One liners, for those embarrassing silences.

[hwystar]

If there was little or no applause after a tune I would say, " I know your out there folks, I can hear ya re-loading " it always got a laugh and more response after ther next tune.

 

[iridiumrocks]

We messed up a song once, complete trainwreck about 30 seconds in. Our singer looked at us, looked at the crowd, and just said "OK! Next song!", and off we went.

I'll be damned if half the bar even noticed.

Whenever that happens to us, we typically make the comment to the crowd that it was a "live version" and jump into the next song. I am always surprised at how well this works because we have mangled a few songs and no one seemed to really notice. As long as you pretend that nothing went wrong, the crowd thinks it was planned that way...

 

[fenderfunker]

This is good. A lot of useful lines coming out of this thread. A band with a sense of humour, helps the audience to warm to the band; shows you don't take yourselves too seriously. A bit more 'human'. Keep 'em coming.

 

[vlxyooper]

In staying with the "canned" or "recycled" joke theme....

Audience unresponsive after you finish a song: "Yeah, we didn't like that one either..."

"Anyone here like to hear some blues???"

After hearing cheers from the audience, respond with: "We were afraid of that ...but we're gonna play this one anyway...."

Of course, there's also the old standard "Thanks mom..." after hearing only one person clap or respond to a song you just did.

As I mentioned in a previous post, I find that any interaction with the audience is better when it's spontaneous and related to the context of the crowd or the music at the moment (as opposed to reading prefab or scripted jokes). Like most other things, it usually gets better with practice.

 

[DizzyExiled]

stupid jokes work well.
"two cannibals are eating a clown, one says to the other, does this taste funny to you?"
or
"A C, an E-flat, and a G go into a bar. The bartender says, "Sorry, we
don't serve minors." So the E-flat leaves, and the C and the G have an
open fifth between them. After a few drinks, the fifth is diminished
and the G is out flat."

 

[fenderfunker]

Hey Dizzy, I'm going to try your E flat minor joke, next time I play in some Hillbilly bar, where they just want to hear 'Sweet home Alabama' or 'Copperhead road'. Could be a real Blues Bros. moment.....Rawhide.

 

[DizzyExiled]

I can't take credit for that one as I heard it originally from my friend who runs the Merch table.

 

[crusie]

if we cause a trainwreck, we usually play the song to end, and tell people "that's what you get for requesting songs we haven't practiced" or "now for something we know!" or perhaps pointing out a heckler, and saying "could we please get this guy removed ? he's so ugly we can't focus on the music"

our singer sometimes burst out linedancing between acts - that's usually a "***" moment for all of us, but mostly the crowd.

perhaps I should say we usually play biker shows

 

[bound'n'blocked]

I used this one on a heckler one time who had finally gotten on my last nerve...

"Wow, eight billion sperm cells and you had to swim the fastest!"

BnB

 

[Elrend]

One of my groups had been booked to play some feminist arrangement (probably because of our female singer), and the headliners; a semi-pro, all-male noise/rock/prog/jazz/funk/psychedelic band had one of the best jokes ever:

Guitarist: Are there any feminists here?
Crowd: WOOOOOO lolol
Guitarist: Why do women menstruate? No? Nobody? *leans closer to mic* because they deserve it.

Then, they instantly lunged into a cavalcade of crazy improvisational noise which ended with them knocking over all the mic stands and crashing into each other, before ending the whole gig with complete silence and a stuttered "Thanks for coming"

Needless to say, I could not contain my laughter.

Also, some of my jazz trios original jokes usually consist of explaining the origin of our song titles.

example:
"Ok, this one is called "Baby Mice Wine and Lutefisk" and it's about a Korean drink which is made by shoving live baby mice into alcohol that is strong enough to pass for gasoline, this drink combined with a horrifying norwegian dish which a lot of you have probably eaten, form the name of the song. Lutefisk, is basically fish treated with an industrial grade solvent, scary. We found that this was the only combination of foods disgusting enough to describe the grotesque chordal harmony of this piece, enjoy.

 

[skidrawk]

We had some dead air and a crowd on the dancefloor so I pointed to a group and said
"I'd like to take this moment to thank those who dressed 80's. Oh you didn't? Whooops."

My first crack at comedy and I got a few chuckles.

 

[gotmule?]

Here's one that could work for cover bands:
"Here's a song that made a few people famous."

 

[Ubersheist]

First off, I NEVER recommend apologetic or self effacing jokes about your playing or your show (i.e. "we didn't like that one either" after the unresponsive crowd).

One appropriate self-effacing joke I heard tonight was something like "Please tip big, not for us, but for our creditors."

If you have an album or an EP for sale, our band always gets a chuckle when we do this: The guitarist says something like "Hey, we have our brand new album for sale over on the table over there." I come back really quickly after with "We recommend buying in bulk!"

Dead time can always be used up by telling a story about the song if it's original... It'll draw people in, connect them with the song, they'll remember your show more, and they'll get more enjoyment out of your show and likely want to buy your EP or album since they'll feel a slight bit more connected to it.

 

[NickInMesa]

We had our first gig in a bar yesterday and for the singer it was his first gig.

What he did was brilliant: he advertized the bar food and drinks. The owner came to tell him of a special and he advertized it as well.