My Hands And Neck Hurt And My Stuff Is Broken
Both bands played last night. BB at the OW first, then GS at the bar up the street.
BB needed a bass, and I have one. But I had to crawl over the storage pile (see previous post) to get it. That took about 20 minutes and I broke stuff in the process. Then, the bass didn't work. "Oh great," I thought. "Another debacle of a show for BB". BB often seems to have problems in a live setting. Either you can't hear something, or something breaks, or the room feels wrong, or something of that nature. Not this time. We had no serious screw ups and everything was clearly audible. It would have been a good first impression for anyone who'd never seen us play. When it's going well up there I like to do funny little dances, and I did some.
The GS show, I'm not so sure about. There was a good turnout and the bands before us played great. I felt like I didn't put the energy into it that I usually do. That's more of a physical than mental thing though, as I'd been up since 7am, have slept poorly all week, and eaten worse. I bought drumsticks that were too heavy, which didn't help. The audience seemed lethargic too, and I feel kind of responsible.
We've had sloppier sets, but were definitely flying by the seat of our rock and roll pants last night. The floor tom and my guitar both got broken. That's, like, all of our gear! BB has a show tonight, and I don't know what I'm going to do.
When we do a show that out of control, what typically happens is we get good feedback from our friends in the audience. Nothing wrong with that. I wonder what the other people must be thinking though.
"Yeah they thrash around and wreck shit, but can they even play?" I wish I could have had some third-party opinions outside of our best friends. I wish WE (initials) had been there, because he thinks critically about music and never bullshits anybody. He'd tell us if we stunk.
I'd be the first to tell you that the "GS whirlwind" is a big part of what we do. Standing still on stage is not in our mandate, and will never happen. My biggest worry is the band being perceived as a one trick pony of destruction. I think we're pretty good at writing songs in this style of music. I don't want the songs to be completely pushed off the map by The Whirlwind. A carnival with no soul and creativity behind it is not artistically interesting. Any band can go wild on stage. I don't think for a second that GS is in this category, but I want that fact to be clear to other people as well.
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Next up, DMC and I went to check out a local band having a reunion show after 9 years of inactivity. The band actually formed in the late 80s, and that's when I got into them. I was in high school, and this band really impressed me a lot. I went to see them play whenever I could. Over time, their membership (except for the singer) and sound had a complete turnover. I wasn't into them quite so much at the end. That's why I was just a little disappointed with last night's set. Don't get me wrong; they played really well and put on a great show, but they seemed to focus almost exclusively on later material. I was surprised at how few of their songs I recognized. Their current drummer was in another high school-era band I liked a lot. This guy can wail on the drums. I've never seen anyone in this city more skilled at playing the "thrash beat". Huge influence on Old Band. Based on his post-1990 projects, I was pleasantly surprised that this skill had not atrophied with time.
When I got home, I exercised the "option" cited below and woke up around 1pm. Hi.
BB needed a bass, and I have one. But I had to crawl over the storage pile (see previous post) to get it. That took about 20 minutes and I broke stuff in the process. Then, the bass didn't work. "Oh great," I thought. "Another debacle of a show for BB". BB often seems to have problems in a live setting. Either you can't hear something, or something breaks, or the room feels wrong, or something of that nature. Not this time. We had no serious screw ups and everything was clearly audible. It would have been a good first impression for anyone who'd never seen us play. When it's going well up there I like to do funny little dances, and I did some.
The GS show, I'm not so sure about. There was a good turnout and the bands before us played great. I felt like I didn't put the energy into it that I usually do. That's more of a physical than mental thing though, as I'd been up since 7am, have slept poorly all week, and eaten worse. I bought drumsticks that were too heavy, which didn't help. The audience seemed lethargic too, and I feel kind of responsible.
We've had sloppier sets, but were definitely flying by the seat of our rock and roll pants last night. The floor tom and my guitar both got broken. That's, like, all of our gear! BB has a show tonight, and I don't know what I'm going to do.
When we do a show that out of control, what typically happens is we get good feedback from our friends in the audience. Nothing wrong with that. I wonder what the other people must be thinking though.
"Yeah they thrash around and wreck shit, but can they even play?" I wish I could have had some third-party opinions outside of our best friends. I wish WE (initials) had been there, because he thinks critically about music and never bullshits anybody. He'd tell us if we stunk.
I'd be the first to tell you that the "GS whirlwind" is a big part of what we do. Standing still on stage is not in our mandate, and will never happen. My biggest worry is the band being perceived as a one trick pony of destruction. I think we're pretty good at writing songs in this style of music. I don't want the songs to be completely pushed off the map by The Whirlwind. A carnival with no soul and creativity behind it is not artistically interesting. Any band can go wild on stage. I don't think for a second that GS is in this category, but I want that fact to be clear to other people as well.
**********************************************************************************
Next up, DMC and I went to check out a local band having a reunion show after 9 years of inactivity. The band actually formed in the late 80s, and that's when I got into them. I was in high school, and this band really impressed me a lot. I went to see them play whenever I could. Over time, their membership (except for the singer) and sound had a complete turnover. I wasn't into them quite so much at the end. That's why I was just a little disappointed with last night's set. Don't get me wrong; they played really well and put on a great show, but they seemed to focus almost exclusively on later material. I was surprised at how few of their songs I recognized. Their current drummer was in another high school-era band I liked a lot. This guy can wail on the drums. I've never seen anyone in this city more skilled at playing the "thrash beat". Huge influence on Old Band. Based on his post-1990 projects, I was pleasantly surprised that this skill had not atrophied with time.
When I got home, I exercised the "option" cited below and woke up around 1pm. Hi.
posted by the baron ash von foolishness at 1:45 PM
1 Comments:
Just a footnote here: I'm not suggesting any of our friends are bullshitting by complimenting us. I'm just a little insecure about the band. I sometimes can't believe it when people still like us, show after show. Because our artform is based so much around complete chaos, it's hard for me to tell good set from bad. W's the only guy who ever tells us we had a shitty night. But he's also the first to give us props when we have a good one.
SO... thanks to all who came out and keep the kind words comin'! And the bad words too. Heh!
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