Hope you guys don't mind, but I'm gonna gripe a bit and it's sorta iOS related.
Some of you guys know I play in two bands, one being Jade Season with April, and the other being a dance rock band called UGT. We're a bit of a big deal locally, making some waves, playing some really good paying gigs and becoming a regional draw. The guitarist and I are new to the band, coming from another band that had gone under due to the drummer's work schedule and overtime. We work very hard, and have the understanding that when you rehearse, you come to practice prepared, with your parts learned and down cold. Rehearsals are for assembly, not for hammering out the shape of the bumpers and deciding whether or not you're building a truck or a car.
It's been going on for some time now that the singer and the drummer, who are both founding members of this band, come to practice very ill-prepared. So much so that it takes upwards of 2-3 hours to get two songs sorted out. On top of that, I set us up to rehearse using IEMs, and the drummer constantly bitches at me about not being able to hear anything, all the while beating the holy hell out of his drums. For the same reasons Rip has mentioned in the past, I wanted this transition, because his drums and cymbals were so loud during rehearsals that it was flat-out deafening. And instead of buying the sound-isolating buds I suggested, he bought a set of Westones that actually cost more, but bleed volume in. The guitarist and I are both running iOS rigs are rehearsal, so we've really been able to dial in an fantastic rehearsal mix and replicate how we monitor live. To me, it's been helpful, except for the drummer and to a somewhat smaller degree, the singer's lack of preparation.
Maybe that is the norm for some bands, but we're not talking Rush or Dream Theater here, we're talking about Nothin' But A Good Time and Ke$ha's Crazy Kids. Not exactly musically taxing, and it's apparent that two of us didn't do our homework.
And while we eventually get the songs nailed down, it's pretty frustrating to commit this amount of time to working out songs and then come to rehearsal and other members haven't committed the time to the work that is necessary.
It's gotten to the point that, after our gigs in August and September, I don't know if I want to continue with this project, regardless of whether or not it's monetarily lucrative.
To top off the issues, it's also apparent that the drummer, who is the BL more or less, doesn't know his parts, and doesn't know the sets very well, and the singer is FOREVER looking at her lyric sheets. The drummer has decided he wants to do a side project of a Queensryche tribute band as well, which will further put us behind the 8-Ball when it comes to keeping our paying gig in order. Previous attempts to right this ship have been met with the word "douchebag" due to the way in which it was handled, with frustration boiling over into an explosion.
Now, I still think that if the right tack is taken, things could get back into a more productive mode and we can rescue this as a group. However, it's been a long standing issue with these guys (I've subbed with them on several occasions in the past). They've felt that if they've done the songs for X amount of times they no longer need to rehearse them, and should be able to recall them at will. Which I agree, should be the case. But it doesn't appear to work out that well when two of the 4 members are the only ones rehearsing the songs on their own.
Anyone have any suggestions as to how you politely tell someone to pull their head out of their posterior, and start taking the work seriously, because we're past the point of weekend warrior bands where apathy is sometimes par for the course. Our gigs are paying the band in the lower- to mid-four figure range and are covering multiple states now, and it's embarrassing to go onstage and have a song that we should KNOW cold nearly trainwreck in front of 1,500 people. It's not the level of professionalism I expect and, like I said, it's extremely embarrassing.
but I always struggle getting a monitor feed sent to me without carrying a 12u rack for the onstage mixing
