Category: Gigs

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Gigs Musicians

Everyone thinks they’re musicians…

At the gig last night this guy comes up on the first break and tells me “man you’re off the chain.” I didn’t quite understand that. I guess this means he liked my drumming. I think he mean to say “you’re off the hook.”

He then tells me and my singer that he plays drums and bass. So my singer says “come up and play a tune with us.”

Guy jumps up on the next set and we play a 1-4-5 slow blues song. This is cake. Well he starts “soloing” (badly) over everything and can’t even follow the damn progression. Our singer is yelling across the stage “C man, C!!!” and he’s looking at the bass like the C note left the building.

What an ass.

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Gigs

Sub gig tonight

After writing the last post I realized I should have mentioned that my day is only half over. Tonight I’m doing a drum sub gig for a variety band. This’ll be my first time playing with these guys but they’re so tight and play all these tunes so well it will just be like playing along with the original recordings. I’m confident I’ll do fine and these guys will be happy with my performance. The gig is in Deer Valley for some corporate party. Dinner included. Yes, we musicians love free food.

Killer musicians

The regular drummer for this band is one of my best drum friends, and probably one of the top three drummers in the state. The guitar player for this band has been regarded as the best guitar player in the state for years. The key player is one of the best too. The female singer I wonder about. She was not terribly nice to me on the phone when I was doing some web site work for their band. She was mad at me because their band picture had the old female singer from 4 years ago. It wasn’t my fault as I was only working with what they gave me.

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Gigs

Caved in guitar pickup

Looked over at my guitar player’s guitar at last night’s gig. His pickup is caving in. After looking at this pic I also realized his tone switch is broken off…
Caved in pickup

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Gigs

Biker Convention Gig Tonight

Today I hit the road and drive about 4 hours south to a tiny little town to play a gig. There’s a 400 member English biker convention there and they’ve hired my rock & roll band to play there. The area is one of the most beautiful in the state with a national park right next door.

I rate small towns based on how many stop lights they have. This town is so small I don’t think it even has one. With 400 bikers and a rock & roll band in a town which may not even have one stoplight, it should be interesting.

A report and pics will follow.

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Gigs Random Rants

Thoughts of quitting the band

I don’t know if it was the back pain last night which made me start thinking of quitting the band… I had this a couple of years ago and took six months off and that refreshed me last time. I don’t think this is the same issue though.

Limited set list

During the last set of the gig last night I was wondering what the hell I was doing there. Ever since we got our new bass player the gigs have been all the same. She has only learned about 1/3 of our set list and that 1/3 she only knows enough to pass through the tunes. There are still lots of notes she’s missing and she just isn’t as solid and aggressive on the bass as my old bass player and great friend. Her tone and playing is wimpy.

Same old same old

We’ve been playing the same damn gig at an “ok” club forever. We’ve been getting decent crowds and making a few bucks at this place so that’s not the problem. The problem is the gig is getting very boring. When you only have a small number of tunes to pick from, which aren’t played as well as they could be, and you combine that with playing at the same damn place for the same damn crowd of drunk smokers it gets pretty monotonous.

Right now I’m thinking if the new bass player doesn’t learn the current tunes better and learn the rest of the set list by the end of the Summer, and if we don’t find a new place or two to gig, I’m out. I may not make it that far but that’s my plan. Maybe it’s my time to go find a different gig anyway. Maybe a jazz group…