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Setlist When You Have An Opener?

BayStateBass

BayStateBass

Jan 25, 2012
1,953
169
Central Massachusetts
#1
Okay, question here on what you would do in this situation.

We have a show to play in May through the Vietnam Veteran's charity, all money goes to benefit the Wounded Warrior Project. We were honored to be asked to do this.

Here is the situation; the organizers listed us as the headliners and originally we were going to be the only full band performing, the rest are solo acts. But last week we were told that the organization took on an opening act for us. Both groups are cover band doing no originals.

Turns out we know these guys and the problem is that their setlist is very similar to ours with a lot of the same songs. They are nice guys and very friendly, but their band is only a couple months old and right now they are hovering around 12 songs or so that they have completed. About 8 or 9 of those are songs that we feature prominently in our sets.

We have about 50-ish, maybe 60 potential songs to pull from for this show.

They play for about 45 minutes, we get about 2 1/2 hours. Obviously we don't want to play the same songs they do.

Both of our bands are doing this for charity, there is no pay involved.

What would you do? What's the proper etiquette here? The event organizers got two bands that essentially do the same thing. And we were not told that this would be the case when we took this on back in November or so.

You ever have this happen to you?
 
#2
I know that you were supposed to be the only act, but I would cut them some slack. Let them play 6 or so of the songs you both know. With their other 3 that should cover 45 minutes. It looks like you easily have enough songs to cover 5 hours+. I know those songs might be important to you, but for a charity benefit I would just brush it off.
 
#3
Sure, I have played with bands that were similar to mine a couple of times and there was song overlap. The last time we did it was for a charity that gets instruments into the hands of kids whose parents cant afford them. Let them play the 12 songs they know. the 40 tunes you have left should be enough to fill out 2.5 hours . Remember this is a charity it's not about you and if you claim your band income on your taxes make sure you get a reciept for tax deduction purposes.
 
#4
This is kinda what I was thinking.

These guys are very talented and recently started up after merging members from 3 local bands that dissolved. They were primarily rock players but decided to form a modern country cover band.

They also happen to be nice guys just trying to get gigs.

We have a pretty good mixture of new, outlaw, and classic country tunes that we do. Plus we have a whole other list of classic southern rock we can defer to if needed.
 
#6
Bert Slide said:
Give them their whole set, except maybe get them up during your set to do one with you if you like. Audiences like that. You have enough other material so use it as a chance to try out songs you don't play out live as much.
Click to expand...

I was going to say this very thing! It's not a competition. Give the new guys a little love! There may come a day when you'll be happy you did.
 
#8
Bert Slide said:
Give them their whole set, except maybe get them up during your set to do one with you if you like. Audiences like that. You have enough other material so use it as a chance to try out songs you don't play out live as much.
Click to expand...


I like this idea!!!

I'm going into this looking to have a good time and put on a good show. That might really work.....

It won't be a big deal to sacrifice a few tunes so that everything goes smooth.

Thanks guys, we're all thinking the same thing here.
 
#9
MatticusMania said:
Ask the other band what their set list will be so that you arent repeating the same songs.
Click to expand...


Hey Bert will love this;

Here are our common songs-

Country Girl Shake It For Me- Luke Bryan
Save A Horse (Ride A Cowboy)- Big-N-Rich
5-1-5-0- Dierks Bentley
Am I The Only One- Dierks Bentley
T-R-O-U-B-L-E- Travis Tritt
HickTown- Jason Aldean
Country Must Be CountryWide- Brantley Gilbert
CrazyTown- Jason Aldean
What Was I Thinking- Dierks Bentley
 
#10
BayStateBass said:
Hey Bert will love this;

Here are our common songs-

Country Girl Shake It For Me- Luke Bryan
Save A Horse (Ride A Cowboy)- Big-N-Rich
5-1-5-0- Dierks Bentley
Am I The Only One- Dierks Bentley
T-R-O-U-B-L-E- Travis Tritt
HickTown- Jason Aldean
Country Must Be CountryWide- Brantley Gilbert
CrazyTown- Jason Aldean
What Was I Thinking- Dierks Bentley
Click to expand...


HAHA! You know how much I love the blowdried cowboys! :spit:

I would get the other band up for a finale doing Country Girl Shake it and also pull every girl within reach up on stage with you.
 
#11
Bert Slide said:
HAHA! You know how much I love the blowdried cowboys! :spit:

I would get the other band up for a finale doing Country Girl Shake it and also pull every girl within reach up on stage with you.
Click to expand...


Nice. :)

Could be fun. I don't see too many of them getting up on stage when we pull out Silver Wings or Luckenback Texas. Maybe when we do Workin' Man Blues, though. Or the bane of my night, Don Williams' Tulsa Time.
 
#12
BayStateBass said:
Nice. :)

Could be fun. I don't see too many of them getting up on stage when we pull out Silver Wings or Luckenback Texas. Maybe when we do Workin' Man Blues, though. Or the bane of my night, Don Williams' Tulsa Time.
Click to expand...

Believe me. If you play Country Girl Shake it and not so subtlely invite them on stage they WILL shake it for you and they will also never forget your band and tell their friends...well except the ones that are so drunk they won't remember anything. :)
 
#13
Ignore the new country crap and play outlaw country and southern Rawk!

Or just give them a call to get their set-list so you don't repeat anything. They could be working on new material you don't know about. I like the idea of getting a couple of their singers up for a song.
 
#14
We run into this often as we play with a bunch of bands that have similar set lists and we don't have a full night yet. I usually talk to the band leader of the other band, send them our projected set list, ask them if they plan to do any of them, and if they do we work it out on who gets to play those songs. Lats time we played together we both did Summero f 69 which was mind numbing but people danced....
 
#16
Bert Slide said:
Give them their whole set, except maybe get them up during your set to do one with you if you like. Audiences like that. You have enough other material so use it as a chance to try out songs you don't play out live as much.
Click to expand...

Phalex said:
I was going to say this very thing! It's not a competition. Give the new guys a little love! There may come a day when you'll be happy you did.
Click to expand...

This is what I would do. Tell them straight up they can do their set, but tell them you want them to come up and jam with you, and then play the heck out of whatever songs you do that aren't on their set list.

Have fun!
 
#18
Take theirs and play 'em better. This shouldn't be a huge issue. Be a true headliner and demonstrate why you're the headliner: showmanship and polish. Duplication of songs is largely irrelevant, as well as easily avoided. Don't convey to the openers it's something you're worried about. Putting on a classy presentation should be your only objective.
 
#20
anderbass said:
How about just playing any of the duplicate songs in your last set. There's probably a good chance that most of the audience that caught that other bands set would have gone home (or be too drunk to remember) by then...
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Well, this is probably true. We're figuring that a lot of people will be gone by the last 1/2 hour unless we're truly spectacular, which is possible I guess.....

If somewhat unlikely......:smug:

I think the decision was to let them do their songs. Seems courteous and we have a lot more material to pull from.
 

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