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Am I right to pump the brakes?
- Thread starter Cloudspine
- Start date
Waiting until you're ready can keep you unready. Set a date for the first gig and keep to it. It will make you get ready for it.
It's very unlikely no one will remember the band at all. And, if it's really, really bad, just change the name because they're definitely not going to remember who was in it.
JeezyMcNuggles
Inactive
- Feb 23, 2018
- 14,723
- 20,970
- Disclosures
- I suck, but nobody really notices
You having a 210 combo doesn't make you any more equipped than anyone with an amp. Also, the brakes have been stuck on since you started playing with a drum machine, and have no gear.
Craigslist a drummer. They aren't hard to find. They might even have enough equipment to play a show.
A gig on stage is worth ten in the basement.
IMO, go play. Play out. Then play out some more. That's the only way you'll find out what works, what needs work, and what doesn't.
IMO, go play. Play out. Then play out some more. That's the only way you'll find out what works, what needs work, and what doesn't.
If you were in the audience, would you want to listen to your band's set?
Set up like you're doing a show and record the performance, video if possible. Then watch it listen back.
If you get FOH sound support, your tiny amps might be a huge advantage. Rookie mistake #1, too much volume on stage. Let the house sound guy do his thing.
Jump in. You don't catch waves sitting on the beach.
Jump in. You don't catch waves sitting on the beach.
I suppose it depends on your goals and at what level you set expectations for the band. Everyone is a beginner at some point. And 6-8 songs seems really reasonable for a goal a month out.
Perhaps you should hire and then subsequently fire a drummer while you have the chance. And record your rehearsals so each person can evaluate and then you can determine how realistic it is to play.
I'm jumping in the chorus, if you're a new project with beginner/intermediate performance experience you'll never be ready until you dive in.
Good luck.
Perhaps you should hire and then subsequently fire a drummer while you have the chance. And record your rehearsals so each person can evaluate and then you can determine how realistic it is to play.
I'm jumping in the chorus, if you're a new project with beginner/intermediate performance experience you'll never be ready until you dive in.
Good luck.
Play the gig. Try to go first. Start with a strong song…end with a strong song. In the middle do your best, people will forgive you. The Beatles got good by playing stages, not by practicing in a basement. I've done multi band gigs where the other bands killed and it was a bit intimidating, as well as gigs where we were the best of the bunch. Get on stage and take your medicine.
It's likely both you're being too held back and they're being too anxious, but man it really be that way sometimes with bands. Also, smart words post earlier.
I'll give you my recent experiences this summer with my current originals band that started in the spring cuz I feel we have some things in common.
I'm also 10 years older but it's 40s to 30s and we've all played live shows before. Our drummer is a guitarist who's only playing drums cuz we need one. His kit isn't the best. We played 4 shows this summer, all multi band lineups and we've used a house kit every time. The guitarist also has a small practice amp but at gigs, goes through the house PA. We've played at 3 different venues in a smallish city and they've all had house gear. I'm the only one using amps and at one gig, i played through another bassist's amp. As an earlier poster suggested, if these are real venues, they should have sound equipment you can go through or talk to the other bands and see if you can use their stuff. Just put the knobs back to where they had it if you tweak anything!
We're a trio. We're doing the guitarist's songs and his voice is our best weapon. They got me off Craigslist and his voice along with the songs themselves and the emotion he puts into them are why I joined up. That being said, he likes to go with the moment and will sometimes repeat lines or do something different within the song or deviate from the setlist we talked about. I can play all the songs straight through but that doesn't always happen and I basically have to watch him instead of the crowd the whole time (when I'm not staring at the fretboard, ha). It makes it somewhat of a tightrope act every time, which can go both ways. Of the 4 shows, 2 were pretty good, 1 was clearly the best and one was not great. But these are my opinions. Like yourself, I'm also more critical than the others. They both are totally happy after we're done and I'm always thinking it could've been better, because it could have! The last show (the not great one), we actually headlined and the 2 openers were clearly tighter than we were (but also have been together much longer; they have merch and CDs and a website, of which we have none). There's a fine line with us of it sounding fun and like anything could happen and it just sounding bad. If I was the other 2 bands, based on that night, I wouldn't want us on one of their bills in the future.
So like you, I also didn't think we were necessarily ready but we did the shows anyway cuz the guitarist has hookups and "just wants to play" and they were mostly successful (as in we didn't completely embarass ourselves; even the not great show had its moments). I feel your apprehension but if the songs are repeatable and you can all practice at home as well as together before the gigs and you're not throwing each other curveballs, you should be able to pull off 6 songs. However, I would try to make it 4-2 originals to covers instead of 3-3 if these are supposed to be original music shows. That way you can say you're mostly originals, ha. Open with the one you do best so at least that first impression will be good even if it's downhill from there!
And as an aside, I completely disagree with the sentiments here that if you don't play these gigs, you'll never get out there at all. Or that waiting to be ready is detrimental. Yes, it would be a problem if you're the type of person that literally never thought you'd be ready unless it's perfect every time but I fully understand wanting to take even 1 extra month to tighten up before playing live. It is 100% possible to actually not be ready and embarrassing yourself in the name of "just getting out there and learning some lessons" seems ridiculous to me. I also wouldn't bother with open mics to get your feet wet. If these guys have legit connections to book gigs, that shouldn't go away if you pass on these first ones, just book a gig farther down the line and practice more.
Only you know how close you are to being ready/acceptable. Some missed notes won't make or break the set. Completely messing up entire sections, starting and stopping and restarting, forgetting words, things like that will not go over well.
I feel your apprehension, it's real and probably warranted (I have no way of knowing) but I also think you'd be able to pull off a 6 song gig with a month's notice.
My vote is to do the gigs and Good luck!
I'm also 10 years older but it's 40s to 30s and we've all played live shows before. Our drummer is a guitarist who's only playing drums cuz we need one. His kit isn't the best. We played 4 shows this summer, all multi band lineups and we've used a house kit every time. The guitarist also has a small practice amp but at gigs, goes through the house PA. We've played at 3 different venues in a smallish city and they've all had house gear. I'm the only one using amps and at one gig, i played through another bassist's amp. As an earlier poster suggested, if these are real venues, they should have sound equipment you can go through or talk to the other bands and see if you can use their stuff. Just put the knobs back to where they had it if you tweak anything!
We're a trio. We're doing the guitarist's songs and his voice is our best weapon. They got me off Craigslist and his voice along with the songs themselves and the emotion he puts into them are why I joined up. That being said, he likes to go with the moment and will sometimes repeat lines or do something different within the song or deviate from the setlist we talked about. I can play all the songs straight through but that doesn't always happen and I basically have to watch him instead of the crowd the whole time (when I'm not staring at the fretboard, ha). It makes it somewhat of a tightrope act every time, which can go both ways. Of the 4 shows, 2 were pretty good, 1 was clearly the best and one was not great. But these are my opinions. Like yourself, I'm also more critical than the others. They both are totally happy after we're done and I'm always thinking it could've been better, because it could have! The last show (the not great one), we actually headlined and the 2 openers were clearly tighter than we were (but also have been together much longer; they have merch and CDs and a website, of which we have none). There's a fine line with us of it sounding fun and like anything could happen and it just sounding bad. If I was the other 2 bands, based on that night, I wouldn't want us on one of their bills in the future.
So like you, I also didn't think we were necessarily ready but we did the shows anyway cuz the guitarist has hookups and "just wants to play" and they were mostly successful (as in we didn't completely embarass ourselves; even the not great show had its moments). I feel your apprehension but if the songs are repeatable and you can all practice at home as well as together before the gigs and you're not throwing each other curveballs, you should be able to pull off 6 songs. However, I would try to make it 4-2 originals to covers instead of 3-3 if these are supposed to be original music shows. That way you can say you're mostly originals, ha. Open with the one you do best so at least that first impression will be good even if it's downhill from there!
And as an aside, I completely disagree with the sentiments here that if you don't play these gigs, you'll never get out there at all. Or that waiting to be ready is detrimental. Yes, it would be a problem if you're the type of person that literally never thought you'd be ready unless it's perfect every time but I fully understand wanting to take even 1 extra month to tighten up before playing live. It is 100% possible to actually not be ready and embarrassing yourself in the name of "just getting out there and learning some lessons" seems ridiculous to me. I also wouldn't bother with open mics to get your feet wet. If these guys have legit connections to book gigs, that shouldn't go away if you pass on these first ones, just book a gig farther down the line and practice more.
Only you know how close you are to being ready/acceptable. Some missed notes won't make or break the set. Completely messing up entire sections, starting and stopping and restarting, forgetting words, things like that will not go over well.
I feel your apprehension, it's real and probably warranted (I have no way of knowing) but I also think you'd be able to pull off a 6 song gig with a month's notice.
My vote is to do the gigs and Good luck!
You guys will not get it perfect. Get out and play open mics to refine your stage presence and to get accustomed to playing in front of people.
You don't have to have top of the line gear to play out. Get the best gear that you can afford and, most importantly, learn how to get the most out of that gear.
Stick with the open mics and rehearsals until you find a drummer.
You don't have to have top of the line gear to play out. Get the best gear that you can afford and, most importantly, learn how to get the most out of that gear.
Stick with the open mics and rehearsals until you find a drummer.
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A number of years back I hooked up with a band that had 3 originals and a cover. I think we were together for about 3 weeks before we did our first gig, which was a battle of the bands format. Wasn't perfect, but the bartender referred us to a friend and we wound up opening for another band a couple weeks later.
Too many people think you need to be perfect to play live. Most of them will never play live because of it.
Too many people think you need to be perfect to play live. Most of them will never play live because of it.
my advice: record every rehearsal, edit out the banter, and review and critique as a group at start of the next rehearsal. Time well spent when you have less than a dozen songs...
If you do play live, make sure it's at a venue that has at least a basic PA system; that's what the drum machine will get put through, not one of the band's amps. And don't be afraid to let the sound person know beforehand that you are a new band, that it's one of your first shows, and that you would appreciate any guidance and advice in getting everything set up onstage for best sound.
I'm in pretty much the exact same boat, new band booked us a show playing a local punk festival in exactly a month from now. Multi band set up like OP mentioned, figured it would be about 25 minutes, low and behold our time was set to 45 minutes! We play super fast punk music, we have 7 songs. We timed the songs we have down pat, after the singer went ahead and booked us on the show, we came in at a whopping 9 minutes! We sat down and talked about realistic expectations, we can rush through the back catalog of demos and ideas on the google drive they have and maybe not flesh ideas out as best as they can be or we can play more covers than original songs and fill our set with filler to make up the time. But is that how we really want to get out on the scene? We decided to ask for a smaller set time in order to get a couple more songs under our belts prior to the show and keep as much fat trimmed out of our first show as possible. We agreed that if we couldn't negotiate our time down we would bow out.
We were under the impression that this show was 50/50 chance it was going to happen, I assumed it was going to be almost like a house gig. Turns out the Singers buddy really is an event organizer and really booked a huge venue with a bunch of bands spread out over the course of an entire day.
I'd say let 'er rip! It's almost as never bad as it seems when you're up there playing. The slightest imperfections that people in the band pick up on, by and large go unnoticed by the crowd. If you all look like you're having fun and rocking out. You ARE having fun and rocking out! Especially if you're playing original music, who is anyone to say you're playing your own song wrong!
We were under the impression that this show was 50/50 chance it was going to happen, I assumed it was going to be almost like a house gig. Turns out the Singers buddy really is an event organizer and really booked a huge venue with a bunch of bands spread out over the course of an entire day.
I'd say let 'er rip! It's almost as never bad as it seems when you're up there playing. The slightest imperfections that people in the band pick up on, by and large go unnoticed by the crowd. If you all look like you're having fun and rocking out. You ARE having fun and rocking out! Especially if you're playing original music, who is anyone to say you're playing your own song wrong!
I say - provided you have enough material to fill the slot you've been given - do it. There's nothing like a deadline to get you focussed.
Just make sure you're all clearly treating it as a learning experience. Nobody should freak out if it's not perfect (or even not very good) but everybody should be prepared to critically assess the show to identify if anything needs to change, whether that be equipment, arrangements, skill/rehearsal levels, stage presence, getting a real drummer, whatever.
Just make sure you're all clearly treating it as a learning experience. Nobody should freak out if it's not perfect (or even not very good) but everybody should be prepared to critically assess the show to identify if anything needs to change, whether that be equipment, arrangements, skill/rehearsal levels, stage presence, getting a real drummer, whatever.
Also, you're in good company starting out with a drum machine—"Echo" from Echo and the Bunnymen was their drum machine as they also went out without a meat drummer at first.
