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No room for the bass player


artisan

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Setting up for tonights gig & sure enough I am shoved into a corner out of the way.

The singers leads monitor etc are right where my pedal board should be.

Of course the rest of the band have all the room they could want.

Why is it always thus ?

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11 minutes ago, stingrayPete1977 said:

Time to go in ears, ampless and no monitor wedges, you'll love it! 

Yeah, but band members even forget that the bassist themselves needs somewhere to stand! There's one gig I particularly don't enjoy where I have so little room, if I step backwards I get the keyboard player's mic stand in my back or a step forward means I am resting my nuts on the hi-hats. I wish I were joking! - I have up bringing my amp as I had to balance everything on under window seating. Precarious to say the least! 

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We play a pub where I have to lift up the neck every time the driver from the attached Indian takeaway wants to go past. There is also a great moment we recorded on our last visit where one of the takeaway guys walks past with a massive bag of onions on his shoulder. It is one of my favourite venues though, great landlord and great crowd every time we play.

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2 hours ago, King Tut said:

Time for a diplomatic but assertive conversation!

 

Or you could just kill them, and then spit on them afterwards. They won’t do it again 

Edited by Geek99
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I remember a bassist in another local band coming up to me a bit worse for drink and telling me how much he respected me for standing my ground against the rest of my band and persuading them to let me use a wireless kit and get out at the front with my foot on the monitor, as he’d tried to have that conversation and been told the answer was ‘no’. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that no such conversation had ever taken place in our band and I’d actually be more likely to get told off (jovially, of course) for just standing there at the back and not putting on a show! Maybe if I had a mic set up for backing vocals and/or constantly needed to do the pedalboard tap-dance I’d stay a bit closer to my starting position, but as it is I don’t even feel the need to stay on the stage all the time. Get wireless, go walkabout, throw a few shapes and take up some space! 🙂

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6 minutes ago, Ed_S said:

I remember a bassist in another local band coming up to me a bit worse for drink and telling me how much he respected me for standing my ground against the rest of my band and persuading them to let me use a wireless kit and get out at the front with my foot on the monitor, as he’d tried to have that conversation and been told the answer was ‘no’. I didn’t have the heart to tell him that no such conversation had ever taken place in our band and I’d actually be more likely to get told off (jovially, of course) for just standing there at the back and not putting on a show! Maybe if I had a mic set up for backing vocals and/or constantly needed to do the pedalboard tap-dance I’d stay a bit closer to my starting position, but as it is I don’t even feel the need to stay on the stage all the time. Get wireless, go walkabout, throw a few shapes and take up some space! 🙂

Exactly this. Just done a small festival this evening. One hour set and I bet I spent less than 2 minutes on the actual stage. Rest of the time I was out front with the crowd. 

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One gig I was the last to arrive and found that the band had left no room for me or my gear. Not even 6 inches!!

Sarcastic remarks were getting me nowhere, so I told them if they didn't move up and make enough room for me I'd be going home.

They finally did but with a lot of grumbling! They went down in my estimation after that debacle.

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There’s often little room for anyone. I occasionally play with a trombone player, we're usually squashed into a corner. Oddly though they tend to make room for us once we start playing, nothing quite like a trombone slide moving in and out, just a few centimetres away from your head to make you reconsider sitting in such close proximity to the band.

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get a headless bass, and start clearing room with it without going out of tune

 

I needed it for survival when my very very smelly guitarer would stand in front of me, trapping me between the drums and wall, and drop the foulest filthiest farts I've ever encountered.

Then one day I bought the headless, and I shoved him outa my way with a prod in his back lol,sent him over the monitors lol.

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10 hours ago, Dood said:

Yeah, but band members even forget that the bassist themselves needs somewhere to stand! There's one gig I particularly don't enjoy where I have so little room, if I step backwards I get the keyboard player's mic stand in my back or a step forward means I am resting my nuts on the hi-hats. I wish I were joking! - I have up bringing my amp as I had to balance everything on under window seating. Precarious to say the least! 

There is something wonderful about the phrase ' resting my nuts on the hi-hats'. could be your autobiog title.

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3 hours ago, lownote12 said:

There is something wonderful about the phrase ' resting my nuts on the hi-hats'. could be your autobiog title.

He he he he! That's brilliant!! If I do, I'll endeavour to credit you!

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18 hours ago, artisan said:

Setting up for tonights gig & sure enough I am shoved into a corner out of the way.

The singers leads monitor etc are right where my pedal board should be.

Of course the rest of the band have all the room they could want.

Why is it always thus ?

I don't know - I presume because you allow it, because I wouldn't? If something was in my way I would move it, if there was a complaint about moving it I would point out that there was no room there so they would have to find somewhere else for it. The end of the bass is hard and long and the singer knows very well what it feels like when he collides with it.  Plus I need a microphone so I am out at the front. If there wasn't room for me then I wouldn't be playing, and that isn't going to sound very good.

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This treatment isn't reserved for bass players. I play guitar too, and I did a couple of gigs with an oldies band in which the singer / rhythm guitarist left no room for my amp and had his pedalboard behind him and in the middle of the space left for me to occupy - partly due to him having insufficiently long leads. I just moved bits over when he wasn't looking. This was the same fella that heaped loads of reverb on his vocal using a floor effect box, then wondered why he couldn't be heard clearly in the FOH PA and was suffering loads of feedback.

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On 27/07/2019 at 19:35, Roger2611 said:

But you are the bass player.....you should be arriving will be expected to arrive long before the rest of the band in order to set up the rest of the band's gear setting up where you want and rest of em will have to fit in around you!  for which you'll receive no thanks, only complaints.

Fixed to reflect the reality :(

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