General Music Chat

My girlfriend & I both played in many cover bands early on and got totally burned out on doing ANY covers AT ALL.
That's probably why I like improvised noise so much.
It's IMPOSSIBLE to play a wrong note.
Lately, I've been trying to get her to learn a few covers with me.
But, she's not going for it.
It's ALL originals or nothing for her now.
I'm thinking that maybe we should have at least a FEW in our set, to get our foot in the door of some places, even if they're rearranged into something different.
Nope.
She's having none of it.
How important are covers in getting gigs anyway?
I've never booked anything myself but doing originals and improvisations.

Getting gigs? Zero importance.
Getting paying gigs? All important.

Yeah and you're about 1800 miles too far away for me to commute...

It does make regular rehearsals tough! The guy sent me an email yesterday saying he was interested in pursuing this. I told him to do some homework (actually lots of homework) and then we could try another hour together.

So ... a few days later he emails me again, with 5 songs he says he can sing, and he picks 5 of the songs I had listed for him that I know backwards-and-forwards. We settle on last night to 'try again'. Once again, he doesn't have an acoustic guitar ("my daughter has a lesson again") - I have a feeling its the daughter's guitar as he didn't try to go upstairs to get it when we heard her return last night.

He really didn't 'know' the songs he had picked, and one of them (Warren Zevon's Roland the Headless Thompson Gunner), I had only learned Tuesday night and already knew how to play it better than him. At first he argued that what he was playing was right, so he put the song on his MP3 player and then realized I was right.
Only one of 'my' songs that he had listed had harmonies (Eagles), but he didn't try to harmonize, and when I asked him about it, he really didn't know how to do it. Geez - if you can't pick a harmony to do on an Eagles song, you REALLY can't sing harmonies!

So that was 2 wasted nights I gave this guy. I told him to keep practicing - he admitted he was nervous playing in front of/with other people, so I think he was not telling the truth about being in a band recently, or if he really was they told him 'no thanks'.

Had another CL response, this guy MAY have something going for him, another Beatles tribute band guy.

CRAP! The most-recent contact, looks like he's just looking for quick ways to make some money, only plays bass, and his song list isn't mine - he said he didn't know any of the 20 songs I listed that I had done live recently. Back to searching ...

Mike....

You suffer from being such a nice guy..if that guy was any good in the first place, he would have picked up your guitar and played it. From a business point of view, and I was a manager, anyone showing up at an interview/audition who isn't prepared for the advertised position will NEVER be ready for anything.

I hope things will fall into place soon for you.

Tammy

So maybe I need to be more of an asshole when I'm auditioning others!
I haven't heard back from the trio guy since I posed the question to him about his 'recording aspirations' and suggested practicing with a metronome.

I'm posting an ad on the BB of GC in Nashua tomorrow. In the meantime, I can keep plenty busy practicing Beatles tunes, working on my own songs and collaborations!

Well, I certainly didn't say to be mean in any way, but if someone doesn't show you respect for your time or your expectations and you feel disappointed, just realize that they let you and themselves down and aren't really very serious and move on and not waste too much more of your time.

Tammy