To bandgear or not to bandgear

[mrkode]

Hi all,

Just wanted to have your opinions on a dilemma I'm faced with.

I'm a session bassist but work around here presently is very scarce so I've been doing the painful customer service day job grind for a while now. As the gigs are starting picking up again slightly, it starts to come in conflict with the day job which schedule is really not flexible. As I still don't have enough gigs I can't afford to leave the day job just yet.

However, I might have the opportunity to do something like 15-20 well paid gigs as a bandgear for a production that's going on tour. Being primarily a musician, the times I dealt with bandgears was to have my basses tuned but I wonder what else it implies. Would I need to be guitar amp tech savy in order one breaks during a show like being able to solder and repair on the spot?

And after this stretch of shows.... will I be out of job completely and in a worse situation than now?

OTOH, it might give me the opportunity to make valuable contacts that could bring some bass gigs later on and would have me working in a music environment rather than to answer 50 imbeciles a day who doesn't have a clue of how INternet works.

What would you guys do in my situation?

[The Golden Boy]

You mean "guitar tech?"

[mrkode]

Yes guitar tech, bass tech, stage tech lol

[The Golden Boy]

I would figure the more stuff you knew, the more valuable you'd be. In other words, the more you can maintain, repair and be prepared for- the better off you are.

Being able to replace a broken amp with a backup, troubleshoot and repair something like a broken fuse in a matter of minutes is a good thing.

I knew a dude who teched for a "name" player in the classic rock area- I don't think he knew much more than any other player of his experience. From what I gathered of what he said, it was change strings and have his guitar changes ready.

Would I do it?

Maybe if I was single with no kids and was still in my 20s...