General Music Chat

And my guitarist have decided to get together tonite and work up our same format accoustic...

Good move Bluemax. I'll bet it will be a great show too! Another strategy is to play the first set really quiet, to the point the owner asks you to turn it up. By the time of the last set (midnite) you'll be rocking at your normal volume.

I'm/was/is a drummer and I don't know what the fuss is really?

For guitarists getting a feel of their work with effects I understand. But isn't this just like being able to play slow? ROCK is popular here but it also has to have finesse. Well in my book anyway.

Thoughts? It's volume after all and we all have a volume switch.

It might be because guitarists like to play loud (I know I do). We actually rehearse at a louder volume than we play live. Maybe it's because we don't having anybody telling us to turn down. As I said before, I've only experienced this problem playing in cover bars.

Bars should put out earplugs instead of peanuts. or wait... never mind. Why didn't they just use the peanuts?

It might be because guitarists like to play loud (I know I do). We actually rehearse at a louder volume than we play live. Maybe it's because we don't having anybody telling us to turn down. As I said before, I've only experienced this problem playing in cover bars.

It's interesting that you've only had this problem in cover bars. Maybe it's because most people already know the song and it doesn't matter if the vocals are intelligible or not. When you play originals you can't play as loud because if the vocals are unintelligible AND people don't know the songs, then you're screwed. Makes sense to me...

When there's drums, there is a certain volume level established. When playing in a "low-volume" venue, I guess the drummer could use brushes, but a lot of the rock effect could be lost (unless, of course, you're playing jazz or big-band..)

I guess the drummer could use brushes

Brushes would be TOO soft. Those multi-rods work pretty well as an in-between without losing too much of the feel.

Yeah but lets get real. They are paying for music, not thrash and bang right?

I know its difficult but a gig is a gig.

Yep, brushes are too quiet. our drummer in the band mentioned in my last post tried brushes, we made him change because the brushes were too quiet and didn't get the right sound. Brushes don't give you the same "POP" as sticks, it's a fizzy "PLOP" instead. Doesn't work. He ended up trying pencils, that worked.

SOmeone else said start at a low volume. That's what most bands I've been with try to do, and gradually turn up the overall volume a little at a time as more people wander in. By the 3rd set you're usually up to your normal volume level and as long as you have plenty people in the building it usually doesn't get "too loud" for most places.

I've also seen the opposite, but only once. PLace we played in Many, LA was all cinder blocks, the worswt acoustics I've seen in a long time, the owner/manager was sitting by the door, which was at the end of a 20 foot hallway behind and beside the stage. She couldn't hear back there, of course, and kept telling us to turn it up. We didn't want to, we were already having feedback problems from the cinder block walls bouncing back at us, and it was still early and only about a dozen people in the place.

She insisted even though we tried to get her to understand that she was not listening from out front, and we were already louder than our normal stage volume, so we kept turning it up even more. I ended up with my Peavey MX (130 watts) turned up to 7 1/2, while I normally managed to keep it below 5 or so, usually closer to 4. It will play clean leads on top of a 100 watt full Marshall stack at that volume level and she was STILL saying turn it up!! Big room, all cinder blocks, no crowd...it wasn't pretty...and we were stinkin LOUD...too loud. The few people in the place couldn't stay in front of us, we had hell with feedback and she wanted louder...

She finally told us to go home after the 3rd set, we didn't play enough country for her, and when the band leader booked the gig he clearly explained that we were a variety band, not straight country. We insisted on full pay, and finally got it, since we did have to make a 2 hour drive to get there and it was not our fault we didn't play what she wanted. It sucked to lose a gig in a new location, but we didn't really mind that much since it was such a disaster overall...

Just thought you guys might get a kick out of a story about a gig with the exact opposite result. And yeah, my ears were still ringing when I got home 3 1/2 hours after we got offstage. That almost never happened with that band, we used a drum machine and had excellent volume control.

I guess the drummer could use brushes

Brushes would be TOO soft. Those multi-rods work pretty well as an in-between without losing too much of the feel.

Winner. ^^

Our drummer uses the rods and they substantially tone down the volume while maintaining the tonality of the drums.

I've come to realize that many drummers suffer not because they can't control their volume, but because they just don't want to.

I didnt add this before but our soundman has a db meter. We try to start the night or first set in the 95db range, by the end of the night we are ussually around 102-105

Once agian use common sense. If theres only a handful of people and you are in a cinder block room it is going to be loud from all the room reflections. Of course there are places where you arent going to make people happy no matter what you do.

I will be the first to admit as the lead guitarist in my group, Im ussually the one that determines our overall volume level by my stage volume. I have been learning to hold back a lot. Just makes the whole band sound better.

I dont think I could ask a drummer to play with brushes. That just doesnt fit what my group does.

Just for the record the people who have complained when I've had a volume issue were the barmaids and bouncers, never the patrons. They in turn complain to the manager.

For me its ussually the little old lady who says "Do you boys know any Meryl Haggard?"

Ive had everyone from the management to the bouncers complain.

In my area from my earlier years I still have that reputation as one of the loudest guitarist in our area, and you know what Im damn proud of it!

The old joke at our gigs was, if you didnt hear crickets the next day, then you werent there.

I will add that over the past couple of years I have reined it in dramatically. But I still get the itch every now and then.

When told I'm too loud, I turn it down. It just seems so very simple to me. Start at low volume & gently rise to a crescendo by the end of each set. After your break, you start low again. It ain't rocket science.

We used to play this club where the club owner would always come up to our sound man and say, "Some of our customers are saying that it's too loud and you need to turn it down a bit." No matter what our volume, he would always say the same thing and we knew it wasn't the "customers", but that he was just in the habit of saying that to all the bands (control freak issues). We were using an old Peavey 16 channel Mark IV board and we had a strip of tape along the bottom with all the channels marked. All the vocals and instruments on 1 thru 16, then Mon 1, Mon 2, Mains L and R (which we used) and Mono (which was unused). So I got an idea, the next time we set up to play there, I took a marker and wrote in bold letters, "Master Volume" on the unused Mono channel. I told the sound man to have that one all the way up and when the owner said turn it down, reach up and pull that one down about halfway. The soundman said, "But that doesn't do anything." and I said, "Exactly." Sure enough, at our first break, the sound man came up laughing and told us that the owner had come over with his usual spiel and when the sound man pulled the "Master Volume" down halfway, the owner stood there and said, "Yeah, now that's a lot better." and walked off and didn't bother us anymore. PROBLEM SOLVED!