Little Things: An Advice Thread

[Threadslayer]

Don't hook up with the singer.

 

[bill5]

Don't use glue traps for pests (cruel as hell) and don't use the "humane" mouse traps that claim to catch them alive so you can release them later. I tried that and caught one but it died anyway...I suspect either from suffocation as it's in such a ridiculously cramped area and if not airtight, close enough, or died of fright that again it was in such a cramped area and could not get out or hardly even move. I curse myself to this day for using it. 

[Tom Williams]

29 minutes ago, bill5 said:

Don't use glue traps for pests (cruel as hell) and don't use the "humane" mouse traps that claim to catch them alive so you can release them later. I tried that and caught one but it died anyway...I suspect either from suffocation as it's in such a ridiculously cramped area and if not airtight, close enough, or died of fright that again it was in such a cramped area and could not get out or hardly even move. I curse myself to this day for using it. 

As a rural-dweller, I gotta disagree with you here.  Use whatever catches them.  Cruelty to a rodent is better than rodent feces on your food.  It's also better than rodent feces on your silverware five days running.  If Mickey continually robs the snap trap, go for the glue board, and then dispatch him as quickly and mercifully as you can tomorrow morning.

 

That said, electrocution traps are probably the best if you can afford them.

[bill5]

I'm a rural dweller too. I don't want rodents in my house either. But being unnecessarily cruel is beyond disgusting. It's not a choice of letting them roam free or being cruel. How are mice "robbing the snap trap?" They have never failed me and are merficully quick. I have also found steel wool packed in key areas they might chew into and mint oil (most animals hate the scent of mint) to be effective.

 

And if you have rodent feces on your food and/or silverware, maybe you could find a better, more secure way to store them? 

[KuruPrionz]

2 hours ago, Tom Williams said:

As a rural-dweller, I gotta disagree with you here.  Use whatever catches them.  Cruelty to a rodent is better than rodent feces on your food.  It's also better than rodent feces on your silverware five days running.  If Mickey continually robs the snap trap, go for the glue board, and then dispatch him as quickly and mercifully as you can tomorrow morning.

 

That said, electrocution traps are probably the best if you can afford them.

This is why God created cats!!!!

Get a female cat who's thrown a litter and she will make the mice go away forever. Mmmm... mice...

[MathOfInsects]

May we keep this focused on tips for keyboardists/musicians?

[Jose EB5AGV]

Don't let the audio guy scratch your gear by carelessly connecting the cables to it. If possible, do that part by yourself

[stoken6]

3 hours ago, EB5AGV said:

Don't let the audio guy scratch your gear by carelessly connecting the cables to it.

Find a good audio guy, give them regular repeat business and tip them. (Oh, and it's "sound engineer" if they're listening). 

 

We found a diamond who loves the band (people and music) and is a complete professional and a pleasure to work with. 

 

Cheers, Mike.

[JamPro]

6 hours ago, KuruPrionz said:

This is why God created cats!!!!

Get a female cat who's thrown a litter and she will make the mice go away forever. Mmmm... mice...

 

OK sure - but then you have to deal with your cat infestation.

 

The Hav-a-Hart traps work well for me.  I set it out every night baited with a dab of peanut butter on the corner of a cracker.  I leave one  door shut, and one open so the rodent has to enter at one end - the PB'ed cracker sits at the other end beyond the trip bar.  If there are rodents around, they will get caught.  I have to drive them far away to release them. If I let them go in the neighbor's yard, they just come back to my house.

[MathOfInsects]

Ah, here's one: when planning your arrival time at a gig, always assume there will be traffic. I always say that if traffic is the reason you are late, then traffic wasn't the reason you were late. If you are counting on things going perfectly, you have the opposite of a plan. I have yet to meet a bandleader who minds having people there ahead of schedule.

This one might seem obvious, but: pack your car so that the most expensive items (i.e., your keyboard[s]) can be removed first. You don't want to take a trip in to the venue with everything else and leave $10K of keyboards sitting there behind a single pane of glass. Even when I am just doing the, "Hey, I'm in a band that's playing here, do you know where we'll be" recon trip inside, I've almost always got my board on my back. The alternative is to make sure your load is covered completely (don't just cover the expensive stuff and leave other music-related items showing), double-click that car-lock so the alarm is set, and say three hail mary's on the way in and out. Same for load-out: load all the stuff you could survive having stolen, first, and then put your keyboard(s) in the car only when you're ready to drive away in it. 

[MAJUSCULE]

The backup/duplicate rig is a good idea, but is certainly cost-prohibitive, especially for younger musicians. And even moreso if we're also following the "buy once, buy right" adage. It's still a good idea. But I'm also thirty and have spent nearly half my life gigging semi- to fully-professionally and am now only starting to get doubles of things like sustain pedals. I sure as hell ain't getting duplicates of my boards.

 

Otherwise, I'll say again that I've learned as much about the music business from the generous wealth of knowledge here than I did from my expensive music degree. Thank you all once again for enriching my life and significantly contributing to my career. I owe you all a great deal.

 

So yes, my tip to young musicians would be to hang out here and pay particular attention to posts by sirs Tim, Geoff, Josh, Jerry, Al, Dave, and anyone else who may resonate with you. But also, make sure you actually play more than you hang out here. The internet will suck you in!

[EricBarker]

21 hours ago, Threadslayer said:

Don't hook up with the singer.

 

too late, singer is my wife of 15 years!

[TommyRude]

"When you deal with little things, you have to be sure that they are handled correctly because if they are not handled correctly, they can become big things that get out of control."

 

- Richard Nixon, reflecting on his legacy and the impact of Watergate.

[bill5]

If you're going to paint a room (or whatever), always buy somewhat more than you need (how much is debatable but IMO a gallon should work), because there's a very real chance you'll eventually need to do some touch-up for whatever reason and companies are constantly changing shades/etc so if you don't, you may never be ever to exactly match it later on.

[Adan]

20 hours ago, MAJUSCULE said:

make sure you actually play more than you hang out here. The internet will suck you in!

That might be the best piece of advice in this or any thread.

 

QWERTY < CDEFGA = some chance of success

[Stokely]

On 3/29/2023 at 9:37 PM, bill5 said:

Don't use glue traps for pests (cruel as hell) and don't use the "humane" mouse traps that claim to catch them alive so you can release them later. I tried that and caught one but it died anyway...I suspect either from suffocation as it's in such a ridiculously cramped area and if not airtight, close enough, or died of fright that again it was in such a cramped area and could not get out or hardly even move. I curse myself to this day for using it. 

Pretty much the toughest job I ever had in my life was my first one, being a barback at a lagoonside restaurant/bar in FL.  One of my jobs was to clean those horrible black mats with a hose at night's end.  I heard a scrabbling sound when grabbing the kitchen mats to go hose them and looked under a counter--a huge river rat had his leg stuck on a glue trap and was scrambling all over the place with it.   Kind of reminded me of the shark in Jaws dragging those barrels.

One challenge, playing where I do and at the places I sometimes do, is to "stay above the fray".  Especially in turbulent political times...we've had a few very racist patrons say some heinous stuff to us (because we look like part of the gang so they feel safe) and it's about all I can to do remember I'm hired as entertainment by management and not there to get into scuffles with jackoffs.  I find something I need to do with my rig quickly.   The ones that get too rowdy generally get handled by the venue.

[KuruPrionz]

Understand that popular music is not beholden to the same rules as European classical music. 

For many of us and keyboardists especially, European classical music is where we are "trained" first. It is beautiful and viable music, I am not disrespecting it at all. I love a good symphony. Further, it is an influence that can be blended into popular music, I saw Ray Charles twice, he played keyboards and had a band with over 20 pieces, including a team of stellar backup singers - The Raylettes. Very much a special blend but truly American music. One of the greats.

 

In the same vein, be aware that not all the notes in the blues (the root music of American popular music) can be played accurately on a tempered scale instrument like the piano. There are lots of "special blends" we can absorb. 

 

 

[ProfD]

I created a separate thread but learn how to use the gear beyond calling up sounds.😎

[Moonglow]

If someone walks on stage and starts playing your gear without asking, instantly, without hesitation, bust them in the mouth.

[Stokely]

56 minutes ago, Moonglow said:

If someone walks on stage and starts playing your gear without asking, instantly, without hesitation, bust them in the mouth.

Which reminds me, and this is much more of a pet peeve than any kind of advice...ok, maybe advice to parents:

If you brought your kids to place where there is a band, KEEP THEM OFF THE STAGE AREA AND AWAY FROM THE GEAR.   The last thing I ever want to do is touch someone else's kid, or even talk to them for that matter without the parents there, but holy hell it's unbelievable what parents let their kids do.   Literally grabbing the guitars on stands and cables on the ground, and we can see the parent sitting there at a table doing nothing.  I was not a strict parent by any means but that's actually dangerous for them and really shitty if they break something.

[bill5]

8 hours ago, Moonglow said:

If someone walks on stage and starts playing your gear without asking, instantly, without hesitation, bust them in the mouth.

Wow - that actually happened to you?

[bill5]

7 hours ago, Stokely said:

holy hell it's unbelievable what parents let their kids do.  

You really don't want me on that soapbox. But welcome to modern America...we've been trending that way more and more for decades and all those village idiots out there don't get the many many reasons why it's a bad thing. Such parents aren't just painfully stupid, but selfish, cowardly, and should have been neutered in their pre-teens. 

 

ugh. I got on, sorry. Just so (so) sick of it.

 

[bill5]

Back to some not quite as "charged" things...   If you cook some meat or fish that comes in one of those plastic wrapped styrofoam containers, a good way to minimize the chance of it attracting bugs when you throw it away is rinse it out as best you can, then nuke it for about a minute (yeah the plastic too). It cooks whatever lingering raw juice is in there and the slightly cooked styrofoam and plastic are not at all appealing to any living creature. 

[Moonglow]

2 hours ago, bill5 said:

Wow - that actually happened to you?

Sure did. I didn’t bust him in the mouth, lol, but did let him know, while admittedly invading his personal space and looking him dead straight in the eye (undoubtedly with my eyes dilated as the result of sympathetic nervous system activation) and using short, concise, functional language (with elevated vocal amplitude) to get his (expletive) ass off the stage.
 

I certainly could have done a more admiral job of 1.) self-monitoring my internal emotional experience, 2.) selecting more respectful language to communicate with him (e.g., using an “I statement”), and then 3.) self-calming or requesting assistance from someone else (e.g., one of my band mates). However, in that moment, I was unable to adequately access these strategies, representing momentary a skill deficit on my behalf.

 

I apologize for any confusion. 

[bill5]

On the other hand, I doubt 

33 minutes ago, Moonglow said:

Sure did. I didn’t bust him in the mouth, lol, but did let him know, while admittedly invading his personal space and looking him dead straight in the eye (undoubtedly with my eyes dilated as the result of sympathetic nervous system activation) and using short, concise, functional language (with elevated vocal amplitude) to get his (expletive) ass off the stage.
 

I certainly could have done a more admiral job of 1.) self-monitoring my internal emotional experience, 2.) selecting more respectful language to communicate with him (e.g., using an “I statement”), and then 3.) self-calming or requesting assistance from someone else (e.g., one of my band mates). However, in that moment, I was unable to adequately access these strategies, representing momentary a skill deficit on my behalf.

 

Seriously. You should have busted him in the mouth.    

 

Really it blows my mind that someone would have such unmitigated gall to do such a thing. I would not be at all surprised to learn that their parents coddled them rotten, enabling such behavior.

 

I have occasionally gone up and just peered at a band's gear out of curiousity at what they had, never daring to actually get within touching range, let alone actually doing so, and even then acting apologetic...they were always nice about talking to another gearhead.   

[Stokely]

Other than kids (at certain gigs where it's possible), the two types of "stage invaders" we've had are:
- drunk dancers
- drunk fighters

A fight rolled up on stage while we were on break and caused over a thousand dollars worth of damage to the PA once, this at a nice place too.   Perhaps because it was a nice place, we left the stage more unattended than we usually do, not that this would have been easy to stop.  They literally were rolling on the ground beating on each other.  Dancers are a problem because they end up stumbling and tripping over stuff.  Neither has happened often, and less so as our gigs have improved overall (less down and dirty bars, though as I say the fight happened at an upscale bar).

This is one reason I've gone with an ipad which can velcro down over trying to have a laptop anywhere.  Those are also times where for once I'm glad I'm more in the back of our setup  

[Moonglow]

We were on break at a wedding reception, where apparently for laughs this guy felt compelled to take our sax player’s tenor saxophone off the stand and then walk around the hall playing it to random people (he was not a sax player). I happened to notice the guy and alerted our sax player (he was standing near me) who ran up to the guy, grabbed it out of his hands, and provided him with verbal behavioral correction. I thought he was going to tear him up. Sorry for derailing this thread.

[TommyRude]

23 hours ago, Moonglow said:

If someone walks on stage and starts playing your gear without asking, instantly, without hesitation, bust them in the mouth.

What if it was Lady Gaga?

 

Or Dwane Johnson?

[stoken6]

1 hour ago, TommyRude said:

What if it was Lady Gaga?

 

Or Dwane Johnson?

I reckon Lady Gaga would know better. (No comment either way on Johnson)

 

Cheers, Mike.

[MathOfInsects]

Nudging this toward advice....what solutions have people come up with for the inevitable situation of kids/drunks/douchebros thinking that the stuff is there to touch and use? What language have you found works? We can't threaten to clobber everyone. What's a safer, more effective approach that people have found?