weirdest/strangest/funniest thing you've ever witnessed in a gig as audience

[fleita]

Ok, I was remembering funny and strange things that I've seen at gigs when I was not playing bass, but was part of the audience, and I thought maybe you could share experiences... I think there are a lot of post like this but not with this topic...

I remember once we were the last band to play so we were waiting watching the scene. It was in a real dump, the kind of bar where rock/heavy/dark bands play.
The opening band was: two guys. Each one playing classic guitar. One sang. Not too much rock, but, well... they played well and I started to enjoy the low volume and the James Taylor kind of thing. Suddenly, a cell phone starts ringing. The singer stop playing and says "please... could you turn off your cells?".
I thought it was ok. Didn't like them stopping in the middle of a song, but, well. Then I motorcycle passed by in the street and the other gut stopped and said "hey, man, close the door! I can't listen too my self when a car pass by!!!"
I think there was a limit crossed.

Another strange thing was when I went to see Dave Matthews Band. Suddenly the sound stopped and the band didn't realized. I was at 50 yards from the stage and you could only hear Carter Beaford really really low. The sound was down for about 10 minutes... An eternity for that kind of show. BUT CARTER NEVER STOP PLAYING! A genius.

[Yools]

Back around '97 my band was opening for Obituary (death metal band, for those of you who aren't familiar) at a club in Houston. After our set we were hanging out by our van drinking beer while Obituary was on stage playing their set. Suddenly, in the middle of a song, the side doors of the club burst open and the bass player, still playing the song through a wireless, comes running out with a roadie right behind him. He turned around and faced the wall (still playing), and suddenly hands the bass back to the roadie (mind you, he still has the strap on, so the roadie has to kinda reach around in front of him to grab it), who proceeds to start pounding on the strings like crazy to keep the song going. Then, while the roadie is playing, the bass player whips it out and takes a piss on the side of the building! He finishes up, shakes and puts it away, then grabs the bass, jumps back into playing the song without skipping a beat, and they both run back into the club. Needless to say, he got a standing ovation from all of us. Quite possibly the most entertaining part of the night.

[Armbruster]

Originally Posted by Yools

Back around '97 my band was opening for Obituary (death metal band, for those of you who aren't familiar) at a club in Houston. After our set we were hanging out by our van drinking beer while Obituary was on stage playing their set. Suddenly, in the middle of a song, the side doors of the club burst open and the bass player, still playing the song through a wireless, comes running out with a roadie right behind him. He turned around and faced the wall (still playing), and suddenly hands the bass back to the roadie (mind you, he still has the strap on, so the roadie has to kinda reach around in front of him to grab it), who proceeds to start pounding on the strings like crazy to keep the song going. Then, while the roadie is playing, the bass player whips it out and takes a piss on the side of the building! He finishes up, shakes and puts it away, then grabs the bass, jumps back into playing the song without skipping a beat, and they both run back into the club. Needless to say, he got a standing ovation from all of us. Quite possibly the most entertaining part of the night.

I would sig' this if I could.

[millsbass5]

Originally Posted by Yools

Back around '97 my band was opening for Obituary (death metal band, for those of you who aren't familiar) at a club in Houston. After our set we were hanging out by our van drinking beer while Obituary was on stage playing their set. Suddenly, in the middle of a song, the side doors of the club burst open and the bass player, still playing the song through a wireless, comes running out with a roadie right behind him. He turned around and faced the wall (still playing), and suddenly hands the bass back to the roadie (mind you, he still has the strap on, so the roadie has to kinda reach around in front of him to grab it), who proceeds to start pounding on the strings like crazy to keep the song going. Then, while the roadie is playing, the bass player whips it out and takes a piss on the side of the building! He finishes up, shakes and puts it away, then grabs the bass, jumps back into playing the song without skipping a beat, and they both run back into the club. Needless to say, he got a standing ovation from all of us. Quite possibly the most entertaining part of the night.

NOW THAT'S THE KINDA ROADIE/TECH I'D WANT!!!Talk about dedication!!Yes!!

[Loel]

Classic!!

Originally Posted by Yools

Back around '97 my band was opening for Obituary (death metal band, for those of you who aren't familiar) at a club in Houston. After our set we were hanging out by our van drinking beer while Obituary was on stage playing their set. Suddenly, in the middle of a song, the side doors of the club burst open and the bass player, still playing the song through a wireless, comes running out with a roadie right behind him. He turned around and faced the wall (still playing), and suddenly hands the bass back to the roadie (mind you, he still has the strap on, so the roadie has to kinda reach around in front of him to grab it), who proceeds to start pounding on the strings like crazy to keep the song going. Then, while the roadie is playing, the bass player whips it out and takes a piss on the side of the building! He finishes up, shakes and puts it away, then grabs the bass, jumps back into playing the song without skipping a beat, and they both run back into the club. Needless to say, he got a standing ovation from all of us. Quite possibly the most entertaining part of the night.

[fleita]

Originally Posted by Yools

Back around '97 my band was opening for Obituary (death metal band, for those of you who aren't familiar) at a club in Houston. After our set we were hanging out by our van drinking beer while Obituary was on stage playing their set. Suddenly, in the middle of a song, the side doors of the club burst open and the bass player, still playing the song through a wireless, comes running out with a roadie right behind him. He turned around and faced the wall (still playing), and suddenly hands the bass back to the roadie (mind you, he still has the strap on, so the roadie has to kinda reach around in front of him to grab it), who proceeds to start pounding on the strings like crazy to keep the song going. Then, while the roadie is playing, the bass player whips it out and takes a piss on the side of the building! He finishes up, shakes and puts it away, then grabs the bass, jumps back into playing the song without skipping a beat, and they both run back into the club. Needless to say, he got a standing ovation from all of us. Quite possibly the most entertaining part of the night.

great!!!

[jnuts1]

amazing! he must have really had to go

[dmusic148]

Would have been funnier if the bassist kept playing while the roadie 'handled' things for him.............

[Spinal Tapper]

Ohh...where to start with this one?

I saw this HORRIBLE onstage meltdown last summer when this band called The Medic Droid (opening for Kill Hannah I had some free tix for at the last show of their tour in their hometown - it was a PACKED HOUSE) at a very well known venue in Chicago called Metro.

This band was clearly very drunk on stage and couldn't get their laptop to work (which seemed to be the main focus of their music) and didn't have a real instrument lying around to save their life...the crowd was starting to notice things weren't going smoothly because of the look of panic on this poor keyboardists face as the only sound coming through his mac was the DING when it boots up...

The fashionable and overly-intoxicated singer stood up there on stage trying to keep the crowd entertained while the keyboardist desperately tried to get his Macbook working.

FINALLY, he got his Mac going and they started their pop-synth stuff, and the singer was whipping the mic around by the cable when it ripped and his mic flew right into the audience!

Someone threw it back and he continued to sing into the unplugged microphone...they ended the song early...he noticed the XLR didn't just come unplugged, but the cable had literally ripped from the socket...so, they got him another one...

The Mac went out again during song 2...keyboard player getting more and more visually frustrated...

You could see panic starting to set in after about 15 minutes of NO SOUND coming from their gear once again...I think his Mac had crashed completely

Finally, the tension broke - the keyboardist slammed his Macbook shut, picked up his Keytar he didn't get to use yet and THREW it into the packed crowd.

He proceeded off the stage and picked up a light stand and SMASHED it onstage in frustration and stormed off!

The singer and drummer were left onstage, not sure what to do, so their "manager" comes out and tries to tell everyone to "Relax, the show will go on"...with their singer's "original freestyle rap"! LOL

The drummer lays down a beat and the singer starts in with his wack-ass rhymes (that didn't rhyme) that just turned the whole thing into a circus of hilarity - and not in a good way.

He shouted at the crowds un-enthusiasm towards his rapping, "You guys thought we were some badass dance-rock band, but guess what? We're total posers! F*** yeah!"

YES, he actually just said that as the rest of the band walked off stage.

It was the definitely the most uncomfortable situation I have ever witnessed onstage.

[Gubna]

One band we'd play shows with - the guy would pull his pants off during the last song and play the rest of the song with his stuff hanging out. The odd thing is, in some cases he did this in front of minors. I don't know how he got away with that... The first time we saw him do this, he left us his shorts on our rented van's windshield wipers. Thanks, dude. what was worse, was while we were driving off, my drummer says, "hey, what's that?", pulling them off the wipers from the drivers seat. I realize what they were, and say "those are dave's shorts!" but it was too late, my drummer, was already sniffing them!

Then, there was this band, Skitzo. The singer could vomit on call. He got banned from that club... years later, he was on Jerry Springer for an episode called "My Boyfriend Pukes On Me". Need I say anymore?

During a Mr. Bungle show at the Civic in San Francisco New Years Eve 1992... Mike Patton whipped it out, pissed in his shoe, and then drank it.

[Thor]

Subscribed. With Yools story, this thread has big win
potential.

[CaptainWampum]

This may be the most winningest thread I have seen in my days on TB.

[Thor]

Read the 'farting at a show thread' in this forum. Priceless.
I bumped it for you.

[LSquared]

Coupe quick hits, nothing too dramatic:

I saw Atlanta Rhythm Section back in the late 70’s when the singer (Ronnie Hammond) was slurring / stumbling drunk…. Rather irritating for those of us who had payed good money expecting to see someone somewhat coherent..

Saw Neil Young stomp off stage in the late 70’s (Stills Young tour) because somebody yelled something while he was playing After The Gold Rush (probably “Rock and roll!” or perhaps simply “freebird”). It was during the solo part of the performance... after a minute or two, Stills came on and did his bit.

Saw Blondie in the early 80’s in Pittsburgh. Rather bad show, and at the end, the drummer jumped over his kit, ran up to the center microphone and yelled “Pittsburgh sucks”. Classy touch.

One of the first concerts I went to, Lynyrd Skynyrd / Outlaws / Steve Marriot….. a couple of guys drag their drunk friend over, drop in in the aisle beside my seat. He proceeds to pitch over and puke, under my seat. His friends notice the guy has lost his glasses somewhere in the mess. They ask if we’ll help look…. Um, that would be a “NO”.

Saw Blue Oyster Cult (with a band called “Law” as warm up) back in the late 70’s. Apparently their equipment truck broke down or got lost, they played their set using the warm-up band’s equipment. Interesting part, they really kicked, and were MUCH better than the next time I saw them, when they had their light show and pyrotechnics and all.

Back in the mid-70’s I was supposed to see Boston as warm up band for the Doobie Brothers, but for some reason they cancelled. Last minute fill in was a local band we’d never heard of, Split Lips or something. They were quite bad, clearly not ready to play in front of 15,000 people, especially 15,000 people expecting to see a hot new band that was tearing up the airwaves. Worst thing: The guitarist kept apologizing, saying that he bought his guitar that afternoon and wasn’t used to it.

I also had Root Boy Slim break a ceiling tile over my head during a show at a club in Chapel Hill, NC, back in the 80’s, but that’s another story.

[GregDunn]

This will probably be funnier to those of you who have been in bands than those who just attend shows, but it was still a classic.

I'm often asked to come and record/photograph shows for friends' bands, so when I was asked to help out a band formed by four friends, I of course gladly accepted. It was at a medium-sized but very bare all-ages venue (formerly a movie theater, now sans seats), and as expected, the crowd wasn't too large - maybe 30-50 people. At these local shows, there isn't really a sense of a "headliner", everyone sort of queues up by mutual assent. Anyway, my friends' band went first, then a band made up of a bunch of pretty young guys who wanted to play early because of curfew and such. As I said, no big deal at these shows. As it turned out I wish I'd rolled tape on their set.

Anyhow, we began to get a sense of trouble when the lead singer of this young band started pretending he was Roger Daltrey, only without the vocal chops. By that, I mean he started screaming into the mic and then swinging it around by the cord. The mic probably hit the floor and/or one of the monitors a few times, and during the second song it abruptly quit. This kid started b*tching at the sound man to fix the PA, and after a few moments when it became obvious the problem was the mic or cable, the sound guy (co-owner of the venue, incidentally) comes up to swap pieces and resolve the problem.

There was quite a bit of byplay going on between the vocalist and the sound guy, mainly to the effect that the vocalist was upset at losing the sound, and the sound guy was annoyed because he was pretty sure the mic (the venue's mic in fact) was broken from the misuse. It may actually have been the mic and the cable, though, because when he got it going and the band resumed, Mr. Showoff started swinging the mic and ... it quit again. He started up yelling at the sound guy, which resulted in the sound guy slamming all the sliders down to the bottom and announcing "your set is OVER!". The other band members meekly started packing up their gear, while the vocalist threw the mic down, flounced back and forth across the stage a couple of times and then stormed out.

We figured that was the end of it, till the band was mostly packed up and out the door when suddenly the vocalist forced his way back in the load-out door and shouted for all to hear, "Yeah, you think you're big stuff now, but when we're all rich and famous we'll come back here and CLOSE THIS PLACE DOWN!!!!!" Exit diva. I kid you not.

I felt so bad for the other guys in his band, but we couldn't stop laughing for half an hour. It was priceless.

[Billnc]

Originally Posted by LSquared

Coupe quick hits, nothing too dramatic:



Saw Blondie in the early 80’s in Pittsburgh. Rather bad show, and at the end, the drummer jumped over his kit, ran up to the center microphone and yelled “Pittsburgh sucks”. Classy touch.

.

Same thing happened in Philly in '78 must be part of the show!

[Stempelloos]

Somewhere back in 1983 or '84, The Birthday Party gave a concert in town. In the venue a friend was handing out paper streamers and confetti to pals.
It was his idea for a practical joke, playing the thick joker, pretending he was visiting a birthday party.

So the show started off, Nick Cave didn't look very pleased and wore
a bottle of rum or whisky with him, giving it a firm sip now and then.
We started throwing paper streamers and confetti.
Another part of the audience started throwing beer.
Cave was clearly disgusted and gave a warning to the beer throwers wiping off the streamers from his shoulders.
That didn't help much, so he jumped offstage into the corner of the beer throwers to give them some kick ass,
meanwhile singing and roaming through the audience giving the buggers an angry look in the eyes.
He kinda adjusted the show by singing part of the lyrics of Wild World "it's a wild world, and she's a wild girl, don't push her" to the woman next to me,
finding his way back to the stage.
The show that followed is still one of the most impressive ones I remember.

[cbassSD]

Originally Posted by Gubna

During a Mr. Bungle show at the Civic in San Francisco New Years Eve 1992... Mike Patton whipped it out, pissed in his shoe, and then drank it.

I was there as well, couldn't believe it. I thought their set sucked, must have been the only way to salvage it.

[meycom]

I have two things I saw a few years a part. Went to see KISS(Madison, WI) in 1976 and during the set up as we were sitting on the floor one of the mirror balls fell from the ceiling and crowned a guy. Had a piece of mirror with blood on it from that show. From then on they had little nets under them. In the early 90's, went to an Ozzy show(same place) and near the end of the show a guy either jumped or was pushed from the lower balcony and grabbed the stage curtain and used it to slide down. Tore the hell out of his hands but saved his body some damage I'm sure.

[Bochafish]

This was my first concert when I was 14. Alpine Valley, which is a huge venue, with a large lawn section.

One of the awesomest things I've seen was during Soundgarden's set. Out of nowhere, everyone on the lawn started tearing up large pieces of sod, and throwing it in the air. Imagine 7000 people all throwing a square foot of sod for 5 minutes straight. The air was filled with flying grass and mud. During the guitar solo, Cornell actually took a step back, and said, "looks pretty f'n cool from here."


Another was at a Slayer show in '94 at the Aragon ballroom. The aragon has a huge general admission floor section that goes all the way to the stage. They have a large section in the middle cleared away that divides the people on the floor into 2 groups, and runs back to the sound board. During a song, a fan managed to get past security, climb up on top of one of the huge monitors at the front of the stage somehow, and tried for a huge 20-30' stage dive. He jumped a little to high and far, and landed in the middle section, where no one could catch him. They had to carry him out.