What Is The oddest gig you've ever played?

caeman · #1 09-30-2009, 11:29 AM

What is the oddest gig you've ever played? For example, you are a death metal band, and a retirement home booked you. Or you show up to a bluegrass festival, but you weren't told it was a bluegrass festival, and you are a 50's rock cover band. Or maybe you played for someone as their dying wish.

drden · #2 09-30-2009, 11:32 AM

I havent had anything too crazy, but a bass player I know once played in a sketch comedy/play/musical pit band, which consisted of him on bass, a guitar player, and a pennywhistle

true story

aborgman · #3 09-30-2009, 12:16 PM

I played upright in a quartet - bass, piano, clarinet, snare drum... doing music written by the piano player to accompany a musical version (in German) of Die Ausnahme und die Regel (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Exception_and_the_Rule)

southernrocker · #4 09-30-2009, 12:24 PM

My 80's rock cover band in high school got booked at some candle-lit dinner thing. We still rocked out to some Judas Priest and Quiet Riot! The act before us was a sax solo. I remember them asking if we'd play the gig and I said, "You know were a 80's rock group, right?" And they said, "Yeah, it will be fine."

It was interesting.

GreenBastard · #5 09-30-2009, 12:26 PM

i played in an all-acoustic folk band for a while. our first gig was at Methfest. FULL DISCLOSURE: Methfest is the noise-rock alternative to Hempfest that goes down every year in Seattle. before anyone asks, it is not meant to promote the use of Meth. just an incredibly tasteless (though hilarious - to me, at least) joke.

5StringBlues · #6 09-30-2009, 12:26 PM

A dog's birthday party.

And I always find it strange that people will hire a blues band for their wedding......

Jim Carr · #7 09-30-2009, 12:27 PM

My touring country band just played for a large crowd of hip hop fans. They dug it.

caeman · #8 09-30-2009, 12:30 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by southernrocker

My 80's rock cover band in high school got booked at some candle-lit dinner thing. We still rocked out to some Judas Priest and Quiet Riot! The act before us was a sax solo. I remember them asking if we'd play the gig and I said, "You know were a 80's rock group, right?" And they said, "Yeah, it will be fine."

It was interesting.

At the table: "This is nice, getting away from the kids for an evening."

On the stage: "Come on feel the noize! Girls rock your boys! Let's get wild, wild, wild!"

gweimer · #9 09-30-2009, 12:57 PM

I have:

played for a shoe store opening
in a McD's parking lot
at a flea market

derrenleepoole · #10 09-30-2009, 01:03 PM

I've busked in York (UK) city centre dressed to the hilt in medieval clothes playing a Citern on many occasions. Being a poor student forces your hand for money sometimes - so you'll do 'owt!

Instagator · #11 09-30-2009, 03:15 PM

Played twice at Gallaudet University.(google it if you don't know)

It was great to see all the kids getting drunk and sluring their words..really I'm not kidding.

Cheers.

mcapote · #12 09-30-2009, 03:17 PM

played a neo-nazi skinhead show and my guitarist is a Black Jamaican. I think he **** himself a little when we walked in.

Kirk Bryant · #13 09-30-2009, 03:47 PM

The San Jose Flea market is a regular gig in the Bay area, nothing to weird there.
Doing a Hasidic wedding (traditional Jewish) where there is a divider between male and female dancers is interesting also you play nonstop for hours with breaks taken individually as the music continues.
One of the weirdest was a Halloween party at a swingers club with just Bass and Percussion doing loops and spacey effects all nite while there was live sex going on. Not necessarily beautiful people either. LOL
Running our Bay Cruise boat aground in the San Francisco bay and being rescued by the coast Guard was interesting.
Playing a New Years gig that had to be evacuated for a bomb threat ( from a competing Itialian restaurant owner) We all took our axes out of the building but they wouldn't let us out with any other gear. after a 1 hour delay for the bomb squad and dogs to go thru the place we partied on!
Once I was doing a wedding in Inverness in Marin County (north of San Francisco) as we were rocking out I pointed out to the other guys a Monk dressed in the traditional brown robe to his ankles. As he walked the several hundred yards to our location up thru a field we all wondered what was up. He went straight to the Bride and spoke briefly to her then left the way he came. The bride came towards us as I said to the guys "I'll bet it's a volume complaint!" Sure enough, we stopped playing, as I was the leader she came to me and said " the Monks at the Monastery next door are complaining about the volume as it's disturbing thier vow of silence". So I said do you want us to turn down? She said hell no that's thier problem keep on rockin' and we did!

there are more but you get the idea.......play long enough and you a lot of strange situations LOL

peace Capt Kirk

pklima · #14 09-30-2009, 04:00 PM

At the bottom of a shallow depression which used to be a castle moat.

Two months earlier we did something similar except up in a fallen tree, with most of the band about eight feet off the ground. I don't have any pics of that handy, though.

gweimer · #15 09-30-2009, 04:01 PM

I guess I should add the St. George's Day banquet we played for a group of Armenians. They loved us, and asked us to join them for dinner. No silverware; you just tore off a chunk of lamb and dug right in.

Edward G. · #16 09-30-2009, 04:17 PM

1. A blues gig at a retirement home.
2. A country gig at a WWII battle re-enactment.
3. A political fundraiser for a candidate I would never vote for, several times, actually.
4. A legalize-marijuana awareness event in the shadow of the Lincoln Memorial.
5. At least two working firehouses where they moved the trucks outside to make room for the band.
6. A grand opening for a Harley dealership.
7. Numerous jobs at a tiny llittle club in the woods where the part of the building that held the stage was directly over a river and supported by 20-ft. stilts and seemed to sway a little in bad weather.

**bassybill** · #17 09-30-2009, 04:41 PM

I did a gig once where the majority of the audience couldn't hear us - at a local centre for the deaf.

They loved us!

J.D.B. · #18 09-30-2009, 04:51 PM

One of the highlights of my career was playing for a live porn show put on at a large bachelor party. I found the experience most inspiring as did the rest of the band. We were able to effect the show with the way we played. A most "moving" evening, indeed!

Josh

Mike Shevlin · #19 09-30-2009, 04:51 PM

I played at a belching/farting contest in Las Vegas in 1999. A chick won the belching & some 400 lb. biker dude easily won the farting & took second to the chick in belching.

theory028 · #20 09-30-2009, 04:51 PM

We played for someone's surprise graduation party (but how big of a surprise could it have been?). It happened to land on the day that her sister came back from some trip so she thought the party was for her. This girl had a history of psychological issues so we let her think that it was. I almost tossed a pop can out of my window at her windshield while I was driving until I realized it was her. She drove a car similar to what my friend drives so it was an honest mistake.

That's about the extent of my strange gigging experience. It wasn't very strange at all but the circumstances were uncomfortable.