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Funny things you've heard at a gig/soundcheck?


krispn
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I was doing the sound and fed up with the band who were soundchecking spending 25 minutes (when I had 3 more bands to check) moaning the monitors were too quiet so I muted the FOH and let them have another bash at the song. Only vocal monitors mind, tiny stage no need to mic kit or amps

By this point the monitors were SO loud you really could hear the vocals clearly without the FOH right at the back of the room at which point the singer says - 'you're sh*t, its still too f***ing quiet all I can hear is the speakers at the front'

To which I replied the FOH was switched off and all he could hear was how bloody loud he had made me turn the monitors up. At this point the other bands, barman etc all cracked up laughing and his tosspot band skulked off stage.

That became a regular trick with bands who had no idea what monitors were meant to sound like who consistantly complained it was too quiet.

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[quote name='throwoff' timestamp='1337703907' post='1664289']
I muted the FOH and let them have another bash at the song.
[/quote]

i do this anyway with my band (i run sound, Dj, oh yeh and i occasionally get to play bass)

so the singers are happy are happy with the levels vs the band from the monitors before i turn on the FOH am i doing wrong?

sorry if its a bit off topic

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[quote name='Chrismanbass' timestamp='1337727061' post='1664726']...am i doing wrong?...[/quote]

Good evening, Chrismanbass...

No, quite the opposite, imho. It's pretty standard practice to go that way and I, for one, recommend (not that it means much to anyone..!). An adjustment or retouch when the whole lot is running, and you're set. Change nothing.

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Our old drummer was a stroppy sod. We were soundchecking one night and the sound engineer asks for the kick drum, so he hits it once. Engineer asks him to do it again, so he does, once. Engineer says "Can you keep doing it mate?". Our drummer repeated this process for the next couple of toms then one of the guitarists shouted to the other "got a spare battery?", quick as a flash the engineer shouts "what for? your ******* drummer?!" :D .

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I was talking to a sound guy at a gig we did a while ago, I always make the effort to get chummy with them for various reasons (they make more effort with sound, better prospects of more gigs if it goes well, another contact etc) and we were talking about DIing my bass amp, he was adamant he never does it in case there's a fault with the bass amp. I managed to persuade him and after my band's soundcheck he came up to me and said that it sounded fine and there were no problems. I said something along the lines of "yeah, there's so many amps around like Ashdowns and the like" which he agreed to. Cue the bassist in the next band come up and ask where he should plug in. The sound guy asked him what amp he was using with a grin at me, we both knew it would be too good for chance to miss and right on cue the poor bassist said "Ashdown".

Our guitarist has a habit of not at all thinking about what he's saying on stage and there's been more than one uncomfortable situation caused by it. It's usually meant in jest but for example, playing a Love Music, Hate Racism gig then exclaiming that you don't like blacks on stage isn't really appropriate (just for the record, he was totally joking, he just wasn't thinking about the situation he was in). We didn't know whether to laugh or cry, especially as he kept going on then after a sharp nudge from me finished off by saying "oh and I don't like jews either". Luckily everyone could see he was drunk and ignored it. He's also started off a gig at an awards ceremony we were playing by saying "I hope you had a good day, I buried my ****ing nan this morning." (which was true) then launched straight into the first song before anyone (including the band) really had a chance to digest what he'd just said which left a few people gobsmacked.

Playing a large festival in France (in my other band), most of the songs are "she left me" type songs and the singer had bought a record on the market for the purpose of destroying on stage. He spent about 5 minutes between songs doing a mock rant about how he'd loved the girl on the cover of this record and she'd left him. He then said "and this is what I think of her now!" and tried to break the record, spending about 2 minutes making a futile effort to snap it with over 2000 people watching him publically humiliate himself.

Edited by ThomBassmonkey
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[quote name='Monckyman' timestamp='1337686002' post='1663898']
Singer " f*** me, that snare`s well too loud,turn it down!"
Me "I can`t turn it down, I haven`t even got a Mic on it"
Singer " Well put a f***ing Mic on it, and THEN turn it down!"
:D
[/quote]

Absolute genius! :lol:

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Don't know if this counts but we almost made our singer quit whilst he was plugging in his wireless mic for a soundcheck once. The reasoning for his tantrum? The drummer violently attacked his lunch/dinner with a drum stick, rendering his burger inedible. I found it funny at least :lol:

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[quote name='Cameronj279' timestamp='1337744849' post='1664795']
Don't know if this counts but we almost made our singer quit whilst he was plugging in his wireless mic for a soundcheck once. The reasoning for his tantrum? The drummer violently attacked his lunch/dinner with a drum stick, rendering his burger inedible. I found it funny at least :lol:
[/quote]

Why? The drummer saved him valuable soundcheck time because he doesn't have to chew it any more.

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[quote name='goblin' timestamp='1337385967' post='1659334']
In an orchestra I used to play in, conductor once told my section (French Horns) and the Trombones that we were too loud and needed to play a bit quieter, and we would try again from etc. So second time, we didn't play at all and he just went "yeah that's fine guys, keep up the good work" ... prick :lol:
[/quote]

Same thing happened to me!

We had a guest conductor and said "Brass too loud!" (We we're a 4 piece section for this work)

She stops us several times despite us playing so quite we couldn't hear ourselves.

So we don't play. She says "Better volume, still a little much in places"

So I suggest we place our instruments on the floor/on their stands.

We sit through the whole piece arms folded feet up. "Brass, just about right"

:lol:

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