Since lockdown we've started to pick up some nicer gigs, and last night we were booked to play a holiday camp. 2000 capacity room, expected to be packed for the holiday weekend, decent money, great sound system.
With the potential for repeat bookings, this was definitely a gig we wanted to go smoothly.
The £130,000 sliding video wall (very X-Factor) was very nice!
Got there mid-afternoon as per contract. Reserved parking area so we can load in easily into a fantastic freight elevator (We played one place on the 2nd floor where the stage access was via the fire escape, so this meant a lot to us!). Matt the stage-tech is is great, and happy that we know what we're doing so he just has to help us out with a few site-specific things.
We were a little concerned about set-up times, as there was an act on before and we needed to clear the stage, but everything is on risers with wheels they can open the video wall, and just wheel us on/off stage. Looking good - sound check is great. They have the biggest, best sounding subs. stage is lovely. They wheel us back behind the wall, and we go off to get food.
Then this happens:
Someone down the road smashes a BIG water main and takes out water to the whole site (and quite a bit of the surrounding area). No water means no fire sprinklers (and no bar!) so the whole facility is shut down! No one knows when it might be back, so we're put on standby.
There's still a hope it might be fixed, as the night progresses the acts before us are cancelled. At our go time, we wheel everything out just so we're ready (change over time: about 4minutes! The stage crew have done this before!).
As there's nothing else to do, and the hall is empty we play a few tracks for the bar staff, and just have fun on the big stage. It was actually a lot of fun and good experience.
They did eventually open the venue an hour before closing time, but by that time anyone who would have been there had already made new plans (and the nature of the venue means there are NO walk-ins). The site manager asked us to play the last half hour just so that there was no question that he'd opened the venue with entertainment, and that we'd performed as per contract.
We literally played to an empty 2000 capacity room, with just the tech, bar and security staff (who had a great night!).
Having played up the drama of the situation to make a good story, I'll clarify that we had a really productive night. We will get paid, we got to play on a nice stage, we got some good photos of us actually playing (I hope), and we got to run a massive scale tech Rehersal, so we know how the venue operates. We already had one booking there for later in the year, but we made friends with the venue staff, tried not to cause them any hassle on a stressful day for them, and they said we were one of the best bands they'd had there, so hopefully we should get more bookings out of it.
plus its a great story... the time we played a 2000capacity venue... to NO ONE.
With the potential for repeat bookings, this was definitely a gig we wanted to go smoothly.
The £130,000 sliding video wall (very X-Factor) was very nice!
Got there mid-afternoon as per contract. Reserved parking area so we can load in easily into a fantastic freight elevator (We played one place on the 2nd floor where the stage access was via the fire escape, so this meant a lot to us!). Matt the stage-tech is is great, and happy that we know what we're doing so he just has to help us out with a few site-specific things.
We were a little concerned about set-up times, as there was an act on before and we needed to clear the stage, but everything is on risers with wheels they can open the video wall, and just wheel us on/off stage. Looking good - sound check is great. They have the biggest, best sounding subs. stage is lovely. They wheel us back behind the wall, and we go off to get food.
Then this happens:
Someone down the road smashes a BIG water main and takes out water to the whole site (and quite a bit of the surrounding area). No water means no fire sprinklers (and no bar!) so the whole facility is shut down! No one knows when it might be back, so we're put on standby.
There's still a hope it might be fixed, as the night progresses the acts before us are cancelled. At our go time, we wheel everything out just so we're ready (change over time: about 4minutes! The stage crew have done this before!).
As there's nothing else to do, and the hall is empty we play a few tracks for the bar staff, and just have fun on the big stage. It was actually a lot of fun and good experience.
They did eventually open the venue an hour before closing time, but by that time anyone who would have been there had already made new plans (and the nature of the venue means there are NO walk-ins). The site manager asked us to play the last half hour just so that there was no question that he'd opened the venue with entertainment, and that we'd performed as per contract.
We literally played to an empty 2000 capacity room, with just the tech, bar and security staff (who had a great night!).
Having played up the drama of the situation to make a good story, I'll clarify that we had a really productive night. We will get paid, we got to play on a nice stage, we got some good photos of us actually playing (I hope), and we got to run a massive scale tech Rehersal, so we know how the venue operates. We already had one booking there for later in the year, but we made friends with the venue staff, tried not to cause them any hassle on a stressful day for them, and they said we were one of the best bands they'd had there, so hopefully we should get more bookings out of it.
plus its a great story... the time we played a 2000capacity venue... to NO ONE.
water in the snow into the back of a rundown bar in NM who wouldn't let us go through the front. After our van got stuck in the snow trying to get behind the darn place first, of course.
