When Do You Think Your Band Will Start Gigging Again ?

[Delberthot]

5 hours ago, paul_c2 said:

Let's not rush too quickly back into gigging once the restrictions are lifted.......give it a few weeks at least, to meet up and do some rehearsals first. Otherwise those first gigs will sound like a bag of spanners.

I agree. The rehearsal rooms will be rammed once everyone knows when we can get back out to get it back to the standards that we were at pre-lockdown. Otherwise there will be a lot of "jazz" being played in venues up and down the country.

At the moment I can't see how pubs and clubs could operate and still comply with social distancing. That's before we even consider weddings and parties which is what my band mainly does - 200-300+ drunk people packed into a relatively small space.

All of our gigs for the beginning of the year have been moved back to next year so the first one that we have in the diary is in the middle of July but I'm preparing myself for not playing this year at all

[Nicko]

18 hours ago, steantval said:

Totally agree, I cannot see how any pub can manage or police SD, especially if a live band is performing, some of the pubs we play, we are lucky to get three feet away from the other band members.

My guess is that when pubs are allowed to reopen they will have reduced numbers of people permitted so that they aren't crowded.  This has two potential effects.

1. Bands will not be able to pull in sufficient punters to make it worthwhile, because the cap will be so low

2. You can play jazz and save them the trouble if policing it because no one will turn up anyway.

[Passinwind]

On 19/04/2020 at 11:16, Bluewine said:

Depending on where you live when we start gigging will be different 

Wisconsin will remain on lockdown  until May 26th.

I'm a senior with some health issues. I don't want gig until I'm confident it's safe.

 

Same here, so the odds are pretty good I'm done with regular gigging. I actually already made that decision a couple of years ago though. These recent developments just mean I may well be done with attending live music shows in clubs too, unfortunately.

[Bluewine]

3 hours ago, Passinwind said:

Same here, so the odds are pretty good I'm done with regular gigging. I actually already made that decision a couple of years ago though. These recent developments just mean I may well be done with attending live music shows in clubs too, unfortunately.

I was just thinking about a few people I know that worked in restaurants. Will people go back to dining out and crowding into restaurants if not ,I doubt those jobs will last long. I'm talking about bands, cooks, waitresses, bartenders and dish washers.

Blue

Edited April 23, 2020 by Bluewine

[Passinwind]

1 hour ago, Bluewine said:

I was just thinking about a few people I know that worked in restaurants. Will people go back to dining out and crowding into restaurants if not ,I doubt those jobs will last long. I'm talking about bands, cooks, waitresses, bartenders and dish washers.

Blue

I pretty much stopped eating out and going to live shows more than once a month or so at the same time I retired from gigging. Gig money was my play money, so no play = no pay. But this could just be a phase for me, wouldn't be the first time! 

For me it'll be a much bigger loss if my weekly house jam down the street goes away. The host and many of the players already had plenty of health issues, and the jam space is quite small and often crowded. So I think it will have to evolve to only being three or four people, when a dozen plus over the course of a night used to be pretty common. But I will find a way to keep jamming, no two ways about that.

I have a lot of friends on the production side of live music too, and a lot of local club and restaurant owners are good friends as well. There's so much uncertainty for all of them right now, yeesh.

 

[ambient]

21 minutes ago, Passinwind said:

I pretty much stopped eating out and going to live shows more than once a month or so at the same time I retired from gigging. Gig money was my play money, so no play = no pay. But this could just be a phase for me, wouldn't be the first time! 

For me it'll be a much bigger loss if my weekly house jam down the street goes away. The host and many of the players already had plenty of health issues, and the jam space is quite small and often crowded. So I think it will have to evolve to only being three or four people, when a dozen plus over the course of a night used to be pretty common. But I will find a way to keep jamming, no two ways about that.

I have a lot of friends on the production side of live music too, and a lot of local club and restaurant owners are good friends as well. There's so much uncertainty for all of them right now, yeesh.

 

I think on the whole musicians are quite adaptable, resourceful and innovative people. You’ve only got to look on social media to see how people have started using technology to continue gigging and collaborating etc. Music is what we do, a large part of that is performing with others, so I’m sure we’ll all adapt to whatever the requirements are that enable both ourselves and others to continue doing that, whilst remaining healthy.

[Bassfinger]

When the pubs, clubs and wedding venues open again.  That's that's only sensible answer I can give.

Were not practicing together or even online at the moment, but the band hasn't  been together long anyway and we're all competent musicians and it didn't take us long to gel in the first place, and will take even less time to get the groove back.  We ain't the London Philharmonic, so the lack of group practice doesn't  seem liable to hurt us.

Edited April 24, 2020 by Bassfinger

[12stringbassist]

I find the current situation worrying - if the band can't play til next year, we will probably have drifted apart as a unit, have no gigs in the diary and a whole bunch of venues will have disappeared.

I haven't plugged bass in for a month.

[Len_derby]

1 hour ago, 12stringbassist said:

I haven't plugged bass in for a month.

I’m relieved to hear I’m not the only one to have lost the appetite for playing.

I am doing a lot of reading about music though, so hopefully not feeling like picking a bass up is just a passing phase.

[odysseus]

19 hours ago, 12stringbassist said:

.. if the band can't play til next year, we will probably have drifted apart as a unit, have no gigs in the diary and a whole bunch of venues will have disappeared.
 

Same here. I'm not expecting to gig again this year.....

[Woodinblack]

Why would the group have drifted apart? My group has no reason to be in contact apart from gigs but I have no doubt that as soon as we can gig we will be out there. Luckily we don't need much practice, we are pretty terrible anyway

I am still playing regularly anyway at home. Probably more so now.

[FinnDave]

I'm playing more than ever at the moment. I try to play along with a recording of a complete gig every day. I've just finished today's - played the first Grateful Dudes gig I was part of, Hebden Bridge April 1st 2018. A good way to spend 2 hours and 40 minutes on a Saturday morning (assuming this is Saturday, I've lost track!).

When we can finally get back together to rehearse and gig again, I want to as ready as I possibly can be, not rusty and with fingers that have lost their memories!

[Woodinblack]

5 minutes ago, FinnDave said:

I'm playing more than ever at the moment. I try to play along with a recording of a complete gig every day.

I have tried that but found it depressing!

What I have done is start going through the songs and recording them part by part so I can really listen to them.

 

5 minutes ago, FinnDave said:

When we can finally get back together to rehearse and gig again, I want to as ready as I possibly can be, not rusty and with fingers that have lost their memories!

That is what I intend too. I hope to have had a chance to listen to all those songs and redo the parts that I always did wrong!

[12stringbassist]

19 hours ago, Len_derby said:

I’m relieved to hear I’m not the only one to have lost the appetite for playing.

I am doing a lot of reading about music though, so hopefully not feeling like picking a bass up is just a passing phase.

I'm hoping so too. I'd rather BE gigging of course, but if this was going to happen it suits us for it to be at this moment. We do / did a weekly jam night and I was getting really worried about hosting those, until the plug was pulled. My wife falls into the vulnerable group and I didn't think singers bringing their own mics and players bringing their own guitars was really going to keep us safe.

The lay-off has actually also come at a right time for my band, as my drummer has had a serious operation which was going to take him out of the game for three months at least and we were lining up dep drummers to cover, so I was looking at 3 months of slightly below-par gigs and myself organising everything.

My band live geographically remote from each other and I would say our contact through Facebook has been very sparse. There's nothing much to talk about. Hopefully we will start work on three or four new songs when the lock-down looks like ending.

Edited April 25, 2020 by 12stringbassist

[Bluewine]

I'm playing an acoustic gig this Friday . We will be playing The Barley Pop in Germantown. We will be playing outdoors to the customers picking up their " take out" meals. 

This is the way it is  for some of us, basically grabbing anything  we can get until Wisconsin opens up. Hopefully we'll get some media coverage.

We have good gigs booked starting the first week in June if we're open.

Blue

[ClassicVibes]

So how will the bogs work at a venue? Can't swing a cat in there normally...

[Steve Browning]

20 minutes ago, ClassicVibes said:

So how will the bogs work at a venue? Can't swing a cat in there normally...

It's simple for those of us more 'gifted' (and then I woke up!).

[Mudpup]

On 23/04/2020 at 12:15, Maude said:

How about quickly snogging someone as you go past? 

Although I did promise the judge I'd stop doing that. 

Got thrown out of Lidl's last week for doing that......she was trying to stack the biscuits at the time