How was your gig last night?

[Jackroadkill]

Two for us yesterday.

 

The first was at a beer festival in a local town at 3.45pm, and the venue was the engine shed of a narrow gauge railway.  It was approx 6m wide, 7.5m high, 100m long and had a shiny concrete floor.  The entirety of the structure was steel.  Can anyone see where I'm going with this?!  We were about 25m from the back wall, so when the drummer hit a skin you heard it immediately, then again as it came off the back wall and then again what seemed like minutes later as it made its' way back from the far end.  We knew the acoustics would be shocking, but what didn't help was that the guys running the PA had the volume set way beyond 'stun' (possibly into 'bludgeon'), so when in full flow none of us could hear much at all.  I, for example, could only hear my bass, which for some reason was pumping deafeningly out of the singer's monitor but not mine, and the snare drum.

 

Unfortunately this didn't make for a particularly enjoyable gig; we hung on rather than ripped the venue a new one, if you catch my drift.    Mistakes were many and varied, and one member's temper frayed afterwards.  However, we went down well and the punters enjoyed us, and we got paid in actual money rather than exposure.  The band that were on after us annoyed me a bit as they started bringing their gear on before we'd cleared the stage, which is an absolute no-no in my book.

 

Anyway, here's evidence that we were there, even if I couldn't have stated with any great honesty if we sounded very good:

 

 

 

So, after my head had stopped reverberating (think Steve Earle's spoken word bit at the beginning of Snake Oil), it was on to the next one, a private party at the studio we rehearse at (this being also on the farm that I work on when not teaching).  Two sets, the first one a bit more staid and the second one much more punchy.  We debuted our version of Crazy Horses to general approval, brought the roof down with For Whom The Bell Tolls and finished with an extended Rocking In The Free World.  We all played better as we could hear what we were doing, and mistakes were few and far between.  Far more enjoyable all round.  No money, but we were fed well and it was for friends, so no worries.

 

 

In the interests of fairness I should say that our rhythm guitarist (stage right) doesn't normally look like Josef Goebbels, it's just an unfortunate picture.

 

At both gigs my gear was my usual; two Precision Basses and a nasty plywood Squier Jazz Bass into the Strobostomp, then the Cali76, Ampeg Scrambler, Bass Clone, Digbeth pre-amp and then into my amp, which was the Eden WTX500 and Eden 2x15.

 

We're next playing on this coming Saturday night, at Bryn Goebbels's birthday party.

 

Cheers,

 

JRK

[Bluewine]

On 20/06/2024 at 21:05, Bluewine said:

This Saturday we're playing Strawberry Fest. Sponsored by C.Weislers.

 

Huge event with lots of walk by traffic. We start at 2:00. There will be a covered stage.

 

Dep drummer, no rehearsal with him. We'll be winging it.

 

I need this gig money. I have property taxes due on 7/31.

 

Daryl

 

This was a gig we maybe should have passed on because of the drummer stuff. However Strawberry Fest is a big event and we have a good relationship with the owner of Weislers who sponsored us. So I guess it was more of a business decision. 

 

It was a 3-7 gig. That's very long for me. And our 2 breaks were short.

 

Not a good gig for me. I can't point fingers at the dep drummer. He did the best he could under the circumstances. 

 

Daryl

[Bluewine]

13 hours ago, skidder652003 said:

Epic pedalboard failure for our guitarist last night.

His Golden plexi pedal started smelling really bad and stopped working halfway through the second set.

Then he found all his other pedals after that one also didn't work and he thought they had all blown as well, (2 delays and a phaser).

So he had to go straight into the amp, no fx, sounded pretty awful to my ears but we soldiered through.

I took his pedals home and apart from the plexi they all work fine so its probably a power brick issue or patch leads.

He was well relieved when I called him this morning (he's not very good with anything Tech related)

 

 

My pedal board failed last weekend.I went bass to amp. My G&L ASAT has an active pre amp so it wasn't so bad.

 

When I returned home I looked at everything and found the my wireless transmitter and receiver were set to different channels.  An easy fix. Lol

 

Daryl

[Obrienp]

I had a three hour (3 x 50) gig yesterday afternoon with the Checkmate Kings (blues band) at the Cock in Dereham. It was in the beer garden, which is a courtyard and it was hot! I nearly melted during the load in. As you can see there was not much space, so we only used one monitor and just put vox and drum mics into the PA. 
 

It was one of those gigs where I felt we were ragged a lot of the time but the punters seemed to like it. For various reasons we have had very few rehearsals over the last 3 or 4 months and I realised we hadn’t played some of the songs this year. Without the usual DIs and monitors, it was hard to hear what the guitarist was doing on the other side of the stage, despite the drummer saying he was deafening! Also, I think we were affected by the fact that Marc, our vocalist/guitarist (the bearded fellow), is having to leave because of family commitments after our July gigs. I have no idea what my backing vocals were like as I couldn’t hear the monitor: probably like a cat being strangled! Anyway, it was good to get out and run through the material before two festival gigs in early July. The set lists for those is going to be the songs that worked well yesterday.

 

My rig was a Blackstar U700 head into a LFSys Monza. I just use the amp voices, drive options and built in compressor for “effects” but I do use a Mooer Bass Sweeper on our funked up version of Black Cat Bone. Basses were a Maruszczyk Elwood 4a medium scale and a bitsa medium scale P bass I just finished putting together (the one in the pics). The Blackstar/Monza combination was plenty loud enough to fill the beer garden and I could hear myself without any problems. It was the first time I had gigged the Monza and it really lived up to its reputation. Just amazing for a 10” cab.

 

I have to make a shout out for the Cock. They are really dedicated to putting on live music. A lot of pubs are giving up because of the economics and it is great that venues like the Cock keep going. Always a great audience too and no idiots! We always enjoy playing there.

[Jack]

15 hours ago, Lozz196 said:

Nice sounds there Jack

Cheers man. That showreel was only February but it's already a bit cringe. You can tell we're trying really hard to remember the songs and not really enjoying ourselves. The mistakes, the fretboard looking, the song choice, my hair! It got us a year of gigs so it served us well, and there'll be a better one soon.

 

I'm a LOT more proud of my video editing skills than I am my bass playing skills, that's for sure.

Edited June 24 by Jack

[rushbo]

Roxy Magic, the UK's leading/only Roxy Music tribute band played a storming gig at The Hare and Hounds in Birmingham on Saturday night. It was a hometown show for half the band, so that made it extra special. It was also our guitarists' birthday, so he threw a few more shapes than usual. The room was packed with sweaty and enthusiastic punters and the band had more fun than is medically recommended.

I've peeled a couple of fan-filmed videos from FaceBook to demonstrate how little shame and coordination men of a certain age can have. There's a couple of nice shots of my Squier-Fender bitsa and too many shots of my undignified mugging for the crowd.

I've included "Virginia Plain" as it's one of the only tunes where I actually get to deploy the pedalboard - the gnarly fuzz at the top of the tune and the boosted cavernous reverb after the guitar solo. Blink and you'll miss 'em.

 

 

 

Edited June 24 by rushbo

[dmccombe7]

32 minutes ago, rushbo said:

Roxy Magic, the UK's leading/only Roxy Music tribute band played a storming gig at The Hare and Hounds in Birmingham on Saturday night. It was a hometown show for half the band, so that made it extra special. It was also our guitarists' birthday, so he threw a few more shapes than usual. The room was packed with sweaty and enthusiastic punters and the band had more fun than is medically recommended.

I've peeled a couple of fan-filmed videos from FaceBook to demonstrate how little shame and coordination men of a certain can have. There's a couple of nice shots of my Squier-Fender bitsa and too many shots of my undignified mugging for the crowd.

I've included "Virginia Plain" as it's one of the only tunes where I actually get to deploy the pedalboard - the gnarly fuzz at the top of the tune and the boosted cavernous reverb after the guitar solo. Blink and you'll miss 'em.

 

 

 

Enjoyed that. Nice to see sax and other wind instruments being used too.

We do Virginia Plain in the Glam covers band too but we don't have keys. I play the mid section on the bass using an envelope filter pedal.

I do love playing that little bass run down after the guitar solo / chorus.

Dave

[BCH]

First gig since shoulder surgery (cant use a strap for months!!!) with the bass on a stand. Looks weird but worked & very easy.

 

 

[ricksterphil]

Gig at The Donkey in Leicester (or The Donkeh in Lestah in the local vernacular) yesterday. An afternoon gig in lovely sunshine in the beer garden with a nice stage and sound man etc.

Decent crowd in who listened appreciatively and did some dancing on some songs, although as Mrs Ricksterphil pointed out, a concrete floor isn't great to dance on.

We had the resident air guitar specialist at the side of the stage - he's a lovely old fella who uses his walking stick as his axe and 'plays' along at the side with a big grin on his face ☺

 

We did two sets and they both went down really well and we threw in 2 or 3 of our originals for good measure. Ended the set on that old chestnut 'Sweet Home Alabama' as it was requested. I'd never played this live before joining this band last year, but it really is a great song with a decent bass lines....and a bit of dirt in the chain doesn't go amiss.

 

Here's a vid of one of our originals 'End of the Line'    Yee-Haw 

 

https://www.facebook.com/100009594104526/videos/1598251874288550/

Edited June 24 by ricksterphil

[Bluewine]

4 hours ago, rushbo said:

Roxy Magic, the UK's leading/only Roxy Music tribute band played a storming gig at The Hare and Hounds in Birmingham on Saturday night. It was a hometown show for half the band, so that made it extra special. It was also our guitarists' birthday, so he threw a few more shapes than usual. The room was packed with sweaty and enthusiastic punters and the band had more fun than is medically recommended.

I've peeled a couple of fan-filmed videos from FaceBook to demonstrate how little shame and coordination men of a certain age can have. There's a couple of nice shots of my Squier-Fender bitsa and too many shots of my undignified mugging for the crowd.

I've included "Virginia Plain" as it's one of the only tunes where I actually get to deploy the pedalboard - the gnarly fuzz at the top of the tune and the boosted cavernous reverb after the guitar solo. Blink and you'll miss 'em.

 

 

 

 

Nice videos. Love your singers sports jacket.

 

Daryl

[Bluewine]

2 hours ago, BCH said:

First gig since shoulder surgery (cant use a strap for months!!!) with the bass on a stand. Looks weird but worked & very easy.

 

 

 

Fantastic vocals and another cool sports jacket.

 

Daryl

[Piers_Williamson]

2 hours ago, ricksterphil said:

Gig at The Donkey in Leicester (or The Donkeh in Lestah in the local vernacular) yesterday. An afternoon gig in lovely sunshine in the beer garden with a nice stage and sound man etc.

Decent crowd in who listened appreciatively and did some dancing on some songs, although as Mrs Ricksterphil pointed out, a concrete floor isn't great to dance on.

We had the resident air guitar specialist at the side of the stage - he's a lovely old fella who uses his walking stick as his axe and 'plays' along at the side with a big grin on his face ☺

 

We did two sets and they both went down really well and we threw in 2 or 3 of our originals for good measure. Ended the set on that old chestnut 'Sweet Home Alabama' as it was requested. I'd never played this live before joining this band last year, but it really is a great song with a decent bass lines....and a bit of dirt in the chain doesn't go amiss.

 

Here's a vid of one of our originals 'End of the Line'    Yee-Haw 

 

https://www.facebook.com/100009594104526/videos/1598251874288550/

 

I really liked your vid.  Tight guitars, great harmony vocals and a nice looking Mike Lull Bass (?). What's not to like!

[Bluewine]

On 19/06/2024 at 07:12, neepheid said:

In my experience, a blended approach is best.  I like to have a set list, and it's carefully thought out and curated.  I'm not afraid to change it on the night depending on what happens though.  If the police enter the venue for an inspection and we're away to start a new song, you can bet your life that we'll just jump straight into "Breaking the Law", for instance...

 

Also, no-one wants to wait for a committee meeting to come to agreement on the next song.  Seen that happen before with bands without set list, cringe.

 

I struggle with our set lists. Here's the good thing. I have absolutely no say in the matter. Lol

 

Daryl

[dmccombe7]

2 hours ago, ricksterphil said:

Gig at The Donkey in Leicester (or The Donkeh in Lestah in the local vernacular) yesterday. An afternoon gig in lovely sunshine in the beer garden with a nice stage and sound man etc.

Decent crowd in who listened appreciatively and did some dancing on some songs, although as Mrs Ricksterphil pointed out, a concrete floor isn't great to dance on.

We had the resident air guitar specialist at the side of the stage - he's a lovely old fella who uses his walking stick as his axe and 'plays' along at the side with a big grin on his face ☺

 

We did two sets and they both went down really well and we threw in 2 or 3 of our originals for good measure. Ended the set on that old chestnut 'Sweet Home Alabama' as it was requested. I'd never played this live before joining this band last year, but it really is a great song with a decent bass lines....and a bit of dirt in the chain doesn't go amiss.

 

Here's a vid of one of our originals 'End of the Line'    Yee-Haw 

 

https://www.facebook.com/100009594104526/videos/1598251874288550/

Enjoyed that.

Curious why THE guitarist, bass and singer are all towards one side of the stage and 2nd guitarist has all that space to himself on the RHS, especially when your singer had to dodge the bass headstock there.   I would have moved the singer over 2-3ft and give you a little more room to move.

Just curious. 

Dave

 

[Piers_Williamson]

3 minutes ago, dmccombe7 said:

Enjoyed that.

Curious why THE guitarist, bass and singer are all towards one side of the stage and 2nd guitarist has all that space to himself on the RHS, especially when your singer had to dodge the bass headstock there.   I would have moved the singer over 2-3ft and give you a little more room to move.

Just curious. 

Dave

 

Perhaps he is the only one that doesn't pay any attention to the (very nice) vocals??

 

 

[ricksterphil]

16 minutes ago, Piers_Williamson said:

 

I really liked your vid.  Tight guitars, great harmony vocals and a nice looking Mike Lull Bass (?). What's not to like!

Thanks, we are blessed with our lead vocalist Emma, she has a terrific voice. She starts one song acapella and, without a pitching note, hits it bang on every single time. We're lucky to have her in the band.

[Bluewine]

On 15/06/2024 at 09:20, dmccombe7 said:

Same female singer but different band Daryl ?

Dave

 

 Hi Dave,

 

Maple Road is comprised of 3 divisions.

 

1. Maple Road ( full electric 4 piece rock& blues)

2. She's Right I'm Left ( acoustic offering)

3. Sound & Lighting

 

Daryl

Edited June 24 by Bluewine

[ricksterphil]

9 minutes ago, dmccombe7 said:

Enjoyed that.

Curious why THE guitarist, bass and singer are all towards one side of the stage and 2nd guitarist has all that space to himself on the RHS, especially when your singer had to dodge the bass headstock there.   I would have moved the singer over 2-3ft and give you a little more room to move.

Just curious. 

Dave

 

Good point Dave.

I think we should have moved the drums over a bit and given those of us on the rhside a bit more room. Me and the lead guitarist share a mic so we're always on the same side. We have a 'no curry the night before' pact

[ricksterphil]

25 minutes ago, Piers_Williamson said:

 

I really liked your vid.  Tight guitars, great harmony vocals and a nice looking Mike Lull Bass (?). What's not to like!

 

It's a Mike Lull P4 and is my 'cold dead hands' bass

Edited June 24 by ricksterphil

[dmccombe7]

2 hours ago, ricksterphil said:

Good point Dave.

I think we should have moved the drums over a bit and given those of us on the rhside a bit more room. Me and the lead guitarist share a mic so we're always on the same side. We have a 'no curry the night before' pact

And no garlic either 

[ricksterphil]

3 minutes ago, dmccombe7 said:

And no garlic either 

 

Correct 💯 😁 

[dmccombe7]

2 hours ago, Bluewine said:

 

 Hi Dave,

 

Maple Road is comprised of 3 divisions.

 

1. Maple Road ( full electric 4 piece rock& blues)

2. She's Right I'm Left ( acoustic offering)

3. Sound & Lighting

 

Daryl

Proper little business venture going on there then 

Is Sound and Lighting a 3rd band or literally PA &Lighting hire Daryl.

If a 3rd band what kind of music are you doing with that one as i don't think i've seen any vids of them. ?

Dave

[dmccombe7]

2 hours ago, ricksterphil said:

 

It's a Mike Lull P4 and is my 'cold dead hands' bass

I was wondering about the bass too. Those Lull basses do look good. Does it sound like a P bass or does it have a more modern P sound like many of the modern mfr's do ie Sandbergs etc.

Dave

[ricksterphil]

1 minute ago, dmccombe7 said:

I was wondering about the bass too. Those Lull basses do look good. Does it sound like a P bass or does it have a more modern P sound like many of the modern mfr's do ie Sandbergs etc.

Dave

 

The last time I owned a Fender P was in the 70's so I can't really remember but it's got standard Lindy Fralins in it, so it's not a bright modern sound. Think Lull are winding their own pick ups now. I do have a set of overwound Fralins bought from @walshy that I haven't got round to fitting yet....only had em about 18 months 🤣

[Piers_Williamson]

36 minutes ago, dmccombe7 said:

I was wondering about the bass too. Those Lull basses do look good. Does it sound like a P bass or does it have a more modern P sound like many of the modern mfr's do ie Sandbergs etc.

Dave

I parallel tested my 77 Precision against a Lull Precision in Bass Direct a few years ago.  I came away thinking my Fender sounded more Precisiony (Read Peaches: Stranglers sound), but it ways a ton and I have had to do quite a lot of work to keep it up to snuff....so horses for courses.