Performance Changes, troubleshooting while on stage

[jbibb]

My band played a 3 set gig, with minimal sound check due to a early evening pre-gig engagement that made set-up time limited...we paid the price...sound wasn't right and it was very difficult to try and fix as we were underway, even during the breaks. Any advice out there on experience with this and how do folk deal with it.

First of all, my bass sound was absolutely lost, could not cut through and was nervous about fiddling with the gain, etc while underway as not to piss-off our sound guy who watches me nervously every time I reach for the dials while I am playing. This is definetely an issue with monitors and myself located too close to the drummer...my thoughts are that my drummers bass drum and tom sound is colliding with my sound and creating issues.

My set-up is a Fender 250/210 bassman combo. I run a Fender P into a small pre-amp, which I had hope to use to get a punchier sound to cut through. It did not work.

Bigger rig, different poisition in relationship to the drummer, better use of a outboard pre-amp?

Any experiences on how you work with the sound guy as you're underway...to fix it...communicating through glares and shouts that cannot be understood.

Any help would be appreciated as I need to have a sit-down with our soundman and the band over this.

Thanks

[badstonebass]

I have been in your situation many times...as a guitarist and bassist.

Personally I find in Live situations(as a bassist) I need more mids to hear myself than I usually would use in a practice situation.

Secondly, stage volumes should almost be automatic when working with the same guys. I always wait and set my bass after I hear where the guitarist sets HIS amp.

Drums are another matter. Maybe try angling your amp away from the drums....or changing places onstage.

In my current band it goes from Left to right....

Bass rig, guitar rig, drums, guitar rig this works very well.

In rush situations you may have to mess with your nobs. Your soundman will have to deal with it....especially if he cannot help with monitors and such. It is HIS JOB to make you hear well.....not YOURS to make his job easy.

I never understood why the soundman gets to dictate what the band members do. If a guy can't handle a couple knob tweaks during a set he has no business being your soundman. There is a limit but come on!

[dcartoon]

What's worked in my experience is:
1) Get soundguy's attention
2) Point at the instrument that needs a volume change
3) Point at the monitor that needs a volume change
4) Give a thumbs up or thumbs down to indicate the direction of volume change
5) Go back to step 2 because nothing happened



Dan

[IanStephenson]

My advice on this would be "don't panic"...

When there's a problem, then it's easy to get hung up on it, and end up tweaking every dial in a stressed frenzy (and REALLY screw up your playing along the way). For example at the weekend I sugguested to my guitarist that his sound was very bassey - the result was he spend the rest of the set worrying about it, and messing with his amp, when i expected him to make a minor adjustment, and move on.

Keep calm and make simple minor changes to get over the worst of it. If you can live with the problem, then maybe it's best to do so - even when things are bad, theres a good chance you can make things worse. Things are rarely so bad that you can't make it through, or that the audience will even notice.

Ian

[jbibb]

Thanks everyone...good advice, that's what I love about this website. I think I'll spend some time with our sound guy before practice for an hour or two...go through all sorts of scenarios, with my different setup's and at least we will have a working knowledge about each other's equipment.

It was a bad feeling up there with no sound and/or this sound "bubble" between myself and the drummer...thinking that this is what the audience was listening to. Good advice just to stay mellow.

Thanks again.