General Music Chat

The odd...the freaky...the funny or scary...I wanna hear it!

There's a bar in Balto, MD, called Joe's Organic Bar (or there used to be, anyway). It's a teensy yet cool bar, but the band is set up in a lil loft up above everyone, cuz there really ain't much space in there. I loved that place, cuz it kept the musos away from the drunks...

When I 1st moved to WV, I sat in with this odd lil band called The Back Pages, which only played B-sides. Of course that didn't win them a lot of fans. They played at 'The Reddy Amber' the night I sat in. The response wasn't the best. There was one guy stompin' around yellin' about how "this band SUCKS" until the owner, Red, hit him with a cattle prod several times, & ran him out the door. The Reddy Amber was one of the more popular bars in the area, but I was only in it that one time.

The 1872 Club was in Sheperdstown. The bar had an open mic. There was actually a curtain in front of the stage, but the stage sat back against the front windows of the place. Johnny Wiess, a local character, ran the open mic. One night the curtain opened on a completely naked Johnny, holding his guitar in front of himself, playing his favorite version of "Folsum Prison Blues." It went like this -

"I hear the train a-comin'
It's rollin' 'round the bend
I hope it's bringin' some women
Cuz I'm tired of f*ckin' men..."

Of course, the drunken fool forgot that his ass was shown to everyone out on the street, but somehow he got away with it.

Other nights, the bar advertised a drawing & a door prize. Of course, Johnny brought out his old screen door to give to the winner of the drawing.

Then there were the nights that a guy was walking around asking ppl "What's 612 & 102?" The answer would win you a Quaalude...Things were way different back then!

A bar I ran an open mic in had a real 1950's style phone booth in it. It wasn't anything unusual to go in there (there wasn't a phone) to see coke lines drawn out on the little metal tray. When you came out, there'd be a guy passing valiums down the bar like they were beer mugs. A couple times there were ppl smoking joints in the booths, & it was common practice for some of the locals to actually sleep the night in the booths.

Ah...the good ol' days!

Everything sure changed for the worse when Nancy Reagan started messing everything up!

We were playing in a town called Manassas in Va. at a place called Tommys and the bass player had a stomach virus. While he played he kept a trash can next to him and with his right hand he held the can and made at least two deposits during the night. Never missed a note but
stunk-up the stage in a real way.

We were playing in a dive bar in S. Cal when we heard the sound of Harleys out front. A large group of Outlaws walked in - colors, attitudes and all. We finished our set and I was approached by three of the meanest-looking dudes I'd ever seen. The leader just pointed to the back door and said....”outside”.


I told my bass player (and wife) that if I wasn't back in five minutes, to call the meat wagon.


I followed these three gorillas out the back door into the alley, and as the door closed behind me, the leader turned to me with something in his hand. A knife? A gun? No.


He just smiled and said......” Dig your music, man......smoke”?


Then I went back into the bar to get my bass player.

An outlaw gang always used to come in where I played down on the lower end of town. They were an off shoot of the Hells Angels. Nicest bunch of rough looking bikers you would ever meet.

I played for a rather large crowd of semi-to-really drunk Navy fellas at a beach-front gig in Palma De Mallorca, Spain

I was in the Navy at the time, and made my [oh not quite short enough] debut on the worlds stage as lead guitarist in the USS JFK Country Band.

I do remember doing the lead to Freebird that night...that was a highlight.

I discovered then however, that country was not exactly my thang...

When I was in the navy we visited Palma De Mallorca. It was fantastic, we missed out on Benidorm on that tour. We spent a lot of time at the Benny Hill bar. I don’t know how much it changed since, but the bars didn’t even open until 10 and if it was a small place and the crowd lively, it would stay open until the daylight hours of the next day. It’s amazing to go there expect something different and instead, experience that level of freedom. The siesta is an amazing idea for a society.

I used to play in a roughish biker bar in the late nighties. Just after I'd met my wife. She and I were still dating, no plans to get married. There were at least two biker groups that hung out there (it could get a little tense, but they mostly got along okay).

My wife used to like to come to the shows. We were a pretty good band, actually. She liked to be able to relax and have fun. This was okay with me, but the inevitable jerk who wouldn't leave her alone when she asked him to wasn't.

This bar, however, she never had that problem in. The bikers there knew me, respected me as a musician. What's more, our singer was friends with most of them (I just found an old video of us, she was hot).

Every time we played there I'd get no less than three of these guys coming up to me during a break saying, "Don't worry, man. We'll take care of your wife." And they did. Nobody messed with her or any of her friends who were there. Ever. A couple guys tried, I don't actually know what happened to them. Not sure I want to.

Nobody in the band was surprised to discover she liked the place better than we did.

Bikers for me have been the best audience I have ever played music for. Blues is good beer drinking music and if you play it well people drink like fish. We used to have a Hell's Angels group following us around years ago. They even gave the band members courtesy cards. I had to explain to them what they were. If any bikers ever give you a courtesy card stick it in your wallet and NEVER lose it. If you're at a bar in the bikers' territory and somebody gives you sh*t pull the card out and they'll leave you alone.

Nothing more exciting to report than little gray haired ladies plugging their ears and old guys walking out of the show because we're too loud even after turning it down ... twice.
We were told we were playing for a youth service.

And then there was the time we had to wait 3 hours for the power company to change out a blown transformer.

Oh well.

A gig is a gig right?

But then again, aren't those the things that make a gig memorable?

Last year I was on tour with an artist and all the venues had to supply FoH, monitors and lighting for the show. We played a dozen shows and all the rigs and sound techs were great ... properly sized for the venue and sound tech's that made you sound great in the room.

Well we get to the last gig on the tour and walk it to the venue (400 seat) and our chin's hit the floor ... the FoH rig could have easily handle a 5000 seat venue. I said to the sound tech "don't you think this is a bit over kill" He said "NO" and then went about his work. I'm thinking ... "oh no, man with an ego ... this could be bad"

We did sound check and it sounded great. Then we start our 1st set and all is well until we are into the last couple of songs of the set and the sound tech start cranking the bass up ... and the sound turns to mud on stage ... the band is playing by brail because you can't even tell if you playing the right chord or if you're on the beat ... nothing. So I get up in the middle of the song, the rest of the band keeps playing, and tell the sound tech to "turn the fu*k down ... and get his ego in check". He complies and we finish off the set.

We start the 2nd set and the same thing happens only this time he waits until we are close to our last song and he just cranks the bass ... I don't know if any of you have work with large powered rigs before (40K watts +) .. but there is enough bass power there, that it can make you feel like you're going to sh*t your pants.

The whole band was grimacing over the effect this was having on us, as you can well imagine, beside the fact that we are having to play by brail again, so we stopped in the middle of the song ... telling the audience "that because of the sound tech's lack of ability to provide a good mix and because of the mix he was providing is making us feel like we are going to poo our collective pants ... the show was over" we thanked the audience for coming out and supporting us .... they very loudly boooo..ed the sound tech and the manager of the venue fired him on the spot.

The manger made a quick phone call to the sound tech's boss and the guy flew down to the venue and apologized for what his employee had done and would make it right . We got up and play for another hour more than we were suppose too ... and the sound was prefect ... the manger was ecstatic that we kept the place hoppin' for another hour ... all was good

We all had a good laugh back on the tour bus about the effect that much bass can have on your body ... and the jokes that ensued ... well ... I'll leave that part to your imagination

I don't doubt that at all. I went to see Marylin Manson at the Hard Rock one year, and the Bass was so loud it would literally take the breath out of you. I remember at the time thinking "wow, I never knew Bass could do that sort of thing." It's really strange that sonically Bass can have an effect on your body like that, but I experienced it first hand myself. I remember that during one song they were using an electronic kick, when I tried to breath in, the Kick would hit, and it would punch the breath right out of you. It was a fast paced song, and it really made it hard to breathe. Freaking crazy.

So, there's this thing you learn running sound. It's a sort of curve of how loud the bass should be through the night.

Start - soft.
Middle - loud.
End - soft.

Why? Louder bass gets people excited, makes them want to dance. But if you assault them with it right off, it will not work. So you have to sneak up on them with it. At the end of the night, you turn it down to cool things off.

This is a known, proven phenomenon.

But the actual difference you want in the levels isn't that huge. Really. Not that huge.

But you get the sound guy who's heard of this phenomenon and thinks "more is GOOD" and soon the bass is an assault on your senses. He tries to use the effect like a bludgeon to force people to dance.

I find myself tempted, on these occasions, to use my instrument as a bludgeon to force him to achieve a more reasonable balance in the mix.

Probably I should control that urge...

Yesterday:

Tony and I showed up at the amphitheater where we were scheduled to play.
Assuming ( ass u me ) we were looking for an covered large and rather obvious structure we walked down into a grassy bowl beside the lake to ask the people there where the amphitheater was.
The gentleman smile and said right here.
We kinda looked around at the terraced freshly mowed grassy hill side and the " stage" = carpet stretched out in the shade ( thank God ). Responded OK thanks and walked back up to our vehicles. We spoke together for a moment about how this was not what we expected and expressed our disappointment to each other but conclude "hey we came to play ... right."
To shorten the story a bit I'll jump to the conclusion.
At the end of the great show, that included us and others, food, activities for the kids and an awesome fireworks display over the lake ( not just there either the whole lakeside was rimmed with explosions of color.)
As we were tearing down I over heard the conversation between two of the event sponsors about the attendance.
Over 600 people
The second gentleman disagreed and said he thought the overall attendance on the hill side, the two parking areas, and on the water was 1000 +/-

Granted a large percentage came just to see the fireworks ... but still ...

ASS U ME = ASS ME TONY

So, there's this thing you learn running sound. It's a sort of curve of how loud the bass should be through the night.

Start - soft.
Middle - loud.
End - soft.

Why? Louder bass gets people excited, makes them want to dance.
force people to dance.

Well the sound tech was just showing of his horse power (ego) ... the dance floor was packed after the 2nd song.

I have no problem with increasing the bass a bit as the night goes on ... but generally you also increase the volume of the whole band with the bass pushed up a little more .... within reason.