How was your gig last night?

[Beer of the Bass]

A good weekend for me. On Friday, Jen and the Gents played Lebowski's in Edinburgh. This makes for an easy night, as I live about 200 metres down the same street! It's not a huge place, but it was pretty well filled, and a lot of familiar faces turned out. Enjoyed the other band, Ulysses jones, and I think we'll try and gig together some time in the future. I'm always quite surprised at how far my tiny GK MB200/EA Wizzy 10 rig will go in small venues like this, as I can sling it over my shoulder yet it filled the room just fine. Saturday afternoon we headed out in acoustic mode for some busking to the Christmas shoppers.
Then last night I headed down to an open mic night with the acoustic guitarist I play with and my double bass, played a couple of tunes and had a couple of pints. We're trying out some new tunes which use the bow a lot more than our older tunes did, so playing them live is keeping me on my toes.

Edited December 9, 2012 by Beer of the Bass

[swanbrook]

Lovin the chrimbo parties mixed in with the weddings, get to play some rockier stuff ! Love my band we have way to much fun

[Dr.Dave]

Unexpected. We were due a nght off but it came in as a cancellation. Cracker though at the Hop , Wakefield. - though some cheeky twat walked up mid song , took my pint out of my mic stand holder and drained it !!!

Our roadie 'had a word' !!!

I walked there and back as it's only half a mile away. This afternoons is even closer , 4pm kick off but I'm leaving the building strictly at 6pm because I'm off to see War of the Worlds tonight in Sheffield.

[Chrismanbass]

played the smaller room at the 02 academy islington last night after soundcheck the promotor took the artist aside and asked to book us for a support slot in the main room in february

[Roger2611]

Played The Cardigan Arms in Stanion last night (tiny village just outside Corby) tipical village pub with the band playing in one room and the crowd? stood in the other and neither band nor crowd should ever cross the others threshold!! Probably the hottest pub I have ever played in (not helped by the 3 par cans I used to cook the drummer (well you just have too don't you!!))
Landlord said we were the best band he had ever had in the pub (I have a feeling we are only the second band to play there) and has booked us again for next year, weird sound as half way through the second set everytime I played F# it felt like the building was going to crumble, by the time we had finished it had returned to normallity.....I have never been able to work out why that happens...any ideas?

! more gig to come this year depping on bass for the band I used to play guitar in...should be fun

[BassBus]

Our jazz band was backing a local jazz singer at Fiori restaurant in Galashiels. Seemed to go down well. One guy even came up to me afterwards to ask me about my bass He even recognised it as a Status In the Scottish Borders too. The last backwater of parochial community.

Anyway, it wasn't the easiest place to play. Long and narrow with a raised section on one side and lots of hard surfaces, with us stuck in a corner. Nightmare for sound. Turned out fine though. Lots of positive comments. Even met a guy I played with on a session years ago who I'd been told was dead. So there you go, there is life after death.

[JapanAxe]

Played lead guitar with a 3-piece in which I have been a 'permanent dep' since [i]May 2011[/i]. Gig was at a social club and went fine on the whole. I have told the guy who runs the band that I am doing no more in the New Year, as I need to leave the calendar clear for my own band.

So, this guy had a prospective replacement lead guitarist (who I will call Bloke) coming along to try out [i]on the gig[/i]. Blokee gets up in the break, and spends a lot of time setting up his amp and pedals (all separate, not on a board), and trying to tune his guitar. And his cables don't seem to be long enough. Half-way through our second set, Bloke is invited up and I take a seat in the audience. 3 mins later (an eternity in stage time), Bloke still can't get a sound from his rig, so I let him plug into my amp. His guitar output is way louder than mine, but he doesn't have the sense to back off the volume on his guitar. Volume wars ensue with drummer and vocalist. Bloke plays in 'bedroom blues' stylee. Lady from audience asks me if I am going back on, and is happy when I say yes, happier still when I agree to sing the number she has requested.

I get back onstage and have to stand in the tiny gap in front of bloke's loose clutter of fx pedals.

Is there a moral to this story? Hell yeah!

(1) A gig is a gig, an audition is an audition. If you make a nob of yourself at an audition, you probably won't get the job. Do it at a gig, and the band may not get asked back.
(2) Time and money devoted to ensuring that your kit is quick to set up, and reliable in operation, are well spent.
(3) Silent tuning good, audible tuning bad.

Just glad it wasn't 'my' band!

[Roland Rock]

A good gig with the Sweetpotato Soundsystem and varoius DJs playing reggae, Drum n Bass and Northern Soul. It was a lovely community feel, with soundcheck in the afternoon and then being treated to a curry before the gig. This was great fun with thirty odd people.

The Sweetpotato Soundsystem is a rediculous 16kw Void soundsystem, and they're not afraid to use it. Each of the four subs contains 2x18 drivers in an enormous enclosure with folded horns. During the DJ set, some notes actually blurred my vision! Pint glasses had to be held, as they would vibrate off the table if left unattended.

I DI'd into this system, but thankfully with a sensible sound guy.
The gig was fun, with a great atmosphere and loads of positive feedback.

My new cab, the '69er, performed well, although I think I suffered some phasing issues where I couldn't hear much bass on stage

[tonybassplayer]

Looking forward to being able to contribute to this thread again from next Sunday morning onwards

[seashell]

Saturday night I had a charity comedy gig. i mention it here, because also on the bill were a local band, The Dirty Old Folkers who are ace and deserve a big shout out.

The venue was a local community centre. I shouldn't complain because they'd let us have it for free, [b]but [/b]it was a huge, cold echoy room. We had to put out the chairs ourselves - they were of the grotty plastic kind and were so grubby looking I went over them all with Detol wipes. Lighting was just strip overhead lighting, but it wasn't working at the end of the room where the rostrums were for the performance. Venue couldn't understand why we didn't want to perform in the dark while the audience was brightly lit! Anyway, we changed it all round so we could get a bit of light on us.

Well, despite our misgivings about the venue, it went really well and the (small) crowd really loved it. We gave it our all and it must have come across.
After we'd done our comedy improv stuff, I had the pleasure of being able to sit back and watch the band. They are such fun.. difficult to describe but it's comedy folk type stuff. They are musically tight and full of exuberance. Their folk version of 'Killing in the name' is a joy to behold!

They also do some really rude stuff about w***ing etc. I imagine it to be the kind of stuff Dr Dave does only not so scary.

Got talking to the bass player afterwards. Really nice bloke, (but he's not on basschat).

[razze06]

Very nice short set on whistlebinkies band showcase last night. We were first up, everybody turned up on time, minimal amount of fuss, quick "soundcheck" to make sure everything was properly plugged in and working (and not at stupid volume). during the gig the sound on stage was quite poor but not unbearable, so we soldiered on.

Gig itself went really well, reasonably well attended for a school night, gave the audience 45 mins of our best and danciest soul/rock/funk, and everybody looked and sounded happy, including the manager who said there would be no problem getting a booking for the new year. Smiles all round!

pic here:

[url="https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/537532_10151295432561952_711703703_n.jpg"]https://fbcdn-sphotos-d-a.akamaihd.net/hphotos-ak-ash3/537532_10151295432561952_711703703_n.jpg[/url]

[chaypup]

Played in Gwdihw in Cardiff last night with a dep drummer as ours had a serious injury.

For someone who'd had 24 hours notice and we'd never met before, he was amazing!

Made up some stuff on the spot as we like to do and there were lots of our saxy robot dancers around the place so a winner all round!

[TRBboy]

Got to be one of the weirdest gigs ever last night......


It was a private party for a bunch of guys that have just finished a tour in Afghanistan. They basically completely ignored us! The guys were just hanging out chatting at the bar down the far end of the pub, whilst we were in effect playing to an empty room! There was no applause, no dancing, nothing. By the time we finished the first set, we were feeling pretty down, but the landlord said we were great, and the guy who booked us said we were awesome and that all the guys were really enjoying it, despite them not showing it! He said "we don't really do dancing or anything."

Strange gig, completely emotionless, but a gig nevertheless.

We've got a gig at a pub in Hereford tonight which should be a bit more lively, we took the roof off the place last time, glasses smashing, people leaping about, falling off barstools, etc, etc.

[JapanAxe]

[quote name='TRBboy' timestamp='1355571121' post='1900015']
Got to be one of the weirdest gigs ever last night......

It was a private party for a bunch of guys that have just finished a tour in Afghanistan. They basically completely ignored us! The guys were just hanging out chatting at the bar down the far end of the pub, whilst we were in effect playing to an empty room! There was no applause, no dancing, nothing. By the time we finished the first set, we were feeling pretty down, but the landlord said we were great, and the guy who booked us said we were awesome and that all the guys were really enjoying it, despite them not showing it! He said "we don't really do dancing or anything."

[/quote]
I did a couple of gigs on RAF bases. Mainly a young crowd. All they wanted to do was get ratted and (in some cases) eat each other's faces. Goes with their job I suppose.

[BigRedX]

Another good one, with Dick Venom & The Terrortones in Derby, this time at the Sitwell Tavern.

Despite the fact that the venue is somewhat off the beaten track, and the on-line publicity for the gig (other than ours) was fairly minimal there was a good-sized audience compared with the last time we played in Derby at a far more centrally-located and much better publicised venue. Weird!

Vocal-only PA so I had to turn up my bass amp (nearly got to 12 o'clock on the output volume), but it sounded good on-stage and apparently out front too. Miss Hurricane Valley broke strings on both her main and spare guitars, and the Theremin definitely needs a service (it's never been quite the same since a couple of fat psychobiilies fell on it) but these are just minor hiccups for us by now and we played through them without much bother. Sold some CDs afterwards, made some new fans and spotted some familiar faces from previous gigs.

Next stop Ilkeston (on the 21st) supporting fellow Basschatter Joey Strange's band - JD & The FDCs.

[barneyg42]

Played a birthday party at my local last night. Literally across the road so I loaded my gear in at 5.30pm and had a couple of pints before dinner. We had planned to have a rehearsal on tuesday to learn a couple of requests the birthday girl had asked for but due to illness all round it didn't happen so it was a case of it'll be alright on the night. Nothing too difficult though so we sound checked one and just did the other straight off later in the set, I love my band! Had a great night, fed and well paid and needless to say I had a few sherbets as I only had to walk home. I've been off work with a damned chest cold coughing up aliens all week and it was the first day I actually felt better. I seem to have sweated the cold out as it seems to have disappeared this morning. I'll be over the pub later to retrieve my gear! Last one before Chrimbo next Saturday at the Barley Mow, Shepperton........singer and guitard have designs on doing Fairy Tale of New York, no rehearsal again so should be a laugh!

[seashell]

Barneyg - let us know if you're playing the Barley Mow again. Quite near my Dad's and I could combine it with a visit to the old duffer.
Can't come down next Sat though as am going to a party in Brum.

[BluRay]

Dreadful gig last night in rotherham. The pub was freezing cold - their heating had packed in (fair enough, these things happen), but apparently no attempt to make do or take the edge of it with portable heaters that can be easily obtained/borrowed. It was just a case of "tough, lets have some blitz spirit". I'm normally happy to muck in, but conseqently punters didn't hang about - and the audience was sparse. Those that were there hung about round a corner - so we were playing to a completely empty space. Well ok, I've done worse. Also the PA that was supposed to be supplied had no functioning stands/mikes - everything was on the blink - and they hadn't got round to sorting it (or bothered to let us know). Fortunately we were prepared for that. The last straw tho was the little tit who was supposed to be doing the sound - fecked off part way through for a joint out back. The PA packed in and he was nowhere to be found. So 10 mins rather embarassing gap - watching the steam of our breath. And then he made matters worse by fiddling about with everything, with no clue what he was doing. Not exactly a high point! Played a blinder anyway - cos what else can you do!

[Dandelion]

Two sets and two encores..

Loads of bum notes, but balanced with much drunkeness on the part on the crowd so they did`nt seem to notice.

[barneyg42]

[quote name='seashell' timestamp='1355650249' post='1900829']
Barneyg - let us know if you're playing the Barley Mow again. Quite near my Dad's and I could combine it with a visit to the old duffer.
Can't come down next Sat though as am going to a party in Brum.
[/quote]

Will do Shell! Nothing booked at the mo but hopefully get a few dates on Saturday.

[Killerfridge]

[quote name='barneyg42' timestamp='1355657401' post='1900937']
Will do Shell! Nothing booked at the mo but hopefully get a few dates on Saturday.
[/quote]

Ooh, also let me know, I like going there if I have a good reason!

[Dom in Dorset]

A bit of an odd one - Back Before Breakfast at Frome FM's Live Lounge. Five of us packed into the studio and played with no monitors (so acoustic guitars unamplified, unamplified vocals and hardly any sound coming from our lead guitarist's corner) Our drummer had to strip his kit right down, he modified his bass pedal tp play the bootom of his floor tom.
I know I could have played better (fighting off a cold, just can't concentrate on anything at the moment), I did fluff a bit on a new song , I have to change between bass and flute and sing lead vocal, nioce when it all works but can be a bit of a ballancing act. The show was live but should be available as a podcast soon.

[Jacqueslemac]

Cancelled. The singer lost his voice. Boo hiss.

I called the landlord and apologised and he agreed to re-schedule the date for February, so hopefully he wasn't too annoyed (or as annoyed as the rest of us were).

[deanovw]

Had a good gig at the kings in Okehampton last night. We thought it might be a bit quiet but as it turned out it was really busy. Everyone seemed to be enjoying the music and drinks. We even had a few dancers and singers at the front.

I had my new/old Jazz bass for its first outing and I couldn't be happier with it. It has its own thread: [url="http://basschat.co.uk/topic/192676-nbd-squier-jv-jazz-content/"]HERE[/url]

Along with the new bass I decided to ditch using plectrums too. I have been really trying hard to get the classic P bass with plectrum sound for a while now. I was never 100% comfortable with it as I have been playing with just fingers for 25+ years!

So, comfy old jazz bass, no plectrum, and I loved it.

The poor old drummer had a bit of a mare though so a rehearsal has been called before next weeks gig.

[Green Alsatian]

Played at a mate of a bandmate's cafe/bar tonight - all plugged into the PA, setting up the sound ourselves (they provide the PA and mics, you do the rest yourself) - guitar (through Zoom 506II), our keys/drums (an old Yamaha Portasound with just an earphone output) and my bass (a white Yamaha BB414 with D'Addario black tapewounds) all in. Took a bit of tinkering to eliminate distortion on the antiquated PA gear with everything running, but we got away with it.

Not that many in there - probably 30 but we still got everyone laughing and dancing, given we're a part-time comedy band writing our own stuff and don't gig that frequently these days. The vibe was like an old Christmas episode of Top of the Pops - fun!

We even got a tenner each, and the promise of some free grub next week! Sometimes, you win!