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#444993 - 10/25/07 09:14 PM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: Mr_Coffee]
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buckaloo
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Registered: 02/24/05
Posts: 607
Loc: L.A.
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You've just finished playing your first Ticketmaster show to a grand total of 7 people in a venue that holds 1200. If that wasn't a slap to the back of the head, as you're loading out, you hear your "radio hit" faintly emanating through the walls of the smaller club downstairs. You assume it's a jukebox until you open the door to find a cover band playing your song to a crowd of about 500. Aaaaah...the memories.
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#445090 - 10/26/07 04:00 AM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: jammybastard]
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teverett
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Registered: 01/24/00
Posts: 22771
Loc: Los Feliz-adjacent
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There was this four-week tour of Midwestern clubs, playing double-bass drums in a prog band. Paid $300/week, and I had to furnish the van.
At least by cutting down on cigs and booze and subsisting on a diet of celery and lettuce, I was able to keep expenses down.
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#445091 - 10/26/07 04:53 AM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: buckaloo]
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d_gauss
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Registered: 07/29/06
Posts: 603
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You've just finished playing your first Ticketmaster show to a grand total of 7 people in a venue that holds 1200. If that wasn't a slap to the back of the head, as you're loading out, you hear your "radio hit" faintly emanating through the walls of the smaller club downstairs. You assume it's a jukebox until you open the door to find a cover band playing your song to a crowd of about 500.
ding! we have a winner!
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#445096 - 10/26/07 06:17 AM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: d_gauss]
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Covered_In_Bees
Bronze Member
Registered: 08/26/04
Posts: 151
Loc: Toronto, Canada
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Played in a heavy rock band in Ireland in the early nineties (who didn't..)
We were playing a student talent show in a bar in Galway city. We drank all of the night before and started again at 7:30am when we woke.
We got on stage at 3pm. the whole venue was full of screaming drunk students so the place was manic.
I was so drunk and into the gig that I fell off the stage twice, (much to the delight of the crowd). The second time I went off I took the guitar player with me who was also blotto.
On our way down we took a small lighting rig with us which smashed across my head leaving a huge gash that required emergency medical treatment and 13 stitches.
Meanwhile the guitar player had a broken little finger (which put him out of work for three weeks) and his custom strat lay be-headed underneath our crumpled bodies with the most unbelievable noise of feedback and angry strings blasting out through his boogie.
The organiser went balistic and started really pushing us out the door so our drummer chinned him. About a week later we were notified by post that the crowd voted us the 'best showmaship of the the day'. We won 25...
The guitar cost me 800 to repair.. that was more than a months wages back then. We got banned from playing Galway as our antics made the local paper.
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#445124 - 10/26/07 11:48 AM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: theofeelios]
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Atom12
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Registered: 05/17/02
Posts: 651
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Not music, but here goes.
I did standup for a while and in the early days a bunch of us did shows together. One guy was our "booking agent" so to speak and he's set stuff up. It went fine until he landed us a gig at the International Brotherhood of Electrical Workers summer meeting/party. Allegedly there was a contest in which the winner would get $100, $75 for second and $50 for third. None of us were getting paid much, if at all, so we figured we'd do it. He talked to the guy and explained the deal (there would be about 6 of us, each doing 15 minutes, etc). Fine.
So we show up and it's a converted gym. Wood floors, mile high ceilings, basketball hoops with tables and metal folding chairs holding about 350 guys with mullets, sleevless shirts and Tasmanian Devil tattoos. The wives were indistinguishable from their spouses. The PA consisted of a $20 practice amp and there was no stage. We get ready to go and the guy says he expects us all to do 45 minutes to an hour. We patiently explained that that wasn't possible, so they told us to get started.
I went third and did okay, miraculously. The guy after me, Paul, was flamingly gay but apparently was the last one to know. Lisp, effeminate mannerisms and voice, the whole nine. Not a big deal except for the centerpiece of his act which was a 10 minute piece on eating pussy. The crowd started heckling him, which he sort of handled, but then they just started laughing at him, so he starts crying.
It pretty much went downhill fast from there. To their credit, they did pay us. I got second. First place went to an older lady who predictably killed with 15 minutes on menstruation. I don't remember who got third, but we all got out of there as fast as we could.
One of our standing gigs was a weekly show at a bar/restaurant that was in a hotel. That usually went pretty good. One night the crowd consisted of a family of four. The kids were probably 5 and 8. They were eating and weren't paying attention, so we basically entertained ourselves. Until Paul got up. Again, he launches into the pussy eating stuff. The family starts eating faster. And faster. By the time he's halfway through it they're just shoveling food as fast as they can. He stops to ask how they're doing and the mom glares at him and says "We're just trying to enjoy our meal. Are you about finished?"
I miss that guy.
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#445127 - 10/26/07 11:53 AM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: teverett]
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JuniorBones
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Registered: 12/11/04
Posts: 64
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There was this four-week tour of Midwestern clubs, playing double-bass drums in a prog band. Paid $300/week, and I had to furnish the van.
At least by cutting down on cigs and booze and subsisting on a diet of celery and lettuce, I was able to keep expenses down.
haha, wrong thread! ha.
But, i would say for myself the worst gig i ever played was in london about 4 years ago. I forget the name of the club at this point, but it was above this australian themed restaurant, where i had the worst 1/2 lbs. burger ever!
But, the story goes we showed up at the venue, go on 2nd out of 4 bands. By the end of the set my drums were all over the stage because the drum set i was using was some piece of shit generic kit that this "studio" owner let me borrow while i was in England. The band played like shit, felt like shit from the nasty burger, played to the soundman and the bartender and then later that night forgot my camera at the venue.
The only good thing about that night was we bought a bottle of absinthe afterwards and took most of it on the train ride back to the tour managers flat.
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#445133 - 10/26/07 12:10 PM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: JuniorBones]
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tomhampton
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Registered: 11/29/06
Posts: 1117
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all i really want to contribute to this thread is this:
a 100 watt marshall head into a single 10" speaker creates the most amazing distorted guitar tone known to man...
...for about 45 seconds.
the resultant smell is, let's just say, less than amazing.
_________________________
"...i used to be disgusted...but now i'm just amused..."
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#445152 - 10/26/07 12:55 PM
Re: And, The Worst Gig You've Ever Played
[Re: tomhampton]
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klarkkent
Platinum Member
Registered: 03/27/02
Posts: 2216
Loc: A nearby, faraway place
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A few more:
* Outdoor show in late spring. Four bands on the bill.Sound company is setting up for the gig in a large open field. The field is pretty soft, so when one of their dumbass stagehands drives the sound company truck across the snake, the wheels cut it right in half. Someone has to drive about 150 miles round-trip to get the backup snake. By the time they got back and get the PA working, all the other bands - as well as the crowd - had bailed. We played to our wives and kids.
* Show in a little club in Oklahoma. The club was about four miles up in the woods off the highway. The Lamplighter, it was called. Anyway, I go to collect after the gig and was told by the clubowner to "watch yourself" on the way out. Sure enough, at the end of the road going back onto the highway the local cops were waiting for us. They went through both vehicles we were in looking for anything they could bust us for (and keep our hard-earned pay, natch). They didn't find anything, and to this day I still believe the clubowner was in on it.
* Gig at the Chelsea Street Pub in Dallas (owned at the time by now-famous drag racer Kenny Bernstein). They had just installed one of the first frozen margarita machines in Dallas and were quite proud of it. Unfortunately for us, we discovered during the first set that they had wired it into the same electrical circuit as the stage outlets - and every time the freezer circuit on the machine would kick in, it would trip the circuit breaker and kill the PA. The bartender would then casually stroll over to the breaker panel and reset it - creating a sonic boom through the PA when the power came back on. It became a game to see if we could get the power amps shut off before the bartender reset the breaker. We beat him most of the time.
Finally, there is nothing quite like the first rush of air that comes out of a club door after it's been closed up from the night before. I am convinced that the blend of smoke, beer, puke, piss, and whatever else that's in that toxic cloud has shortened my life considerably.
-- klark --
_________________________
From a retiree's diary: "Mailman skipped my house today. Will be waiting with shotgun tomorrow."
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