Ross Brown Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 Hello. My name is Ross and I played bad bass last night. We played a one set practice gig at a local Pub. We are still getting our full complement of songs together. I played the first song in a different key than the rest of the band. It sounded bad but I could not figure it out while playing. I thought it was the sound system (no monitors, we couldn't hear well). I thought it was the guitarist. I thought I just didn't remember the song sounding so wierd. I was so full of myself that I could not believe that I would be doing something wrong. It was my fault. I will try to do better. "When I take a stroll down Jackass Lane it is usually to see someone that is already there" Mrs. Brown Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Athanacropolis Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 You are forgiven; it happens to the best of us. How did the rest of that gig go Ross? Kalta Eye The Blog Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Danzilla Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 That'll teach you all to communicate as to who's doing drop tuning! At least it was just a warm-up gig at a pub, so the people were half drunk and couldn't tell, right? "Am I enough of a freak to be worth paying to see?"- Separated Out (Marillion) NEW band Old band Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ross Brown Posted March 31, 2006 Author Share Posted March 31, 2006 It was OK. The singer was off key several painful times. He couldn't hear either. The guitarist did a nice job but does a lot better with his own gear. We used house gear. There were some holes in the songs that we have to fix. We are essentially a trio. Drums, Bass, Guitar. Singer just sings. "When I take a stroll down Jackass Lane it is usually to see someone that is already there" Mrs. Brown Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ross Brown Posted March 31, 2006 Author Share Posted March 31, 2006 Originally posted by Danzilla: That'll teach you all to communicate as to who's doing drop tuning! At least it was just a warm-up gig at a pub, so the people were half drunk and couldn't tell, right? Yes. They was all drunk... One guy at the end of the bar just kept staring at me like he was pissed. I guess he probably was... "When I take a stroll down Jackass Lane it is usually to see someone that is already there" Mrs. Brown Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
tnb Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 Saw a band do that a few months ago. Played the entire song in 2 different keys. The guitarist/singer looked annoyed, but never went to the bassist and said "hey man, ...". Neither did the drummer. Shame on all of them. When you heard that something was wrong, why didn't you switch keys? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
wade_g Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 Hello Ross. I've been there too. I hate not having adequate monitor. Side story, there was this guitarist I used to play with who was young and new to playing. He had this little $20 tuner, can't remember the brand, that worked decent BUT had two settings; guitar and bass. And if someone were to put the setting on bass, it wouldn't tune a guitar well at all. I know, doesn't sound right, but I guess that's why it was cheap. I wouldn't do it before a gig, but it sure made practice more entertaining. There is a difference between Belief and Truth. Constantly searching for Truth makes your Beliefs seem believable. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eric Iverson Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 I remember once we were playing along with a CD, which was doing a song in D that the band usually did in C. The bassist played the whole song in C anyway, and when I mentioned it to him, he said, "They told me it was in C." I had to ask just who in the hell THEY were, and why the opinion of his musical masters, excuse me, bandmates, wasn't considered. (I'm just kidding about the "master" part, BTW!) Don't get the wrong impression - I love good bass players! In thinking about it, why was the band playing along with the CD anyway? I guess it was because we didn't want to sit there twiddling our thumbs! Why were they playing the CD if the band knew the tune? That's one of those cosmic questions best left unasked by mere mortals! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
UTS-D Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 Yeah, I hate hitting wrong notes on stage. It's the worst. It leaves me thinking "Was I the only one who noticed?!??! Shit! I hope so....yeah, that's it, nobody noticed...no one pays attention to the bass player....Crap! someone just looked at me! They did noticed that I played the wrong note...CRAP! I played that same wrong note again! Was I the only one who noticed?!??! Shit! I hope so...when is this fucking song going to end?!?!" Ok, so maybe it's not that bad. UNDER THE STONE Me Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
EddiePlaysBass Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 Well, second gig I ever played (and last one to date ) was with the HBC, on the fretless. Guitarist starts playing a song, I really have no clue what he's doing ... Neither does he, as it turns out We start over three times, then decide to skip that song and start an original tune ... and he forgot the chords again. Mind you, HE wrote that tune Gotta love guitar players "I'm a work in progress." Micky Barnes The Ross Brown Shirt World Tour Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Fred TBP Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 I empathize. One of the risks in playing fretless is getting caught off-key or slightly out of tune. A few weeks ago me and my fretless are wailing away at an open mike night, and I left my tuner (one of those Intellitouch-clones that works on vibration instead of plugging in so you can tune in the middle of a loud set) in my bag at the back of the club. Wouldn't you know it? A sax player was sitting in front of me with one of those Korg tuners and he kept telling me I was slightly flat. (How he could tell in the middle of a jam with 3 guitarists is beyond me.) Made some minor adjustments in-between songs, he's happy now. A half-hour later a guitarist comes up with his Korg tuner and tells me I'm slightly flat. I tune using his tuner, then surprise-surprise the E and B strings are now out of tune! So I play the next 3 songs on the A-D-G strings (good training anyway) and call it a night. (having to pass up a solo was the low point in my frustration) Next time the Intellitouch-clone goes with me onstage. I'm not trusting another person's tuner again unless I'm forced to. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ross Brown Posted March 31, 2006 Author Share Posted March 31, 2006 Originally posted by tnb: Saw a band do that a few months ago. Played the entire song in 2 different keys. The guitarist/singer looked annoyed, but never went to the bassist and said "hey man, ...". Neither did the drummer. Shame on all of them. When you heard that something was wrong, why didn't you switch keys? I didn't switch keys because I had my head up my ass. I felt really stupid. I have no excuse, except for those already offered. Thank God that I have had lots of other experiences with presentations. I think that had I had less experience with tough situations, I would have just snuck out...(not really). I wanted to crawl in a hole. It did make me a better bass player/musician. "When I take a stroll down Jackass Lane it is usually to see someone that is already there" Mrs. Brown Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
way2fat Posted March 31, 2006 Share Posted March 31, 2006 Ross,Ross,Ross......it was the rest of them that were in the wrong key. You are the BASSIST dude, the right key is the key YOU are playing in..... www.ethertonswitch.com Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ross Brown Posted March 31, 2006 Author Share Posted March 31, 2006 Originally posted by way2fat: Ross,Ross,Ross......it was the rest of them that were in the wrong key. You are the BASSIST dude, the right key is the key YOU are playing in..... Drummer was in the same key as me. I guess it was a tie ( 2 vs 2). "When I take a stroll down Jackass Lane it is usually to see someone that is already there" Mrs. Brown Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
slowfinger Posted April 3, 2006 Share Posted April 3, 2006 I'm very much a noob at bass, even tho I'm a greybeard. At our first public performance we were playing away nicely (Brown Sugar - Stones). I was having a great time, looking around at the audience (who loved us), enjoying my first gig with a real rock band. However, I could hear this awful rumbling drone kind of sound from the backline. I looked around and could see nothing obvious - looked at my left hand to see that I was playing the pattern (Eb-C-Ab-Bb-C) one fret out. Like Barney said when he dropped the monorail car - "I hate that sound" Epi EB-3 G-K Backline 600 2 x Eden EX112 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
dcr Posted April 3, 2006 Share Posted April 3, 2006 Sucks. But we all screw up. At our last band practice, the guitar player tunes up before we begin, & he likes to tune to the piano. So the piano player gives him the notes on his keyboard. The guitar is WAY out of tune, the guitar player is making lots of "What the...?!" sounds, but finally finishes up & we start the first song. Whoa--not right. I ask what key we're in, & he tunes up again. Somehow we figured out that his open E string was now tuned to F#. General puzzlement, & I say to the piano player, "Does that thing have a transpose function?" "Yeah." "Is the transpose function on right now?" "No...er, yeah, actually! Sorry!" So like 5 minutes later, we can actually start playing. In practice, it's really funny. Before a gig...I'm real generous about sharing my electronic tuner. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Rowbee Posted April 3, 2006 Share Posted April 3, 2006 DCR, exactly the same thing happened to me at rehearsal but it took over an hour to convince the guitarist the keyboard was wrong and that it wasn't my tuner. And Slowfinger, if the audience loved you I guess it must've sounded ok. Now theres three of you in a band, youre like a proper band. Youre like the policemen. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Gruuve Posted April 3, 2006 Share Posted April 3, 2006 Well...I hope you learned some lessons about actually LISTENING to what your bandmates are playing! The musicians who achieve any level of greatness are the ones who use their ears to listen to the whole picture (rather than just concentrating on what they themselves are playing), and then use their minds to actually REACT to what they hear. Notice the words I capitalized...LISTEN and REACT. Dave Old bass players never die, they just buy lighter rigs. - Tom Capasso, 11/9/2006 Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ross Brown Posted April 3, 2006 Author Share Posted April 3, 2006 Originally posted by Dave Sisk: Well...I hope you learned some lessons about actually LISTENING to what your bandmates are playing! The musicians who achieve any level of greatness are the ones who use their ears to listen to the whole picture (rather than just concentrating on what they themselves are playing), and then use their minds to actually REACT to what they hear. Notice the words I capitalized...LISTEN and REACT. Dave Yes! That is what has made this a good experience for me. I now have been there and hopefully will handling it much better if it happens again. I wish I would have reacted right away, but it is now forever burned into my soul. Someday it will be funny. "When I take a stroll down Jackass Lane it is usually to see someone that is already there" Mrs. Brown Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Eric VB Posted April 4, 2006 Share Posted April 4, 2006 I didn't bother playing a song last Sunday at all because I didn't have a monitor. (I got there late and had to go straight into the house; didn't have time to drag my cab in.) The "music" was a bunch of chords scribbled on an odd sheet of paper by the guitarist. There were just chord names; no indication of meter, measures, etc. To make matters worse, it was written with his capo in mind. Had I been able to hear myself, I would have attempted it. But without any feedback as to what I was playing, there's no way I could pull it off. I sightread all the charts for the remaining pieces. (Well, one piece we played the last couple of weeks, so it wasn't entirely new to me.) Still, I felt awful not being able to hear myself. No complaints, however. On other occasions --before I had my own tuner -- I'd start a practice without tuning up. If I was lucky I'd be a little flat; I'd just bend all the notes up a tiny bit (being on a fretted bass) and avoid open strings. If I was a little sharp, I'd have to transpose down a half step and then bend more aggressively. The worst is when you're out of tune, and so is someone else. It doesn't matter who you adjust to, because someone will still be out of tune in the ensemble. No matter what, a tuner is no replacement for your ears. If you can't hear yourself you're probably better off not playing. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ross Brown Posted April 4, 2006 Author Share Posted April 4, 2006 I will definately shy away from "no monitor" gigs. Even the songs that I was playing correctly I could not hear a lot of what I was doing. I hope my fingers remembered. I was sight playing, I guess. Just looking at my fingers and wondering "what the heck and I doing here? Band leader (drummer) was cool about my playing in wrong key. He said "We sounded bad. We either all sound good or we all sound bad. We are a band". I like this guy... but it was me... "When I take a stroll down Jackass Lane it is usually to see someone that is already there" Mrs. Brown Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
ATM Posted April 5, 2006 Share Posted April 5, 2006 Admitting that it was you was a sure sign that you're a bassist. Embrace it. ATM http://img.photobucket.com/albums/v506/atmofmn/Bass/DeepThoughtsBS.jpg Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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