What do you guys play when sound checking

[gt4ever]

Bit of a general question here, but when the pub is full of people and youre setting up you equipment what are your favourite warm up riffs you play when sound checking. I've only done a handful of gigs with my current band so limited experience and was just interested in what people do and play. tunes not in their set, scales? any favourite harmonic riffs to practice to while live audience in the midst?

ta

Rich

[Doddy]

[quote name='gt4ever' post='1297772' date='Jul 8 2011, 10:46 PM']Bit of a general question here, but when the pub is full of people and youre setting up you equipment what are your favourite warm up riffs you play when sound checking. I've only done a handful of gigs with my current band so limited experience and was just interested in what people do and play. tunes not in their set, scales? any favourite harmonic riffs to practice to while live audience in the midst?

ta

Rich[/quote]

The venue is usually empty when I'm setting up and sound checking.

For sound checking,I normally just play a simple walking line or simple funk groove that goes over the entire
range of the instrument. Sound check isn't the time to practise or rehearse,especially if there are people in
the room.

[neepheid]

[quote name='gt4ever' post='1297772' date='Jul 8 2011, 10:46 PM']Bit of a general question here, but when the pub is full of people and youre setting up you equipment what are your favourite warm up riffs you play when sound checking. I've only done a handful of gigs with my current band so limited experience and was just interested in what people do and play. tunes not in their set, scales? any favourite harmonic riffs to practice to while live audience in the midst?

ta

Rich[/quote]

I play bits of the songs I'm going to play at the gig. I play in originals band, so it's not like I'm boring everyone with the typical top ten bass riffs

[dc2009]

I go for the intro to The Glass Prison by Dream Theater, uses all 5 strings, high and low frets, that 4th fret harmonic. Tends to be a good warm up for the hands as it uses all left hand fingers and involves some stretching for the right, as well as checking the bass out thoroughly fairly quickly. I also run this test on any bass I try in a shop, just to see how it does against the benchmark I have in my head.

If you mean warm up, which I try and class as different to a sound/level check, then I play unplugged (or more realistically just with the wireless pack turned off), or with the mute button on the tuner pressed, no need for people to hear me going 0-1-2-3-4 up and down the strings over and over again

Edited July 8, 2011 by dc2009

[gt4ever]

we've been turning up an hour before start, setting up and pub is pretty busy and then quick 10 min chill then on, so when i mean practice i mean just to loosen up the fingers. just curious on how others do it, on like a non-professional pub band level

Rich

[gt4ever]

[quote name='dc2009' post='1297787' date='Jul 8 2011, 10:55 PM']I go for the intro to The Glass Prison by Dream Theater, uses all 5 strings, high and low frets, that 4th fret harmonic. Tends to be a good warm up for the hands as it uses all left hand fingers and involves some stretching for the right, as well as checking the bass out thoroughly fairly quickly. I also run this test on any bass I try in a shop, just to see how it does against the benchmark I have in my head.[/quote]


cool, thats what i mean man, nice choice

[xgsjx]

We usually play a jammed version of one of our songs. Each of us has a little time & then a quick run together to make sure we're not muddy or messy & then we do a little impov.

Actually, that sounds like my entire last gig!

[BigRedX]

Normally the main riff from VampireMan. It's a good one for balancing up with the kit too.

[JTUK]

Soundchecking yourself or the band.

For me, I'll just goof around for a few minutes max....nobody in the room wants to hear endless noodling, from bass, gtr or whoever.
If we are soundchecking the band sound..we will pick a number that we aren't going to pay that set...

If we don't get that chance on a low key gig..our first number will be chosen as being specifically an easy song to soundcheck to..

[dc2009]

[quote name='JTUK' post='1297814' date='Jul 8 2011, 11:12 PM']If we are soundchecking the band sound..we will pick a number that we aren't going to pay that set...[/quote]

This.

[BigRedX]

For the whole band if there's no audience in the venue, then we'll play whatever we'll be opening the set with. That way there's a slim chance that when we actually start our set it'll sound half way good (depending on how many bands are on before us).

[RockfordStone]

as im in an originals band, i tend to play whatever im likely to play in the set, or girls aloud - love machine if i'm bored

[ficelles]

Fast ascending arpeggios, which the guitar player then plays at 19 times my speed in the other direction. We are a right pair of poseurs.

ficelles

[LiamPodmore]

Soundcheck when theres nobody around, tends to be either 1985 by Bowling For Soup, or our latest original.cover we want another run through. For me personally it tends to be our song Lying Through My Teeth as it uses quite a big tonal range (D on my B String to the D at the 19th fret on my G) so i get to check everywhere i use.

Edit: We also run through the bridge section of Monster by The Automatic to check mic levels.

Liam

Edited July 9, 2011 by LiamPodmore

[thisnameistaken]

I only mess about when checking my mic - I'll do old kids TV themes (Rent-A-Ghost comes up a lot, as does Record Breakers) and belt them out so they can get a good level. On the bass I'll play something that suits what we're about to do, so the sound guy knows what sound I want. With my last band it was often something like Sublime or a Clash tune.

I think if you can play something reasonably well-known that has a sound that you'd like, it's worth a go. But only if you've found that sound works in rehearsals. No point asking a sound guy to make you sound like Marcus Miller if you're just going to get swamped by guitarists when the rest of the band joins in.

[Jarhead]

Peaches by the stranglers, with varying levels of distortion, and a warning to sound guy that I'm about to use some synth sounds as well. I know this is during our soundcheck, but my band avoids playing anything when we get onstage that isn't the first song.

[Blademan_98]

I run the Em Pentatonic scale up the neck (starting with open E to the G on at the 24th 'fret' on my fretless )

I then do a piece I have written myself in 'C' as it uses all the basses range.

(I do similar on my acoustic guitar but with a few more string bends lol)

[Marky L]

Pub gigs?
Plug it in, turn it on, makes a bass noise? Fine, bass back on stand and out for a smoke.

[jezzaboy]

Get singer to stand at the back of the boozer, play Kinky afro by Happy mondays and wait for the singer to make the appropriate directions, you know, kit up, bass down.

He always says the bass is too loud, so I pretend to turn it down and then he says thats much better. Every time!!

Plonker!

Jez

[Deep Thought]

We have a slow blues called 'Can't get home', by a band from the Midlands called True Grit which I've been playing for 20-odd years. It's become our standard soundcheck song, it's now 'usual?' and off we go. Generally only play the first few bars, we're not too fussy.

Edited July 9, 2011 by Deep Thought

[Les]

[quote name='Marky L' post='1297966' date='Jul 9 2011, 08:31 AM']Pub gigs?
Plug it in, turn it on, makes a bass noise? Fine, bass back on stand and out for a smoke.[/quote]


You and I were obviously seperated at birth mate.

[BottomE]

[quote name='Les' post='1298040' date='Jul 9 2011, 10:46 AM']You and I were obviously seperated at birth mate. [/quote]
could be triplets

[chris_b]

[quote name='Doddy' post='1297781' date='Jul 8 2011, 10:51 PM']....Sound check isn't the time to practise or rehearse,especially if there are people in
the room....[/quote]
+1

If the audience is in the room I just line check.

[Ross]

A bit up and down the fretboard, loud and soft. Nothing fancy, bit of improv.

[Doddy]

[quote name='chris_b' post='1298068' date='Jul 9 2011, 11:09 AM']If the audience is in the room I just line check.[/quote]
That's all it takes. The majority of pub gigs are backline only,so all it takes is a quick
check to make sure everything is working.