A long way from home today! This came about through keeping in touch with Ian Babington, one of the main players from the Monochrome Museum glory days. Ian was kind enough to offer me this gig in aid of the Young Minds charity, and since I've never really done one of my own gigs outside the West Midlands, it was too good an opportunity to turn down...
Not wanting to mess this one up, I kicked off with the Bitterness/Get Out Of My Head combo. I was amazed at the fact that even though the size of the audience was modest (7 people at best,) they were all watching me attentively as I was playing my songs. I've only come across that before at the Yardbird in Birmingham and it's definitely not something I'm used to! But yeah, we'll have some more of that. Apart from a few fluffed chords, I played the songs well, all the better because people were actually listening to me. That went a long way to making me feel like it mattered.
The next song was interesting, and is one of the few times where an impulse decision to play a song actually worked out OK. I decided to play Let's Start A Band by Amy MacDonald, having been singing it to myself all the way up the M6. I'd never really played that song on my own before - at all, not even rehearsed. I know it because it comes up in Perception, so being the guitar player from that band I know the chords to it, and for how often Hannah misses practice I often end up singing it as well so I know all the words. It was a risky move, but it actually went really well and definitely one to break out again in the right atmosphere!
I did Storm From the North next, after announcing that it was about my old band Crashpoint, and that I wouldn't embarrass anybody by asking them if they'd heard of the band! Again, I fluffed the last part and covered it up by noodling around on the guitar until I remembered the words, and funnily enough it all seemed to work. It's always nice for it to be one of the songs people remember, in this case having it described to me as "The Sea Shanty One." Thinking about it, this song takes me back to the Nightwish gig back in '08, when they were touring Dark Passion Play and put The Poet and The Pendulum as the 'mid-set epic.' For how many parts there are to that song, the middle of the set is probably a good place to put it, where the crowd are hooked and will at that point be interested enough to digest some more abstract material, and it's the same with Storm From The North. It's about as progressive as I get and I think in future I'll be putting this song in the middle, where it can do it's job providing variation from what I've been playing up to that point, while people are still interested...
Moving swifty on, I had a go at Believe. For a song I wrote almost 5 years ago, it's still going strong, and in front of an audience that really was appreciating the music, it went down very well. I played it OK, that's about all I've got to say about that one...
One of the guys in the audience (who turns out to work in Dudley, of all places,) was wearing a Feeder Tshirt, and I wasn't going to miss an opportunity to play a Feeder song in front of someone who wants to hear one! I played High, which is probably the best song of theirs to play at a gig like this because it doesn't necessarily rely on the heavy guitars, but is interesting enough for it to be played on acoustic with one guitar and one voice. It was nice to see people singing along to it as well!
Too late, I realised I'd forgotten to play Girl's Names (I'd have done it instead of Believe if I'd remembered,) but after a gig like this there was only one way I was going to end it, and that was by playing We Will Survive. Not much to say about how I played it; it's all getting tighter! What was interesting was being asked by Ian whether that song was my own, and on telling him it was, (notwithstanding the not-so-obvious fact that I copied most of the music off DragonForce) being told "Well, if writing hooks is the game, you're winning!"
All in all a very good gig and probably the best solo gig that I've done. It felt a lot better for the audience, to be honest. I'd rather play to 7 people who were listening to me than 50 people who weren't. I remember my therapist telling me about The Police's first gig in America. I don't know if it's true or it's an urban myth, but apparently that first gig 8 people turned up to it. The Police did the same show that they'd do to 10,000 people, and good for them, because those 8 people turned out to be New York's most influential journalists and The Police shot up to fame in a very small space of time. Whether that will ever happen to me I don't know, but I think the real message of that is, if the people you saw enjoyed your show, it doesn't matter how many of them there are. It's a bit of a same that I've got to go all the way to Leicester to manage it... but it was a great laugh and I'd happily do it again. Hopefully I'll see you all again soon!
Wednesday, 4 May 2011
Tuesday, 3 May 2011
The Wharf Bar, 30/4/11
A couple of things before I get started: This is probably the last of the string of gigs I've been doing at the Wharf Bar that has lasted about 7 months, so thanks to Jon for re-booking me all those times and thanks to anyone who came to see me during this time! Also, as I mentioned the other day, my choice of songs was largely influenced by my not-so-good gig at Katies on Wednesday, so if this all seems familiar, there's a reason for it...
I got started with the venerable combo of Bitterness and Get Out Of My Head. I've marked those two songs as my attention-grabbers and until I write something that can surpass them in that role (I might! I wrote both of them roughly a year ago so it's not like I'm recycling any of my really old songs,) that is how they're likely to remain. I guess now that I have two, I can get away with switching one around from time to time if I want to try something new, but if I need the gig to go well, definitely open with those two songs.
Impulse decisions to play songs are never usually a good idea but I fancied playing something fast, so I went into a rendition of Hall of Mirrors by The Distillers, something I've not tried for a while. It all went OK actually, I don't think anybody knew it but I was playing that for myself rather than anybody else. Trouble is when I got to the quiet bit, I had to keep up the pace AND keep quiet and I lost it a bit. Other than that it went OK, but I'd be careful where I play it; not one to do if I'm minding my Ps and Qs!
We Will Survive was next, which now that I think about it is a similar sort of pace in a different key so this was probably as good a place as any to put it in the set, though it's usually best reserved as the closer. It's a bit wierd with that song actually because I was reluctant to play it live for a while (last year, before I started doing regular blogs like this.) I always liked the lyrics to it but I find the "Hurricanes and avalanches, fodder for the human monsters" part to be a bit clumsy. Now that I play it at near enough every gig I do, certainly when I'm playing more than about 4 songs, I can't imagine it sounding any other way, and it's become one of the main songs that I play sticking with the 'rock songs on an acoustic guitar' theme I appear to be doing so well. Anyway...
I chose to play Prisoner Of My Mind today to see if it would go down any better here. Again, it might; there's usually a number of people in the audience at the Wharf who are experienced enough to remember Radiohead at their peak, and we almost always get Creep played between bands, so catering for the shoegazing Indie audience isn't too much of a bad idea in this context. It went down as well as it ever does, I guess, but when the new material starts to take shape it might have to be relegated to the longer gigs because it's not exactly uplifing.
Linger by the Cranberries was next; I know Dave told me to leave that one alone but everyone else seemed to like it when I tried it before so I gave it another go. In hindsight, it would have helped if I'd have practiced it before. I need to be more careful with that chorus though; there's only so long I can hold 'finger' on without feeling very silly. I made mistakes with that A6 chord that is pretty much integral to the song and shouldn't have happened. And I can't shake off the feeling that, even though I have no trouble hitting the notes, the song doesn't necessarily fit my voice too well. Still, it's a nice, safe song to play if the occasion calls for it, and it seemed to go down OK.
I finished off with Storm From The North. Again, this proved an interesting one: apart from mucking up the chords occasionally, I once again found myself forgetting the words to the last part of the song. Now you would think, wouldn't you, that after playing this song live for nearly a month I'd make some semblence of an effort to learn the words properly, especially as it's always the same bit I get wrong. Obviously I haven't... but thinking about why not, I think it's because I actually quite like being able to cover up the fact that I don't know the words to my own song by noodling around on the E string for a while. Who else is going to know? I don't think there was anybody in the room other than the sound guy (I think) who had heard me play it before. With a suitably climatic ending I think it's a good one to end the set with, though I may have to let it achieve a more familiar place in my set before I put it there again.
So, all in all a far more focused and effective gig than the last solo outing. The reaction was near enough the same but that's more typical of the venue as much as anything else. I was happier with the way that I'd played and my choice of songs, and kudos to Mezzotonic who never fail to ensure that I'm having a really great time for half an hour...
I got started with the venerable combo of Bitterness and Get Out Of My Head. I've marked those two songs as my attention-grabbers and until I write something that can surpass them in that role (I might! I wrote both of them roughly a year ago so it's not like I'm recycling any of my really old songs,) that is how they're likely to remain. I guess now that I have two, I can get away with switching one around from time to time if I want to try something new, but if I need the gig to go well, definitely open with those two songs.
Impulse decisions to play songs are never usually a good idea but I fancied playing something fast, so I went into a rendition of Hall of Mirrors by The Distillers, something I've not tried for a while. It all went OK actually, I don't think anybody knew it but I was playing that for myself rather than anybody else. Trouble is when I got to the quiet bit, I had to keep up the pace AND keep quiet and I lost it a bit. Other than that it went OK, but I'd be careful where I play it; not one to do if I'm minding my Ps and Qs!
We Will Survive was next, which now that I think about it is a similar sort of pace in a different key so this was probably as good a place as any to put it in the set, though it's usually best reserved as the closer. It's a bit wierd with that song actually because I was reluctant to play it live for a while (last year, before I started doing regular blogs like this.) I always liked the lyrics to it but I find the "Hurricanes and avalanches, fodder for the human monsters" part to be a bit clumsy. Now that I play it at near enough every gig I do, certainly when I'm playing more than about 4 songs, I can't imagine it sounding any other way, and it's become one of the main songs that I play sticking with the 'rock songs on an acoustic guitar' theme I appear to be doing so well. Anyway...
I chose to play Prisoner Of My Mind today to see if it would go down any better here. Again, it might; there's usually a number of people in the audience at the Wharf who are experienced enough to remember Radiohead at their peak, and we almost always get Creep played between bands, so catering for the shoegazing Indie audience isn't too much of a bad idea in this context. It went down as well as it ever does, I guess, but when the new material starts to take shape it might have to be relegated to the longer gigs because it's not exactly uplifing.
Linger by the Cranberries was next; I know Dave told me to leave that one alone but everyone else seemed to like it when I tried it before so I gave it another go. In hindsight, it would have helped if I'd have practiced it before. I need to be more careful with that chorus though; there's only so long I can hold 'finger' on without feeling very silly. I made mistakes with that A6 chord that is pretty much integral to the song and shouldn't have happened. And I can't shake off the feeling that, even though I have no trouble hitting the notes, the song doesn't necessarily fit my voice too well. Still, it's a nice, safe song to play if the occasion calls for it, and it seemed to go down OK.
I finished off with Storm From The North. Again, this proved an interesting one: apart from mucking up the chords occasionally, I once again found myself forgetting the words to the last part of the song. Now you would think, wouldn't you, that after playing this song live for nearly a month I'd make some semblence of an effort to learn the words properly, especially as it's always the same bit I get wrong. Obviously I haven't... but thinking about why not, I think it's because I actually quite like being able to cover up the fact that I don't know the words to my own song by noodling around on the E string for a while. Who else is going to know? I don't think there was anybody in the room other than the sound guy (I think) who had heard me play it before. With a suitably climatic ending I think it's a good one to end the set with, though I may have to let it achieve a more familiar place in my set before I put it there again.
So, all in all a far more focused and effective gig than the last solo outing. The reaction was near enough the same but that's more typical of the venue as much as anything else. I was happier with the way that I'd played and my choice of songs, and kudos to Mezzotonic who never fail to ensure that I'm having a really great time for half an hour...
Monday, 2 May 2011
29/5/2011 The Fakes: Baseline Venue, The Earl of Dudley Arms
For those of you who don't know, The Fakes are my indie-rock covers band that keep quite a low profile but always do great shows. We've known Frank and James literally since they started the Basement studios and it's a pleasure to play in their venue.
For the uninitiated, a quick history of the band and my involvement with it: I was asked to join on bass guitar back in 2004 when I answered an ad in what I believe was the Dudley Chronicle. It turned out Drewey on the drums and Harvey the singer had been in bands before, they pulled Matt on guitar in from Drewey's work and Steve on guitar from... somewhere, I never found out where. We spent the following couple of years putting together a set of different popular songs, basically choosing them on the basis of what we enjoyed playing. Gigs were not regular because of various other bits and pieces the band were involved with (they're all a bit older than me and were getting married, having kids, etc.) Steve had to leave in 07 when he hurt his hand to the point that posed a significant risk to him should he continue to play guitar, and after floundering around for a while, we eventually recruited Steve (different Steve) on bass and I switched to lead guitar. 6 gigs in 7 years is not great, but you know what, we've kept it together for that long which is more than you can say for any of my other bands...
So this was our first gig in a while! I'm not going to do a track-by-track review of our own gig here. We knew it was going to go well because it always does; we play the right kind of music for the right kind of people. Yes, there were mistakes, there always are, and sometimes I joke that we trade on the idea that everyone's hammered and can't tell if we're mucking it up. Being far less cynical about it, it's more likely that we like to make sure that EVERYBODY in the room is having a good time, all of the time.
The original plan was 10 songs, because of the way things work at the Baseline. So we chose 10 of our heavyweights and got ready to play them, to discover that one of the bands had pulled the gig and it was actually 14-15 songs we could play. Highlights of the set... Opening with She Sells Sanctuary is something every cover band should do at least once, and is not a moment any of us are likely to forget. I was very pleased with myself when we nailed She Bangs The Drums. Our ska version of 7 Nation Army wasn't as well-received as I'd have liked, perhaps we need to work on that a bit more with more references to the style of music. Set closer Dakota was by far the best one we did that night, and possibly ever.
Criticisms? Well, the crowd were reluctant to let us leave the stage - which, for all the gigs I've been doing this year, is a rare and pleasant feeling - but we stuck around for far too long playing songs that we hadn't really rehearsed, and it showed. We know the songs well enough to get all the way through them, but the cracks were there and were getting ever larger. Kudos to Frank for calling a halt to proceedings when he did. Being drunk (as a band) and high as a kite on adrenaline is not a good combination and we need to be a bit more disciplined about that in the future.
For now, though, let's take a moment to remember the mot enjoyable gig I have done for a long, long time...
For the uninitiated, a quick history of the band and my involvement with it: I was asked to join on bass guitar back in 2004 when I answered an ad in what I believe was the Dudley Chronicle. It turned out Drewey on the drums and Harvey the singer had been in bands before, they pulled Matt on guitar in from Drewey's work and Steve on guitar from... somewhere, I never found out where. We spent the following couple of years putting together a set of different popular songs, basically choosing them on the basis of what we enjoyed playing. Gigs were not regular because of various other bits and pieces the band were involved with (they're all a bit older than me and were getting married, having kids, etc.) Steve had to leave in 07 when he hurt his hand to the point that posed a significant risk to him should he continue to play guitar, and after floundering around for a while, we eventually recruited Steve (different Steve) on bass and I switched to lead guitar. 6 gigs in 7 years is not great, but you know what, we've kept it together for that long which is more than you can say for any of my other bands...
So this was our first gig in a while! I'm not going to do a track-by-track review of our own gig here. We knew it was going to go well because it always does; we play the right kind of music for the right kind of people. Yes, there were mistakes, there always are, and sometimes I joke that we trade on the idea that everyone's hammered and can't tell if we're mucking it up. Being far less cynical about it, it's more likely that we like to make sure that EVERYBODY in the room is having a good time, all of the time.
The original plan was 10 songs, because of the way things work at the Baseline. So we chose 10 of our heavyweights and got ready to play them, to discover that one of the bands had pulled the gig and it was actually 14-15 songs we could play. Highlights of the set... Opening with She Sells Sanctuary is something every cover band should do at least once, and is not a moment any of us are likely to forget. I was very pleased with myself when we nailed She Bangs The Drums. Our ska version of 7 Nation Army wasn't as well-received as I'd have liked, perhaps we need to work on that a bit more with more references to the style of music. Set closer Dakota was by far the best one we did that night, and possibly ever.
Criticisms? Well, the crowd were reluctant to let us leave the stage - which, for all the gigs I've been doing this year, is a rare and pleasant feeling - but we stuck around for far too long playing songs that we hadn't really rehearsed, and it showed. We know the songs well enough to get all the way through them, but the cracks were there and were getting ever larger. Kudos to Frank for calling a halt to proceedings when he did. Being drunk (as a band) and high as a kite on adrenaline is not a good combination and we need to be a bit more disciplined about that in the future.
For now, though, let's take a moment to remember the mot enjoyable gig I have done for a long, long time...
Saturday, 30 April 2011
Katy Fitzgeralds, 27/4/2011
Yet again I find myself with a backlog of blogs for the various bits and pieces that I've been doing. I have been a busy boy!
This one, I've got to be honest, didn't feel so good for me. This is unusual for Katies, usually I quite enjoy it, but either I wasn't feeling it, or my confidence was knocked by the people who were walking out while I was playing (I'm sure there were good reasons for it, in fact I spoke to two people afterwards who had perfectly good reasons I'd have to be a cruel man indeed to begrudge them,) or maybe even with the various bank holidays this week people's minds aren't in the right place at the moment. Whatever the reason, tonight wasn't my night.
As it was less than 2 weeks since I last played Katies, I decided to turn my set list on it's head. Not one of my best-timed decisions, if I'm honest; most of the people in the room had never seen me before so it was only Sam and Stefan who would have noticed. Why deviate from what I know works? But I did, and started off with Get Out Of My Head. I managed to intrigue the audience by playing the first verse and chorus without any chords and a backbeat played by banging on my guitar, and I played the rest of the song well enough to polite applause.
I've not written a set list for an acoustic gig for a while now, I tend to only do it if I'm in a band and need everybody else to know what's going on! Acoustic gigs, I generally pick four or five songs I definitely want to play and fill in the gaps with whatever I can think of at the time. I placed We Will Survive next, and I think that was probably not the right time for this song, given I start it with an a'capello chorus - which I'd basically just done with Get Out Of My Head. The idea would have got old after two songs, so it probably didn't do so much damage as I'm suggesting here, but it's one to keep in mind for the future not to put those two songs together.
Girl's Names was next. Apart from the fact that I'm playing the transition to 12/8 a lot more smoothly now than I have been, this song was faily unremarkable. It usually goes down well and for that reason I play it every time I play Katies - but, perhaps as a result, I didn't notice much of a reaction tonight.
I announced a new song and started playing Amy's Song. For those of you who listen to Switchfoot, this is a very different song that I wrote about my girlfriend. This was the first time I'd ever played it live and it's a dramatic change from my usual melancholic style; whether it's a particularly good idea to do it in a set this short is debatable at this point. It's going to take a few more goes before I figure it out. However I noted that it was this point that a significant number of people were walking out, which didn't do much to raise my confidence in playing the song live...
I think at all my gigs I'll always do either Believe or Prisoner of my Mind, and tonight I elected to do Prisoner. I didn't get much of a reaction out of this either, but then again by now there weren't all that many people left to react! Not a good sign for what was once (OK, 3 years ago) considered my best song.
I had at least remembered to put a couple of heavyweights at the end, and even though it was a little too late to pull it back by then there is such a thing as going down fighting. Few of my songs are better for that than Bitterness! Still, I think I'll have to stick with opening with this one. If I'm going to inject the correct amount of bile into the chorus I either need to use it to get the adrenaline going and surprising the audience, or the entire gig has to have gone well, neither of which were the case tonight. But other than that I played it OK.
I ended with Storm from the North, which I think was the first time in a while I made it all the way through the song without forgetting any of the words, kudos to me for that! I think this one will end the greater majority of the shows now, but it's like driving up a hill when it's snowing - I need to have a certain amount of momentum when I hit it, otherwise I'll get stuck half way up. I think that's a reasonable metaphor for, OK it's a good song, but if the gig hasn't been good then it's not going to change anybody's minds.
I doubt that those few people who did watch me all the way though would tell me that it was as bad as all that, and I have been quite harsh on myself this time. But that isn't the sort of gig that I want to make a habit of doing. I've got the Wharf Bar again tonight, and the fact that audiences there generally are quite unresponsive makes that gig very hard work, I don't need to be making it any harder for myself! The mistake was, I think, switching the set around. Bitterness and Get Out Of My Head are the attention grabbers, We Will Survive and Storm from the North are the set-closing epics, everything else is filler though there are some that are good enough to play them at most shows. Let's see what happens tonight...
This one, I've got to be honest, didn't feel so good for me. This is unusual for Katies, usually I quite enjoy it, but either I wasn't feeling it, or my confidence was knocked by the people who were walking out while I was playing (I'm sure there were good reasons for it, in fact I spoke to two people afterwards who had perfectly good reasons I'd have to be a cruel man indeed to begrudge them,) or maybe even with the various bank holidays this week people's minds aren't in the right place at the moment. Whatever the reason, tonight wasn't my night.
As it was less than 2 weeks since I last played Katies, I decided to turn my set list on it's head. Not one of my best-timed decisions, if I'm honest; most of the people in the room had never seen me before so it was only Sam and Stefan who would have noticed. Why deviate from what I know works? But I did, and started off with Get Out Of My Head. I managed to intrigue the audience by playing the first verse and chorus without any chords and a backbeat played by banging on my guitar, and I played the rest of the song well enough to polite applause.
I've not written a set list for an acoustic gig for a while now, I tend to only do it if I'm in a band and need everybody else to know what's going on! Acoustic gigs, I generally pick four or five songs I definitely want to play and fill in the gaps with whatever I can think of at the time. I placed We Will Survive next, and I think that was probably not the right time for this song, given I start it with an a'capello chorus - which I'd basically just done with Get Out Of My Head. The idea would have got old after two songs, so it probably didn't do so much damage as I'm suggesting here, but it's one to keep in mind for the future not to put those two songs together.
Girl's Names was next. Apart from the fact that I'm playing the transition to 12/8 a lot more smoothly now than I have been, this song was faily unremarkable. It usually goes down well and for that reason I play it every time I play Katies - but, perhaps as a result, I didn't notice much of a reaction tonight.
I announced a new song and started playing Amy's Song. For those of you who listen to Switchfoot, this is a very different song that I wrote about my girlfriend. This was the first time I'd ever played it live and it's a dramatic change from my usual melancholic style; whether it's a particularly good idea to do it in a set this short is debatable at this point. It's going to take a few more goes before I figure it out. However I noted that it was this point that a significant number of people were walking out, which didn't do much to raise my confidence in playing the song live...
I think at all my gigs I'll always do either Believe or Prisoner of my Mind, and tonight I elected to do Prisoner. I didn't get much of a reaction out of this either, but then again by now there weren't all that many people left to react! Not a good sign for what was once (OK, 3 years ago) considered my best song.
I had at least remembered to put a couple of heavyweights at the end, and even though it was a little too late to pull it back by then there is such a thing as going down fighting. Few of my songs are better for that than Bitterness! Still, I think I'll have to stick with opening with this one. If I'm going to inject the correct amount of bile into the chorus I either need to use it to get the adrenaline going and surprising the audience, or the entire gig has to have gone well, neither of which were the case tonight. But other than that I played it OK.
I ended with Storm from the North, which I think was the first time in a while I made it all the way through the song without forgetting any of the words, kudos to me for that! I think this one will end the greater majority of the shows now, but it's like driving up a hill when it's snowing - I need to have a certain amount of momentum when I hit it, otherwise I'll get stuck half way up. I think that's a reasonable metaphor for, OK it's a good song, but if the gig hasn't been good then it's not going to change anybody's minds.
I doubt that those few people who did watch me all the way though would tell me that it was as bad as all that, and I have been quite harsh on myself this time. But that isn't the sort of gig that I want to make a habit of doing. I've got the Wharf Bar again tonight, and the fact that audiences there generally are quite unresponsive makes that gig very hard work, I don't need to be making it any harder for myself! The mistake was, I think, switching the set around. Bitterness and Get Out Of My Head are the attention grabbers, We Will Survive and Storm from the North are the set-closing epics, everything else is filler though there are some that are good enough to play them at most shows. Let's see what happens tonight...
Wednesday, 27 April 2011
The Yardbird, 19/4/11
Right about now there is a burglar alarm going off outside my house and it is driving me INSANE...
I heard that the Yardbird did an open night on Tuesdays so as I was staying in Birmingham last week I decided to go down and have a look. What I didn't know was that there were featured artists on beforehand and the actual open part of the night didn't start until 10pm, so Amy and I ended up going for a Cantonese first which was very nice. Unusually for open nights most of the guys I saw were only doing one or maybe two songs, I told the guy Jason that I had four, took the stage and got on with it...
Regular readers will have heard about my last visit to the Yardbird and while I was there I did a quick mental assessment of the sort of music the guys there would appreciate. As a lot of my songs are quite agressive I was a bit funny about playing some of them, however I was always going to play Get Out Of My Head. I started this one off somewhat slower than usual, I'm not sure whether I like that or not yet but it lends a certain subtlety to it, and the crowd really seemed to like it!
Bitterness was one of the songs I was umming and arring about, but I played it anyway two songs in and I needn't have worried, I got some very appreciative applause for that and it was about this time that I realised that the crowd at the Yardbird is actually really really good, and I'm really looking forward to my next one there.
It was all looking so good... until I did Storm from the North. It began well enough, apart from the previously-described problems with the vocal range being a little too low for me. The problem came when I was belting out the second chorus to have my D string snap on me. Thankfully I knew what had happened straight away, didn't panic and carried on right to the end of the chorus, yanked what remained of the string off and followed it up with the quiet bit. The guitar was obviously a bit out of tune by then, and possibly owing to the stress of breaking the string I also forgot the words to the last bit which I covered up by noodling around on the E string for a bit, but I got to the end of the song to a great applause from the crowd.
Given the circumstances, I decided to call it a night at that point, the other song would have been Walking on the Sun and I can't really do that without the D string. It was unfortunate, but it happens, and I think I made my point. I'll definitely be going to the Yardbird again!
I heard that the Yardbird did an open night on Tuesdays so as I was staying in Birmingham last week I decided to go down and have a look. What I didn't know was that there were featured artists on beforehand and the actual open part of the night didn't start until 10pm, so Amy and I ended up going for a Cantonese first which was very nice. Unusually for open nights most of the guys I saw were only doing one or maybe two songs, I told the guy Jason that I had four, took the stage and got on with it...
Regular readers will have heard about my last visit to the Yardbird and while I was there I did a quick mental assessment of the sort of music the guys there would appreciate. As a lot of my songs are quite agressive I was a bit funny about playing some of them, however I was always going to play Get Out Of My Head. I started this one off somewhat slower than usual, I'm not sure whether I like that or not yet but it lends a certain subtlety to it, and the crowd really seemed to like it!
Bitterness was one of the songs I was umming and arring about, but I played it anyway two songs in and I needn't have worried, I got some very appreciative applause for that and it was about this time that I realised that the crowd at the Yardbird is actually really really good, and I'm really looking forward to my next one there.
It was all looking so good... until I did Storm from the North. It began well enough, apart from the previously-described problems with the vocal range being a little too low for me. The problem came when I was belting out the second chorus to have my D string snap on me. Thankfully I knew what had happened straight away, didn't panic and carried on right to the end of the chorus, yanked what remained of the string off and followed it up with the quiet bit. The guitar was obviously a bit out of tune by then, and possibly owing to the stress of breaking the string I also forgot the words to the last bit which I covered up by noodling around on the E string for a bit, but I got to the end of the song to a great applause from the crowd.
Given the circumstances, I decided to call it a night at that point, the other song would have been Walking on the Sun and I can't really do that without the D string. It was unfortunate, but it happens, and I think I made my point. I'll definitely be going to the Yardbird again!
Tuesday, 26 April 2011
Pan and the Poets at The Yardbird, 17/4/2011
I've really got to hurry up with this or I'll have done another gig by the time I've written up all my ones for April...
So as I mentioned earlier, I'm depping on bass for Pan and the Poets now. Or at least I was, more on that later. I had my debut with them at The Yardbird a couple of Sundays ago, I was very impressed with the place and was back there the following Tuesday. After setting up, we had what I can only describe as 'The usual problems with the microphones.' Bearing in mind that I've known Luke since school, and later 6th form, rare are the times when he's happy with how the vocals sound first time. In this case we couldn't hear Andy singing and it took a few minutes to put it right, during which all I could really do was keep quiet until we'd got it sorted, though I did reach for my earplugs when the microphones started to pop...
After this, we began with The Quail and The Cat, because Luke reckons this is a good one to begin with to get the levels sorted out because it's all about the vocals. I don't know about that, but I enjoyed playing it; in the absence of any specific bassline in the verse I twiddled around with the Gm pentatonic over the relevant chords and I think it sounded really good. Highlight for me - and Luke, he told me later - was when he brought the bass in for the second chorus. It's a simple line, but you don't half feel like a pro when you play it!
Next was Girl Like You, which is Pan and the Poet's staple track having done it at every single gig they've played. I played this as well as I needed to, I think; once you know the bass lines to it it's almost impossible to play wrong. I don't know whether it's the band's most inspiring song, but they play it well and we held it together that night.
Victory Cafe came after that, I love this song! If ever a party's going flat, get the Ska out. I don't know what bassline Jack originally played for this track so I considered the style of music and went for something inspired by The Specials. It was working well until the instrumental bridge parts bit, where I forgot what notes I was supposed to be playing and started paying A sharp when I should have been playing A, which threw me on the next note as well. Nobody seemed to notice, but that shouldn't have happened. Concentrate!
Queen of Hearts was a mission, because for some technical reason I can't fathom, I only learned it that day. This was a lot of following Luke's chords and keeping it simple; any attempt to go off on one would be followed very shortly by me falling flat on my face. In spite of this, I think we held it together very well indeed; I made it to the end of the song without any glaring errors and the crowed seemed to like it.
Liberty a Paris (There's supposed to be French punctuation in the title to that song, but by nature of not being French, I don't know where they go) is a really good song to play live because if the gig is going well and it's the right atmosphere, it may well turn into a barn dance. For the most part it's a relatively simple 'Hoe Down' bassline, and I was really pleased when I saw some guys at the front clapping with the band in the a'capello chorus. Tripped up on the final rundown to the root chord at the end, which shouldn't have happened, but hey, the crowd liked the song and that's what counts!
Rat Dog was supposed to end the set. This song is very rhythmic and the bassline is easy enough to follow, right until the fast punky bit at the end. Luke had told me that this part is very busy, so rather than work out anything specific (bearing in mind I had all the other songs to learn as well,) I decided to just go off on one and noodle around E minor for a bit. It would have worked if Ste on guitar hadn't been doing the same thing; I've never been in to the sound of both guitar and bass doing solos at the same time. Granted we had the keyboards and nylon guitar to hold it all together, but in hindsight, I reckon I should have stuck to a riff for this part. Should it come up again, need to have a word with the guitar player before the gig to find out who's doing what!
We ended with Jukebox, which is a nice one to finish a gig with and always takes me back to the first gig I did on bass in the school production of Grease. Not much to say about this one; we played it well and I enjoyed it.
So, my first gig with Pan and the Poets wasn't too bad at all! Unfortunately it's also my last gig with Pan and the Poets, as for his own reasons Luke has decided to leave the band and I can't see the others carrying on without him, not least because Andy will be in Spain from next September. Not a long tenure then, though Luke and I have been friends for a long time now and I do like his songwriting, so I'm sure our paths will cross again.
So what happened at the Yardbird the following Tuesday?
I'll tell you tomorrow...
So as I mentioned earlier, I'm depping on bass for Pan and the Poets now. Or at least I was, more on that later. I had my debut with them at The Yardbird a couple of Sundays ago, I was very impressed with the place and was back there the following Tuesday. After setting up, we had what I can only describe as 'The usual problems with the microphones.' Bearing in mind that I've known Luke since school, and later 6th form, rare are the times when he's happy with how the vocals sound first time. In this case we couldn't hear Andy singing and it took a few minutes to put it right, during which all I could really do was keep quiet until we'd got it sorted, though I did reach for my earplugs when the microphones started to pop...
After this, we began with The Quail and The Cat, because Luke reckons this is a good one to begin with to get the levels sorted out because it's all about the vocals. I don't know about that, but I enjoyed playing it; in the absence of any specific bassline in the verse I twiddled around with the Gm pentatonic over the relevant chords and I think it sounded really good. Highlight for me - and Luke, he told me later - was when he brought the bass in for the second chorus. It's a simple line, but you don't half feel like a pro when you play it!
Next was Girl Like You, which is Pan and the Poet's staple track having done it at every single gig they've played. I played this as well as I needed to, I think; once you know the bass lines to it it's almost impossible to play wrong. I don't know whether it's the band's most inspiring song, but they play it well and we held it together that night.
Victory Cafe came after that, I love this song! If ever a party's going flat, get the Ska out. I don't know what bassline Jack originally played for this track so I considered the style of music and went for something inspired by The Specials. It was working well until the instrumental bridge parts bit, where I forgot what notes I was supposed to be playing and started paying A sharp when I should have been playing A, which threw me on the next note as well. Nobody seemed to notice, but that shouldn't have happened. Concentrate!
Queen of Hearts was a mission, because for some technical reason I can't fathom, I only learned it that day. This was a lot of following Luke's chords and keeping it simple; any attempt to go off on one would be followed very shortly by me falling flat on my face. In spite of this, I think we held it together very well indeed; I made it to the end of the song without any glaring errors and the crowed seemed to like it.
Liberty a Paris (There's supposed to be French punctuation in the title to that song, but by nature of not being French, I don't know where they go) is a really good song to play live because if the gig is going well and it's the right atmosphere, it may well turn into a barn dance. For the most part it's a relatively simple 'Hoe Down' bassline, and I was really pleased when I saw some guys at the front clapping with the band in the a'capello chorus. Tripped up on the final rundown to the root chord at the end, which shouldn't have happened, but hey, the crowd liked the song and that's what counts!
Rat Dog was supposed to end the set. This song is very rhythmic and the bassline is easy enough to follow, right until the fast punky bit at the end. Luke had told me that this part is very busy, so rather than work out anything specific (bearing in mind I had all the other songs to learn as well,) I decided to just go off on one and noodle around E minor for a bit. It would have worked if Ste on guitar hadn't been doing the same thing; I've never been in to the sound of both guitar and bass doing solos at the same time. Granted we had the keyboards and nylon guitar to hold it all together, but in hindsight, I reckon I should have stuck to a riff for this part. Should it come up again, need to have a word with the guitar player before the gig to find out who's doing what!
We ended with Jukebox, which is a nice one to finish a gig with and always takes me back to the first gig I did on bass in the school production of Grease. Not much to say about this one; we played it well and I enjoyed it.
So, my first gig with Pan and the Poets wasn't too bad at all! Unfortunately it's also my last gig with Pan and the Poets, as for his own reasons Luke has decided to leave the band and I can't see the others carrying on without him, not least because Andy will be in Spain from next September. Not a long tenure then, though Luke and I have been friends for a long time now and I do like his songwriting, so I'm sure our paths will cross again.
So what happened at the Yardbird the following Tuesday?
I'll tell you tomorrow...
Sunday, 24 April 2011
15/4/11 Katy Fitzgeralds
Whew, am I ever behind in this!
I came back to Amy's from the Bull Ring on Friday to find that Sam had messaged a few people for an emergency booking. I asked if there were any slots left and they were kind enough to give me five songs. Interestingly this was downstairs at Katies; it's not Acoustic Brew so there were supposed to be full bands on. There wasn't a band tonight, but hey, I do what I can.
It didn't get off to a flying start as I kicked off with Bitterness and forgot what song I was playing. It sounds silly but there is a reason for it: Apart from the far larger amount of spite and agression I put in to Bitterness, the intro to it sounds almost exactly the same as Girl's Names, same chord and everything. (Which, incidentally, is why I never put those two songs together in the set list.) So it took me a minute to remember what to do next, which thankfully I passed of as the overlong introduction I sometimes do to Bitterness when I play it first. Apart from that, it all went OK, but my mind probably wasn't in the right place when I kicked off that night!
I followed it up with the fairly predictable Get out of my Head, which actually seems to be more consistent with how well it's going down these days, pleasing to see. Can't say why, maybe I'm playing the relatively difficult song with more confidence these days and it's coming across. I'd like to think so. However, because of the way the sound was mixed, I noticed a few errors. One thing I really shouldn't be doing is playing the A string when I hit the D minor chord, but those bass frequencies were really ringing out through the monitor so I could hear I was doing that a lot. This is especially important in a solo situation because I haven't got a bass player to hit those low notes; it's all coming from me. I shouldn't be wanting Ds and playing As. That one might need a bit more practice.
Then I lent my cement-mixer-like voice to The Kill by 30 Seconds To Mars. Since I've been playing this song I've since discovered that there is an acoustic version of this song already by the band themselves, but in front of the right audience this will never go down badly as long as I play it correctly. Tonight was no exception and when I spoke to some people after the show, this was the one that they remembered. Fine, but I don't like to play the same cover twice in rapid succession; I'll end up boring myself and anyone who comes to see me more than a couple of times a month. Still, that's a good one to break out if it's going a bit flat and my audience is roughly my age or younger!
Girl's Names is a song I think I will play every time I play Katies because this is the one people tend to remember and sing along to when I come back a month later. I enjoy it a lot more now than I did when I first started playing it live, even the 12/8 bit doesn't sound so pretentious to me now! It didn't go down a storm, but then again my mid-set jobbers rarely do once the novelty has worn off. To be honest I don't think I could have done this one much better, and I'm thankful for that!
I finished off with Storm from the North. This one takes me back to my Crashpoint days, not least because the song is about the band, but also because of its position in the set. I remember when the band wrote Get This Manic Off Me; we had one more gig at the Wharf Bar to do before J left the band. J came up with the riff, we wrote the song and thought, "Wow, this is actually really really good!" It was a bit of a gamble but we started the set with the song that we usually finish with, and ended the set with the new song, because we knew it was amazing and we would play it well whatever happened. It was a bit of a shame I never learned the words to it so I could carry the song on after Emma left the band, but then again we were never really the same after that last show with J anyway. We got a little bit better, but...
To return from my digression, I've noticed a couple of things about this song, the first of which is that I forget the words to it; it's always the last bit as well. Thankfully, that night, there was only Amy in the audience who knew what the song was supposed to sound like in the first place, so nobody else seemed to notice that when I was plucking a melody on my top strings it was purely because I didn't know what else to sing. The second thing is that it's a little too low for me to sing comfortably. Normally in this situation I would use a capo, but that's not an option for me with this song. Remember those instrumental sections between the chorus and the verse? Well, that's supposed to have a tin whistle in them. The whistle that I have, whether I like it or not, has a range of D to about high B, I think, the same as a descant recorder. Which means that the best key for me to play in is G or Em. So I can only really play the song in Em. Is it possible to work on my voice so I can sing lower and still make a convincing sound? Time will tell...
Well that's it for the time being, I've got two more gigs to write up but I'm going to have a break for now. See you soon...
I came back to Amy's from the Bull Ring on Friday to find that Sam had messaged a few people for an emergency booking. I asked if there were any slots left and they were kind enough to give me five songs. Interestingly this was downstairs at Katies; it's not Acoustic Brew so there were supposed to be full bands on. There wasn't a band tonight, but hey, I do what I can.
It didn't get off to a flying start as I kicked off with Bitterness and forgot what song I was playing. It sounds silly but there is a reason for it: Apart from the far larger amount of spite and agression I put in to Bitterness, the intro to it sounds almost exactly the same as Girl's Names, same chord and everything. (Which, incidentally, is why I never put those two songs together in the set list.) So it took me a minute to remember what to do next, which thankfully I passed of as the overlong introduction I sometimes do to Bitterness when I play it first. Apart from that, it all went OK, but my mind probably wasn't in the right place when I kicked off that night!
I followed it up with the fairly predictable Get out of my Head, which actually seems to be more consistent with how well it's going down these days, pleasing to see. Can't say why, maybe I'm playing the relatively difficult song with more confidence these days and it's coming across. I'd like to think so. However, because of the way the sound was mixed, I noticed a few errors. One thing I really shouldn't be doing is playing the A string when I hit the D minor chord, but those bass frequencies were really ringing out through the monitor so I could hear I was doing that a lot. This is especially important in a solo situation because I haven't got a bass player to hit those low notes; it's all coming from me. I shouldn't be wanting Ds and playing As. That one might need a bit more practice.
Then I lent my cement-mixer-like voice to The Kill by 30 Seconds To Mars. Since I've been playing this song I've since discovered that there is an acoustic version of this song already by the band themselves, but in front of the right audience this will never go down badly as long as I play it correctly. Tonight was no exception and when I spoke to some people after the show, this was the one that they remembered. Fine, but I don't like to play the same cover twice in rapid succession; I'll end up boring myself and anyone who comes to see me more than a couple of times a month. Still, that's a good one to break out if it's going a bit flat and my audience is roughly my age or younger!
Girl's Names is a song I think I will play every time I play Katies because this is the one people tend to remember and sing along to when I come back a month later. I enjoy it a lot more now than I did when I first started playing it live, even the 12/8 bit doesn't sound so pretentious to me now! It didn't go down a storm, but then again my mid-set jobbers rarely do once the novelty has worn off. To be honest I don't think I could have done this one much better, and I'm thankful for that!
I finished off with Storm from the North. This one takes me back to my Crashpoint days, not least because the song is about the band, but also because of its position in the set. I remember when the band wrote Get This Manic Off Me; we had one more gig at the Wharf Bar to do before J left the band. J came up with the riff, we wrote the song and thought, "Wow, this is actually really really good!" It was a bit of a gamble but we started the set with the song that we usually finish with, and ended the set with the new song, because we knew it was amazing and we would play it well whatever happened. It was a bit of a shame I never learned the words to it so I could carry the song on after Emma left the band, but then again we were never really the same after that last show with J anyway. We got a little bit better, but...
To return from my digression, I've noticed a couple of things about this song, the first of which is that I forget the words to it; it's always the last bit as well. Thankfully, that night, there was only Amy in the audience who knew what the song was supposed to sound like in the first place, so nobody else seemed to notice that when I was plucking a melody on my top strings it was purely because I didn't know what else to sing. The second thing is that it's a little too low for me to sing comfortably. Normally in this situation I would use a capo, but that's not an option for me with this song. Remember those instrumental sections between the chorus and the verse? Well, that's supposed to have a tin whistle in them. The whistle that I have, whether I like it or not, has a range of D to about high B, I think, the same as a descant recorder. Which means that the best key for me to play in is G or Em. So I can only really play the song in Em. Is it possible to work on my voice so I can sing lower and still make a convincing sound? Time will tell...
Well that's it for the time being, I've got two more gigs to write up but I'm going to have a break for now. See you soon...
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