Dressing well and dancing

[blue4]

Actually the band I was in at the time was covering stuff like INXS, Simple Minds, Rem, U2........
Very danceable and pretty well-done.
All this being one mans opinions.

Aside from REM those bands weren't really what was happening though. They were still popular of course, but they weren't where the excitement was at. Being danceable wasn't really what was needed from live bands then, because the club scene with stuff like "What is Love" was where dancing was done. People tend to forget the huge popularity of country acts like Brooks and Dunn and Garth Brooks as well as an explosion of hip hop as well. They just look at Eddie Vedder and Kurt Cobain and think, "that's why we don't get booked".

Like you said it's one man's opinion. I just think it's unrealistic to blame grunge for changes in the live music scene. It's a popular belief here, but IME as a very frequent audience member (and club goer as that was where the ladies went) in my late teens and early 20s it doesn't accurately reflect what actually happened. Again IME.

 

[EastCoastThump]

I knew a trumpet player who in the 1980s got calls for jazz gigs all over NY and New England. Around the upstate NY town where he was a music professor, he'd put together small combos and slay—to enthusiastic audiences of 25-30 souls. Everybody was deeply invested in the music, but it couldn't draw big crowds because it wasn't what was happening—and it hadn't been for a decades. He was born 40 or 50 years too late.

In terms of gigs and crowds, guitar rock is the new jazz.

 

[C_Becker]

I guess you can do quite alright in shorts

 

[Korladis]

I just grabbed a sweet Black Sabbath t-shirt for our next gig.

I'm only interested in gigs where a Black Sabbath t-shirt is appropriate attire.

 

[JohnDeereJack]

A wee dance usually indicates the need for a trip to the restroom....

I have been known to do the wee wee dance toward the end of a set, especially if I've had a lot of water and/or beer!

Oooh, you crazy kids! Wny, I oughta..!

 

[THUNDERGODX]

I dont even own a pair of cargo shorts.

 

[THUNDERGODX]

It's not about being comfortable on stage. It's about everything that happens to the band on and off the stage.

In this modern day and age, people complain that engaged audiences are very hard to come across. And then you ask what they're doing to get a more engaged audience, and it usually turns out, not all that much. In order to continue to get gigs and get audiences, band members have to be social representatives off stage as well as competent musicians on stage.

Your band is absolutely right to make you dress a certain way. That way, you can be recognized as being in the band and not as some Craigslist hired gun. When you're at the bar for the hour afterwards, then people know, hey, you're in the band, the band didn't just ditch out after the set. Just by being recognizable as a band member, you're doing some amount of minimal good for the band.

You can wear flip flops, shorts, and a kickball t-shirt if you want. But if you're doing that, you don't get to complain about audiences not showing up and taking you seriously.

And if you ever become the person who books shows, represents, and does outreach for the band, you'll learn quickly that every time a band member decides not to make that extra effort, it's completely deflating.

Flip Flops????
Birkenstocks?
Sandals of any brand or kind???

Unless youre in some kind of hippie flower-power band...
Absolutely Not!!

 

[two fingers]

You only have to look around your local music scene to see if this whole concept is valid or not. In my area the "biggest" cover band is a band that dresses and acts like 80s nerds. They play well, not virtuosos. All the non musicians rave about how great they are. They put on a show that is fun and energetic.
I have been in bands on both ends of this debate . from my experience great musicianship will never be as commercially successful as great entertainment.
Each of us need to choose and be aware of where we fall in this spectrum and understand the ramifications of our choices.
Musicians complain that rates haven't one up since the 80s. Right about when grunge came out and music/musicians got demystified. It went from bands being larger than life to just some ordinary guys with guitars who look like they just woke up. Coincidence?
Image does matter. Choose yours wisely.

Thank you!!!!! For years here I have been telling everyone how grunge MURDERED local music scenes and nobody seemed to believe me. Glad to know I'm not the only one who witnessed it first hand.

The moment looking the part went out the window live music lost its cool factor. Period. It hasn't gaimed that back since. And current dad bands wearing tucked in T-shirts and white sneakers are doing every bit as much damage today as unbuttoned flannel shirts and drab colors did in the 90s.

 

[THUNDERGODX]

View attachment 3014171 View attachment 3014172 I think you gotta be what you are. I wear a shirt and tie at work everyday ... usually with jeans ... so I just toss an $8 Goodwill sport coat and an old thrift store hat on to play gigs.

Drummer is into tie-dye and t-shirts and that's what he wears. The other guys are less formal, but comfortable.

No, No, and NO!

 

[Tony In Philly]

I love the way some folks on this thread blame other bands for their apparent economic failures. I think it's really misdirected.

 

[mellowinman]

Thank you!!!!! For years here I have been telling everyone how grunge MURDERED local music scenes and nobody seemed to believe me. Glad to know I'm not the only one who witnessed it first hand.

The moment looking the part went out the window live music lost its cool factor. Period. It hasn't gaimed that back since. And current dad bands wearing tucked in T-shirts and white sneakers are doing every bit as much damage today as unbuttoned flannel shirts and drab colors did in the 90s.

Hair metal was never cool. Spandex tights, leopard prints and endless hair flinging was just plain silly.

Rock was cool in the late sixties/early to mid seventies, and then it ate itself, largely due to the incredible profit corporations could make off of it.

When you sell 60 million albums and capacity-fill stadiums, there's bound to be a little less soul in your product.

 

[two fingers]

Hair metal was never cool. Spandex tights, leopard prints and endless hair flinging was just plain silly.

Rock was cool in the late sixties/early to mid seventies, and then it ate itself, largely due to the incredible profit corporations could make off of it.

When you sell 60 million albums and capacity-fill stadiums, there's bound to be a little less soul in your product.

But you are selling out stadiums and selling millions of albums to millions of people who obviously loved your product.

Some of it is not my favorite either. But I would rather have a thriving local music scene than only play music that has "a little more soul".

In other words, I would rather see nightclubs filled with patrons watching live bands doing setlists including both soulful and soulless music than what we have today.... which is a live music desert consisting mostly of dive bars paying dad bands $400 to play Cocaine and Dust in the Wind..... and doing it horribly..... wearing T-shirts and white sneakers.

If I can help revive my music scene by wearing "gig clothes", setting up a light show, and including some Poison, Journey and BonJovi in my set, so be it. Sign me up. I'll take the small hit to my soul rather than play in a dad band or sit at home every Friday and Saturday night.

The bands that SHOULD be playing in garages are killing local music by taking their half @$$ "bands" out in public doing half @$$ versions of "soulful" music nobody can party to wearing their half @$$ grass cutting clothes worrying only about two things....
1) Are my bass and rig light enough not to hurt my back?
2) Am I getting to play MY favorite songs (regardless of the quality of performance or what an audience would actually LIKE to hear)?

Try harder or keep it at the house. Anything else is selfish.

Local live music secenes don't exist for the single purpose of allowing dads amd geezers to have fun however they wish. A local music scene is a symbiotic relationship between the artists, venue owners, and patron. Each of those must do their part or the scene dries up.

Showing up in street clothes playing your favorite songs with no SHOW in your show is NOT doing your part.

(This rant is aimed at the collective and not @mellowinman ..... I have seen the videos enough to know I'm "preaching to the chior" with regard to his trying a little harder to be something special.)

 

[mellowinman]

I would rather have a thriving local music scene than only play music that has "a little more soul".

In other words, I would rather see nightclubs filled with patrons watching live bands doing setlists including both soulful and soulless music than what we have today.... which is a live music desert consisting mostly of dive bars paying dad bands $400 to play Cocaine and Dust in the Wind..... and doing it horribly..... wearing T-shirts and white sneakers.

If I can help revive my music scene by wearing "gig clothes", setting up a light show, and including some Poison, Journey and BonJovi in my set, so be it. Sign me up. I'll take the small hit to my soul rather than play in a dad band or sit at home every Friday and Saturday night.

The bands that SHOULD be playing in garages are killing local music by taking their half @$$ "bands" out in public doing half @$$ versions of "soulful" music nobody can party to wearing their half @$$ grass cutting clothes worrying only about two things....
1) Are my bass and rig light enough not to hurt my back?
2) Am I getting to play MY favorite songs (regardless of the quality of performance or what an audience would actually LIKE to hear)?

Try harder or keep it at the house. Anything else is selfish.

Local live music secenes don't exist for the single purpose of allowing dads amd geezers to have fun however they wish. A local music scene is a symbiotic relationship between the artists, venue owners, and patron. Each of those must do their part or the scene dries up.

Showing up in street clothes playing your favorite songs with no SHOW in your show is NOT doing your part.

I agree that crappy bands playing crappy music is killing the scene, but it's also lazy bar owners, who don't know what to book; apathetic customers who have seen 20 million live shows; a changing music scene; and people's general distaste for hanging out with rooms filled with alcoholics that are killing that scene.

The world is changing, man. I try to change with it, while still remaining me. Local music scenes have been garbage as long as I can remember, but crappy bands used to get treated like Kings, and didn't deserve it.

Before it was dads and geezers, it was no-talent druggies/alcoholics/insane freaks sleeping with our daughters and screeching out lame songs, with proper stage attire and nothing to offer that was the least bit entertaining.

I fear you may be a victim of selective memory, because I frequented the 80s and 90s music scene, and it was mostly awful.

 

[two fingers]

I agree that crappy bands playing crappy music is killing the scene, but it's also lazy bar owners, who don't know what to book; apathetic customers who have seen 20 million live shows; a changing music scene; and people's general distaste for hanging out with rooms filled with alcoholics that are killing that scene.

The world is changing, man. I try to change with it, while still remaining me. Local music scenes have been garbage as long as I can remember, but crappy bands used to get treated like Kings, and didn't deserve it.

Before it was dads and geezers, it was no-talent druggies/alcoholics/insane freaks sleeping with our daughters and screeching out lame songs, with proper stage attire and nothing to offer that was the least bit entertaining.

I fear you may be a victim of selective memory, because I frequented the 80s and 90s music scene, and it was mostly awful.

All I'm saying is that there are/were redeeming qualities of each era.... not that any particular era was ?more better-er" than another.

Sure, the execution of the song should be good. You you GOTTA have a little bit of SHOW in your show.

The 80s DID capture the eyes of music fans by going a little further to separate themselves from the average Joe on the street. (As did some 70s acts.) Sure, there were local bands that were all show and no substance. But there were also local bands around here that put on a show, wore the spandex and had the hair, but also KILLED it on stage performing the music. One band from around here had members who went on to tour the world with other acts (and they still do). But their main shtick back then was flashy clothes, sparkly guitars, big hair and lights..... all the while KILLING it by perfectly executing Yes and Rush and Kansas in between the Poison and Motley Crue.

No, we shouldn't be doing all fluff. But we also shouldn't be doing NO fluff. There's a happy medium between just standing still in street clothes playing great songs pretty well and running around the stage with your hair on fire playing only crap under bright lights.

The former won't rescue our local music scenes, as much as we wish it would. If you can't do any better than mom jeans and T shirts and white sneakers with no light show, keep it in your garage.

Again, I'm not talking to you specifically. I honestly don't think we're all that far apart in our thinking. We're just wishing for opposite ends to be considered more. You wish people would play better music and execute it better. I wish local bands would add a little show to their shows WHILE playing SOME better music... and also letting the crowd have some of their simple soulless favorites at the same time.

 

[hrodbert696]

It's funny, in a way dancing is why I play bass in the first place.

I had a bass as a teenager, dabbled at it, never got good or played in a band. Later on it was stolen but I didn't replace it because I wasn't really playing it anyway.

Fast forward about twenty years. I'm married with kids, but settling into married life means not going out for nightlife much. Then as a grad student I spend six weeks on my own on a language program in Germany, and going clubbing is what the other students do, so I get back in touch with the side of myself that loves going dancing during those weeks. I start listening to new music again and rediscovering old stuff, like James Brown and others.

Back with the family, again not as much nightlife opportunity but I'm listening to all this funky music, and my teenaged bass-dabbling comes back to me. I really start craving playing bass, and finally wrangle a cheap one from craigslist. From there I start figuring things out and working up the food chain of bands until I'm in gigging projects that make ladies dance.

So in my life now, it still isn't much of a thing for my wife and I to just go dancing unless there's a wedding or something. But if I have a gig, it scratches that itch, I can move to the groove a little myself and take some satisfaction in laying it down for others.

 

[THUNDERGODX]

It's funny, in a way dancing is why I play bass in the first place.

I had a bass as a teenager, dabbled at it, never got good or played in a band. Later on it was stolen but I didn't replace it because I wasn't really playing it anyway.

Fast forward about twenty years. I'm married with kids, but settling into married life means not going out for nightlife much. Then as a grad student I spend six weeks on my own on a language program in Germany, and going clubbing is what the other students do, so I get back in touch with the side of myself that loves going dancing during those weeks. I start listening to new music again and rediscovering old stuff, like James Brown and others.

Back with the family, again not as much nightlife opportunity but I'm listening to all this funky music, and my teenaged bass-dabbling comes back to me. I really start craving playing bass, and finally wrangle a cheap one from craigslist. From there I start figuring things out and working up the food chain of bands until I'm in gigging projects that make ladies dance.

So in my life now, it still isn't much of a thing for my wife and I to just go dancing unless there's a wedding or something. But if I have a gig, it scratches that itch, I can move to the groove a little myself and take some satisfaction in laying it down for others.

CONGRATULATIONS!!
GOOD THINGS COME TO THOSE WHO WAIT! (20 years)

 

[Speedhitter]

I can only aspire to be that good! lol!

 

[Speedhitter]

I'm in my 40th year of performing. Yea, starting to look it! But I have always tried to make sure I stand out in a crowd. People usually know that I'm in the band by the way I dress. We are performing artists. Plain and simple. I've seen bands that play looking like they just finished their postal route. There are those of us that make money playing and those of us that wonder why we dont!

 

[Speedhitter]

Yeah depending on the stage, I usually have to stand behind two guitars and the singer. If the stage is narrow, we kind of stand in a row in front of the drummer. I like to bust out rock moves as much as the next guy but it is hard when standing a row back. Bass player problems.

I'm lucky to be the lead singer as well as the bass player! lol!

 

[Jimmy4string]