a PA with bins to going through a small speaker like the Icoa. Took me about a year to get the hang of the editing, if the kit has sample layering it really helps. Good luck.

[StingRayBoy42]

44 minutes ago, tauzero said:

 

If I'd known, I might have considered coming out to see you. OTOH, Mrs Zero went out yesterday morning and reported back that it was dreadful weather, so maybe not, and I hadn't got to bed till about 3 with a long drive home and post-gig buzz. Ankerside has been gradually bleeding out for years since Ventura Park (the big just-out-of-town shopping centre) opened, hence all the closed shops.

Yeah, the weather was abysmal!
You didn't miss much TBH but it would have been nice to meet a fellow BC'er without handing over a stack of cash. 😀

I don't think the dying shopping centre/high street is unique to Tamworth - Kidderminster's looking pretty run down, as is pretty much every town centre.

I blame the internet. 😟  And Tesco probably.

[neepheid]

Sorry for the sidebar, but could you Tamworth boys go and pull UPS's effin' hair for me?  Got a bass stuck at UPS Tamworth for the past 3 days...