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New Year's Eve 2016 gig de-brief


Truckstop
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Hello all, happy new year!

Had a stormer at The White Bear in Rickmansworth! Pub is owned by an Indian family and the food they gave us before we started was top-notch. Had a belly full of chicken Cylon :)

All the punters were up for it big time and it really couldn't have gone better. Except that we ended up playing Mustang Sally twice(!). Everyone was receptive, everyone danced and we got three more gigs out of it including a wedding. Really happy!

Money wasn't amazing, but we wanted a small local pub gig this year. Less hassle, less pressure and no need to pull out all the stops with PA, Lights, stage show and clothing etc. I think we, as a band, enjoyed it more too. Going back to our roots, so to speak.

How did everyone else get on?

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We played a 2-6 bar gig,it's sane place we play every New Years Eve.It's a $500.00 gig. Place was packed from 2-6.

I thought we sounded great in the 1st set. The 2nd & 3rd set we're not so great for me.

Bkue

Edited by blue
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Three sets starting from 9.30. Lead guitarist did a great job on the mic at midnight. Massed dancing on tables (really), got a nice sound, the Precision and the Orange doing everything from full-on pick rock to DB style on ballads. Songs from Everlys to Beatles to Bowie to Monkees to Glen Campbell... very mad, and very busked. Fun night, oldies and youngies all joining in, job done.

Only irritant was lingering for the money. 2am and will ye pay the fecking band? Jeez.

Happy new year.

Edited by KK Jale
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[quote name='bassace' timestamp='1451641425' post='2941934']
Very prescient of you guys to foretell NYE 2016 but I get the drift.
[/quote]

Oh! I never noticed the OP is a year ahead of the rest of us. But I have only just woken up. :D

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Great gig. Fed lovely pie and mash (small portion for me). Free bar though we are all driving. 2 x 1 hour sets. As we knew the clientele the set had to be adjusted and ended up playing Johnny B Good which they loved. We often gig as a 5 piece but keys couldn't do it last night. The sound was fantastic - not loud but clear and full. Reminded us that we need to tell the keys player to reign it in a bit. It was an excellent room for a live band with just the right amount of soft furnishings to soak up any harshness.

The downside - like a demented fool i locked my car keys in the boot of my car! Just waiting for my bro in law to pick me up to go and collect it!

Happy New Year
x

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Ours was pretty similar to Truckstop's, the Sussex Arms in Twickenham. Small local with a great reputation as a CAMRA stronghold, plus a hog roast.

The pub was rammed from start to finish, our 4-piece band had to set up in the amount of space you'd normally use as a large wardrobe, great excitement to be standing next to the door of the Ladies (the Gents was down the other end), the beer was superb with an unexpected tab for the band, and the money was decent too.

At the start of Set #2 a large, elderly gentleman came and sat as near the band as he could, and spent the rest of the gig watching me and my playing. At the end of the gig I went up to him and asked if he was a bass player himself since he'd been watching so closely.

He replied in a very refined manner / accent (think Sergeant Wilson crossed with Private Godfrey), "Oh no, I've never played, I was watching you because I thought you were so very good."

Result! That guy can come back any time ... easily the nicest compliment I've ever received.

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Royal British Legion in the Challows south Oxon. Really nice place with a big stage decked in fairy lights and lots of real fir trees. Big range of ages (14-90) but a very enthusiastic crowd of over 250 and a packed dancefloor. 3x40 min sets and a couple £k made it not only fun but a very tidy earner. Calendar for 2016 already pretty much full - happy days.

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We were at the Social club in Crawley Down, good sound, good audience, happy landlords, well paid, overall a great night.

We did 3x 1hr, so not as long as Blue's usual sets, but longer for us and they were still asking for more when we finished at 1

We played well, the drummer we were using last night has found his feet with us now and is used to our arrangements and our tendancy to change things on the fly. Also, my amp behaved itself last night, which was a real relief.

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Played 3 sets at the coach house in Paignton. Tickets sold out. It's our favourite local pub and last night was a belter. Fancy dress was very popular and all 4 of us went for it. A long night and my vocals and ears had enough by 1am. Took the effort to video it too which may be interesting looking back. Got to go and collect what gear we left now.

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We played a hotel near Gatwick, nice place: 4 star, £90 a head party and it was chaos! The hotel lost everyone's pre order of the menu so people had to wait an hour and a half for their mains, some of them didn't manage to get desserts. They didn't have enough bar staff so it was about a ten minute wait for drinks. It delayed our start by 45 minutes so we had to cut our first set down. The audience were thoroughly p'd off by the time they came into the dance hall, we got them dancing in the end but it was bloody hard work.
Not surprisingly lots of complaints to the hotel managers etc I reckon they'll end up giving refunds - better luck next year eh!

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[quote name='BobVbass' timestamp='1451668906' post='2942279']
We played a hotel near Gatwick, nice place: 4 star, £90 a head party and it was chaos! The hotel lost everyone's pre order of the menu so people had to wait an hour and a half for their mains, some of them didn't manage to get desserts. They didn't have enough bar staff so it was about a ten minute wait for drinks. It delayed our start by 45 minutes so we had to cut our first set down. The audience were thoroughly p'd off by the time they came into the dance hall, we got them dancing in the end but it was bloody hard work.
Not surprisingly lots of complaints to the hotel managers etc I reckon they'll end up giving refunds - better luck next year eh!
[/quote]

Oh god! Coming from a hospitality background I know what an absolute nightmare something like this can be! My skin's crawling just thinking of it :)

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[quote name='BobVbass' timestamp='1451668906' post='2942279']
We played a hotel near Gatwick, nice place: 4 star, £90 a head party and it was chaos! The hotel lost everyone's pre order of the menu so people had to wait an hour and a half for their mains, some of them didn't manage to get desserts. They didn't have enough bar staff so it was about a ten minute wait for drinks. It delayed our start by 45 minutes so we had to cut our first set down. The audience were thoroughly p'd off by the time they came into the dance hall, we got them dancing in the end but it was bloody hard work.
Not surprisingly lots of complaints to the hotel managers etc I reckon they'll end up giving refunds - better luck next year eh!
[/quote]

Blimey, where was that? As I'm local

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[quote] BobVbass, on 01 January 2016 - 05:21 PM, said:
We played a hotel near Gatwick, nice place: 4 star, £90 a head party and it was chaos! The hotel lost everyone's pre order of the menu so people had to wait an hour and a half for their mains, some of them didn't manage to get desserts. They didn't have enough bar staff so it was about a ten minute wait for drinks. It delayed our start by 45 minutes so we had to cut our first set down. The audience were thoroughly p'd off by the time they came into the dance hall, we got them dancing in the end but it was bloody hard work.
Not surprisingly lots of complaints to the hotel managers etc I reckon they'll end up giving refunds - better luck next year eh!

Blimey, where was that? As I'm local
[/quote]

I'll pm you - I don't want to publicly name it ;)

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Played The Nines in Barrow, great venue, fantastic in-house PA and engineer - we sounded very very good. 2x45s, finished for 11:30, on the road for 12:10, and the money was excellent. All in all a very good one... :D

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Played a Golf Club with two events - both with live music. Ours started at 930, two 1 hour sets stopping at 0015 promptly - the other was on similar timing but consisted of a duo (guitarists) with bass playing and drumming emanating from a box next to them. Seemed to go down as well as a proper band though.

Was great fun and went very well - unfortunately the Classic Sabre disgraced itself being dead of battery at tune up - quick change and back to normal (I always carry spares but the first time they've ever been used). I noticed the Mark Bass 2 X 10s flapping my trousers when I got close to them....

I haven't played the Hokey Cokey for at least 30 years!! Great fun!! Excellent pay!! Back home just after 1 am.

Edited by drTStingray
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Great night at the Poppy and Pint. We had two set lists as our female singer almost couldn't make it but she beat throat lurgi and family illness to make the gig, superb trooper.

The place got so hot they had to put the air conditioning on for the first time since the summer. 😀

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3 x 40 mins at our favourite pub. Ticket only affair so no idiots which was great. Best payday of my gigging career, and 4 diet cokes so went home completely sober.

Was new to us to do 3 sets, so I sat down with a napkin and wrote them out on the spot, and for once, no-one complained. Went for 1st set Rock, 2nd set Punk/Pop Rock, 3rd set Dancing tunes. It worked really well as had a full dance floor for most of set 2 and vast majority of set 3.

Really enjoyed it actually even though it was very much in the "work" gig type.

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