• TalkBass has been independent since 1998. Add your voice.
    Create a free account to reply to discussions, view embedded media, and browse with fewer display ads.
    Join free Log in
    Want zero display ads or expanded classifieds tools? Compare plans.

Being a jerk to the audience?

G

GSMBass

Oct 24, 2013
233
129
#1
What was the worst thing you saw a band member say to the audience member, without a good reason?

Here is my story: there is a Jimi Hendrix tribute band here, that gets a lot of gigs despite each song being 1 minute singing, 10 minutes lead guitarist soloing something not even related to Jimi's style. I attended the audience, and a local homeless man, who pretty much everyone in the audience knows (he is a great guy, always carries his guitar to a city square where us musical younglings spend our friday and saturdays night socializing, and plays and sings really well for our amusement) comes to the stage to compliment the aforementioned lead guitarist on his playing after the song. Lead guitarist got to the microphone and insulted the man in front of everyone because the guy "annoyed" him during the gig. Everyone who knew him booed the guitarist, but the bar manager ordered him to get out anyway, politely. I just left the bar, speechless, and never attended their gigs afterward, neither did my friends who also know the homeless guy.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Zodion, organworthyplayer337, My name is Mudd and 3 others
#3
I can't respect anyone who doesn't respect their audience. They are your bread and butter.

I remember back in the 80's there was a funk/R&B bassist around here. I won't mention any names because he's still playing around and might be a member and the band was named after him. He was playing all the A bars and getting all the best gigs, so I decided to check him out.

The bar was a bit slow and he was obviously upset about it. He Shouted angrily into the microphone "MAN, What a Sh!ddy night!" Like it was those who showed up's fault there were few people there. Then he proceeded to play like he just didn't care. At one point he was so visibly frustrated with the lack of attendance I thought he was going to throw a fit.

I never bother to check him out again. I thought to myself, I'm struggling to get where this guy is at and he has the gall to treat me and the other patrons with such contempt, like WE were his problem.

Great player, too. But with an attitude like that I can see why he never got any farther than the bar scene.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Kmonk, DanBass, BassistNATE and 1 other person
#8
Coming of age in the late 70's L.A. punk rock scene, I was most impressed by those bands confident enough to express
disinterest or outright hostility toward their audience. I just thought that was the quintessence of cool.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pacojas
#10
pacojas said:
^^^ yeah,.. i've been kicked & spit on by some of my favorite punk bands!
btw,.. JW is one of my inspirations! PIL RULED!!!
Click to expand...

I got the tar kicked out of me toward the end of the PIL show at the Olympic auditorium in L.A., Spring 1980 -- so we are on the same page: Being used and abused by audience and band alike was an inherent part of the experience and the aesthetic at that time and place.
 
  • Like
Reactions: pacojas
#12
GSMBass said:
That's a different time, different situation kind of deal. I wouldn't mind being called an idiot by a band whose entire deal is calling their audience idiots :)
Click to expand...

Have you seen the documentary DIG about the inter-band rivalry between Brian Jonestown Massacre and Dandy Warhols?
Said doc includes a real scene of BJM bandleader Anton booting an audience member in the head for heckling. I think that would fit
your criteria, since there is never "good reason" to boot an audience member in the head, unless, I suppose, he is swinging a blade at you...
 
#13
Jah Wobble Fan said:
Have you seen the documentary DIG about the inter-band rivalry between Brian Jonestown Massacre and Dandy Warhols?
Said doc includes a real scene of BJM bandleader Anton booting an audience member in the head for heckling. I think that would fit
your criteria, since there is never "good reason" to boot an audience member in the head, unless, I suppose, he is swinging a blade at you...
Click to expand...
Yeah, but he was not even close to heckling. He waited for their set to end. It's a very unbluesy thing to do in a Jimi Hendrix tribute band.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Kamrin and Jah Wobble Fan
#14
GSMBass said:
Yeah, but he was not even close to heckling. He waited for their set to end. It's a very unbluesy thing to do in a Jimi Hendrix tribute band.
Click to expand...

Yeah I totally hear you! And I also hear you saying, rightly, that one owes it to Jimi Hendrix when wearing his mantle to try to express his
energy and spirit accurately as it were. Great point, and a related example is a a meme floating around Google+ depicting a sly Jim Morrison with an
assassin's pistol in hand. It is a photo-shop job, of course, but also a gross distortion of the artist, who never depicted himself with guns (and there were plenty at hand, as his common law wife Pamela collected Lugers and kept them around their house).
 
#15
GSMBass said:
What was the worst thing you saw a band member say to the audience member, without a good reason?

Here is my story: there is a Jimi Hendrix tribute band here, that gets a lot of gigs despite each song being 1 minute singing, 10 minutes lead guitarist soloing something not even related to Jimi's style. I attended the audience, and a local homeless man, who pretty much everyone in the audience knows (he is a great guy, always carries his guitar to a city square where us musical younglings spend our friday and saturdays night socializing, and plays and sings really well for our amusement) comes to the stage to compliment the aforementioned lead guitarist on his playing after the song. Lead guitarist got to the microphone and insulted the man in front of everyone because the guy "annoyed" him during the gig. Everyone who knew him booed the guitarist, but the bar manager ordered him to get out anyway, politely. I just left the bar, speechless, and never attended their gigs afterward, neither did my friends who also know the homeless guy.
Click to expand...

A Jimi tribute band. In Serbia.

FAR OUT!
 
  • Like
Reactions: Lava
#17
SanDiegoHarry said:
A Jimi tribute band. In Serbia.

FAR OUT!
Click to expand...

Yeah, we have an amazing The Doors tribute band here, very authentic too. Old-timey keyboards and stuff, they play great.

codycon96 said:
Should of hit him with a classic Stone Cold Stunner.
Click to expand...

I am extremely anti-violence, but noone can control their basic human instinct from kicking in. I really wanted to take one of guitars from a stand and hit him over the head with it, but my self-control, thankfully, overpowered my desire to do so :)
 
  • Like
Reactions: SandCBass, TheCrimsonKing, SanDiegoHarry and 1 other person
#18
True "rock gods" invariably show themselves comfortable in dealing with, and being depicted amongst, the poor and the dispossessed. True rock gods revel in interacting with street people. They are Christ-like in this sense (or, the cynical might say, like politicians, for it also gives the rocker credibility).

Serbian Jimi's behavior toward the tramp only proves he is a false god.
 
Last edited by a moderator:
  • Like
Reactions: LiquidMidnight and codycon96
#19
I have a fill in gig tonight with an old band of mine that I'm regretting telling them I'd do. Two rehearsals and now I remember exactly why I quit the first time. Since I'm doing them a favor I don't mind that it's an all original, non paying gig...I knew that when I agreed to help them out. But now that it's upon me I'm beginning to dread it. It's sure to be a dead night playing original music that is, quite frankly, really bad, and in front of people who don't want to hear it (we're opening for a bigger, more popular act). Having said that, I know there will be people in the audience that paid to get into the place, whether to see us or not, and I owe them the best performance I can give. You never know who's watching...perhaps someone will need a bass player for an upcoming project. If I act like a jackass I won't be getting it.
 
  • Like
Reactions: Cyanide, 47th Street, BazzTard and 3 others

Latest posts

Top Bottom
Back