Incredibly boring songs to play

[KuruPrionz]

Grey, all best wishes for your daughter!

 

Bass is something I do and then don't do, family is always family.

[Tom Williams]

I've always considered there to be a difference:

 

Grump A person who is hates everything

 

Curmudgeon A person who has fun hating everything.

 

To Grey: Pedantic jokes aside, I'm praying for your daughter. Try to get some rest.

[allan_evett]

Just about anything 'Bro-Country', at the moment... Doing a NW Indiana bar gig tonight, and that's part of the main course. '5150', 'Country Girl Shake It...' , 'She's Country' and a few other notables. Cue the gratuitous banjo and fiddle parts, though I'm playing more tonewheel than anything else on these - since the subtle stuff would get buried

Hey, at least there's some Journey I like, along with a few well-crafted old-school rock/pop songs. But I have heard about enough 'catfish down in the creek', 'tailgates' and 'bonfires' to last a few lifetimes

[GRollins]

I've always considered there to be a difference:

 

Grump A person who is hates everything

 

Curmudgeon A person who has fun hating everything.

 

To Grey: Pedantic jokes aside, I'm praying for your daughter. Try to get some rest.

 

Well, yeah...it's no fun hating everybody and everything if you can't have fun doing it, right?

 

Or something like that.

 

I and my wife went to see our daughter today. Not good. Not good at all.

 

Went to look at the crash site to try to wrap my head around what happened. Man, if only I'd been there the day before to flag her down before she screwed up.

 

Thanks for the good wishes.

 

Long day. Gonna crash.

 

Er...can I have a do-over on that last line?

 

Grey

[DaveMcM]

GRollins, I've been away from my computer for several days. I am so sorry to hear about your daughter. I hope she makes a full recovery. This is hard with any family member. But having your child in pain is the worst.

[AWkeys]

Wagon Wheel

 

Yeah, this one too...

[AWkeys]

GRollins, I can only imagine what you are going through. All my best to your daughter for a speedy and complete recovery.

[AWkeys]

All that said, I wouldn't mind taking home the royalty checks on these songs.

[GRollins]

Again, thanks for the good wishes. At this time, my daughter's in for surgery. The first of many, looks like. We're on pins and needles because she's had bleeding on the brain and her intracranial pressure is up (this is bad), but they've got things they need to work on ASAP, so...

 

Jeez, this is a bitch...

 

Grey

[o0Ampy0o]

Wagon Wheel

Normally I would agree. But one band I was in had this rather attractive fiddle player that was a total bad a$$ player. I was happy to play that song and just sit, accompany and listen (& maybe stare a little).

 

[CowboyNQ]

Again, thanks for the good wishes. At this time, my daughter's in for surgery. The first of many, looks like. We're on pins and needles because she's had bleeding on the brain and her intracranial pressure is up (this is bad), but they've got things they need to work on ASAP, so...

 

Jeez, this is a bitch...

 

Grey

 

Thoughts with you and your family Grey.

[Delaware Dave]

People love some of the most boring songs. I can come up with an extensive list but I thought I would start things off with the most current song;

 

Tennessee Whisky

 

I'll still play it because it is our job to make people happy, but I don't have to enjoy it.

 

[video:youtube]

[o0Ampy0o]

FOOTNOTE: If I sound grumpier (read: more curmudgeonly) than usual, chalk it up to the fact that my daughter's....

I did not see this earlier.......may lots of love and good warm vibes heal everyone during this difficult time.

[GRollins]

1) Sorry...didn't mean to hijack the thread. I just thought I'd put in a disclaimer regarding my mindset a couple of posts back and things went from there.

2) Yes, I'm prone to gallows humor sometimes. I (try to) use humor to counter pain. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't. Hope I don't freak people out too much. Hope I don't freak myself out too much. (Too late.)

3) After many delays--only one of which made sense to me--they finally got my daughter into surgery, six hours behind schedule, only to cancel almost immediately as her intracranial pressure shot up. Don't know what will happen now--caught between rocks and hard places and time is running out.

4) Again, thanks for good wishes. Sometimes the sort of phone call you dread receiving in the dark at 3AM actually arrives at 1PM on a bright, sunny day and your entire world collapses.

 

Grey

[ProfD]

Brotha Grey, thoughts and prayers are definitely with you and your family.

 

Sometimes, the full range of human emotions is the only way we can make it through the worst situations and circumstances.

 

Yet, music has the power to soothe and heal. That could include the most boring and/or simple songs/tunes.

[allan_evett]

Wagon Wheel

Normally I would agree. But one band I was in had this rather attractive fiddle player that was a total bad a$$ player. I was happy to play that song and just sit, accompany and listen (& maybe stare a little).

 

Continuing on, and slightly OT: What is it with these fiddle players? Almost every one I've shared the stage with has had a mystique; the guys having a magician-like aura, the ladies very attractive. And maybe some of that magic is partly based on my strong crush for Morticia Addams - from the original TV version of the Addams Family?

 

A bad-a$$ violinist can make even my most boring song work. And this particular intrigue was ignited when I attended several Jerry Goodman Band gigs in the late 1980s. The violin dude on my church gig is a monster player, in many genres. In addition to some amazing acoustic instruments, he owns two different electric violins. Wish he could be cloned for some of my band gigs

[allan_evett]

1) Sorry...didn't mean to hijack the thread. I just thought I'd put in a disclaimer regarding my mindset a couple of posts back and things went from there.

2) Yes, I'm prone to gallows humor sometimes. I (try to) use humor to counter pain. Sometimes it works. Sometimes it doesn't. Hope I don't freak people out too much. Hope I don't freak myself out too much. (Too late.)

3) After many delays--only one of which made sense to me--they finally got my daughter into surgery, six hours behind schedule, only to cancel almost immediately as her intracranial pressure shot up. Don't know what will happen now--caught between rocks and hard places and time is running out.

4) Again, thanks for good wishes. Sometimes the sort of phone call you dread receiving in the dark at 3AM actually arrives at 1PM on a bright, sunny day and your entire world collapses.

 

Grey

 

Adding an addendum of sorts to my last post, as I just caught up on the all the info preceding the above...

 

Grey, I'm very sorry to read of your daughter's accident. Hoping that those attending her will draw from good resources and perhaps unconventional wisdom, and that she will have successful surgery and recover well. Thinking of you, your wife and family right now.

[GRollins]

That could include the most boring and/or simple songs/tunes.

 

Except 1-4-5 12-bar. That crap's off the table.

 

Today's crisis...strike that...this hour's crisis is that she's got a blood clot and they can't use blood thinners because her blood pressure's already low. There's a Plan B involving some sort of a mechanical filter...she's going in now for a procedure to see if they can get that installed before her brain inflates and destroys itself.

 

Grey

[GRollins]

Anybody got teen-aged kids they want to scare the ever-living fuck out of? I'll send you a picture of the car so you can show them. I made damned sure that my sons saw the pictures and we (I and the boys) went and found the crash site. I rubbed their noses in the fact that this is what can happen in an accident. They're 14--too young to drive yet--but I want them VERY aware of the downside to acting stupid in a car. They were pretty somber afterwards. The trick will be to keep them from forgetting once they get their driver's licenses and start thinking foolish thoughts.

 

Bottom line: Car + Tree = BAD

 

Grey

[Stokely]

I can't say I ever get bored playing, even if the song is one I find boring to listen to.

 

The closest might be Gimme one reason, it's kind of plodding...but mostly because I suck so bad playing in F# that I can't add a lot of "flair" So not the song's fault.

 

As far as car crashes--in Driver's Education they played an old film of some horrific after-crash footage to try to scare us 15-year-olds...not sure it worked, but I still remember seeing some guy with half a head lying on the street with blood and brains everywhere.

[Outkaster]

People love some of the most boring songs. I can come up with an extensive list but I thought I would start things off with the most current song;

 

Tennessee Whisky

 

I'll still play it because it is our job to make people happy, but I don't have to enjoy it.

 

[video:youtube]

 

 

That doesn't sound good.

[Pa Gherkin]

Grey, let me add my voice to the chorus of well wishes for your daughter,you,and your family.

[JohnH]

Bad to the Bone. I Detest it. And it fits right in with your 1 4 5 post. I am sorry about your daughter and hope she gets well soon.

[elsongs]

"Kiss" by Prince.

 

Now -- the original is a wonderful tune, with lots of little subtleties that make it work.

 

But 99.97% of all bands who cover it make it sound like a dorky, hokey blues rock tune that I feel embarrassed to play.

[Bobadohshe]

What a grumpy lot. On the simplest tunes (Tennessee Whiskey) I love focusing on locking in with the band as much as humanly possible and making every fill as close to Nashville perfection as I can, serving the presentation of the singer and band as best I can. If the set was full of those songs though I could see how it would get old.

 

Some songs get boring to play because I've played them zillions of times, but inherently they don't bore me by themselves. If you're not a fan of your fellow bandmates though, the whole thing could be a drag, boring song or otherwise.

[vonnor]

If you get bored you're not playing it right ð

This.

 

For any song regardless of simplicity, chord progression, or repetition, I always find some element of performance I can focus on and challenge myself. Timing of note attacks, key release, dynamics, locking into the pocket with the drummer, adding a cool counterpoint to what the guitar player is doing, the list goes on. The desired but never quite attainable goal is perfect execution: as an individual musician and as a group, and there is both frustration and satisfaction in the endeavor.

 

Head in the game. It's way more fun than daydreaming while your fingers play that same boring song for the thousandth time.

 

~ vonnor

[The Real MC]

Sometimes when I'm bored playing a song, I'll have a little fun.

 

Years ago the band covered The Eagles "Wasted Time". A tearjerker song. There is a piano breakdown "You can get on with your search baby..." Am->G#aug5->C/G->D/F#, then on the last chord I improv'd a New Orleans jazz style descending run.

 

The next chord was on F after a fermata, but the singer lost it and broke into laughter.

 

Another band covered Billy Squier "Everybody Wants You". Stupid piano solo, octaves on the quarter notes. Yawn. The incredibly difficult solo also appears at the end of the song, so I played the "Batman" theme nana-nana-nana-nana. Band loved it so I did that at shows.

 

Styx "Too Much Time On My Hands" has a cool synth intro that is stupid easy to play. One night I didn't tell the band I was going to open the song with a Kurzweil preset "Clocks" that sounded really authentic. Singer is really baffled when she hears "tick tock tick tock tick tock tick tock..." then I play the opening synth of the song. Tongue in cheek "Too much time"... She loved it and I did that ever since.

[DaveMcM]

So for me it comes down to this. Playing the same two chords, back and forth through an entire song, is boring. For those who say in essence it is the players fault for not making it interesting, I can partially agree with that. On Tennessee Whisky, I take an organ solo that goes from a mellow 00850000, to a churchy 86800456 then finish with a down-low 88800000/3rd perc/C3. I enjoy it, the band enjoys it, the audience couldn't give a !@#$.

 

Another song that I really don't enjoy is Boogie Shoes. Provided there are no horns in the band, select a brass sound, and play two notes. That's it. I fool around with a clavinet patch with wah just to make it bearable. On the other hand I feel that if the audience digs it, then it's worth playing. And having a full dance floor can help make up for a crappy tune.

 

I've been playing professionally for 40+ years, in multiple genres from progressive rock to disco, surrounded by a vast assortment of keyboards, and it was a ton of fun. Today you can almost get by with an iPad and a 37 note controller. It seems that some of todays popular music has dumbed down the audience. Then again I could be wrong and just turning into a grump-bucket.

[Threadslayer]

having a full dance floor can help make up for a crappy tune.

 

I should have this put on a T shirt. Or my headstone. If I had to pick one phrase to capture all the years I spent playing in clubs, I think this would be it - Thanks.

[The Real MC]

There's a difference between being bored with a song, and really hating a song.

 

Towards the end of my days with the southern rock band back in 2016, we had a guitar hero picking songs that were fun to play on guitar but left nothing to play on keyboard except doubling the guitar barre chords. I abhor that role. I hated one song in particular so much that I wanted to sit that song out but the band insisted that I play. So at one practice I played the song with the keyboard volume all the way off. After we finished the song I asked the band how they liked my playing. Sounded great. They never noticed the silence.