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Gig Ethic


ZeromiserY

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i just want to know how aberdeen bands feel about gigs.

eg : statue of misery have only ever played one gig stone sober (which wasnt through choice and wasnt a good experience). so as you tell we like to drink during gigs but dont drink at practice.

though my other band tensium love to drink at practice and gigs which is cool.

how do the rest of our aberdeen musical geniuses get through gigs/nerves/practice etc.

i know lots of people on the forums have been all "you guys don't take your music seriously"

im more interested in hearing from bands that drink at practice and your experiences of gigs etc.

hows about organising a gig filled with various styles of bands that all have fun at practice rather than going in with lab coats on and having set break times. last practice we played one song in the first hour and got a little 'tipsy' and it was our best practice in months.

discuss (i sound like an AOL advert)

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I drink a pint, either beforehand or throughout the gig. Two at a push. I like to play with a clear head.

I used to drink beforehand for nerves, but I've played a lot of gigs, so nowadays it's just a routine I suppose. I've never played drunk, but don't really want to cos I'll probably bugger up and make myself look daft. :)

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Drinking before playing increases my nerves directly in proportion to the likelyhood of a major fuckup.

Still, a lot of people seemed reasonabley impressed with my heroically drunken performance at Drummonds the other night. I suppose if you're used to playing at a certain level of inebriation, you adapt to it.

Still, it's a thin line. There's no argueing that playing sober makes finding your way around a fretboard far simpler. Therefore, I try limit myself to one pint before a set. A freebie's a freebie though :love:

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The last gig I played with a drink in me was down at the Moorings. Hog wasn't able to make it so I was responsible for all of the guitar parts. Had good feedback on it and I thought it went well from what I remember of it. I don't get silly drunk that I don't know what I'm doing but yeah, I don't usually drink as I have to take my car to transport my gear (can't really go out anywhere with a head, 4x12 and 1/2 guitars can I?! :laughing:

If I play at the Moorings - I don't need to take the Powerball - as they have one! - so I can usually afford to have a few and not worry about carting all the gear around afterwards.

I have no problems with people doing it though - I'm out to enjoy myself and to entertain the people that come along and if you guys have a few pints or whatever and put on a performance that you and the crowd enjoy - more power to you! :up:

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Played gigs in various staes over the years. Always 'thought' I was doing well after a few drinks, not so. Never really fucked up big time through being pished until the Fudge awards a couple of years back where we, as the last band, got inaboot the rider! Needless to say we were in the same state as the audinece so no one noticed.

We have a recording of the night that I have refused to listen to but I am assured that it is delighfully barfly pissed. Nothing to be proud of but have to see the funny side. It was the Fudge Awards

These days I like a JD before hand with one on stage. Just a habit more than anything... Jim+pissed+drumming=shoddly over confident and lacking in ability.

:up:

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I think it's fair to say my band were pretty well known for our alcoholic exploits back in the day, and while it seemed to be 'part of our charm' then, I can't help wondering about it now. It gave us an image, and I dare say it probably was a large part of our appeal. We were on stage, pissed, and having a fantastic time, therefore so was everyone else. Usually. But it was an incredibly tricky tightrope to walk. The fact remains that despite what we thought at the time, sometimes the crowd were not quite loving it as much as we thought. The number of fantastic gigs we had was more than matched by the amount of embarrassing disasters. One notable occasion ended up with our name being pretty much mud with all the major promoters in Scotland for years after.

I'd say the whole band have experienced difficulties through alcohol, some worse than others, and I'm just not convinced it was worth it.

Drinking is like riding motorbikes. It can be a hell of a lot of fun, and can make you cool. But if you want to ride a bigger bike, the increase in exhilaration is tempered by the risk. You really have to learn how to handle it first. If you can't, you're fucked.

I'm certainly not going to be all pious and say you mustn't drink a bucket before playing, because if the situation allows it, it can be fantastic. For example we played bike rallies where the entire room was utterly fucked, and so were we, hence the gig was great. But these gigs are rare. In most cases, you basically owe it to your paying audience to be fit to play at, or near your best. A pint or two will possibly loosen your inhibitions, maybe increase your 'performance persona', but your technical ability is only ever going to go down. It's up to you to know when you cross the line into cheating your crowd of what they've paid to see.

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Never drank more than a couple of pints when playing apart from 2 occasions.

1) Charity gig last year. I was cunted and some people told me " I have seen Element play a lot tighter".

2) Spike Pile Driver at the Moorings. Minced. Jake and Scorge didnt seem to mind at the time whcih was much appreciated.

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Never drank more than a couple of pints when playing apart from 2 occasions.

1) Charity gig last year. I was cunted

I was worse, went to the pub to watch football, sank five/six pints of the black stuff and nearly forgot I was playing a gig. Oops.......

SPD treat gigs like a night out: therefore if we're on first or second, we're only mildly pished. If we play at the end, we're dangerously fucking blootered.....

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I usually have a pint or two to loosen me up a bit, but never enough to effect me because i have too much to concentrate on when we're playing and it would probably bugger my voice up a bit. I don't really get nervous about playing though, I get very nervous about setting up equipment/thinks not working/strings snapping and all that malarky.

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I've been known to perform with catastrophic results after having a few.

I've also been known, however, to perform with catastrophic results without having a few.

Six and half a dozen I reckon. I tend to have a couple of drinks before playing, sometimes have a pint on stage but usually its just water so my throat's not too bad.

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Two bad experiences in situations like that:

1. Stapleton gig- i sank a couple of pints of Leffe whilst on super drowsy cough medicine (not one of my brightest plans i'll freely admit) and spent most of the gig trying to stay upright and concious. I'm not sure my playing was overly bad though.

2. I'd had a few when i was playing a gig when i was in Undertow and i concussed myself on one of the overhead speakers on the Doctor Drakes stage mid-song. The result was quite comedic and i didn't realise exactly how bad my timing was until i saw some video footage of the song directly after that a few days later and i was clearly playing my percussion parts on a djembe about a bar and a half behind everyone else and in the wrong time signature.

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I've not played much in the way of gigs but I would think to an extent it depends on the situation, how much it is sensible to drink, or not to drink. I think it would also make a difference what sort of enviroment you were in before you went on stage. Personally, I think I would like to distance myself from the audience and be in another location as much as possible before I play. Drinking more than a couple of pints is always going to make you play worse.

On a slightly related note....

I heard a story of a sound engineer who recorded a local band while they were completely 'bleezin'.

At the end of the recording session they claimed it was "the best they had ever played".

The next day, they listened to the recordings and realises that no amount of technology available could make them sound half decent and I believe one of the band members said something to the effect of "we've played gigs worse than this."

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i've played plenty of gigs and at every point on the drunk spectrum from stone cold sober to a complete shape (as anyone who attended the MMw EP launch at Moshulu a few yeara back will remember) and although i love the feeling of rocking out after a few pints, i love even more, the feeling of having played a blinder. that being said, most of my aberdeen gigs these days seem to be in the moorings and with the selection of beverages up there, it'd be silly to play sober! puls, they're usually fudge gigs and they're all about getting mingin' and having a hoot!!

/x

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Guest inc18457

it looks like there is a fairly obvious recurring theme to this thread:

*if you're happy to porbably end up looking a tit, go ahead and have a few drinks.

*if you care about your band, the performance and not 'cheating the crowd out of what they paid for' don't drink until you've played. looking at it, the majority of bands mentioned here don't seem to be the stadium-filling-headliner-types (feel free to correct me!), therefore, why not play the gig to the best of your ability - sober, then get mashed up, there's always plenty time after your set (unless you're closing a night, which as i hinted at abovce, is mabye not the case with som of the bands mentioned here)

the thing about drinking to get rid of nerves sounds like big hairy balls to me. you don't see athletes downing a couple of double vodkas before running their races, do you?

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Ok, the story is that I was possibley the most hungover I've ever been yesterday. I think I must have got accidentally roofied or something (nobody would want a piece of this).

Anyway, for the first time as a guitarist I went on stage without a single drink inside me - and a slightly helpless tone of voice - and it was really easy! The lyrics were in my head... my fingers hit the right strings.

I am born again! Drinking before a show will only make you worse and therefore increasingly nervous as you keep fucking up.

On another note... playing hungover: alright by night time, but it makes last minute practicing quite difficult. You'll be far too busy lying in the foetal position smelling of booze for the majority of the day.

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it looks like there is a fairly obvious recurring theme to this thread:

*if you're happy to porbably end up looking a tit, go ahead and have a few drinks.

*if you care about your band, the performance and not 'cheating the crowd out of what they paid for' don't drink until you've played. looking at it, the majority of bands mentioned here don't seem to be the stadium-filling-headliner-types (feel free to correct me!), therefore, why not play the gig to the best of your ability - sober, then get mashed up, there's always plenty time after your set (unless you're closing a night, which as i hinted at abovce, is mabye not the case with som of the bands mentioned here)

the thing about drinking to get rid of nerves sounds like big hairy balls to me. you don't see athletes downing a couple of double vodkas before running their races, do you?

ya i'd agree here.

i don't like my bands drinkin before we play (but they never seem to listen).

the booze fucks up the vocals (the lyrics and how they generally sound) and makes you think you;re awesome. then next day it seems to be "oh. . ah well doesnt matter. . no-one woulda noticed" even though the paying punters aint gonna want to see the band again. i mean who'd pay for a sub standerd performance?

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