Short Gig report - had a black out!

[Jimi75]

Hi Folks, last Friday we played our first official gig with the Blues band. The gig was sold out! The location we played is located right in the middle of an old cole mine area that now serves as an office area for media companies.

Our program consisted of 11 songs and the set was 60 minutes long.

The promoter offered to hire amps for us and I ordered a 59 Bassman or a Marshall Bluesbraker. The instruments company delivered a 65 Fender Twin Reverb. The amp didn't like my Tubescreamer TS9 and due to the fact that they recorded the gig through a P.A. (no good idea for a first gig), I couldnt turn the amp up to get a good sound. The PA guy said that volume on 2 is too loud. I offered to turn around the amp and put it off stage, but he said 1,5 volume is the maximum. I wasn't eager to start a discussion, so I just accepted and played the gig. Man, everybody knows that the Twin is one darn clean amp. Although I am used to play very clean I missed a little drive which made me feel like I had to work like three times more for every note. My 62 Strat is a monster to play, but it pays off with beautiful tone! Anyways, the gig was excellent, the audience took our Blues for serious and the reactions after the gig were overwhelming.

During one song I play a solo that I totally fell in love with. It's Sean Costello's "Have you no shame" and the solo is quite challenging as you have to follow the chords. My brother was in the audience and in the beginning ofthe solo he looked over to me and smiled, I had to smile back and from there on I totally lost the plot! This is the first time such a thing happened to me. I was lost, had no idea where I was on the fretboard, every note I played sounded terrible. There was only one way - keep cool and pretend that you know what you do - that is what I did. I destroyed the biggest part of this beautiful song, but hey nobody's perfect.

We have received three more offers to play gigs still in 2008 and it feels good. But next time I definitely check the amph stock before having to play again with the Twin.

 

[Jipes]

That really sounds great Jimi nice outfits for a blues band :AOK: As for your black-out I experiences that once or twice but rather at beginning if the songs where i can't seems to remember any lyrics or even how to satrt the guitar intro Quite scary but as you say if you stay cool and keep smiling everybody think that you get it under control :rotflmao:

Do you have any clips of your concert ? I discover only recently Sean Costello unfortunately :thwap:

 

[Jimi75]

That really sounds great Jimi nice outfits for a blues band :AOK: As for your black-out I experiences that once or twice but rather at beginning if the songs where i can't seems to remember any lyrics or even how to satrt the guitar intro Quite scary but as you say if you stay cool and keep smiling everybody think that you get it under control :rotflmao:

Do you have any clips of your concert ? I discover only recently Sean Costello unfortunately :thwap:

Thank you mon ami!
I will post some clips as soon as we get the recording which is supposed to be in three weeks.

 

[bigoldron]

Had a similar experience back in May at our local Relay for Life. The youth praise band and I were playing that night and by the time we played, I was whipped out. I had worked all day, run down equipment, set it up, then had to help set up our church's booth. We were having power problems (tripped breaker) at the booth, but fortunately, we were close enough to the power panel that I could set up a temporary circuit, which of course, required me to run around and find wiring, breaker, etc.

In the meantime, the parents of the kid who was going to play drums for us called and he was playing baseball in a game that was going into extra innings, so I had find a last minute replacement drummer. THEN, the kid who played bass got sick and had to leave before we played, so I had to find a last minute replacement for him.

Fortunately, we were only playing 3 songs (OK, so we're not big-time performers). On the second song, I had played my part and faked the bass part on one verse, got the end of the song and FORGOT where I was! :thwap: So, I started back over at the bridge and replayed it and the last chorus again, which in church music is not totally unusual. Except my kids aren't used to that and everyone one of them turned and looked at me like I was crazy (which I was). I started singing the bridge, so they finally got the idea and began singing and we did finally finish that song.

We played the last song with incident and got quickly off the stage. My kids do a good job at our home church, but we seem to be snake-bit whenever we play somewhere else. Of the last 3 times we've played outside our church, there's been some kind of boogerality. :thwap: Guess we'll stay at home.

 

[marnold]

A Twin Reverb at 1.5? Where's the fun in that? I look forward to the clips, Jimi.

 

[sunvalleylaw]

Thanks for the report Jimi! That would have been frustrating with the amp. I am sure you sounded great though. I will enjoy hearing the clips.

 

[ShortBuSX]

Sean Costello...I had to look it up.

 

[Brian Krashpad]

Great report!

And cool pics too!

Playing through a backline not my own is something I've only done once or twice, it's always a little dicey.