How was your gig last night?

[niceguyhomer]

Played at The Priory in Lancaster t'other night - it's a huge 500 year old listed church. Getting a decent sound was a bit tricky but we went down really well with the congregation of about 100. Here's a quick pic.

[Cat Burrito]

Winchester last night & I enjoyed it. I thought the band did well. The (Canadian) headliner did a rant about musicians from the UK & had the audacity to compare himself to Check Berry in how he picks up bands to work with. The punch line was he had found this great band and they were all from overseas. As a working UK musician I found that a little offensive. Still the promoter seemed more impressed with us than him. Karma!

[Cat Burrito]

[quote name='waynepunkdude' post='990023' date='Oct 16 2010, 11:09 AM']We had a gig lined up supporting Kunt and the Gang last night but or drummer had to go to Blackpool we knew in advance but due to me being away on business all week we couldn't have a practice. We don't like pulling out of gigs so a message was sent to the two guitarists that went 'you guys got acoustics?' got 2 messages back saying yes so we f***ing did it, was a lot of fun crowd seemed to enjoy it, winner.
[/quote]
Careful Wayne, you'll get an ASBO!

[karlfer]

After last weeks crap night, we were all a bit twitchy, but last night at The Stocks in Walkden, it was a blinder.
Great crowd, owners, place to play.
Sadly the next free date they could put us in is next June.
Crackin night Grommet

[witterth]

[quote name='niceguyhomer' post='992552' date='Oct 18 2010, 06:11 PM']Played at The Priory in Lancaster t'other night - it's a huge 500 year old listed church. Getting a decent sound was a bit tricky but we went down really well with the congregation of about 100. Here's a quick pic.

[/quote]
I want this gig AL!!!
(BTW looking cool yourself! special K diet?)
PS, not just flattery to get gig

[Spike Vincent]

Surprisingly good,considering it was my first one for 13 years.Persuaded to do it for our original Uberfan's birthday,it all went well,good crowd,and,most importantly we got fed.Might even do it again.

[bluesparky]

Once again, it wasn't a gig I was playing at, but one I was working on.
O2 indigo, DVD shoot and the notoriously temperamental parts of the show that I'm responsible worked a treat for the telly-box-video-dvd filming of the gig, - happy days.
Some day soon I'll have another gig where I'm playing!

[karlfer]

[quote name='essexbasscat' post='990964' date='Oct 17 2010, 11:10 AM']Oh dear

Another potentially good gig ruined by the guitarist being too loud. Trouble is, he also controls the PA.

Had a last minute call - out to fill in for another local legend that had accidentally double booked himself elsewhere. All well and good. Until the halfway point.

Our guitarist / frontman and PA controller regularly turns up the volume at the halfway point. He's never explained why, even though I've asked him why he does it. Last night, he turned up to such an extent that the gain on my Ampeg B2RE was set to 2 'O Clock and the master at 3 'O Clock, in other words, full up, with my Precision going into it. This is for a small / medium size pub, with my Ampeg into one GS 112. Rating 250 Watts at 8 ohms.

I asked him to turn it down but he said no.

Thing is, I don't know if;

- it's an adolescent desire to just be loud. Repressed in childhood ?

- it's because he honestly thinks that significantly turning up at the half way point somehow enhances the evening's entertainment. Again, I have asked him about this, be he avoids answering the question. He has previously ruined the very good PA settings for the first half of a gig by turning up in this manner. The second half was abysmal as a result.


Thing is, to acheive this exercise in childish behaviour, this guitarist;

- Selfishly damages the hearing of everyone around him to acheive an aim he can't, or won't explain. It is selfish, as he refused to turn down when I asked him to.

- Sacrifices articulation, dynamics, phrasing and to a large extent, listening and teamwork by adopting this stance.


On the plus side, we can busk practically anything (that's in his style and to his liking), he does get the gigs and I've done more stage work with this guy than anyone else in my musical career.

But I do find myself thinking more and more about the musical career I'm sacrificing to have my ears damaged in this way. Additionally, I also find excessive volume highly irritating, even very annoying.
I know our moods are under our own control and not the product of our circumstances, but I have to say, some things are just genuinely very annoying.


The irony ? At the end of the evening we were offered a residency. At least I can use the income to finance a set of ER15 earplugs.

[i]It's like rain, on your wedding day[/i]
[i]it's the free ride, when you've already paid[/i]
[i]it's the good advice, that you just can't take[/i]
[i]and who would have thought, it figures[/i]

T[/quote]


ER25's?
I know a guitard who used to do this, his excuse was more bodies in, more volume soaked up by crowd.
NOT ON BLOODY STAGE MATE!
Enjoy the residency and well done

[EskimoBassist]

Really good gig last night in Leeds, upstairs in The Library. Absolutely packed and enough money to justify the travel from Birmingham.

[thisnameistaken]

Opened for spunge at the Duchess in York. Our set went great; we were tight, lively, our trumpet player moved about a bit more which I'd asked her to do, our singer's diction and mic technique was much improved which I'd asked him to do, and everybody got up to check us out so all that went well, but the atmosphere with the other bands was weird.

Spunge weren't sharing any gear so we set up our kit infront of theirs and the sound guy (who was great - go play the Duchess it's a good no-bullshit venue, and pretty big) had to lift a cover they'd placed over their kit so he could mic ours - half-way through our sound check one of the spunge guys comes out on stage and yells 'Oh I'll put this cover back myself shall I?'.

Then after our set I went to find the band who were on before us, found the bassist backstage and asked 'Did you bring an amp?' and I was genuinely surprised when he said no. So being nice I told him he could use mine, and to be fair he didn't f*** with it, but I was surprised that he hadn't asked me when he arrived, especially given that we loaded in at the same time, or even that he hadn't contacted us prior to the gig to ask about sharing my amp. Very poor.

Then during spunge's set the singer announced 'I would thank the support bands but they've already gone home so they can go f*** themselves'. We were all standing at the back of the room at the time. So f*** them. We were supposed to be opening for them at the Cockpit next week, so we were glad we turned it down.

I've decided that at future gigs I will say to our singer 'Hey, do you remember that night we played with spunge?'. And I will do this every gig for the next however many years.

Edited October 24, 2010 by thisnameistaken

[Toasted]

[quote name='EskimoBassist' post='997960' date='Oct 23 2010, 12:46 PM']Really good gig last night in Leeds, upstairs in The Library. Absolutely packed and enough money to justify the travel from Birmingham.[/quote]

Did you support Kassius?

[Lozz196]

Played at The Blacksmiths Arms in St Albans last night. First time there. We set up, and just before going on, a bunch of guys who had obviously been drinking all day sat right next to where we were playing and remarked "a drum kit, I`ll have a go on that". Then, as we were abt to start, one of them grabbed hold of the mic - so our singer grabbed him, and told him to f*ck off away from it. One of the "mates" said there was no need to be aggressive, to which our singer replied "we`re a punk band".

Anyway, this was great, as we started full-on, and did two 1-hr sets. Had people up dancing, even the drunk-lads, and we were all best of friends by the end of the evening. We couldn`t have set that up - it gave us a real good kick to go on as hard and fast and tight as possible, not taking anything for granted, and we played a blinder, probably the best we`ve played for a while. Only slight downside was that as The Blacksmiths is a "step up" in class from our usual establishments (more the audience were a bit more cultured really), So What wasn`t received very well by some of the audience - tho others loved it.

All in all, a great evening, and hope to have many more there.

[WalMan]

Not actually my gig, as I had to watch another guy filling my boots with the proggy band I am in.

Looked like it was going to be a strange one as it was a basically a folk/acoustic music club so the "support" was various earnest acoustic acts to be followed by the full electric prog but actually it went really well for them (dammit ) Probably helped by a load of friends into prog being there and so whooping it up. Before they went on it looked like it was going to be one of "those" gigs that you're talking about years later for all the wrong reasons, but thankfully not.

Bring your own booze, so MrsW tucked into a bottle of wine & kept exiting at the start as she was unable to behave herself , and we forgot to switch phones to silent so in the middle of a gentle acoustic number her Nokia kicked off with its banging house ring tone leading to scrabbling in the handbag to find it and kill it, which seemed to take an age.

Still wish I could have had a go, but there's always next time.

[E sharp]

The Grapes , in Bury St Edmunds .

As usual rammed full . Just a late one as usual here . Finishing at 1:30 am , Hit the sack just after 4 - Rock'n'Roll .

Big family kids do 12 noon next day - NOT Rock'n'Roll . Ho Hum .

[dave_bass5]

Social club gig on Sat. I got down there (2 hour drive, pleasant enough), told all the guys about my new CV P bass, opened the gig bag and to my surprise there was my CV Jazz.
Not a big deal, except the pups weren't wired in, strap pins weren't screwed in as the screws were too thin (i had just taken the strap locks off it to put on my CV P the night before) and my only strap had strap locks on it that are very firmly secured and wouldn't come off.

I had to wire the pups using Gaffa tape, plug the holes for the strap pins using drum stick splinters and borrow a very, very, short strap off my guitarist.

Gig went well though, we played so quietly you could actually hear everything. It made a nice change and the small but appreciative audience made the night pass quickly.

Its the first time ive done anything like that before, and hope its the last. It could have been much worse as i wasn't going put the pups back in just yet.

[BigRedX]

Played at Dogma in Nottingham with Dick Venom as part of the Hockley Hustle. I can't believe given all the Nottingham BassChat members there are that no-one else here was playing as well...

However on with the gig. Overall not bad. I was suffering from a really bad cold so dosed up to the eyeballs on painkillers and other cold meds, so my perception of the event was a bit strange.

Everything seemed to be well organised, there was a drum kit and backline supplied for all the bands to use. Unfortunately whoever had set up the stage obviously had never played in a band before since the drums were in one corner and the bass amp was over on the other side of the stage. The PA "crew" muttered something about being able to put the bass in the monitors, but that to me is trying to find a solution to a problem that shouldn't have existed in the first place. Also small wedge monitors great for vocals (best sounding vocal foldback I've had on a small stage) and guitars but as I suspected completely crap for bass.

All this meant that it was quite as tight as we'd like it to be and it took a couple of songs to get into it, but the audience seemed to enjoy it. Had a friend come from Manchester to see us play and he said it's the best band he's seen me with.

Onwards...

[EskimoBassist]

[quote name='Toasted' post='998592' date='Oct 24 2010, 01:55 AM']Did you support Kassius?[/quote]

No, Not Great Men were the headline act I think.

[WHUFC BASS]

[quote name='dave_bass5' post='999706' date='Oct 25 2010, 09:34 AM']I had to wire the pups using Gaffa tape, plug the holes for the strap pins using drum stick splinters and borrow a very, very, short strap off my guitarist.[/quote]

You are McGiver and I claim my 5 bob. I didn't even know you could do that !

[dave_bass5]

[quote name='WHUFC BASS' post='999848' date='Oct 25 2010, 11:46 AM']You are McGiver and I claim my 5 bob. I didn't even know you could do that ![/quote]

LOL, it wasn't easy i can tell you. I was a bag of nerves all the way through the gig, thinking it will either cut out or fall off the strap but it was fine.

The reason the pups weren't wired in was i wanted to try my HW-one pups in the bass but thought it best to keep the stock pups in the bass until i got around to it, and these two had just gone back in after taking my Wizards out.

It actually sounded really nice at the gig and ive now wired them in properly.

n fact a bass player came up to me at the end of the night to tell me he also plays covers in a band, with a pick like i do, and was very impressed with the tone from my Fender ;-)

Just goes to show, no one notices if your playing a Squier or a MIA, as long as it sounds good thats all they care about.

[Mog]

Cracking session yesterday. 20+ bands, all on top form. Pics to follow

Pics as promised. Still shattered after this one.
[attachment=62295:24.jpg]
[attachment=62296:30.jpg]
[attachment=62297:26.jpg]
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Edited October 27, 2010 by Mog

[ShergoldSnickers]

Just about to sit down and play back a radio broadcast that Fear of Bicycles did last night. Crammed into a tiny studio - the drummer has enough room for a snare and cymbal , and I had to leave the bass rig poking in through the studio door.

We were asked to do 9 five minute ditties spread over three hours. After standing for three hours with my bass around my neck my back is just a little tired today. The radio station? Vixen Radio a local radio station and it was 'The Fox's Den slot 9pm 'til 12.00 midnight.

Normally, the band has a bit longer to explore, develop and expand* on improvisations, being limited to five minutes was hard work mentally, but good fun. If any of the slots are any good I might post them up on BC.

*This is what is [i][b]supposed[/b][/i] to happen.

[Mog]

Handy gig in one of the locals last night. Fancy dress affair.
[attachment=62608:pirate.jpg]

Another gig in drag, love it!
Next up is ourselves and Diamond Head. Cant wait!!

[Clarky]

First gig with new band Rattlin Bone last night at The Miller near London Bridge. Fantastic evening (lots of burlesque, circus showpeople, Halloween dressing up etc) and my first gig on DB. Here's a pic or two. You can't even see the horn section who are left of stage. There were 15 of us in total!

[attachment=62680:rattlin_bone_187.JPG][attachment=62681:rattlin_bone_189.JPG]

[duke of prunes]

it went well. our first show in 6 months. good crowd. we kicked ass.

[MacDaddy]

[quote name='Clarky' post='1007313' date='Oct 31 2010, 01:32 PM']First gig with new band Rattlin Bone last night at The Miller near London Bridge. Fantastic evening (lots of burlesque, circus showpeople, Halloween dressing up etc) and my first gig on DB. Here's a pic or two. You can't even see the horn section who are left of stage. There were 15 of us in total!

[attachment=62680:rattlin_bone_187.JPG][attachment=62681:rattlin_bone_189.JPG][/quote]

glad the hand healed in time! I'm guessing it was still a bit sore after?