OT: "real" roadies at show yesterday

[EscapeRocks]

I could get used to this....dammit...

 

We played at an Oktoberfest yesterday.

 

The promoter who hired us had large what I would call golf cart type vehicles to move gear from drop off point to stage.

 

Not only that, they had about 6 guys who were basically roadies.

 

They unloaded all my gear out of my truck, onto the cart, then drove me AND my gear to the stage. Same with the rest of the band.

 

When it was out time to take the stage to setup, the roadies moved stuff to where we needed it, helped lift keyboards on the stand, and carry my 8,000lb rack.

 

Same with tear down, they brought my heavy key cases to the stage, helped load the board, etc... and drove me and all gear back to my truck, and loaded it all up for me.

 

This was my first experience with this kind of dedicated help. It was especially nice since this was a typical festival show where there's 1/2 hour between acts.

 

The nice part, is all the guys hired to help knew how to move expensive gear. No throwing stuff around, treating gear with kid gloves.

 

As I said, I am spoiled now...which sucks, since I know unless I hook on with Journey (yeah right) it's back to heavy lifting for me at next week's show

[timwat]

You had me at "They unloaded all my gear out of my truck, onto the cart, then drove me AND my gear to the stage."

[Jason Stanfield]

Nice!

 

I've said for a while that complements are nice, tips are better, and being hit on by cute girls in the audience is excellent -- but if you REALLY like the us, help us load out!

[kanker.]

I have to admit - I hate having roadies. If anything gets broken, I want it to be my fault. If anything gets lost or forgotten, I want it to be my fault. I've been in too many situations where people, be they roadies or other folks, start trying to help me move my gear and stuff gets lost or dropped as a result. Cart me around, spot my gear on my cart, sure, but touch my gear? No thanks....

[J. Dan]

That's one nice thing about a couple of the Casino gigs. They aren't roadies, but the A/V techs (sound and light guys) bring a cart out to your car (they carry a cell phone that you call when you're 5 min away). They help you load your stuff on the cart, then they take it in and load it onto the stage while you park. Pretty much same thing in reverse at the end of the night. Plus the added benefit of being Fri-Sat gigs (setup fri, teardown sat).

 

I also dig the festivals where they have a stocked, air conditioned trailer and people there to get you anything you need.

 

Those are better than bar gigs, but of course the flip side is weddings - early, long load-in up steps, elevators, winding through kitchens, then waiting around to play, band sandwiches, etc...you guys all know the drill.

[Sven Golly]

I'm with Kanker; I'm not a fan of people trying to "help".

 

The exception to the rule was when I was touring with a signed recording act, and we had our own crew travelling with us; they knew exactly what went where, and I never lifted/moved anything. Show up in the next town, hit the hotel, grab some sleep, get up, grab a shower, lobby call for travel to the venue, everything's already set up and wired ready to go, do a soundcheck, then off to the restaurant for dinner, then back to the venue, play the gig, off stage, meet & greet/schmooze, get herded into the bus when the road manager deemed it was time to leave, and either on the road to the next gig or off to the hotel on layover nights.

 

Ahhhh, the good old days.

[SpaceNorman]

I have to admit - I hate having roadies. If anything gets broken, I want it to be my fault. If anything gets lost or forgotten, I want it to be my fault. I've been in too many situations where people, be they roadies or other folks, start trying to help me move my gear and stuff gets lost or dropped as a result. Cart me around, spot my gear on my cart, sure, but touch my gear? No thanks....

 

I fully understand Kevin's feelings on this. Personally, I like the "blended" approach. I too don't want anybody touching my gear while I'm setting it up and/or tearing it down.

 

My rig is reasonably well cased - with a place for everything and everything in it's place. I use real road cases for my keys and electronics and decent rolling plastic tool boxes for my pedals and accessories. My two monitor wedges (passive monitors) and the base of my Quik-Loc "Z" stand are the only pieces of gear that are not cased. Everything is labeled so it's easy to track.

 

As long as I get to set it up and tear it down myelf - once things are packed - I'm ecstatic if I have sober help to schlepp it.

[kanker.]

The exception to the rule was when I was touring with a signed recording act, and we had our own crew travelling with us; they knew exactly what went where, and I never lifted/moved anything.

Yeah, crew and roadies are two different things IMO.

[drawback]

I'm with Kanker; I'm not a fan of people trying to "help".

 

The exception to the rule was when I was touring with a signed recording act, and we had our own crew travelling with us; they knew exactly what went where, and I never lifted/moved anything. Show up in the next town, hit the hotel, grab some sleep, get up, grab a shower, lobby call for travel to the venue, everything's already set up and wired ready to go, do a soundcheck, then off to the restaurant for dinner, then back to the venue, play the gig, off stage, meet & greet/schmooze, get herded into the bus when the road manager deemed it was time to leave, and either on the road to the next gig or off to the hotel on layover nights.

 

Ahhhh, the good old days.

 

Ditto on all points & comments.

 

OK Sven - what band? Svengle of course, yields nothing.

 

 

[mate stubb]

In my rock star days, we had 2 roadies that travelled with us, drove the equipment truck, set everything up including my ridiculous Hammond based keyboard rig, and ran lights and sound.

 

It was heaven.

[Sven Golly]

OK Sven - what band? Svengle of course, yields nothing.

 

Sorry, drawback... the names have been changed to protect the guilty.

[Michelle ggurl]

I'm with Kanker; I'm not a fan of people trying to "help".

 

The exception to the rule was when I was touring with a signed recording act, and we had our own crew travelling with us; they knew exactly what went where, and I never lifted/moved anything.

 

Agreed here, too. I wasn't in a touring act, but in a local band who did have roadie help on a fairly regular basis (by a guy who used to actually BE a roadie for Journey, incidentally).

 

I've had other people "help" me bring gear to my car ... fairly recently this meant my gig bag with wheels developed a see-through case of road rash and the side block of my PC2 getting a 2-grit shaving treatment. Duct tape and buffing out with finer-grit sandpaper made everything OK enough, but damn, coulda been worse ...

 

Tim, have you ever played Rivertown Jamoree in Antioch? They load your gear onto a golf cart and gingerly unload it for you at the stage and help you with the return trip. THAT kinda help is cool.

[EscapeRocks]

I agree with the points above about people handling gear.

 

I guess I should be more specific to say that as far as actually getting keyboards from case to stand and back, it was a collaborative effort, with one of the guys grabbing one end, and me the other. None of them handled any of our gear alone.

 

The nicest part was not throwing out my back in the quick change-out that often goes along with these types of shows.

With all the help, it was efficient and safe.

 

The only handling the "roadies" did alone was lifting and moving my heavy Road Ready cases that my Keys, Rack, and Guitar all ride in.

 

All in all I just thought it was fun getting the "rock star" treatment on a Saturday afternoon with roadies, our own stage manager, and her flunky who made sure our backstage/green room was comfortable and we had our deli tray, etc. as specified in our contract.

Just a lot of fun for this weekend warrior

[ksoper]

I have to admit - I hate having roadies.

 

I was blessed to have had a personal keyboard tech for about a decade. Now I'm back to humping my own stuff and not digging it.

[NewImprov]

There's a festival we used to play regularly that has a union stage crew. Get this, not only did they shlep our gear for us, we were not even allowed to shlep our own stuff. Which was great because it was a ridiculously complicated load-in. We'd show up at a side street, they'd meet us with electric carts and haul our stuff to backstage, then we'd collectively figure out a plan to make the set change as efficient as possible. Then they'd assist us getting stuff onstage. They really knew what they were doing, and deferred to us about instrument handling and such. Was a real luxury.

[Jason Stanfield]

I have to admit - I hate having roadies. If anything gets broken, I want it to be my fault. If anything gets lost or forgotten, I want it to be my fault.

I think I'd put my own gear in the cases, then get some help then.

 

I don't even let my bandmates put my 'boards into their cases.

[BluesKeys]

I have played some professionally run shows and have been helped on and off stage but not curb service. Sounds sweet to me. Why is it when I was younger we had friends around to help with equipment. Now days I can't even vet band members to help much.

[marino]

I have to admit - I hate having roadies.

I LOVE having roadies - unless they are idiots or drunk, which has happened. When I played big stages, we usually didn't have our own crew; we used to find people on the various locations. You give them instructions, they carry the heavy stuff for you; it's what they're paid for. Not having to lift the RD300S or the Chroma was a godsend to me.

Of course I remained around while they did their thing, carrying the lighter stuff and insurung that they wouldn't do anything stupid.

I especially appreciated their help during teardown, when everybody was tired and thinking about dinner.

 

Generally, to avoid lifting heavy equipement helps me to play better; also, the feeling to be there to be a musician and not a luggage handler is nice.

 

 

[MuzikTeechur]

We play a couple of gigs (festivals) which are the same setup - call when 5 min out, special parking, they meet me, take my gear, give me a stage pass, and the same thing when it's time to load out.

Hard part is making sure all my stuff gets to the stage and back to the car when we're done.

[Joe Muscara]

Dave, I think you guys are Movin' On Up!

[Al Coda]

I LOVE having roadies - unless they are idiots or drunk, which has happened.

 

Same here !

I´ve never seen one of ´em drunk at work, but I was on 1 tour, some of the crew were too much addicted to,- ehmm,- you know what I mean.

They damaged gear all the time durnig that tour, not only mine, but that was the only exception within 30 years.

 

When I played big stages, we usually didn't have our own crew; we used to find people on the various locations. You give them instructions, they carry the heavy stuff for you; it's what they're paid for. Not having to lift the RD300S or the Chroma was a godsend to me.

 

I differenciate between "stage hands" (helpers) payed by the local promoter and crewguys being personal techs and getting payed by the production.

Stage hands is what you have to fear according to the handling of your gear. They move the gear out of the truck up on the stage and this way can be long.

Because of poor payment, they don´t care on your gear normally.

The techs do good work setting up the gear precisely and if necessary do service too.

By the time, there were 3 guys knowing my rig very well and they were able to set it up much faster than me and they also instructed the stage hands at load in or tear down, payed attention nothing got lost, stolen or broken.

That worked pretty well for me and I could trust these guy so much they had a key for my homestudio to pick up my gear.

I had one of these guys with me always for gigging.

 

For smaller band work, we mostly had two guys for all and payed ´em like band members because they also drove the gear truck, set up the PA and lights and were able to mix FOH and stage monitor and there was real friendship always.

 

Of course I remained around while they did their thing, carrying the lighter stuff and insurung that they wouldn't do anything stupid.

 

Well, lightweight and small pieces are the most prone gear.

After some experiences, I changed to larger racks and cases, all on wheels.

 

Generally, to avoid lifting heavy equipement helps me to play better; also, the feeling to be there to be a musician and not a luggage handler is nice.

 

+10 on both !

 

Before starting to work w/ roadies, I had the years of doing all myself too and that also ruled for studio sessions and at times I usually had a Rhodes, Clavinet, stringmachine, Minimoog and other analogue gear in the car as well as amps, speakers and a case w/ FX pedals and cables.

When I had my gear set up, I looked like a sweaty worker w/ dirty and swollen hands and needed a hr. or more to refresh before I was able to play anything.

That was a unsatisfying situation not only for me or other session player buddys, but also for the producers who payed for the studio time.

It was not very hard until they agreed to pay for roadies setting up the gear early enough and before recording started.

In fact, it was best for all,- and cheaper in the end.

 

Since we´re able to record our keys professional in our homes, roadies for session work became obsolete, but for live gigging I call good roadies essential, especially if they have the skills to do quick repairs.

 

A.C.

 

 

[Mickey Keys]

If anything gets broken, I want it to be my fault.

If anything gets lost or forgotten, I want it to be my fault.

I've been in too many situations where people, be they roadies or other folks, start trying to help me move my gear and stuff gets lost or dropped as a result. Cart me around, spot my gear on my cart, sure, but touch my gear? No thanks....

 

This, unquestionably. At least at the weekend warrior level, which is where I am now and is as high as I'll ever get or aspire to.

 

Simply put, I don't want to be heading home at 2:30 am pissed off at some friendly, helpful, tired, drunken customer/"friend of the band"; or worse yet, a bandmate or the wife, while I wonder how much the repairs wll cost and how fast I can get a $2K piece of kit back on stage. The most any of them gets to do is coil up my cables and pedals, drop them in the gig bag and stay out of my way.

[MonksDream]

I love it when someone is there to help with the schlep!

 

I manage stages at festivals a lot. I have a set of rules about what what my crews are allowed to do. Rule #1 is:."Never touch a musician's gear without their permission AND supervision! Never!".

[John Tweed]

Back in the day when I did lots of touring with name acts we always had a full road crew to do all the lifting. Sometimes we'd help with the load in at a venue, just for the exercise! Some crew members would be keen and knowledgeable enough to wire my rig together, although I wasn't pleased on one occasion to find various marks being made on keys and amps etc, with a marker pen, to 'code' the connections.

 

Nowadays my newly downsized rig is so easy to move - SK1 in one hand, PX3 in the other - that it's easy to turn down assistance from the unknown and possibly inebriated. As a matter of fact I take a perverse pride in the whole process of carrying, setting up and tearing down my own gear (sorry, can't help you with that amp rack though).

[SpaceNorman]

With so many guys responding that the don't care much for help - I'd be curious about what the response would be if asked - do you have anybody you trust to set up your rig?

 

These days - I have my two sons (ages 19 and 23) trained up to the task. Both of these are fully capable of setting up my keys rig - doing everything short of patching the connections at the keyboard and dressing the cabling on my keyboard stand itself.

 

They also know the various configurations in which my gear leaves the house ("Keys rig only", "brains only" PA or "Full PA", and "Lights" or "No Lights".) More often than not these days - I pack the cables and pedals of my keys rig in my rehearsal space leaving all the pieces where they are - and then leave instructions for what I need loaded.

 

The boys case my keyboards - and then load whatever the appropriate gear is into the truck with neither my assistance or supervision. I make a pass through the rehearsal space to ensure and my PA storage area to make sure nothing was left ... and I'm out the door. If I'm playing local - I can usually talk at least one of 'em to help me with load-in and set up as well.

[kanker.]

With so many guys responding that the don't care much for help - I'd be curious about what the response would be if asked - do you have anybody you trust to set up your rig?

Like I said, when there's actually a crew of guys you work with regularly, I feel a lot better about it - it's in their interest to make sure everything's cool, and they generally treat my gear better than I would. When it's random folks, I just don't like it. I've been burned too many times.

[Michelle ggurl]

SpaceNorman, absolutely, when you have a regular guy like the one I mentioned in my previous band, who knows everyone's gear and works with the band all the time, and in our case, has high-level professional experience, etc.

 

You have trained your sons and I think that's awesome, because having help from a consistent crew you trust is great. As Kevin says, it gets hinky with random folks trying to "help," unless you trust them implicitly, for whatever reason you do.

[Analogaddict]

I'm with Kanker; I'm not a fan of people trying to "help".

 

The exception to the rule was when I was touring with a signed recording act, and we had our own crew travelling with us; they knew exactly what went where, and I never lifted/moved anything. Show up in the next town, hit the hotel, grab some sleep, get up, grab a shower, lobby call for travel to the venue, everything's already set up and wired ready to go, do a soundcheck, then off to the restaurant for dinner, then back to the venue, play the gig, off stage, meet & greet/schmooze, get herded into the bus when the road manager deemed it was time to leave, and either on the road to the next gig or off to the hotel on layover nights.

 

Ahhhh, the good old days.

 

Sounds just like my christmas tours, except for the meet & greet part - when the artists are doing that, I'm already in the bus with a cold beer - or hot glühwein...

[Eric Iverson]

I remember back when I was a teenager, I was friends with a local band. There was a guy nicknamed "Toad" (I presume it wasn't was REAL name!) who was so enamored of that band that he considered it a great honor to let him lug their amplifiers on stage. Of course, they let him, LOL! Not sure if they let him handle their precious guitars.... and I'm quite sure they couldn't have afforded to actually pay him anything!

As far as roadies, the guys who did it for a living, even back then, had to at least have had some idea what they were doing, or they wouldn't have kept their jobs long!