Ding Ding....Lunch time... Monday 2/ 27

[ChrisPcritter]

Lunch today is grilled cheese
cooked t6ill the cheese is meted then
turn up the heat to brown. add a glass
of milk and i'm done with lunch..

Ok, I'm still recovering from a rough weekend of gigging.
my new bands first public venue went good but being on
PA duty is rough sometimes. Add in the massive amount
of mistakes we made and it's amazing they asked us back.
[youtube]E0Qu2u1foSQ[/youtube]


What are the best or worst gigs you've either played at
or gone to and why..

My worst was ZZTop sounded completely out of tune with
each other thw whole time with a close runner up for Judas
Priest who was half way through my favorite song they do
before I even knew which song it was..

Best was the band I was in opened for Chris Young when
"getting you home" was 15th on the charts, second was
the scorps in San Antonio in 1988. They exploded up from
under the stage which was amazing...

[sickbutnottired]

Cris, thanks for picking up the LR. I was feeling guilty for not finding a reporter, and another open mic week would have been too much!

Leftover Spaggehti for me, today.

The worst big time show I have ever scene was the probably The Black Crowes and Robert Randolph. The front-of-the house sound was miserable for both acts. I think the bands couldn't hear much, either, because they looked totally PO'ed.

I am surprised to hear about ZZ Top, I have seen them several times, and always good shows.

I have seen a ton of great shows, I am going to go with Neil Young at the Columbia River Gorge Ampitheater as one the best. I wasn't the biggest Neil fan before the show, but he blew me away. He played everything on stage, and is a fantastic guitar player. Better than I had previously thought. Plus, his energy was incredible.

Another I have to mention was The Who, also at the Gorge. No Keith, of course, but with Entwistle.

Thanks for sharing the clip, I like 'The Foundation', a lot, and that's a good song.

[Kit]

Bucktown Drive must be kind of like the bands playing the Central California valley towns when Leo first started making Teles. You certainly got the crowd going.

By pure coincidence the hobby band I'm in played our first public gig this past Saturday. I've been playing with the bass player and the drummer for over a year, and we had played a couple of open mics before. Within the last few months we added a female singer and another guitar player/singer and we've had a lot of fun playing for fun. Several of them have been wanting to play out to see whether we can handle it and gauge what kind of reaction we'd get. We found a grill pub that told us that they used to pay bands to play, but the return in business did not justify it. They told us we can play for no money if we want, but if we do well they may bring us back and pay us something.

Since several of the band members really just want the experience of playing out we signed up to do an 8 to 11 gig last Saturday. We came through fine, did not screw up noticeably, and actually got pretty good response. I'm sure when we get together this coming weekend we would have heard back from the establishment and we will talk about what we like to do next.

The best sounding gig, actually it was a proper concert held in a casual venue, was by a band named "China Crisis" from England. It was just an amazing sounding concert. They are a pretty mellow kind of band so it wasn't so much the energy of the concert, but the sound was just incredible. For high energy concerts, there has been many, but it is also many years ago. Some I remember being particular fun was Oingo Boingo, the Cure, and UB40.

Kit

[yowhatsshakin]

Hey Cris,

I seem to miss the chicken wire screen between the band and the audience

First gig my band had at the annual high school social, I blew out a tube on the Orange amp we used for that gig. That put a pretty fast end to it because we weren't smart enough to have spares around. I'm also reminded of some open mike at the National Rolling Stones convention (yes we had one of those in the Netherlands) which had a nice small Fender tube amp on stage (a Princeton Reverb if I recall but memory fails me here). Only thing was, there was hardly any volume in the thing because one of the switches in the back was malfunctioning. Just a puny amount of volume. Oh well.

Me and my wife have seen so many shows in our lifetime; known names, up and comers, where are they now, etc. jazz (in all its varieties), pop, rock, blues, new wave, punk, etc. You name it, we might have seen it. To distill a list of absolute worsts and bests is a tough problem but I distilled it down to these 10.

Bad shows (sound wise):
Elvis Costello and the Attractions (5/19/2002, Paramount, Seattle): way too loud such that you could barely make out the songs. It was very disappointing, the more since his previous engagement at the Paramount has been with just Steve Nieve. There Elvis got rid of the mic for the encore and gave an impressive performance of 'bel canto'. So it was clear you didn't need to be loud.

Phish (11/27/1996, Key Arena, Seattle): The Key Arena is one of the worst venues for a concert because the sound has a tendency to reflect from the ceiling and the concrete walls. This again becomes more of a problem the louder the Front Of The House is.

The worst: U2 (6/4/2011, Qwest Field, now Century Link Field, Seattle): With the prices they charged they couldn't hire a decent sound engineer? No balance what so ever, muddled, too much bass, phase problems, etc. You name a sound problem, they had it at least from our vantage point. We saw opening act Lenny Kravitz from behind the stage and that was OK, but the 2 o'clock position where our seats were was sonic hell.

Great shows:
Comsat Angels (4/2/1983, De Koog, Noord Scharwoude, NL): They had a small hit in the NL with 'After the Rain' and were a big positive surprise. I could list many concert at that venue because my wife and I went on a weekly date there listening to live music. Got the bug then and have not been able to get rid of it yet ...

Tears for Fears (5/4/1996, The Moore, Seattle): Great sound and great show during the 'Raoul and the Kings of Spain' tour when Roland Orzabal had not reunited with Curt Smith yet. Any other time we have seen them before or after has not been half as good.

Sigur Rós (9/28/2005, Paramount, Seattle): Didn't know the band at all but got tix through a friend of my wife. Absolutely mind blowing. Been a great fan ever since.

Norah Jones (9/28/2004, Key Arena, Seattle): Just to indicate that you can get a good sound at the Key after all; they were playing at low volume levels and all was great.

Rolling Stones (10/30/2005, Key Arena, Seattle): Decent sound but the coolest thing was the vantage point of our seats. We could see Pierre DeBeauport take care of Keith's axes and wardrobe. Priceless!

Pat Metheny (1/21/2000, State Theatre, Olympia and 9/21/2011, Jazz Alley, Seattle): Two shows with 11 years in between. The first was a general rehearsal for the American leg of the '99->00' tour with drummer Bill Stewart and bassist Larry Grenadier. We were seated about 3 feet from the front of the stage. Amazing. Never thought we would be able to get any closer but at Jazz Alley, this time with Bill replaced by Antonio Sanchez, there was 3 feet between our seats and the man himself. We could hear him breath, heard the the switches toggle, the scratching noises of his strings. Another priceless experience. And great music, great music, ....

- Jos

[repoman]

Hi there Crispy-
thanks for filling in this week.

Some of the most enjoyable shows I've been to were at smaller venues where there was some interaction with the bands.
I got talked into seeing They Might Be Giants a few years ago and had a blast. The band was tight, the sound was good and they seemed to be having a great time playing. The joy was infectious! There was singing, dancing, and a giant conga line made its way thru the theatre.
Likewise with the Ramones back when I was a bit younger (and when the majority of the band members were still alive). That was a rowdy, sweaty, slam-dancing good time. I remember even outside the venue waiting for the doors to open the crowd was friendly and chatty.

Luckily I can't say I've been to a lot of shows that were terrible. Saw a few shows where the sound systems sucked: The Cure and Emerson, Lake, & Palmer shows come to mind. I saw The Allman Brothers and Greg Allman was so drunk/high/whatever he practically had to be carried to the organ bench. He did manage to come around after 30 minutes or so and it turned into a good show by the end. I hope he keeps his new liver in better shape these days.

Jeff

[gitman001]

Hey Chris,

Thanks for taking the bull by the horns this week. Love that silver sparkle WR.

I have seen many shows, i tend to have a better experience in the small clubs. One bigger venue show that stands out was seeing the Foo Fighters in Toronto. The show ended up being most of the DVD release "Anywhere But Home" It sounded outstanding.

I had a terrible gig on the weekend. My main rig is a DR Z route 66 into a 2x12 z best cab. I had a long day teaching, then went straight to the gig. Did sound check, went and had a quick dinner at Subway then back to the venue. 10 mins before the gig i got back up on stage did a final tuning hit the standby switch and ....... Nothing. No power to the amp. No glowing blue LED. Total panic kicked in. We had a packed house and i live 20 mins away. I ended up driving home, getting my old marshall head, rushing back to the gig (which i made round trip in record time) plugged in the marshall in the the z best and started to play. The marshall and z best do not go together well. I had a terrible tone all night and it took 5 songs for my heart to stop pounding. Very stressful indeed!

Looking forward to the week

Scott

[Philby]

Hi Chris, thanks for parachuting in.

Best gigs: Midnight Oil on the Blue Sky Mining tour get the gong for my best ever gig. I was not prepared for the sheer energy of their live performance nor how tight they were as a band. Peter Garrett danced like a crazed, electrocuted ghost. It took me several days to digest what I'd seen. Crowded House at the Myer Music Bowl on the Kare Kare tour were also exceptional. The sound was perfect, the weather was perfect and the band were at their playful best. They made the crowd turn around to view an awesome sunset then hid from view while bidding a fake 'goodnight, you've all been great' after only 3-4 songs. Radiohead on the OK Computer tour were also sublime and the sound was perfect given the dodgy venue (Festival Hall, a renovated indoor swimming pool).

Worst gigs: Ben Folds Five at The Palais. For those who haven't been to The Palais it is a relatively small, art deco concert hall that holds 2500 people. The idiot on the sound had the volume dialled up to outdoor stadium levels. After the first song I could not hear any nuance in any of the music. My ears hummed, fizzed and rang for 3 weeks after. REM on the Monster tour were equally disappointing. Michael Stipe hid behind a music stand which held the lyrics for each song. After each song he'd screw up the lyric sheet and throw it into the crowd. That was the extent of audience interaction. The rest of the band looked disinterested, as if they were rehearsing.

The best sounding gig, actually it was a proper concert held in a casual venue, was by a band named "China Crisis" from England. It was just an amazing sounding concert. They are a pretty mellow kind of band so it wasn't so much the energy of the concert, but the sound was just incredible.

I used to love China Crisis. 'Black Man Ray' always features heavily whenever I'm driving.

[youtube]E2UriAMDuwA[/youtube]

[Elwood]

Did sound check, went and had a quick dinner at Subway then back to the venue. 10 mins before the gig i got back up on stage did a final tuning hit the standby switch and ....... Nothing. No power to the amp. No glowing blue LED.
Scott

Scott,
Same thing happened to me with my Swart SST, I was lucky it was at home before a practice
and not at a gig.
Do you have any clues as to what happened with your Route 66 ?

Elwood

[louis cyfer]

having worked for different venues along the way, including the whiskey a gogo and the roxxy in hollywood, i have seen more concerts than i care to remember. also worked for the eagles, pink floyd, nine inch nails, lollapalooza, and oingo boingo.

best sound, eagles. don't care for them musically, but the sound was absolutely phenomenal.

best concerts: deep purple in 85, opening concert of the tour in budapest, queen in 86, they made a movie of the concert. john mayall and the bluesbreakers with coco montoya and walter trout on guitar, and jethro tull with michael schenker opening. iron maiden powerslave tour. kiss reunion tour irvine medows.

worst concert: a whole lot of up and comers at the whiskey and the roxxy. i choose not to remember the names. oingo boingo at universal amphitheater. terrible in every way. sound, energy, just bad.

worst sound: motorhead, just too loud to enjoy. nine inch nails.



critter, what amp are you playing in the video?

[Michael-GnL-Michael]

Hello Crispy,

I think the flake guitar finishes look awesome under stage light.



I have seen Paul McCartney several times but when he played outdoors at UC Berkeley in California the sound system was horrible. The static, compressed range and distortion gave me a headache. They also had an array of laser lights that were just wasting electricity because they were not set up for an outdoor venue. You really have to come prepared to pump the fog. Everything was too open and it just dissipated.

I saw Pink Floyd outdoors and they had the muscle as well as stage design to contain the atmosphere for what was probably the most elaborate light show to that point in time. They mixed in plenty of Vari-Lites. Their sound is as clean as a large stadium system can be plus it is quadraphonic.

Peter Gabriel was very very good.

The HP Pavilion in San Jose California is well designed. There are not many bad seats in the house and I have left my expensive close seats to sit further away in the nose bleed section when I have felt claustrophobic and still felt the view and sound was great. I do not even recommend better seats than the distant seats. You have more freedom to breath and move whereas the closer seats keep you a little more contained in space and because of an extra layer of security. You can buzz right in, find parking within a decent walking distance. You can get out of there without a jam even when everyone exits at the same time. the freeway system gets you in and out very cleanly. I have never had a bad experience there.

On separate occasions Peter Gabriel, Sarah McLachlan and Alanis Morrisette were all good. Saw Paul McCartney there twice, both of which were wonderful performances.

The Allman Brothers at The Shoreline in the later 80's were great. No problems at all detected with Greg. I was very surprised how good they still were. Flawless really. Still had Dicky Betts with them. Warren Haynes was in Duane's place.

Marshall Tucker Band was in bad shape when I caught them at the County Fair. The singer with the higher voice had lost it. (The deeper voiced singer/guitarist "Can't You See" had died). I thought the PA was clipping out his highs but a friend who we ran into there pointed out that he just had no voice when he tried to hit the highs. They tried to play substituting a slide guitar for their usual parts played on a pedal steel. It was awful. Some drunk hit the guitarist with a bottle and the singer was ready to jump off the stage and go after the guy. As we exited the grandstand a riot broke out on the fairgrounds so we got the heck out of there. As we were running to our car the cops were being chased in our direction by a crowd tossing rocks and bottles at them. Ah... the County Fair.

I don't remember the name of the band but they were the opening act for Peter Frampton playing in a large ballroom at a hotel in Sacramento, California. The sound was mixed so that the bass dominated and it was very irritating. I remember watching as some old hippie in the crowd went up to the stage and was yelling at them to turn it down as his girlfriend yanked at his arm. The ceiling was too low for a concert stage. Peter Frampton and his band did put on a good show however.

When David Pack was still performing with Ambrosia they were outstanding.

Caught a small venue with Gary Wright who put on one of the most memorable performances. I had seen him touring with PF before that Frampton Comes Alive album was released. He was forgettable that time.....but there were a few other acts that were peaking like Fleetwood Mac and PF.

I have been pretty fortunate with larger acts. Usually it has been a sound system issue with lesser acts. If the venue did not offer better the headliner was turning the screws on the opening act and giving them a bad mix. The only performer who stands out as a miserable show was Ryan Adams. He could not be finished soon enough as far as I was concerned. His music, his personality on stage and the sound......all unbearable.

Robin Trower ......too loud....to the point of being inaudible to discern.

[louis cyfer]

i thought pink floyd was as good as large stadium sound can get, until i saw the eagles. pin floyd was great though. but david gilmour is as big an <censored word> i have ever seen. just vile.

[KenC]

Best:

- Beach Boys, Carowinds Amusement Park, 1978: Outdoor concert. Most of the crowd ran for cover when a thunderstorm rolled in. A couple of dozen of us stayed, and the band kept playing for us in the rain.

- Jimmy Buffett, Biloxi MS, 1987: His first hometown show in over a decade. The stadium was packed, but it felt like a private party. He played his song "Biloxi" for an encore, and the crowd left the stadium in complete silence.

- Bryan Ferry, Portland ME, 1994 or 1995: Great sound, great stage presence, and it fit the venue (an Art Deco theater) perfectly.

- 16 Horsepower, Portland ME, 1998: Opening act for Bob Weir. I had no idea who they were at the time. David Eugene Edwards sat on his speaker cabinet while playing a banjo and moaning about hellfire and brimstone, while an upright bassist made the building vibrate. I wasn't sure what to make of it, but it certainly powerful.

- Free outdoor concert, Paris FR, 2000: The Paris and Boston Symphony Orchestras performed together near the foot of the Eiffel Tower, with several world-class singers. The crowd was reportedly over 500,000. The high point was the fourth movement of Beethoven's Ninth Symphony, and the Eiffel Tower erupted in strobe lights at just the right moment. Closed with Stars and Stripes Forever and Frere Jacques, which were followed within seconds by a severe thunderstorm.

Worst:

- Allman Brothers Band, San Diego, 1993: The sound was so loud that it was impossible to tell which song they were playing. We left partway through the show. About two blocks away, with the car windows down, the sound came into focus and for a brief second they sounded great.

- Bob Weir and Rob Wasserman, Portland ME, 2000: Billed as a completely acoustic duo performance, but Weir used the show to audition a new keyboard player instead. It was almost all electric, jam band fare. It wasn't bad for jam band music, but it wasn't what we paid to see.

Ken

[Michael-GnL-Michael]

...david gilmour is as big an <censored word> i have ever seen. just vile.

Big sized? Big idiot?

[ChrisPcritter]

critter, what amp are you playing in the video?

I am fortunate to have a Fuchs Blackjack 21

[ChrisPcritter]

Hello Crispy,

I think the flake guitar finishes look awesome under stage light.



Marshall Tucker Band was in bad shape when I caught them at the County Fair. The singer with the higher voice had lost it. (The deeper voiced singer/guitarist "Can't You See" had died). I thought the PA was clipping out his highs but a friend who we ran into there pointed out that he just had no voice when he tried to hit the highs. They tried to play substituting a slide guitar for their usual parts played on a pedal steel. It was awful. Some drunk hit the guitarist with a bottle and the singer was ready to jump off the stage and go after the guy. As we exited the grandstand a riot broke out on the fairgrounds so we got the heck out of there. As we were running to our car the cops were being chased in our direction by a crowd tossing rocks and bottles at them. Ah... the County Fair.

Robin Trower ......too loud....to the point of being inaudible to discern.

I love just about all the flake colors..
I played the silver and the gold that night and the bass player has a lefty gold G&L.

I got to see Marshall Tucker at Colusa casino, and had about the same experience you did. I forgot to add two of my favorites, Chris Duarte opened for Jeff Healey and Chris and I had a two minute discussion about Picks during his performance, I finally said "Chris" he said "What" I said "shut up and play" he said "ok'" and went back to work.. I wish he'd play around here. And the first G3, my friends uncle is Mike Keneally so we got to go backstage after the show.. Thanks to all for the support this week...

[louis cyfer]

...david gilmour is as big an <censored word> i have ever seen. just vile.

Big sized? Big idiot?

a-hole.

[Kit]

Best gigs: Midnight Oil on the Blue Sky Mining tour......
Crowded House at the Myer Music Bowl on the Kare Kare tour were also exceptional.....
Radiohead on the OK Compview while bidding a fakuter tour were also sublime......

I can die a happy man if I had been at these 3 concerts.

I used to love China Crisis. 'Black Man Ray' always features heavily whenever I'm driving.

I have that CD and that was one of my favorite songs. The intro to a China Crisis song ranks in my top 10 song intros, and this is it:

[youtube]8ea0QFcfGTw[/youtube]

Kit

[gitman001]

Did sound check, went and had a quick dinner at Subway then back to the venue. 10 mins before the gig i got back up on stage did a final tuning hit the standby switch and ....... Nothing. No power to the amp. No glowing blue LED.
Scott

Scott,
Same thing happened to me with my Swart SST, I was lucky it was at home before a practice
and not at a gig.
Do you have any clues as to what happened with your Route 66 ?

Elwood

Hey Elwood,

It turned out to be just a fuse thank goodness. I took it to the amp tech and he went over the whole amp, everything checked out okay. His best guess was the amp got hit with a surge or maybe fuse fatigue. I am not an electronics wiz so i hope thats all it was. I do know i will probably take my backup amp with me to the next few shows!

Scott

[Elwood]

Hey Elwood,

It turned out to be just a fuse thank goodness. I took it to the amp tech and he went over the whole amp, everything checked out okay. His best guess was the amp got hit with a surge or maybe fuse fatigue. I am not an electronics wiz so i hope thats all it was. I do know i will probably take my backup amp with me to the next few shows!

Scott

Good news, I'll have to recheck the fuse/ try on another one,
it looked ok but maybe the filament broke near the end.

thanks,Elwood

[bassman]

Best concerts for sound and Music:
Chicago Transit Authority- 1972 - Free concert at American university, Washington D.C.
Rolling Stones, June 1973 @ RFK stadium in Washington D.C.- Stevie Wonder opened for them, festival seating
Emerson Lake and Palmer-Aug 3, 1974 Capital Center, Phenomenal sound, We had 6th row seats and everyone stayed seated. WOW
Frank Zappa Nov. 1, 1974 Capital Center, He played to the tele-screen, which were brand new then.
Paul McCartney in 1990 and 2009- great shows, great sound.