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Musicians on stage wearing black clothes...

#121
Gustopher said:
You can go ahead and look down on me then, we wear shorts when we play marinas and outdoor gigs in the warm weather months and I would never see the reason not too at these venues. You think people at a lake marina bar, channeling their inner Jimmy Buffet want to see us sweating in dress pants or jeans? lol, we play party music for people to have a good time with... not jazz standards. The whole dress code snobbery on TB is hilarious, nowhere outside of this website have I ever encountered it. I guess you really wouldn't approve of my flip flops either :)
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Dressing appropriately for the type of gig you are playing is not snobbery (you are dressed appropriately for your Jimmy Buffet crowd, I believe). Not dressing for the type of audience you are entertaining is disrespectful to them and their dollars.
Even a poolside band can wear a fun Hawaiian shirt, white beach pants, a cool hat. It harms no one to put a little effort into your coordinated image, and stepping it up a bit. Just the same approach you would take towards your playing.
 
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#122
Chad Michael said:
Back in the day when I was gigging, we wore whatever.

However, the trend of wearing black seems to be a thing.
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Yeah black just works. It’s classic now at this point. I mean think Johnny Cash, Metallica, Pink Floyd. I pretty much always wear a plain black shirt with jeans onstage. If I want to “spice things up” I’ll do it by what hat I choose to wear or not wear. But yeah I’m assuming there will be a lot of responses to this. Everyone has their reasons. Looks good under stage lights. The contrast of a black shirt makes guitars and basses “pop” visually. For some people it’s the Johnny Cash “Man in black” thing and there’s more of a message behind it. Personally one of my favorite things about wearing a plain black shirt onstage is it says “I’m a musician, not a clown”
 
#125
Chad Michael said:
What if it's 100 degrees, you are playing outside, in the sun? Black with long pants even then?
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I have played that gig. Clothing at setup:

65657553_10156879569108113_5974095519264276480_o.jpg


Clothing for performance:
66074574_10156880307763113_4124094229741830144_n.jpg
 
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#129
Black and white both have the advantage that the whole band can be unified in wearing exactly the same color (as opposed to differing shades of one) without having to buy and wear exactly the same stuff as an explicit uniform, which looks really dorky except in very specific styles of music. Back when we were gigging, our singer would wear whatever she wanted, and the rest of us would wear black (accessorizes with everything, after all) - but whatever we wanted that was black, e.g. black T-shirts, but with different text/symbols (or none) depending on mood.
 
#130
TNCreature said:
Dressing appropriately for the type of gig you are playing is not snobbery (you are dressed appropriately for your Jimmy Buffet crowd, I believe). Not dressing for the type of audience you are entertaining is disrespectful to them and their dollars.
Even a poolside band can wear a fun Hawaiian shirt, white beach pants, a cool hat. It harms no one to put a little effort into your coordinated image, and stepping it up a bit. Just the same approach you would take towards your playing.
Click to expand...
We make the same point... the snobbery I refer to is the "no shorts ever" crowd. There is attire that works for all kinds of events. We play a lot of classic southern rock in little bars too, those are not shorts crowds... those are jeans and tshirt/denim jacket/leather jacket type crowds. There are no rules to make this work, dress the room or above it. The better you play, the less they notice, lol
 
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