Manditory Story (LONG)

[Squigly Wiggz]

Well, once again I have to “publish” something for school and posts on official forums apparently count so here I am again talking about my high school music experiences.

To start my little story I should tell you that I’m 18 and in the tenth grade (yes, I failed and it sucks). My school started a new club this year originally called “So you want to be a rock star?”. Judging by the name I first thought “Wow, this is either going to be cool or absolutely horrible….”

But I signed up anyway. I’m very glad I did. It more or less turned into the “School of Rock” movie after a while. Except our Jack Black came in the form of a school custodian named Kyle Bullock. Mr. Kyle or just “Kyle” as he prefers, eventually sorted through all the random kids who joined the club and found the ones who were serious about wanting to be in a band. I landed the position bass player which was a given being that I’m one out of the only two people in school who play bass. One of the classic reasons to play bass, you get in bands and get gigs way easier. :]

We started jamming on some simple covers like “Zombie” by The Cranberries. And though it was sloppy and we were basically novices, I think I speak for the whole club when I say we had fun. It was our first time playing in a somewhat organized group.

I had been playing for about four or five years mainly by myself. Every time someone told me about some band they wanted to start I would show up and nothing would happen. I was beginning to lose hope. Our lead guitarist had been playing for about four years prier, but only in his room and by ear too. So he needed to learn his basic music theory. Our rhythm player had only been playing for a year and was coming along surprisingly fast. But he was strictly a tab reader then, so he had to work on improvisation. We had no real complaints with our drummer, solid player, good beat keeper, good enough for us. We had an extra guitar player who was kind of a jerk, fun guy but very distracting and not really necessary. He quit the club half way through the year which worked out because we got along much better without him. Our singers (we had three this year) were all very different. We had a shy girl who would pretty much only sing backup vocals, not the best singer in the world but a cool gal all the same. Then there was another girl who was about medium on the skill level but she would sing anything and she was a friend of mine so it was fun to work with her. She is a great show girl. And last but not least we had another girl who was amazing at singing. She mainly does hip hop stuff in her group (who I enjoy a lot) but does a very good job on soulful bluesy songs. I loved working with her and I think she has a great future ahead of her in show business.

With the line up at least somewhat chosen, we blazed our trail throughout the year playing many school related events. Man, we sucked at most of our little shows…. really badly. But by the end of the year Kyle had taught us all a lot about being in a rock band and we all improved skill wise. We had been playing together all year and were starting to sound pretty solid.

Our last show this year (I wrote a separate post about it) went pretty well. And over the summer the original club members, me included, want to make our main lineup into a real band. Wish us luck.

I also got invited to record some bass lines for that one singers hip hop band I mentioned, can’t wait. A lot of good things happened this year for us all musically, especially for me as a bass player. I hope the same happens with next year’s club and I hope I can be a part of it in some way.

[xgator4u]

Cool, so what does your teacher grade you on. I mean is he/she looking @ spelling, grammar, punctuation, what will determine your grade ?

[Squigly Wiggz]

I dont know exactly, I'm sure spelling counts somewhat, but I'm not so sure about grammer. I mean it's my story so I'm sure she would let me tell it the way I would say it if I were talking to you in person.

[Squigly Wiggz]

i like the quote in your sig btw. i really like that song

[geeza]

This story shows a marked improvement in spelling, grammar, and composition over your last posted story. It shows that you're actually taking the assignment seriously.
You should be proud of yourself and keep up the good work.

[Jimmy Bones]

Squigz, gotta say... not all bass players have external genitalia. Might consider altering that sig.

[Squigly Wiggz]

thanks to geeza.
to mr. bones, i know, im just qouting claypool on that one and i'll get around to changing it eventually. i have dial up and it causes me to be very lazy about things like that. but good point

[DerHoggz]

What song is that from?
I didn't even know dial-up still existed at this point lol.

[geeza]

It must. It took 2 weeks for your post to show up.

[Woofer]

Originally Posted by geeza

It must. It took 2 weeks for your post to show up.

OWNED!!! lol

But yeah, good for you squigz. I hope the band works out this summer for you.

[Rick Auricchio]

Originally Posted by Squigly Wiggz

I mean it's my story so I'm sure she would let me tell it the way I would say it if I were talking to you in person.

There is quite a difference between the written and the spoken word. You may have heard someone give a totally boring, long talk, and then realize they're reading an article---instead of simplifying the wording to a spoken version.

We don't speak with the same detail that we use in writing, because we have the ability to use inflection and gestures to convey additional meaning. With a written piece, however, there can be no inflection or gestures. As a result, there are extra words to provide the details.

Because of this difference, your teacher may not want your written pieces to attempt to sound like conversational speech. Listen carefully to the speech of others: do you hear "you know," "like," and other filler phrases? You would never want those in a written piece. Being a good writer is a skill that will serve you well all your life.

[Pilgrim]

If spelling counts, then I always recommend that my students use the online resources available to them to check ANY word about which they are in doubt.

For example....in your thread title, the correct spelling is "Mandatory".

Here's a hint: read books, and read a lot. The more you read, the more you learn about the written word and the better you will recognize correct written work.

[King Of Suede]

Sounds allot like this "guitar club" that was started at my school this year, also by a custodian O_o, but it ended up just being a "How many Kirk Hammet solos can you play?" contest with the 3 bass players there just kickin back. I ended up giving lessons to one of the kids there because he had gotten a bass for Christmas and didn't know where to start so that was cool.

Good luck with the band man, I'm glad you got something meaningful out of it.
Make the best of it while you can.

[WyrdoBass]

Originally Posted by Pilgrim

Here's a hint: read books, and read a lot. The more you read, the more you learn about the written word and the better you will recognize correct written work.

+1

__
It's cool that the club worked out, Squiggly. This year at my school, someone started "Rock 'n' Roll club". I went to it, thinking that at the very least I could find some good musicians. What really happened was that I found four... mediocre guitarists and an AMAZING drummer, who showed up to one meeting and then disappeared into thin air (I was never able to find him after that one meeting) . The only things that resulted from it is that four different () "guitarists" want to start bands with me. However, I do get a lot of respect as a good bass player now (via guitard word-of-mouth).

Overall, it failed. Hard.

[John Webb]

Originally Posted by Jimmy Bones

Squigz, gotta say... not all bass players have external genitalia. Might consider altering that sig.

............and still the quote might remain true!