Happy New Years!
Posted: Tue Dec 31, 2013 1:42 pmAnyone here got a gig tonight?
The one and only time I played a NYE was back in the mid-80s. Gig was at the French-American Club in a town outside Boston. They offered us $400 (4 piece band) for a 4-hour gig, plus $100 if they decided to have us play an extra hour plus free drinks for us and our guests (open bar event). For us that was very good pay - we'd been averaging $200 and as a house band at one bar on Saturdays, only getting what came in at the door, which hardly covered beer expenses.
We were a classic rock band so our set list was mostly fast danceable stuff, so we knew we'd have to add some more slow songs in the set list. Most songs we added were simple early 60s (Daddy's Home, Don't Let the Sun Catch You Crying, etc), but we also knew we needed a 'waltz' song. Now waltzes are in 3/4 time and 99% of all rock songs are in 4/4 so we finally came up with "Mr BoJangles" as a 3/4 song.
So the gig was going fine, started after 9pm, planned on 4 45-minute sets - we had just enough songs to fill out the time and if they wanted us to play the extra hour (which they did) we'd just repeat songs and have longer lead sections. Middle of the 3rd set, we do Mr Bojangles, and one song later a guy comes up to the stage and (loudly) asks us to 'play a waltz'! We're all "WTF? we just did our only one!" Anyway, we told him we'd get to one and later did Mr Bojangles again in the 5th set.
I'll dig out some photos from that night later when I get home and post them here.
The one and only time I played a NYE was back in the mid-80s. Gig was at the French-American Club in a town outside Boston. They offered us $400 (4 piece band) for a 4-hour gig, plus $100 if they decided to have us play an extra hour plus free drinks for us and our guests (open bar event). For us that was very good pay - we'd been averaging $200 and as a house band at one bar on Saturdays, only getting what came in at the door, which hardly covered beer expenses.
We were a classic rock band so our set list was mostly fast danceable stuff, so we knew we'd have to add some more slow songs in the set list. Most songs we added were simple early 60s (Daddy's Home, Don't Let the Sun Catch You Crying, etc), but we also knew we needed a 'waltz' song. Now waltzes are in 3/4 time and 99% of all rock songs are in 4/4 so we finally came up with "Mr BoJangles" as a 3/4 song.
So the gig was going fine, started after 9pm, planned on 4 45-minute sets - we had just enough songs to fill out the time and if they wanted us to play the extra hour (which they did) we'd just repeat songs and have longer lead sections. Middle of the 3rd set, we do Mr Bojangles, and one song later a guy comes up to the stage and (loudly) asks us to 'play a waltz'! We're all "WTF? we just did our only one!" Anyway, we told him we'd get to one and later did Mr Bojangles again in the 5th set.
I'll dig out some photos from that night later when I get home and post them here.
