is anyone in a band spread over two cities?

Fishbrain · #1 03-06-2007, 05:16 AM

is anyone in a band with a bit of distance between members? I may shortly need to move cities, not too far away, only about half an hour on the motor way but has anyone else encountered this and or any problems with it?

thanks

trasser · #2 03-06-2007, 05:24 AM

Yes, more than once. The problem is, that it will be more difficult for you to have a regular practice day. And when you don't have that, it becomes much more difficult to pull yourself together and set up a band meeting or practice session. Depending on how dedicated/professional the band members are.
I find that working on new material can be quite difficult as well, and the best solution to that is recording digitally, so you can send each other new ideas etc.

HomeBrewTJ · #3 03-06-2007, 05:29 AM

30 minutes isn't that far- not enough to worry about. If it were an hour or more, then that's where I've found the problems to start.

bassicinstinct · #4 03-06-2007, 05:31 AM

Formerly Nottingham Mansfield and Leeds, now Nottingham Mansfield and Wakefield.

No problem at all although, if they closed the M1, things might be different.

Bayou_Brawler · #5 03-06-2007, 06:41 AM

yeah 30 mins shouldn't be a problem man....that's nothing...

actually my entire bands lives about 30 mins from where we practice...

i've seen and been in much worse....hell our fiddle player used to commute 4 hours every weekend for gigs haha....

threshar · #6 03-06-2007, 06:51 AM

same here, we all live about 30-40 minutes from each other.

The biggest trouble we have is getting the ENTIRE band together for a practice. We all have families and lives, so it can be difficult to line everybody up. (Especially for our keyboardist who runs a performing arts school, so there are a lot of evening classes he does).

But it does work fine. We can reliably get the "core" together. And we then try to practice with one of the other guys (6 person band, the core is 4 of us). Luckly everybody in the band is a great musician, so you'd never notice

fretlessspence · #7 03-06-2007, 07:02 AM

I play in a band that is in the midwest.

I live in Davenport, IA along with the drummer.

The horn section (Trumpet,sax,bone) lives in St.Louis
4+ hours south or 260miles

The guitar player lives in Des Moines, IA
2 hrs 45 min west, 170 miles

The singer lives in Carbondale, IL
6 hours south, 365 miles

I'd say we are pretty spread out. We play 10-15 dates a year and usually email songs and changes to the set list back and forth. We show up for a gig with a good chunk of hours to talk through the songs (in a hotel room) and we go play. The little rehersal time keeps everyone is on their toes and we have some pretty exciting shows. This is in part because we all have done the work and figured out the songs, but having never played some of them in a band setting it's pretty fun for us too. None of it gets old. Anyway, that's one of the bands I play in.

Fishbrain · #8 03-06-2007, 07:02 AM

Diggler · #9 03-06-2007, 09:03 AM

Yes. One lives in MI (4 hours+), and one lives an hour south of me, and one lives an hour above me.

We had played for years before and reunited, after a few initial practices, we don't practice anymore. We do covers, we tell each other what key it's in, and discuss how we'll end it/do breaks over the phone. The first time we play a song together, it's almost always live.

Lazylion · #10 03-06-2007, 09:25 AM

My band is spread over 2 states, Maryland and Virginia. The states are smaller, here on the Eastern Seaboard.
But after reading about this guy:

Quote:

Originally Posted by fretlessspence

I live in Davenport, IA along with the drummer.
The horn section (Trumpet,sax,bone) lives in St.Louis
4+ hours south or 260miles
The guitar player lives in Des Moines, IA
2 hrs 45 min west, 170 miles
The singer lives in Carbondale, IL
6 hours south, 365 miles

I'd say we are pretty spread out.

We don't compare. Never mind!

ludwig109 · #11 03-06-2007, 10:31 AM

my ones spread over 3 counties, since everyone moved away to college. but everyone gets together at weekends so its not much of a problem

Jimi Cleek · #12 03-06-2007, 11:43 AM

Singer/Guitarist in Austin, The rest of us are in The Dallas area. We practice a new song or two before we go on when we gig and if it feels good we play it that night. Does make it hard to keep a really tight feel together. I am constantly amazed at how good we sound after not seeing each other for weeks and occasionally a month or more apart.

Drives me crazy sometimes.

Jimi