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Have you ever missed a gig?

#21
I missed one two weeks ago - playing at a church as a sub. I got most of the way through the first service and started having a kidney stone move - unbelievable pain! Needless to say, I did not play the second service and the hour drive home was agony. The "funny" part is that the stone quit moving at about 11 PM and I woke up at 3 with the flu! That was NOT a good week.

Dan K.
 
#22
I used to play in an Allman Brothers Tribute band. The band leader/vocalist wasn't real strong on communication and once booked a gig and forgot to tell me. My day job was in construction and after a hard week I get home on Friday, shower, have dinner with my wife and am just settling in for a night of TV and an early bed when the phone rings. It's the bandleader, "Hey where are you"? I'm home I say, where are you? He says "we're at the bar setting up, we start in 30 minutes." The bar they were at was at least and hour from my house. I tell him you never told me we had a gig tonight. At this point he starts apologizing and begging me to get there as quick as I can. I get off the phone, get all my gear in the car and high tail it down the road. I get there and they are just kicking off In Memory Of Elizabeth Reed which was our first set closer. I start setting up while they continue playing. A bunch of our regular crowd was there and everybody came out and starting grabbing my stuff and bringing it in the bar. I got set up so fast I came in right in at the transition from the slow to the fast part to a cheer from the crowd. Fortunately they had jammed it out a little longer. Needless to say the band leader bought me dinner and drinks for the next three or four gigs.
 
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#24
Stinsok said:
I drive a truck and I'm subject to D.O.T hours of service rules. We have electronic logs and there is no cheating. I got caught out of town on the day of a gig. No one that could come that far to get me. The bad thing was I was a sub on this gig. I was able to call them in time for them to cancel or get another sub. I felt terrible!
Click to expand...
HOS rules changed again.
 
#27
I was living in Chevy Chase, Maryland, outside of DC at the time. My brother in Pittsburgh played guitar in an oldies/classic rock cover band, his drummer couldn't make a Friday or a Saturday gig due to work. I'd driven up and covered gigs with him before, the band I was in didn't have a gig that weekend, it would be fun.

I had my Yukon loaded with drums, left work early, drove up and made it in plenty of time for the Friday gig. We set up, had dinner and played three strong sets. At the end of the night I tore down my kit and got ready to load my vehicle and suddenly I lost use of my right arm and leg. I had a stroke.

I missed the Saturday gig...
 
#34
Dan Knowlton said:
I missed one two weeks ago - playing at a church as a sub. I got most of the way through the first service and started having a kidney stone move - unbelievable pain! Needless to say, I did not play the second service and the hour drive home was agony. The "funny" part is that the stone quit moving at about 11 PM and I woke up at 3 with the flu! That was NOT a good week.

Dan K.
Click to expand...


Kidney stone got me once, too. May it never happen again.

I've done gigs two weeks after major (left) shoulder surgery, with a migraine, the day after the death of someone very important to me, with an acute back injury, and any number of other ailments, some self-inflicted. The diciest one was food poisoning, a year ago. I was FOH, not on stage, but if I'd had an iPad with a house mix out from the headphone jack, I'd have felt better about being in the restroom for the entire set. I did try to find a sub or fill-in or somebody that day, but could not. I was on my own.
 
#35
Edwcdc said:
I have never missed a gig that the rest of the band didn't miss. I've played with a broken bone in my hand, stitches on my left hand index finger, swollen jaw ( fight the night before) ,so sick I had to put a bucket to the side of the PA to hurl in, and that's just what I can remember.
The closest I came was missing the last set because I was passed out on the bathroom floor. Hey that was 24 years ago and the last time I drank.
Click to expand...

this guy...

sounds like your shows would have been rather entertaining :)
 
#36
Never missed a gig but did miss some church services. First one was for a Wednesday night and I got the notification Thursday morning. Second was I broke my leg on the Saturday morning and was in hospital.
 
#39
I think the only time I totally missed a gig was when my alternator went on me while crossing the Gothels Bridge into Staten Island. It was during rush hour and I decided my best chance was to turn around and go back to the NJ Turnpike where I knew there was a service area, hoping that my battery would get me through. Fortunately, I made it back across the bridge, but only to have the car die just after getting to the exit ramp shoulder for the service area. I walked to the service area and called the band leader's wife (this was before cell phones) and AAA. Luckily, it was a paid rehearsal not a full-blown performance.

I've been late a couple of times mostly due to circumstances beyond my control, although one time, pre-Google maps and GPS, I took my host's word for how long it would take me to drive from his house to the hotel where I thought we were playing. It turned out that it took about 30 minutes longer than he had estimated to drive to the wrong side of town and the wrong hotel. I, basically, had passed the correct hotel, which was only about 10 minutes from his house.
 
#40
So I'm currently sitting in an orchestra pit getting ready to play the closing gig of a 2 week musical and the piano player...the absolute most important member of the pit...had his car break down on him miles away. They've announced that were postponing the 2pm downbeat a bit.
 

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