Ed Friedland Posted February 15, 2001 Share Posted February 15, 2001 Either real or imagined, we all have done gigs that fall into this category, how about a New Years Eve gig that's a 250 mile drive, you play with a bunch of green school boys that don't know tunes trying to back a washed up boxer that thinks hes an Al Jolson impersonator? Hey, it only pays $100, but its okay because you wind up getting STIFFED at the end of the night anyway! (True story from my horror files!) www.edfriedland.com The Bass Whisperer Bass Whisperer TV Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ST.Morigeaugte.net Posted February 15, 2001 Share Posted February 15, 2001 A private party for a bunch of hospital workers, where the gal that hired us got so fricken drunk that Jack (our band leader) just said packer up boys...this suckers heading into the twilight zone... It started with some really off the wall requests.... that didn't stop and escalated into some just out right bullshit....... not worth the money.....!!! Having to load up with half the crowd rooting for us the other half wanting to kill us. Still a gig out of the deal with some really cool people. Mo Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cornbread_medhotmail.com Posted February 15, 2001 Share Posted February 15, 2001 The worst gig I ever played was a frat party. The crowd loved us but the neighbors didn't and called the cops. We played our first set and then the band was arrested. We were released and had the charges dropped because the frat did apply for and get a noise permit. The president of the frat "conveniently" couldn't find it at the time but had his girlfriend bring it down to the police station after the party. When we were released, we came back to the frat house to find a dozen or so drunk frat guys playing our equipment. They did pay us, but they still think that we had to bail ourselves out. The lessons to be found here are A: apply for and carry with you a noise permit for any gig in a neighborhood; B: have friends or road crew go with you to all the shows to protect or pack up your gear in case you can't; and C: have a good lawyer. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Jeff Addicott Posted February 15, 2001 Share Posted February 15, 2001 I made the mistake of doing a July 4th parade float. No matter how gently the driver let out the clutch, we were slip sliding all over the place. If the driver hadn't built a makeshift "fence" on the back, the drummer would have slipped off, for sure. The funky generator power literally blew up my bass head, 10 minutes before we were about to be wheeled out in front of 5000 people. (I promptly plugged in through the PA, which thankfully didn't give out.) The guitar player's Fender Twin amp kept blowing fuses, so we got a guy to jog behind the float with a screwdriver, changing fuses! Oyy, oyy, oyy... Oh, well. At least we got to stand out in the 95 degree sun for 4 hours... for free! Jeff Addicott http://www.jeffnet.org/~addicott/bass.html Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
xtian_dup1 Posted February 15, 2001 Share Posted February 15, 2001 I used to play in SF with a woman who was a singer/songwriter/guitarist/militant lesbian. She wrote all of the parts out, note for note (including which string I should play the note on). The band was great. The drummer and I were really tight, and the second guitarist was this gorgeous little Japanese girl who played the tastiest lines I have ever heard. Unfortunately, the singer goes insane when she gets on stage. She can never hear herself (she says), so she continues to turn up until you can't hear anything else. She is always severely out of tune and then blames it on my intonation, the other guitarist, or her "defective" guitar. However, there was a good side. As a fairly prominent figure in the SF lesbian community, the crowd she drew was...ummm...*ahem*..... well, I am sure you can imagine!! I found myself at the edge of the stage one time, watching this gorgeous dominatrix and her knockout slave "dancing" together on the dance floor in front of me... My reverie was broken when the drummer SLAMMED the one, and shook me out of it...I realized I hadn't been playing for a whole bar! There were rewards to playing with this woman.... - Christian Budapest, Hungary www.Crunchy-Frog.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ST.Morigeaugte.net Posted February 15, 2001 Share Posted February 15, 2001 xian sez... >> watching this gorgeous dominatrix and her knockout slave "dancing" together on the dance floor in front of me... My reverie was broken when the drummer SLAMMED the one, and shook me out of it...I realized I hadn't been playing for a whole bar!<< Not political correct!! But Way Too Funny. Mo http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/cool.gif Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
arvidgunardihotmail.com Posted February 17, 2001 Share Posted February 17, 2001 Audience requested Donna Lee!!??!?!? Are you crazy? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Spidey Posted March 3, 2001 Share Posted March 3, 2001 On the first gig you ever play, during the first song, one of your strings break and since you don't have a back up your forced to pause and restring. Now after your done and the crowd has stopped booing, you get into another song and your amp suddenly blows a fuse. Now instead of trying to fix it your forced to finish the gig and when it's over, the band tells you they've decided to find a new bassist. Spidey Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BassLand Posted March 3, 2001 Share Posted March 3, 2001 Nightmare gigs? I believe I have one coming up. At the rehearsal, the leader was an hour late (for a two hour rehearsal), had this show opener arrangement for which there wer no good charts and each time we started playing the bad charts and made the expected mistakes, the leader stopped and started over again. We only got to rehearse the opener before the scheduled rehearsal was to end. At my question "any last minute things we should know" the reply was "Oh yes, we are to wear a tuxedo" This is the night before the gig... How bad the charts you ask? some of it written out in bass clef, a good thing, most of it in treble clef with the words lick written in the chart where they did not have time to write out, there were some notes written out longhand for some licks ie F G A Bb C etc and no rhythms. Anyway, I can't complain, A gig is a gig... BassLand BassLand www.BassLand.net Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Stream Posted March 4, 2001 Share Posted March 4, 2001 The nightmare on Bass Street. Well there were quite few, but there is one, worth of even the Wes Craven and Robert Englund. Anyway, many of you had problems with audience, but I prefer the problems with gear. Once we had to play, on a gig for final day of seminar for ethnic musicologists, and since it was on really short notice and there were like five more groups, I didn't even bother to take the amp with me. So when I arrived at soundcheck everything was behind the schedule, so we all had to hurry. When it was my turn, I went up and plugged into an old tube Marshall (I don't remember anything about it-model etc.), they brought on stage for me. Since there were only two of us (bass players,in six groups), and the other one had the upright, I was the only one to play on it; and the soundcheck went fine. But when the gig started, things went terribly wrong. Something went wrong with tubes on amp, and there was no sound coming out of it (well it did cough up 3 to 4 tones, before it went to mute). "Luckily" I was using amp as monitor (everything was there was no time due to the tight schedule, and the audience seemed to groove to my bass, I've couldn't go looking for another monitor. So I played like nothing happened, though I couldn't hear a thing, not even from the speakers, since the place was quite small, and the overall was not so loud. But just to make the things worse, the percussionist, who joined us two weeks ago was really counting on the support of the bass. Obviously someone set the difficulty to 100%. I started wondering what was next, dodging the flying objects, jumping over the lumbers or maybe spinning the plates on the stick while playing. That's when icing on the top came. Every now and then there were sporadic bursts of impossible to describe fart like sounds kicking from the 100 watts box behind my back, completely screwing everybody on the stage, and especially rhythm section, apart from me. I really felt sorry for the audience, and especially for this really nice, old enthusiastic musicologist from Japan who set up a "base" in the front row with his tripod and camera trying to shoot the whole gig. Well at the end, many people stepped to us, congratulating and praising us. They've must thought that the really odd measures, and some really wild tempo changes were part of the show. Or maybe by some chance everything went on smooth without mistake? We'll never now. That is my favorite 'I can't hear a thing from my bass, and sound guy is prick' gig. I bet you all had similar experiences, even if they come into 'my sound guy is so wasted' category. Stream Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Wally Malone Posted March 5, 2001 Share Posted March 5, 2001 I play a show in San Francisco, Tony & Tina's Wedding. The band consists of keyboards, bass and drums and a male and a female vocalists. One time the keyboard player didn't make it (car problems). We sang all the melodies of the instrumental sections. The pressure was really on me. We made it through the day. Nobody asked for their money back. I have basses to play, places to be and good music to make! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
cornbread_medhotmail.com Posted March 5, 2001 Share Posted March 5, 2001 It looks like we've all had our fair share of nightmare gigs in our careers. I've had more than my fair share of them. Just last weekend, my band had a major showcase set up for a few record labels. We played the first song and everything was fine. We start off the second song and nothing is coming out of my amp. The DI isn't even working, so I'm not out front either. This was a borrowed amp as well because mine was in the shop because someone decided that my tubes needed a drink of beer the night before at practice. (That's a nightmare in itself.) Anyway, I do everything I can think of...change cords, change basses...nothing worked. So, I grabbed the unballanced female to ballanced female connector and went straight into the PA. But, the sound guy killed me in the board when he noticed the problems and didn't realize I was back in. So, I was playing again, but still nothing was coming out, until it was time for my bass solo 3 songs later. After it was almost over the sound guy decided to turn me back up in the board. Needless to say we didn't get signed and haven't heard back from that record company. Maybe they didn't like the music or thought we were a bunch of idiots running around that didn't know how to make sounds come out of our amps. Maybe they just thought we sucked. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
jazzbass1 Posted March 16, 2001 Share Posted March 16, 2001 My band played the New Years Eve gig in 1986 that Rick Nelson was on his way to in Dallas when his plane crashed. We were a good show band, but we weren't prepared for the pressure of playing for a sold out crowd expecting one of their rock and roll heroes. It went OK, but as you can guess, there was an undercurrent of sadness and shock through the entire evening. One of the most depressing gigs of my life. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
BenLoy Posted March 23, 2001 Share Posted March 23, 2001 Did a private party gig with a swing/jump blues band once way out on Long Island on the south fork for some charity fundraiser. The guests were all extremely rich folks from NYC and Connecticut. For reasons I'll never know, people regularly decide to come to me to request songs (maybe it's cause I don't look mean, I don't know). In any case, I usually smile and direct them to the bandleader who handles the requests. With this crowd, though, that sort of behavior seemed to always get an insulted reaction as if I was somehow a jerk for not stopping the band in mid song to take this person's request. One particular woman came up to me in the middle of one of our "barn burners", "Hey Marie". She steps up onto the crowded stage, taps me on the shoulder and says: "Excuse me, could you PLEASE play something that's good?" I directed her to the bandleader. She looked at me like I had just insulted her lineage. "I'm talking to you!" she said, "I want you to play something good!" "Ma'am," I said, doing my best to stay calm after a night of being bitten by hundreds of misquitoes and nary a can of repellent in sight, "I'm not the bandleader, I don't have any control over what songs we play, you have to talk to the bandleader." She then walked over to stand right in front of the bandleader (right in his face as he was soloing) and say "Can you boys PLEASE play something good?" Our bandleader, who by this point had already fielded two requests for "Anything by Beethoven" and three repeated drunken requests for "Rock n' Roll all Night" by Kiss (we were wearing pinstripe suits and fedoras), had had enough. "Ma'am," he said, still soloing, "I'm sorry. We only play songs that suck." Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Friedland Posted March 24, 2001 Author Share Posted March 24, 2001 <<"I'm sorry. We only play songs that suck." >> Hey, I've played with those guys! http://www.musicplayer.com/ubb/wink.gif ------------------ www.edfriedland.com www.edfriedland.com The Bass Whisperer Bass Whisperer TV Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ricknbokker Posted March 28, 2001 Share Posted March 28, 2001 My band's doing an outdoor gig for some friend's party. $150 for the 5 pieces. We lose our drummer[6th one in 2.5 yrs!] Find a fill-in who just sunk $2800 into a new kit. He's real concerned about the security at my boss' warehouse where we're to rehearse for 3 days straight. I call him from a pay phone in my nieghborhood. I tell him, 'no problem, it's a new warehouse with the usual alarm system and all-don't worry about a thing'. I give him directions. He shows up for all three rehearsals. Sounds great. The next day, I get back to the shop from the job, and my boss calls me into the office. Go in the office and who's there? A detective and uniformed officer of the local P.D.! "well", the detective says, "I can tell by the look on your face that you know why we're here, so you're coming with us to the station."Go to the station, where this putz puts me through the ringer for almost an hour, before finally telling me "Look, we know all about your plans for ripping off the warehouse, plus all the equipment you're renting for your 'gig'!' WHAT??!!! What the hell are you talking about??!! Turns out some old lady heard my phone conversation at the pay phone, wrote down the directions, and called the local cops to tip them off to my 'plot'! So for the 3 days of rehearsal it turns out a SWAT team was watching our every move![and digging the jams!] When I told the detective about my new drummer's concerns, plus invitations to the party with the band's name listed, he backed off and realized the absurdity of the whole situation.---POSTSCRIPT--- When the drummer found out about the cops, he refused to play with us at the party- turns out he was dealing large quantities of coke and felt 'nervous' being around us! We found another drummer that didn't show up for the gig, so we asked the crowd of 150 people[in the RAIN], "Hey, anybody play drums??! Got a guy. He drove 55 miles to get his kit, broke his snare drum head on the first song, fixed it w/duct tape, then played the rest of the show with us! We never sounded better!!!I swear on my eyes, this story is true. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ed Friedland Posted March 28, 2001 Author Share Posted March 28, 2001 Truth is stranger than fiction! ------------------ www.edfriedland.com www.edfriedland.com The Bass Whisperer Bass Whisperer TV Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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