Uh well yeah, about that. A typical response would be either we have some contacts but nothing confirmed yet or yeah, we have one booked in May and another in late August and that one pays $100, for the whole band. Sorry to seem so cynical but I've been down this road before.
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Hit the ground running
- Thread starter oldrocker
- Start date
Things seem far different today than they did back in the hey day of club bands. First of all every established band had gigs. Some paid very well, some not so well but we all got paid. Few clubs in our area had a cover so there was no "playing for the door" and we didn't share a four hour gig with four other bands and take home $100 for the entire band. We played four hours gigs for $100 a man or more if you could get it.
Few if any bands advertised for player who weren't working bands because if you weren't gigging every weekend you were never gonna score the better players. There were Dad bands and Basement hobby bands around but you knew that because they told you that ahead of time and all it amounted to was a jam where you had to play everyone's favorite song and one guy's wife or GF also wanted to sing a few.
Over the past decade what I've run into more than once is a one man band with a guitarist who fronts and sings all the song but wants a drummer and a bassist as backing band. Not very pro level or imaginative but I got paid even if the leader didn't except for his ego. But even at that level we still prepared set lists that worked to follow no matter how loosely. Nothing was ever note for note so you just got close enough.
Maybe that era is over to but this year I plan to find out and figure out just what people want these days.
Few if any bands advertised for player who weren't working bands because if you weren't gigging every weekend you were never gonna score the better players. There were Dad bands and Basement hobby bands around but you knew that because they told you that ahead of time and all it amounted to was a jam where you had to play everyone's favorite song and one guy's wife or GF also wanted to sing a few.
Over the past decade what I've run into more than once is a one man band with a guitarist who fronts and sings all the song but wants a drummer and a bassist as backing band. Not very pro level or imaginative but I got paid even if the leader didn't except for his ego. But even at that level we still prepared set lists that worked to follow no matter how loosely. Nothing was ever note for note so you just got close enough.
Maybe that era is over to but this year I plan to find out and figure out just what people want these days.
I had a different but similar bullet-dodging moment about a year ago. I was getting back into playing after a number of years away due to life, family, etc…
I was doing the Craigslist circuit, jammed with probably 5-6 different people/projects, all in various states from just getting started to we have gigs booked and need a bass player yesterday.
One band in particular, cover band, somewhat established, and with gigs booked. I made it to the “final round” with one other dude. I didn’t get the gig.
Turns out they were recording the auditions. Now of course that’s not weird, or unexpected, but the fact that they were doing so surreptitiously, and I only learned about it after the fact, rubbed me the wrong way. Seems like the kind of thing you’d give someone a courtesy heads-up about.
But more so than the secret recording, the leader made it sound like they were using accuracy to the original recordings as their main barometer. Again, OK, maybe that is important, maybe you don’t want someone being overly interpretive in a cover band, but does fit, or feel, matter at all?
It was a terrible situation, and I’m so glad it didn’t work out. They’re already on another drummer a year later (he was the only one I really liked), and some other personality-type things I observed with this group were major red flags.
A couple months later, I finally fell in with the right project a guy was starting up. We filled out the rest of the group with very talented musicians, who are all thoroughly decent human beings. For the first time in forever I am having so much GD fun playing music again, and I am thankful every day the bad situation/secret recording thing didn’t work out.
So to the OP, I have no doubt you would’ve gone in and kicked ass with that group, but sometimes things just unfold the way they should, even if there’s a little ding to your pride.
I was doing the Craigslist circuit, jammed with probably 5-6 different people/projects, all in various states from just getting started to we have gigs booked and need a bass player yesterday.
One band in particular, cover band, somewhat established, and with gigs booked. I made it to the “final round” with one other dude. I didn’t get the gig.
Turns out they were recording the auditions. Now of course that’s not weird, or unexpected, but the fact that they were doing so surreptitiously, and I only learned about it after the fact, rubbed me the wrong way. Seems like the kind of thing you’d give someone a courtesy heads-up about.
But more so than the secret recording, the leader made it sound like they were using accuracy to the original recordings as their main barometer. Again, OK, maybe that is important, maybe you don’t want someone being overly interpretive in a cover band, but does fit, or feel, matter at all?
It was a terrible situation, and I’m so glad it didn’t work out. They’re already on another drummer a year later (he was the only one I really liked), and some other personality-type things I observed with this group were major red flags.
A couple months later, I finally fell in with the right project a guy was starting up. We filled out the rest of the group with very talented musicians, who are all thoroughly decent human beings. For the first time in forever I am having so much GD fun playing music again, and I am thankful every day the bad situation/secret recording thing didn’t work out.
So to the OP, I have no doubt you would’ve gone in and kicked ass with that group, but sometimes things just unfold the way they should, even if there’s a little ding to your pride.
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Yeah, I'm gonna hit the ground running in the opposite direction in this scenarioLOL, this is a weekend warrior band. There are no charts
I'm with the rest of them - you definitely dodged a bullet - not due to the song list, but for them being asshats. Even if you haven't played them all before, there's not a song on that list that a halfway decent bassist with rudimentary chart reading skills couldn't pull off.
I mean, are they expecting you to run thru every song on the list the first time, without even seeing if you gel? Doesn't sound like a bass-friendly band, tbh.
I mean, are they expecting you to run thru every song on the list the first time, without even seeing if you gel? Doesn't sound like a bass-friendly band, tbh.
