Stub Mandrel

I've only come across multiple sets with early starts (8pm) or late finishes (1am). The 2x45 + encores is definitely embedded in the culture around here, although we usually do more if there isn't a hard curfew and the audience want it. But we don't flog a dead horse either. Only exception is one venue that does 5-7:30 ish on a Sunday, and we normally do 45 + 60 + encores.

Hang on... he's talking about bands dragging out the end of the night. If you're booked for a three hour gig, you probably start earlier and are likely to be playing a venue that has a high turnover of punters. That's a different animal. Perhaps you might want to think about why you took his comment as a personal slight, rather than just someone else's experience.

My brother's band used to do that Then they realised that 'leave them wanting more' is a good strategy that leaves the audience on a high and pleases landlords and landladies.

I can't believe how many 'open mic regulars' spend years honing the same three songs. Fortunately some others take pride in having learnt two or three new songs each week.

It was John McVie in the womble suit on at least on occasion.

No-one's ever noticed! I've been using my Affinity skills elsewhere:

You stop seeing the cone move when you handle the bass or hit a string.

Or one of these:

Most venues want 2x45 plus encores. Never bothered about doing extra time if venue/audience want it. Often end up doing 50 + 60 in practice. Venues like a break as most people buy a drink. Just to clarify, in S. Wales most venues want music to start at 9 and run to 11, then do some encores. Some pubs have a 'hard' curfew but may let you do an extra encore if the audience is keen. A recent gig one guitarist commented "I want to be paid for travelling and setting up, then knocking down again. I'll play for nothing as long as they want to listen." I've played a few venues where they want you done by 10 or 11 because the 'rock loving' audience turns into clubbing 20-somethings in the space of 15 minutes!

eBay offers to generate ai descriptions for you know iirc. AI generated instruments are interesting indeed. But consider they are probably better than most non-players could draw from memory. Same string count/tuner issue as above, but I figured the audience won't notice.

My local. Less than a Trumpshot from home....

And 'battleship chains' - two hit wonders!

Rock You Like A Hurricane is a step too far. But we had a vocalist who rejected Hey Joe. Actually he found about 20% of songs problematic.

Just taken off the playlist.

I've depped with a band who do a mashup of Play That Funky Music and Superstition. Which seems a bit pointless, and it's really tricky shifting from one riff to another almost but not quite identical one.

Not around Cardiff!

The band after us on Sunday mashed up Bang Bang by Nancy Sinatra (drummer played trumpet) with Money, Money Money... TBH Abba songs are all ripe for rocking up.

It always amazes me how difficult some bands make the task of choosing songs. There are, literally, thousands of well-known songs to choose from that general audiences will happily enjoy, and as many again if you focus on a particular genre (e.g. ska, classic rock, country...) Assuming that any band has a basic genre or style and that the band members don't actively dislike the music that fits the band, it shouldn't be hard to pull together a couple of dozen songs that everyone agrees on. Both bands I'm in regularly share videos on what'sapp and rather than actively chucking songs out we tend to have songs that come up where we all say 'yes'. Yes, we have the usual constraints - the vocalist says he's been in a band singing Dio songs, and he doesn't want to do that to his vocal cords any more. The drummer likes things that stretch him. I don't like songs that just have root eighth notes.... But this positive discussion has brought in a lot of songs that are new to at least one or two of us. I have never thought of doing Audioslave or INXS before. We all have been pretty excited by the suggestion of a Manic Street Preachers song. Despite scepticism, we enjoyed doing a Tom Jones song (Sex Bomb) so much, we're going to rock up Delilah as well.

We got some pics from Sunday.

I considered myself as a non-precision person until the last five years when I felt the need to try one out. However, some time later it occurred to me that the fretless I've been playing for about 37 years is a Japanese (Maya) P-bass copy. Hmm. I had never actually thought of it as such.

I surprises me how many people blithly ignore the fact that the 'standard p-bass' doesn't have the un-contoured body, single coil pickup or headstock of the 'original p-bass', yet 'Leo got it right first time'.

So it's the J-bass version not the P-J one?