2006-10-28 The Finest Worksong

Well, last week was so hectic! We finally made it to a gig - firstly we played a gig at an open mic session and secondly at a Battle of the Bands competition.

At the Leederville Hotel, we seemed to wait forever! Our slot was meant to be at 10.30, but it was close to 11pm before we got on! We had to sit through some really good performers, and some absolutely dire ones too! It almost seemed like our worst nightmare when, at 10.30 a group finished, and the stage just kept filling up with more performers - one introduced each song at length, and was a bit drunk, and wailed into the mike! When he did a version on 'Jolene', that is when I just gave up worrying. We all had a bit of a laugh, but were absolutely knackered by the time we went on. Steve brought loads of people down, Duffy brought a couple of people, and me and Kyle brought no one. We were all a bit nervous when we got on, but by Am I Close, we felt great! Closedown my guitar went completely out of tune, and I ended up not even playing it, so Steve had to cover for both guitars, which was hard work.

The Battle of the Bands was much better, albeit a fairly slim crowd of 20-30 people, most of whom we knew, which Kyle and I invited. It was great to see people come and support us, such a shame the sound engineer did an absolutely crap job of miking everyone up - he completely forgot about my acoustic, turned the wrong mike of when it was giving us feeback, making the bass guitar overpower everything apart from vocals, and made the drums sound weak - and they were the good bits! Next time, we gotta do a proper sound check, and get someone to make sure our sound is right, otherwise it did not do us justice. People said Weapon would have been our best song if the sound had been good, but I though our timing of the songs was pretty good - just a shame about the drums! Again, we relaxed towards the end, and Am I Close did sounds pretty good. We got through on votes from the crowd, with the next round, the semi-finals, based on 70% judges and 30% crowd response.

A reasonable start, and we got this picture in the paper!

2006-10-18 Never Tear Us Apart

Well, tonight we play our first gig, and I am unsurprisingly unexcited about the whole thing due to recent events.

On Tuesday, the discussion of band name came up - I have been completely bored with all discussion on the subject, as people seem to be more interested in the name than the music, and I let rip, finally. It had been building up for a number of weeks. We left it for Thursday's practice, but as Kyle was not well, nothing was said, and that we're going into tonight's gig with a lot of bad feeling.

However, after a chat with Kyle, we decided to try and clear the air by meeting in Leederville on Sunday night. I don't know about the others, but it is clear to me that this band is going to be short lived. Steve says it is low on his priority list, although he seems to have a lot to say on band direction (note, he is the only student in the band), and cannot commit. He never made eye contact, which spoke volumes. Duffy seems slightly more serious about the music, and also apologised for the things he commented on, which I appreciated. He said he was thinking about quitting the band, and that seems serious, but wants to see how far it goes from here. Kyle started saying it was a hobby, but is prepared to take it as far as it goes. Me? I want to record, market, promote, and I am taking this very seriously. I told them their commitment worried me, but I'll see after a few gigs where it is taking us.

If we don't take it seriously, no one will take us seriously.

We need to set group goals said Kyle, which is a great, but with the current crowd, a pipe dream.

Worth meeting up to get an idea of where they all stand. At least I know now.

Tonights gig - we were asked to be there at 7.30, but they all seem to meeting at 9ish. Serious, aren't they? We'll see...

Can't wait...ZZZZZZZzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz.................

2006-10-06 Going Down

Well, mixed feelings about the last few weeks!

At times, I have wanted to just give up, as I am bored with the attitude of some members of the band - namely their lack of practicing, lack on effort regarding band names, their lack of enthusiasm regarding practices, the fact that they expect so much with the minimal of effort. On a few occasions I have felt a lot more positive, especially when we have finally booked in to do a gig, but based on our recordings, we are far from ready.

But if I walk away now, there will no doubt be problems if I start from scratch again. But heck at least we'll have a band name!

I find it bizarre that the 2 members of the band who said they were not bothered about the band name are the exact 2 people who are actually opposed, and joking about the band names suggested. One of them is even too cowardly to even suggest any names himself! It is very frustrating, and I am so utterly bored with the issue. I am tempted to just name the band, and if they don't like it, then we can easily recruit other band members, no problem.

Practices have been going well up until the last practice, where I was really pissed off at the attitude again - we have a gig in less than 2 weeks, and people don't even want to practice more, even though we heard ourselves, and made us realise that there is a lot of work to do. Frustration is a polite word for how I feel. When we play well, we sound very good, when we just go through the motions, we sound awful!

If things don't pick up at the next practice, and we don't get 2 practices in at least next week, I'm pulling out of the comp. Don't fancy making a fool of myself, purely of the fact that we haven't practices.

Do all bands go through this? Maybe we all have days like this...

Pissed off.