Most embarrassing stage moments

[Strategery]

Well, heres the first one that comes to mind. :grin:

 

It was almost 9:00pm on a friday and our other guitar player STILL wasn't there.

He show's up about 10 minutes before, DRUNK off his A$$!

Come to find out, it's his birthday and he drank about 3/4 of a fifth of bourbon.

He said...don't worry, I can still play my ass off.

He set his little Peavey amp up in a folding chair like we used to do way back, plugged in his guitar and turned to me with a $hit eating grin....and FELL straight beck into his amp, which fell back into the drums and cymbals and toms went crashing!!

The club owner wanted me to boot him out but I said no.

I was able to handle it alone that night but it was sorely lacking how we normally sounded.

 

Come on...let's hear'em!! :grin:

 

Randy

[Trucks]

I walked across the stage flexing my "muscles", occasionaly stopping, facing the audience, and doing the muscle man stance.

 

I was 5 yrs old, though it is still a little embarrassing

[A String]

Oh man...road stories, I have hundreds of them. From the time a dog got on stage with us, to the time the bar owner thought "Beach Night" just wouldn't be complete without adding a 20 X 20 foot "beach" in front of the stage (this was indoors). Of course, this caused our equipment to become filled with sand, but that's another story.

 

I guess one of the embarrassing things was having our bass player, spill a full beer, into our lighting matrix. A bright flash, a tiny explosion noise and all the lights went out.

 

Either that, or the time bass player, spit beer in the air ("misting" he called it) and the band leader smacked him in the back of the head for being a dolt.

 

One of my personal embarrassing moments, involve me, pointing a par64, too close to a sequencer unit and having it melt during a show.

 

Oh, and having to sing with laryngitis. The show must go on right?

[Zuben]

One that comes to mind. We were late getting to a gig so the band was helping the crew. I plugged in speaker cables marked monitors to the stage monitors and speaker cables marked stage to the mains. Sound man tuned on the board and amps for a quick sound check and blew every stage monitor we had. 3000 watts into 500 watt monitors.

 

Pretty sad for someone who use to build spealers and has a degree in engineering! LOL

 

NEVER AGAIN! I as banned LOL

 

Peace

 

PS - not quite as bad as Freebo stepping on and through Bonnie Raitt's 335 DURING a show. Certian people deny this ever happened to this day but way too many witnesses

[A String]

Pretty sad for someone who use to build spealers and has a degree in engineering! LOL

 

Hey Zuben, we used to use Butterfly bass bins in our P.A. (A folded, reflex cabinet). They were originally designed for Super Tramp. I've been trying to find info on them for years. Have you ever heard of them.

[fantasticsound]

Not as a player, but on our mideast tour I gave a CE (that's civil engineer) my requirements for two 15amp circuits. That sounds easy enough, but when you're outside, in the middle of a desert, on a base that was all sand less than 6 months earlier and the stage is hundreds of feet from the nearest gennie it's just a shade more complex. He was young, but enthusiastic and seemed to have his head on straight so I trusted him.

 

He ran the feed and, when asked, I gave him my extensions to plug in.

 

We were a few songs into the set when all of a sudden the PA and stage power were gone.

 

It took about 5 minutes to determine he'd put both extensions into the same circuit. Not gonna happen with two stereo power amps powering the PA plus all the associated gear and instrument amps. Especially since this was gennie power from a unit already purposed to who knows how much other gear. (Air Force base tents are air conditioned! ) Suffice it to say we were lucky to be up again within 5 - 10 minutes after he ran back to the gennie to reset the breakers.

 

The good news was it gave some service people time to present us with a few tokens of their appreciation so the audience didn't lose interest.

[Zuben]

Craig,

 

Sounds familiar but for some reason I remember them in studios. I'll ask around

 

Peace

[A String]

Craig,

 

Sounds familiar but for some reason I remember them in studios. I'll ask around

 

Peace

 

I'm not sure they would work out in a studio. They were quite large, measuring about 5 feet deep, 4 feet wide and 2 feet tall (When they were laid down). The handles on the sides, turned into ladder rungs when you laid them down, so you could climb up the stack to add all the parts. When it was assembled, the stacks were over seven feet tall.

[Eric Iverson]

Well, the usual breaking an E-string just before the performance and having to play the chords higher on the neck... and amps suddenly deciding to quit working, so I had to play a few tunes unamplified so the bass player could use my amp ... stuff like that.

 

I haven't really played in bars much so I don't have those kind of stories to tell. And so far no dogs or horses or kangaroos on stage... which might be kind of fun, come to think of it. It would at least be MEMORABLE!

 

I don't know of anybody who rides a horse on stage, but I have heard of people riding motorcycles for a grand entrance.

[Danzilla]

The other night, I was transfering the 4-track casette tape of our last show to PC to burn copies for the band. As an intro to one of our songs, I heard myself say, "Is anyone ready for some funky blues?" Our guitarist replies, "The funky blues? Oh, 'Rocky Top'!"

 

We don't DO "Rocky Top". I refuse. He's a little bit country, I'm a little bit rock'n'roll.

[Dr. Ellwood]

"Is anyone ready for some funky blues" ...I quit saying those things...sometimes they say NO!! LOL

[S. Yeti Bigfoot, Esq.]

Well, let's see....

 

I played a whole set with my pants completely unzipped and my fly standing open.

 

I set a notebook that was laying on top of a road case behind my amp on fire with a cigarette in the middle of a set. I set the ashtray on top of the open notebook and my cigarette rolled out of the ashtray and it was actually in flames when a bar patron pointed it out to me mid-song.

 

I took a couple of steps backward once and tripped over a monitor that the bass player had moved from where it was supposed to be on a very small stage. Luckily I took him out too on the way down. Not so luckily, we both took the drummer and his kit out.

 

A vocalist lost his freakin' mind one night and decided to pick up his mic stand and dance around with it when I stepped up to take a solo and hit me in the forehead with it and split my head wide open right at the hairline and knocked me silly for about 10 minutes. Blood was just running down my face.

[Rampdog]

I bought an anniversary Strat from a "friend" back in the eighties. Turns out he and a bud of his stole a bunch of them from one of the railroad cars outside the Fender plant in Fullerton Ca. Our soundman worked at a music store and I gave it to him to have it set up. I got it back a week later and was playing a gig when two detectives walked up to the stage and handcuffed me and took me off to the pokey... The serial numbers were givin to all the music stores and the tech notified the law and I spent the night in jail and lost the strat... I showed them a funky bill of sale but it was stolen merchandise... I lost... I paid 400 bucks for it... Gold with the tweed case... Damn...........

[S. Yeti Bigfoot, Esq.]

Did his family give him a nice funeral?

[Strategery]

Damn....those were hilarious! :grin:

 

Well, we were playing a Juke Joint in Troy, AL one night.

I was helping out a vocalist friend of mine whose guitar player skipped out on him and he was stuck with the gig.

We had a FULL house and the place was rockin'!

 

I didn't know it, but the night before my friend had tied on a big drunk and had mexican food.

So there I am on stage, taking a solo, when he walks over and RIPS ONE!! GEEZ!!

He then walks off laughing like hell.

http://i68.photobucket.com/albums/i31/Rikkukileo_photos/th_skunk.gif

 

It was so bad I forgot what I was playing.

I had that deer in the head lights look for sure.

I couldn't go anywhere cause we were mid song and I was tethered to a guitar cable.

 

Man, no wonder his other guitarist skipped out on him. :grin:

 

Randy

[mdrs]

"Is anyone ready for some funky blues" ...I quit saying those things...sometimes they say NO!! LOL

 

Don't ask a question unless you know what the answer will be!!

[mdrs]

This actually happened at a Wedding....I suddenly smelled something that smelled like a hot dog burning. I looked to my left, and a female friend of my wife's had backed up too close to a burning candle, and caught her hair on fire!! She's got flames comming off the top of her head. I'm not sure she even realized it when I ran up to her, and started slapping her in the head!!! Luckily, I put the flames out before she was injured in any way. Messed up her hair a bit, however!!!

 

Talk about a HOT CHICK :grin:

[Gifthorse]

Probably dealing with a floyd rose.

[Strategery]

Oh my God Don...that was unbelievable!!

 

Glad to hear everything turned out alright. :grin:

 

Randy

[Guitarzan]

we were playing a party last year, i went for the solo in a song, for some reason the band was lost on the count and hung back before changing to the solo progression making my solo sound like i was early.

you could clearly hear that they were way off. after my solo the singer stops the song and announces " sorry about that, Boyd broke a string".. i am like WTF?

thanks, i was the only one who had it right... :grin:

one cool thing that happened once was being cornered by a hot chick when i ventured out past the band and was checking out the sound out front and she started dancing damn close while we played "funky music".

she acted like i had no guitar hanging off my body.

later she showed our other guitar player and bass player her tattoo ( yeah it was there).

i was sitting at a table behind her and the look on thier eyes was priceless.

 

[Strategery]

BOING!!!! :grin: hahahhahhaa

[mdrs]

It helps to pay attention, and to be quick in a pinch!! All those years as a trauma surgeon occasionally pay off!! LOL

 

This story has ZERO to do with playing, but I was watching my son play on his High School Basketball team's game. We were sitting on those old fashioned wooden bleachers that they have in gyms. You know, the kind that you pull out from the wall, and they sort of look like stairs. So, these annoying little kids are running around, and going under the bleachers, and climbing up thru the foot rest part to the bleachers to come up from below, then going back down thru the same narrow slot to go back underneath. Remember, we're in a pretty big crowd. I suddenly noticed that one kid had literally got his head stuck in the narrow slot, and was HANGING FROM HIS HEAD, DANCING IN MID AIR. I thought he was going to hang himself, or break his friggin neck. I lept down from the top row where I was sitting, jumbing down the bleachers two and three rows at a time, jumping over people, and quickly lifted him from below to take the weight off of his neck. I pushed him thru, and probably saved his little life. Lucky that I just happened to notice what was going on.

[Strategery]

OMG!!

[mdrs]

we were playing a party last year, i went for the solo in a song, for some reason the band was lost on the count and hung back before changing to the solo progression making my solo sound like i was early.

you could clearly hear that they were way off. after my solo the singer stops the song and announces " sorry about that, Boyd broke a string".. i am like WTF?

thanks, i was the only one who had it right... :grin:

one cool thing that happened once was being cornered by a hot chick when i ventured out past the band and was checking out the sound out front and she started dancing damn close while we played "funky music".

she acted like i had no guitar hanging off my body.

later she showed our other guitar player and bass player her tattoo ( yeah it was there).

i was sitting at a table behind her and the look on thier eyes was priceless.

 

So, she was an artist, eh Zan??? :grin:

[Guitarzan]

:grin:

i was on the wrong side of the room.

[mdrs]

IF she was cute, you were..........

 

they all look alike....NOT!! :grin:

[Guitarzan]

very cute

[mdrs]

Check Please!!

[caprae]

Someone please post the story of the bag piper. EDIT: I believe it was at a biker's convention. That was one of the best I'd ever read.

[A String]

It helps to pay attention, and to be quick in a pinch!! All those years as a trauma surgeon occasionally pay off!! LOL

 

This story has ZERO to do with playing, but I was watching my son play on his High School Basketball team's game. We were sitting on those old fashioned wooden bleachers that they have in gyms. You know, the kind that you pull out from the wall, and they sort of look like stairs. So, these annoying little kids are running around, and going under the bleachers, and climbing up thru the foot rest part to the bleachers to come up from below, then going back down thru the same narrow slot to go back underneath. Remember, we're in a pretty big crowd. I suddenly noticed that one kid had literally got his head stuck in the narrow slot, and was HANGING FROM HIS HEAD, DANCING IN MID AIR. I thought he was going to hang himself, or break his friggin neck. I lept down from the top row where I was sitting, jumbing down the bleachers two and three rows at a time, jumping over people, and quickly lifted him from below to take the weight off of his neck. I pushed him thru, and probably saved his little life. Lucky that I just happened to notice what was going on.

 

Also not stage related but, I had the same thing happen to my 1 year old nephew (11 years old now). My wife (then girlfriend) heard him crying upstairs from his crib. She said the cry sounded sort of funny. I went running up and sure enough, he had slid through the bars of his crib. Well, all but his head. His body was hanging through, but he was stuck at the neck and was choking. I quickly lifted him up to get the weight off his neck and his Dad pried the bars so I could slide him back through. Thankfully my wife heard him that day, or there would have been a very different outcome.