My singer is a ****ing idiot! People eat it up. It's like we have a license to be stupid!
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On Stage Banter
- Thread starter bluewine
- Start date
My singer is a ****ing idiot! People eat it up. It's like we have a license to be stupid!
I'm in the "minimum banter" camp. Props to the band before you (if there was one), introduce your band, play your set, tell the audience you'll be back after a quick break (if you do more than one set) and tell the patrons to tip their servers / bartenders because they're working so hard (if you're in a bar).
- Jul 30, 2006
- 2,315
- 453
- Disclosures
- Endorsing artist:Regenerate Guitar Works Carvin, Micheal Kelly Guitars
After reading a lot of the posts in this thread, I can see that most everyone is apprehensive about talking to the audience. Many people confronted with something difficult tend to downgrade it's value by saying it's dumb or not appropriate. Talking to the audience IS part of the show & if you suck at it you should try to get better. They're just people who are exactly like you, except for your gift. If you cannot talk to them intelligently I'd say that you are ignoring a very important part of the show. It's very easy to say "They came to hear music, not hear us talk." For 90% of the time that's true. For the other 10% of the time you could be saying things that bring them into focus on your music, sell merch & win fans. People ARE interested in you. After all, they paid to get in to see you. Being a talented musician just plain isn't enough. Being a social cripple who can't speak intelligently for 30 seconds or so is a detriment to your chosen profession. Of course, you will inevitably say stupid things from time to time. Learn from it. If you refuse to talk to them they may think you're stuck up, aloof & better than they are. You don't want that either. You just need to consider it part of your gig & think about it just like you think about the scales....etc. Get it squared away & straight in your military mind & you'll do fine.
If you really want to come off cool, then just keep your mouth shut and play. And that goes for everyone - except for the front man. And he should cut the banter to an absolute minimum.
If the music is good - I mean really good - it will speak for itself. And if it's not all that good, then that's where you need to put your effort - not into contriving some stupid stage banter...
If during rehearsals you practice transitions from one song to another, striving to keep them to 15-20 seconds or less, then your "need" to banter (i.e. trying to distract and/or entertain the audience while band members retune, fumble with amp/effects settings, get a drink, etc.) will be practically eliminated.
Making quick, smooth song transitions is part of staging a professional-quality show. And it doesn't just happen - it must be worked out at rehearsals. You do rehearse transitions, don't you?
MM
I generally try to put songs into groups of three (two minimum, four maximum) where there are no stops (barring technical difficulty) in those songs. Those groups are almost always played together so the band is all on the same page every time and the songs transition quickly and smoothly with no banter in between.
If you don't have someone in the band who is naturally charismatic to a crowd, avoid improvised banter. Compose it and use it as part of the show.
Have the people who tune their instruments often bring multiple axes to the gig and find a way to bribe a player to be the guy who tunes the axes that aren't in use. When the necessity to tune arises, swap instruments.
Just some thoughts.
KO
If you don't have someone in the band who is naturally charismatic to a crowd, avoid improvised banter. Compose it and use it as part of the show.
Have the people who tune their instruments often bring multiple axes to the gig and find a way to bribe a player to be the guy who tunes the axes that aren't in use. When the necessity to tune arises, swap instruments.
Just some thoughts.
KO
- Jul 30, 2006
- 2,315
- 453
- Disclosures
- Endorsing artist:Regenerate Guitar Works Carvin, Micheal Kelly Guitars
Zappa was much more than a great guitarist & composer. He was an entertainer. There's a big difference. Although many things have changed since I started my career, some things never change & audiences are one of them. They want to be entertained. They could stay home & play tracks & drink cheap if the music was everything they were interested in. When I started in this business (1964), if you just stood there & rattled off your songs, you would not have worked much if at all. Somebody on stage had to have some of what the agents called "personality". Realize I'm not talking about a 5 minute routine. Simply make people feel relaxed & at ease & maybe a laugh now & then. If there's someone better at it than you, let them do it until you learn. But somebody up there needs to be entertaining from time to time. You can think that standing around looking cool is plenty enough if you want to, but don't fool yourself. You ain't that cool.
Passinwind
I know nothing.
- Dec 3, 2003
- 23,045
- 45,904
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- Designer/Toaster Tech @ Passinwind Electronics
After reading all the comments here, I guess I am glad we have a front person with a lot of experience and she is great at handling the crowd. People just like her.
As for me I would really have to work at canned phrases that I knew inside out, that would garauntee a positive response from the audience everytime.
As for me I would really have to work at canned phrases that I knew inside out, that would garauntee a positive response from the audience everytime.
Yeah, our singer is great at it and she goes out into the audience to interact with the crowd during some songs. People absolutely love it (and it doesnt hurt that she is easy on the eyes). I could probably pull it off, but I would be more of jokester commenting about funny things going on at that particular gig (like the 6 foot 5 380 lb guy with no shirt and suspenders dancing to most of our songs lol)
The Who always had the best stage banter. "Live at the Isle of Wight" is pretty funny, I like when they come out and Pete's saying "Sit down, stand up, sit down!" And Keith goes "Sit down, Roger!" Keith would always boo when Entwistle was introduced and it's hilarious.
But folks, if your band doesn't have a Townshend or a Moon, don't act like you do. There is nothing worse than a small-time bar band that thinks they're funnier than they really are with stage banter, especially when nobody is even paying attention to it. Mostly I just want bar/club bands talk between songs to be respectful of the audience, tell us what the song is, who you are, etc. If somebody in the band is charismatic and talented enough to pull off a real stage persona, fine, but they better be good.
Yea, listen to the banter introducing "Cheepnis" on Roxy and Elsewhere. Great example of how to do it.
Was in a band in the 70's where all four guys sang lead and played multiple instruments; the show started out rather acoustic and ended full electric. Anyway, because of all the instrument changes and movement on the stage the entire show was choreographed and rehearsed down to who introduced what songs and with what "tested" lead-in (joke, anecdote, etc). Impromptu interaction would happen and if it worked it was left in. Our show was rehearsed like a stage production, which, if you think about it, is exactly what we were doing.
Keep it short and keep it real I'd say. Having some ideas about specific intros to songs or whatever is definitely a good plan but try not to make it sound too rehearsed.
We played with this band of relatively young guys who had all of these obviously staged "humorous" interactions on stage, one liners, terrible jokes, etc, and it just made the whole thing really hard to sit through.
My band generally does 2 songs back to back to get the set started and then takes a short break for our singer to introduce us and rile up the audience a bit - then we have a few bits between specific songs, such as one of the ones I wrote in which he will introduce by saying "This song was written by our bass player after watching way too many hours of late night televangelists" .. and during certain songs when myself or our lead guitar player are doing something cool he'll just quickly yell kind of point to one of us and be like "Ryan Stringer everyone!" Makes us feel good
We played with this band of relatively young guys who had all of these obviously staged "humorous" interactions on stage, one liners, terrible jokes, etc, and it just made the whole thing really hard to sit through.
My band generally does 2 songs back to back to get the set started and then takes a short break for our singer to introduce us and rile up the audience a bit - then we have a few bits between specific songs, such as one of the ones I wrote in which he will introduce by saying "This song was written by our bass player after watching way too many hours of late night televangelists" .. and during certain songs when myself or our lead guitar player are doing something cool he'll just quickly yell kind of point to one of us and be like "Ryan Stringer everyone!" Makes us feel good
