Anyone embarrased by their band onstage?

[lowfrq]

I've been playing in a cover band for almost a year, & the band seems to be getting worse.
At last night's gig ,I was embarrassed to be on stage with them. Playing simple covers & having the rhythm guitard miss some chords & turn way up.
The drummer & lead guitard are both competent musicians ,I've talked to both of them & they think with more rehearsals things will improve.
Friends & others in the audience said its sounds great, but I know better.... I think they're just being nice.
I usually record our gigs & rehearsals with a zoom recorder & did last night. I just listened to it & IS embarrassing! I think maybe its time to move on.
What would you do?

[kreider204]

How's the singer?

[Edward G.]

Not anymore.

What used to annoy and embarrass me was players who would kill the world in practice and then totally go blank when the stage lights came on.

[lowfrq]

the vocalist is kind of average , sings a bit flat sometimes

[cavedweller]

Been in 2 where I was embarrassed.I saw no hope with these bands so I quit. It is hard to find pro minded people who have talent know how to put a good show together and book shows! Keep looking for something you are proud to be a part of,something will come your way if you are persistant and patient.

[pasta4lnch]

I have a few times in the past. Mostly stupid stuff . . . I used to be in a band that would make all these decisions in rehearsal and at the show wouldn't do any of them so I was the one who looked like a fool . . .

I like my current band. It's a trio and it's so easy to manage. The singer leads and we follow. we never rehearse and we're pretty tight. The singer/artist runs the band so there is no drama. Plus we're all adults! (an important factor!)

[PastorofMuppets]

finding musicians with similiar work ethic to my own is a continual challenge.
if rehearsal doesnt improve things then they might be hopeless

[kreider204]

Good singers are definitely hard to find - even a mediocre one might be worth putting up with for a while.

It sounds like the rhythm guitarist is the main problem. If he's open to constructive criticism, I'd try to work with him for a while.

[taphappy]

Make sure the singer can hear himself in the monitors. Make sure the singer has a monitor. Make sure everybody's in -tune- so he doesn't have an excuse to go flat :)

But. I would sit down with the competent guys and have a conversation. Then have polite, but direct conversations with the singer and rhythm guitarist individually, let 'em know they need to fix this. Use video as evidence. If they freak, cut em. But, I've seen guys crap themselves and really put in an effort after one of these conversations. Also seen em pull the 'taking my ball and I'm going home' bit.

It's a bummer, and can potentially take you guys off the circuit for a bit (in the singer's case, unless you're extremely lucky), but you are only as strong as your weakest link, and the audience will hear that. As long as the core is stable enough to survive the change, it IS very very worth it.

Use video as evidence. "If it pleases the court, exhibit Q at 31:32 on the tape, you can see where the defendant reaches over to once again turn up his amp to 142db, his shirt rides up, and his ass crack appears. He pauses to take a drink, then haphazardly sets it down on the floor next to the surge protector..."

If they don't practice enough, pull antics, or screw up otherwise - in a five piece, that's four guys that they're screwing over. That's simply selfish, and personally deserves no place in a "band" situation. Hand the guy an acoustic, a list of coffee shops that dig solo artists, and flip him the Live Long and Prosper.

But, that's me.

"The ratio of We's to I's is the best indicator of the development of a team." ~Lewis B. Ergen

[John Bigboote]

This was my last project all over. The rhythm guitarist really wasn't good. The lead guitarists is a decent player, but couldn't be bothered to learn songs, and could often be seen/heard hunting all over the fretboard for the right chords on songs we'd played for more than a year. The drummer often blew arrangements, especially endings. The singer was dynamic, but a bit of a putz and technically not very good.

Thing is, the band has had a very strong (if not very large) following, and people danced all night, from early in the first set until we turned the amps off. It is/was a fun band, and people had a good time. Several members believed you were either good or fun; I never thought the two were mutually exclusive.

After a particularly sloppy gig in January, I told them I was done. Gave them plenty of time to find a replacement. Which they did. Now he's gone, and I'm subbing with them until they find someone else.

The keyboard player -- by far the best player in the band, technically (and, conveniently, my wife) -- finally gave her notice last week. Got fed up for the same reasons. She and I have started a new project, and all the other players are *excellent.* As I told a prospective singer yesterday, we used to be embarrassed to invite people to gigs with the old band, but now we're *excited.* Makes a world of difference.

Life's too short to play with lame-ass musicians, even if they're nice guys.

-jb

[greggster59]

I thought you were talking about our band. Three hour drive due to traffic. We played outdoors last night to, thankfully, almost no one. The bassist for the opener used my 500W rig and they sounded really good. Their mix was pretty good too considering they barely had a sound check.

I noticed the other bassist had the gain on my rig about 35% up. We set up quickly. Knowing our lead guitarist's tendency to crank it, I upped my gain to nearly 50% and he started the count for Summertime Blues while I was still strapping my bass on. It was all downhill from there. All I could hear was the lead guitar. I actually had to watch the bass drum to lock into it since I could barely make out a sound. I thought about cranking it up to an annoying level but didn't want to start a urination contest.

Someone shot a video of one of our songs and, sure enough, all you could hear was the lead guitar who was missing chords, notes, dropping verses and extending solos. My ear are still ringing and I'm seriously considering moving on

[NateS]

i read somewhere that there are three different types of bands:

if a band sounds good, but with a bad singer, the audience will think "oh, that's a good band, but their singer sucks"

if a band sounds good, but with a bad guitarist, the audience will think "oh, that's a good band, but their guitarist sucks"

if a band sounds good, but with a bad drummer or bassist, the audience will think "the band sucks..."

don't be embarrassed of being in the band, just get a new rhythm guitar

[Unrepresented]

Sometimes.

I wish our stage show had less "variables" in it. We seem to average at least one technical difficulty per show in terms of cables getting unplugged, pedal boards malfunctioning, drum stands getting knocked over, etc.

We're a high energy band but we shouldn't have the amount of issues that we do.

[Marko5657]

Originally Posted by greggster59

I thought you were talking about our band. Three hour drive due to traffic. We played outdoors last night to, thankfully, almost no one. The bassist for the opener used my 500W rig and they sounded really good. Their mix was pretty good too considering they barely had a sound check.

I noticed the other bassist had the gain on my rig about 35% up. We set up quickly. Knowing our lead guitarist's tendency to crank it, I upped my gain to nearly 50% and he started the count for Summertime Blues while I was still strapping my bass on. It was all downhill from there. All I could hear was the lead guitar. I actually had to watch the bass drum to lock into it since I could barely make out a sound. I thought about cranking it up to an annoying level but didn't want to start a urination contest.

Someone shot a video of one of our songs and, sure enough, all you could hear was the lead guitar who was missing chords, notes, dropping verses and extending solos. My ear are still ringing and I'm seriously considering moving on

Wow, what a guitard.

[greggster59]

Originally Posted by Marko5657

Wow, what a guitard.

I've been using the word "guitard" at band practice lately. Seems to go right over his head.

[Marko5657]

Originally Posted by Unrepresented

Sometimes.

I wish our stage show had less "variables" in it. We seem to average at least one technical difficulty per show in terms of cables getting unplugged, pedal boards malfunctioning, drum stands getting knocked over, etc.

We're a high energy band but we shouldn't have the amount of issues that we do.

I hear ya…

Last nights gig was worse than usual, though. Sound/light guy (not a pro at all, but he’s ours and he’s helpful) set up the new lights I bought (Chauvet 4bar x2) incorrectly, and I had to straighten all that out, and with all the other stuff I do, I forgot to finish hooking up all the amps/snake/speaker cables. I was also particularly tired that night.

When doing the sound check it was like, why isn’t any sound coming out of the mains, why isn’t that monitor working, etc. Man, I looked like an ass. We were only five minutes late to stage, but didn’t have a second of chill time.

I was supposed to hook up karaoke for the breaks (little gimmick of ours), but we decided against it at the last minute, so I left it in the trailer. Then on first break realized we didn’t have a player for break music, the juke box was far away in another area and couldn’t be heard too well, so we only took 10-minute breaks to keep the music going. I didn’t mind playing that much, except that my back starting hurting towards the end of the night.

[Marko5657]

Originally Posted by greggster59

I've been using the word "guitard" at band practice lately. Seems to go right over his head.

[taphappy]

[hijack!] mi scusi mi scusi...

Originally Posted by Marko5657

I was supposed to hook up karaoke for the breaks (little gimmick of ours)

Great idea! How does it go over?

[Woofer]

Oh, I'm definitely riding this bat with you. My guitarist can't seem to figure out that there are volume setting on his amp below 11, so there's amost no hearing the bass or vox. Of course, our singer isn't terribly good either, so...

Besides that, we just got out of the studio recording a 5 song E.P. Rather than wait for me lightscribe the disks and print the album art so we could distribute it properly, they decide to just burn a bunch of copies, jot the name of the band and the song titles on the disk in sharpie and stick them in paper sleeves. Then they gave them out for free at the show!

I may be headed for greener pastures soon.

[ric stave]

Such was the start of my life in bands.

And you can do one of two things - live with it, or change it.

After years of being 'the bad guy' and being the one to fire people from 'my' band, I ended up with a dream bunch of musicians and never looked back. That was about 20 years ago. And every evolution of the band, or other bands I've joined or started, I kept the same standards. People have come and gone over the years, but I've always ended up with someone else who could take their place - never settled for someone who couldn't. And the nice thing is, it seems that once you hit a bunch of players who are talented and humble and easy to work with, they always seem to know others of the same breed, either for future reference or fill-in or new projects.

One of my friends from a few bands we've played together in has a very simple formula to get rid of headaches and ulcers:

"Don't Play With A** ****s"

You can use that word to define annoying traits of other musicians that bug the hell out of you, and then follow the advice.

One step closer to a healthy happy musical life.....