The Guitar Pron Thread

[Buzzrock 14871]

So, LVS

[DougO 5239]

2 hours ago, Celery Man said:

i keep trying to come up with stage names for the Koffs. LIke there's Joey, Johnny, Deedee Ramone, etc. But all I can come up with is Jack. Maybe Nabo if anyone is into literature or underage girls.

They should add Dave Grohl and become the FooKoffs.

[DougO 5239]

2 hours ago, G650 said:

I also submit Fred (Biletni)Koff

Molly Koff

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

i keep trying to come up with stage names for the Koffs. LIke there's Joey, Johnny, Deedee Ramone, etc. But all I can come up with is Jack. Maybe Nabo if anyone is into literature or underage girls.

Our guitar player drew this and we were gonna make shirts. I modified it to remove the bodies and made buttons we gave out in Vegas. He asked if he should add Koff last names like the Ramones. I was ambivalent, but said the Linda Linda's do it too. Last I heard of that idea.

[Goredho 17349]

Why not just fire the asshole and keep the band together, @AnotherUTFan?  Cool name, you've got an album, presumably a bit of a following.  Don't blow it up over a prima donna frontman.  Go Van Halen on 'em and exert your authoritah!

[DougO 5239]

Better without the stick bodies, imo.

[G650 14107]

Yeah the buttons are dope

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

@Goredho That was kinda the original plan. Jessica had "quit" the band previously because she didn't want to put me in the middle. We worked up sone more material with a different drummer, but switched to relearning all the Vary Mary stuff (she had forgotten most of her parts) when we learned our drummer was coming to visit and we booked that show. Singer showed an improved attitude when we started back to work and even she was talking about reviving it.

She had a mini-breakdown Fridsy following a rough practice Thursday, but rallied and killed it. When I texted her that I couldnt be in a band with Sinjin, she indicated that she didn't want to be in a band for a while period. To much stress.

I got no drummer, no bass player, and no singer. I got no band! Its time to just move on, take the lessons, and focus on the positives.

I've got half of an album written for this real conceptual thing I came up with when I had covid. I shared it with a guy who's probably the most talented musician I know and he's been super excited to work on it with me for months.

I also have a bunch of high energy punky/rock stuff written to start a new band with - maybe steal a Vary Mary song or 3. Jessica's 1st call on bass if she changes her mind,, or if she just wants to contribute as a writing collaborator maybe that would be better for her mental health.

I've got plenty to keep me busy.

[G650 14107]

4 hours ago, AnotherUTFan said:

Our singer is super talented, but a pain in the ass to work with. That's why we never bothered finding a replacement drummer. He came back into this with brand new, improved attitude because he's seeing me on stage with other bands and wants to play again. So I thought there was hope of resurrecting it and even had a few drummers in mind. By the time we got to the venue I was 90% sure i was done with him, that turned to 100% when mid-set he turns and asks me if we can skip a song on the setlist he doesn't like. I responded by tearing into the riff and letting him decide if he wants to sing it or stand there looking like an idiot. Of course he was long gone by the time load out came.

I texted Jessica in the morning that I couldn't be in a band with him anymore and she replied that she didn't want to do it either. Im gonna have to break the news to him next time I see him. Its not gonna go well, he's still high from the success of Saturday.

I wrote a bunch of songs, formed a band and got an album out there. I learned a ton and there's a lot I'd do differently looking back, but there's a lot for me to be proud of and a lot to carry into my next project. I have like 3 that have been on the back burner im going to move on to, plus I have The Koffs, they would love for me to write.

Speaking of The Koffs, everybody there is so easy to work with and just glad to have each other. Our singer is almost guilty that he doesn't play an instrument and compensates by helping us load gear and doing everything he can to help. Vary Mary was like that until we let one guy in.

Be careful who you into your band. I guess thats a big lesson learned.

 

So I wanted to make sure I wrote out a thoughtful response to this. Over the years most of us, if we've been at it long enough, have gone through this in some form. Except half the time the pain in the ass in question isn't even talented. 

We have all made compromises to play at one point or another, whether it be the music or the people we deal with or whatever. The camaraderie of a group making something together is what makes it worth it, because the whole is greater than the parts, in terms of music and how it makes everyone feel. So if one or more people are detracting from that then what's the point. It's hard to see that in the moment sometimes, but by virtue of experience, it's really easy to see in retrospect.

 

I've recently gotten back with my entire band from my late teens and early twenties, and it's been just as much fun to just hang out as anything, as these guys were my best friends back then. It's definitely not a nostalgia trip for us, we are looking to make new music and not rehash the 90s, and honestly I'm so virulently against nostalgia acts I probably put off getting us all back in contact way longer than I should have. But the enjoyment I get is a lot higher than any of the other stuff I done because of who it is.

In a related story, my drummer always ends up in these abusive music relationships. After our band split right at the millennium, I went to California, the bassist to Hawaii and other guitarist to New York. The drummer stayed in VB and ended up in this band where basically everyone was a passive aggressive dick. Except the guy that was an aggressive aggressive dick. And all of them sucked musically. They had delusions of grandeur but generally I was just bummed they were all jerks. Anyway, when I moved back, they had split up, and myself, the drummer and bass player reformed for one EP and some shows with a couple others that came and went. After the last singer moved away, the bass player kinda wanted to step back, so the drummer and I just kind of went to a play some tunes on a week night mode. If course he suggests the singer from the passive aggressive band should come out, and against my better judgement I'm like sure. So I find myself in a group that plays music I don't like with a dude I can't stand. Lovely. It wasn't all bad because I met another bass player that's a cool dude and good, but generally I'm not enthused. Luckily the singer bails, and we go through a few others, but we aren't writing anything and it's not super engaging.

 

We all drift away a bit from that arrangement, mostly me because I'm just not into what's going on. So recently when I reach out to the drummer, he's like I'm playing with <singer I hate> and another guy who is friends with said d bag singer, who apparently just got divorced and now is expressing it through his music and whatnot. Which is totally fine, I get it So I'm like cool let's just do some writing when you have the time. He texts me like a couple weeks later that he asked to have me come play with those guys and they didn't want me to join, to which I think but don't say, yeah I ain't playing with those fucking clowns man why did you even ask them. But we have carved out one night a week to work on material and record.

 

Fast forward to now, and the drummer has not heard a peep from the other guys in like 3 weeks because he he had the temerity a family vacation while the aforementioned singer wants to play everyday so now he is giving him the silent treatment.

[Celery Man 20886]

a funny realization was finally understanding that despite almost 15 years together, I always hated the singer of my old band. Like always - he was just a shitty brother. Absolutely tone deaf too. Some of his synth lines were cool just by sheer virtue of.... nobody with an ounce of musicality would have ever thought to do that. It always fucked up some of my ability to work through what happened there - I was steadily progressing through later stages of alcoholism but he was always and still a selfish low talent asshole (but a good showman). A lot of the conflict at the end had to do with balancing band stuff and career stuff, which was hard but also weirdly the random who gives a shit three show stretch in Colorado or whatever would always be something that came up during spring break. And of course when he finished grad school and his sugar mama made him move to Nacogdoches where she was going to practice law, that was the end of it for everyone else. I really still need to let go of a lot of resentment around that shit. Honestly wish it was as simple as "I was a drunk asshole and it got to be too much".

Man I'm jelly of AUTF out there, but also a bit inspired. I mean, it'll be tough for the next bit as I suspect another baby will come around the corner at some point, but I'm going to get on a stage again one of these days.

Edited August 30, 2022 by Celery Man

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

Yep, when I was forming Vary Mary i always said I'd rather make mediocre music with people I enjoyed being around than great music with people I loathed. Jessica even wrote the song Mediocre about it. We had that and still do with the 3 of us. We even kept Garrick company during covid when he moved away with weekly Zoom game nights. Sinjin is actually a friend, so I was stoked to have him join. Its just something in this context. I think he works his daddy issues put on me or something. Thats how I'm gonna break it to him. Im just gonna say that can't be in a band together and still be friends.

https://music.youtube.com/watch?v=Pq0LkU3U_ec&feature=share

The Koffs are like brothers. I've known Casey (guitar) almost as long as I've been in SF and never knew he played music until around the 1st of the year. Then he started telling me they had this band but needed a bass player because the Vegas thing might happen. Really selling me on it and the guys. I was not wanting to commit to a weekly half hour drive down the coast and couldn't commit to Vegas in Aug at that point. I made excuses for couple months while they tried several bass players. Everytime id get a story of how they sucked and asked to come down again. I finally went, reminding myself not to commit to anything the entire drive down. We were fairly locked in by our 1st break and I felt like I'd known these guys my whole life. By the end of that 1st practice they invited me to join. Its been a big silly bromine since. Our group band text is like a bunch of teenaged girls. They are all well known in that small town, and people always come up and introduce themselves to me when I'm down there. "You're the new bass player! The guys talk about you all the time! So glad to meet you!"

Funny thing is, Casey knows fuck shit about playing playing guitar, but just comes up with great simple riffs one after another. Meanwhile our drummer is actually a guitar teacher. None of them know shit about being in a band. I shared our 1st event to my FB page a few weeks prior and got like 40 going or interested, assuming they're follow my lead. Nope. A week prior I asked them to in the group text. They were like, good idea. Did it and we were at like 150 by the next day and packed that place.

Same with the buttons. I made all these. Im like, we are the 1st band the 1st day. Nobody is going to remember who the hell we are if we don't leave something behind. We gave them out at our show, and kept them in our pockets to give anybody who asked about our band. That band already has twice as many FB followers as Vary Mary. Oh ya, I had to create the band page. Im like guys, we have to have a way to connect with our audience. Good idea!

Great dudes. I got really lucky there.

Separately, I just got back from dropping that amp off at the practice space. Serendipitously ran into the musician who wants to work on this concept thing i wrote. He was at the consol putting beats to the Space Odyssey soundtrack and changing its time signature. I had no idea he could do all that shit. He's ready to start recording it as soon as I get back from my daughter's wedding next month. I dont know if i want to that just me and him as a recording project, or invite a few others and build a small show around it. Im super stocked about it.

[Celery Man 20886]

I like how Shawn Koff is the only stick figure with a dick.

[hullabelew 3705]

i keep trying to come up with stage names for the Koffs. LIke there's Joey, Johnny, Deedee Ramone, etc. But all I can come up with is Jack. Maybe Nabo if anyone is into literature or underage girls.

Nabo Koff is really funny. I looked him up after he was named checked by The Police.

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

I like how Shawn Koff is the only stick figure with a dick.

It ain't big, but its real skinny!

Seriously, see if you can arrange one night a week for therapy. Go to a dedicated spot and work on music for a couple hours. It really is therapy. I was frustrated that I couldn't find a band to join, they were all full. A friend told me to start writing and I'd have a band. Thats the only reason I started writing, I'm really not that into songwriting. But it worked. When you meet other musicians you always say "let's jam sometime" and it never happens. When you say, "I've been working on some stuff, wanna come by after work Wednesday and check it out" they do.

Otherwise, im not trying to be a rock star, just an outlet for my creative side and motivation to keep at my guitar. Aside from the weekly therapy, a show every month or two where our friends come out is plenty. Our next is an afternoon gig where ill be home by 6.

I figure everybody's not LeBron, but plenty of guys play in a pickup basketball league. Of course I'm not complaining if we get to go play Rock Star in Vegas every year at Psycho. That was super fun.

[DougO 5239]

I was only in a beginner garage band among post-college friends in their 20s who suddenly decided to learn to play and start a band. We were together practicing for a year, played one "talent show" gig and it was an awesome experience. Those times, that experience, was one of the best things of my life. Losing it was one of the worst things of my life. They are like girlfriends that break your heart, and then take all your best friends away that might have been there to help pick you up off the floor. Never could find another bunch of guys to play with. I was really starting to feel like I could be a guitar player, but didn't have anyone to play with and I got depressed about it. So I kinda lost the music momentum, too. 

Bands are bitches, man. 

Edited August 30, 2022 by DougO

[noharleyyet 2837]

12 hours ago, Celery Man said:

I like how Shawn Koff is the only stick figure with a dick.

Almost touches the ground....needs longer legs

[Chad Fuck 17566]

57 minutes ago, noharleyyet said:

Almost touches the ground....needs longer legs

...or does it?

[noharleyyet 2837]

14 minutes ago, Chad Fuck said:

...or does it?

Dirt Diggler

[Goredho 17349]

Owner of the little guitar store in Salida texted me some pics of a 1967 whiteguard tele this morning that he just picked up.  Body is stripped, don't know much else, he hasn't responded to my questions yet.

Edited August 30, 2022 by Goredho

[Deej 76568]

He should knock 15% off just for all those pickguard screws. 

[G650 14107]

13 hours ago, AnotherUTFan said:

Yep, when I was forming Vary Mary i always said I'd rather make mediocre music with people I enjoyed being around than great music with people I loathed.

 

Man, I wouldn't sell yourself short even saying that, if it's meaningful to you then it's good.

That does bring up a somewhat related point though. I mentioned either here or in the share your music thread my dad was a touring musician when I was born, and it was largely his experience that put me off ever wanting to do that for a living. Music meant too much to me to compromise it for the sake of making money. But if you are doing it as sole employment, then you definitely have to put up with stuff you never would doing it for the love of it. It then kind of becomes a tradeoff calculation you make in any career between financial reward and quality of life.

Back in the day, I was in another band that was my first, and the three other guys separately started the band as a trio we would all ultimately be in together. I had a good time with the other group, not going to pretend otherwise, we wrote a lot of tunes that were pretty good for high schoolers, played a lot of shows, but looking back it was similar to @Celery Mans experience and somewhat yours with the Vary Mary singer where I looked back and realized one of the other guys was basically a jerk. He was wildly talented in some ways, probably the most naturally gifted player I have been around, though the other guitarist from the second band is close, but at the same time  he didn't have "it" in terms of artistic feel in my mind. Just very clinical. But at any rate, the other three guys went through a couple rhythm guitarists in the meantime, but always were really hoping I would come over as we were all best friends. Once I had a rupture with the first group, that was it. And I really wanted to be with them as well anyway. So going back to the first sentence of this post, our music was immensely better because of it. The feel and vibrancy of what we did was so far beyond my first band it's hard to compare.

The group dynamic can be funny sometimes. Three of us reconvened in the '04 to '06 time frame as I mentioned, and it was definitely fun. Some good tunes came out of it, once I remix and rerecord some I plan on sharing one day. But it certainly wasn't the same as before. Probably a lot because we were older and not starry eyed kids where it was all still new. But also just because the varied singers and guitarists who came through were more peripheral figures and it wasn't just a few really tight friends anymore. Plus I became the sole songwriter, which sounds fun for like 10 seconds.

 

 

12 hours ago, DougO said:

We were together practicing for a year, played one "talent show" gig and it was an awesome experience.

 

Oh, this reminds me we also got banned from our school's Battle of the Bands for almost getting in a fight at sound check one year. Rock n' roll bitches.

[noharleyyet 2837]

2 hours ago, Goredho said:

Owner of the little guitar store in Salida texted me some pics of a 1967 whiteguard tele this morning that he just picked up.  Body is stripped, don't know much else, he hasn't responded to my questions yet.

Five screw black'ard or go home....

[DougO 5239]

We won the talent show, by the way. We turned out to be the only entry. 

It was a big company Christmas party, most of the band worked at this place. I don't know how many people were there, but it was in the hundreds in a huge hall. I nearly barfed until we hit the stage, then I was somewhat OK and did pretty well for myself, as did our drummer, whom I wish was still around to jam with. The singer forgot every lyric he had down for months, and started singing gibberish. Bass player was deer in headlines, mostly played his parts semi-legible, but was a frozen statue with saucer eyes. We unwisely included a keyboard player who had only joined in on a couple of practices and knew absolutely none of the songs properly. But if one can live through that, nothing can really be that bad. And we got tons of praise from the crowd, and many dancers on the floor, like they didn't even know.

[Bogeywon 2518]

Lead singers always freak out it seems even if they are the weak link. Jumped into a band where the rest of the group was terrified of the singer. They had been a band for 10 years and I was like the 4th guitarist. Anyway I learn the songs play some gigs and the rest of the guys are like we should write new music.  So naturally I jump in excited (because I didn’t just join to play their shit I want to be creative)  and say “let’s do it”. They get really quiet until the bass player tells me how the singer never wants to and just gets mad about shit as well as in there face (very toxic dude). Well I decide we are writing some shit and he decides not to show up for a month. I peal off 5-6 really good songs we all work on the like 4 days a week together and all of a sudden the singer wants to hear them. Upon hearing them he wants to be the producer/composer of how the parts go certain things needed to be changed ect. Told him we had been working our ass off without him and if he wanted to sing our songs he could but I wasn’t changing shit just to put him on front street. He wouldn’t budge so I respectively told them all to pack up their shit and leave my rehearsal space. I’m not putting up with that. Not when I was 28 and not now THAT IM A MAN IM 40. I play with my original bass player and the best drummer I know and we are great friends (see the song posted a few pages back). They are so easy to work with and honestly it’s effortless. We all know exactly how to make each other happy without compromising the songs or stepping on each other’s musical dicks. Fuck that guy and keep very Mary. You guys are very Mary not him. 

[jimmyjazz 45560]

My HS cover band came in 2nd in our talent show my senior year.  We were going to play some FM radio crap (a big REO hit, something else) and were rehearsing it the night before.  After about 30 minutes we all just kinda looked at each and said "this sucks, let's play Rush", so we did "Working Man" and "Fly By Night".

Three judges:  a pair of 10/10 scores and one 0/10.  Fucking Mary Ellen Boyd.  Cost us the trophy.  The school loved us, we were heroes.

[Celery Man 20886]

There was definitely a battle of the bands once in high school, and I *believe* we won. It was definitely either us or our friend Taylor's screamo band. Pretty sure we had that, but I think Taylor won the Mr. Woodlands pageant, or at least was in the running - he hd a Taylor guitar and played some Dashboard Confessional. One of our other friends was in that and wanted to do a whole glam rock thing - I think that big "The Darkness" album had recently dropped. So he enlisted several of us to back him playing "For Those About to Rock". I had a wireless system on my bass, I found some tight jeans and a rabbit fur coat in a closet somewhere, a cute redhead whose name I wish I had more reason to remember put makeup on me backstage, I remember I yanked out a bunch of my hair when I slid across the stage on my knees and then went to my back and pushed myself back across the stage going the other direction. I went home still wearing makeup and my dad was hanging out with a bunch of his actuary friends drinking port in the kitchen, and I think it was just some head nodding and ".... huh. how's it going there buddy?" The idea of getting on stage in front of my whole class wearing girls clothes and makeup and doing that kind of shit doesn't really square with the kind of confidence I ever displayed anywhere else in high school apart from probably band/marching band. But being one person on a stage with other people doing crazy shit makes it a lot easier to do crazy shit yourself, and I guess by that point in senior year I was used to it enough that I wasn't freaked out. I wish I had video of that.

Oak Ridge had a battle of the bands. Our friend Matt's band played, and he brought an axe out to smash his keyboard. He got suspended, his dad was the principal if I remember correctly so that was probably embarrassing. Even then I'm surprised that having an axe didn't result in bigger consequences.

We did some sort of habitat for humanity battle of the bands thing on the steps of Gregory Gym in 2004/5 - I think Mike Truth (surely some of you guys know him) was one of the judges, he recognized us from constantly being at the Music Lab, that helped us break into the Austin scene a bit since he bounced around booking for seemingly every venue.

Honestly though, coolest battle of the bands thing ever was my first year at my old company - there were maybe 40 people in the whole company, another older new guy who played keys got a wild hair about the HAAM Battle of the Bands, and we ended up with like 25% of the company on stage playing. Beat some bands from HEB and GSD&M and won some ACL tickets and studio time that we had absolutely no use for whatsoever. Funniest thing was the HEB band that consisted of clearly white collar dudes and a ringer on the drums that they pulled from cart patrol somewhere. But that was so cool - the whole company was there, 10 years later after we got acquired random corporate bozos would ask me about the battle of the bands.

[jimmyjazz 45560]

10 minutes ago, Celery Man said:

I found some tight jeans and a rabbit fur coat in a closet somewhere,

LOL . . . I wore skinny jeans, a horizontal red-and-white striped t-shirt (think Venice gondola boat pilot) and a white chemistry labcoat.  I thought I was the tits.

[noharleyyet 2837]

We never wrote anything but I sure butchered the lyrics to damn near all of em...no prima donna

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

I mistakenly texted everybody what we made on Sunday. I hung out with Jessica and Jessica that evening cause Garrick had to fly home. I rounded up to the nearest $5 when I paid them. I go down into the bar after work yesterday and Sinjin's there with his girlfriend (who's a sweethheart, btw), said he'd come to "scoop up" that money. I came upstairs and counted it out to the penny for him, only regretting that I had told him what we made - I should have divided it so that those who loaded gear in and out got a bigger cut. Oh well, its not like anybody got rich. He's still all excited from the show and telling me he has a drummer he wants me to meet. I wasn't in the place to tell him. I just said we need to talk about it. Like I said, he's a friend. He's just a shitty bandmate. 

Here he is leading the mosh pit and high fiving me on stage at the Koffs 1st show. I watched a few of these this morning. God, i love everything about being in this band. When we finally got paid for this one, the owner said that our show was the best night he's had all summer business-wise. 

 

https://youtu.be/XoN-8JcA6k4

 

 

Edited August 30, 2022 by AnotherUTFan

[G650 14107]

1 hour ago, Celery Man said:

I think that big "The Darkness" album had recently dropped.

One of RTB's finest moments.

[BoomMF 1398]

We got the plug pulled midset in our high school talent show. We had the bright idea (read: stolen from Pearl Jam iirc) to play Another Brick in the Wall as an outro and it was going awesome, but when the crowd started singing along (We don't need no education, etc....) it was too much for the admin and they killed the power. Just came on stage and stole the mic and stand and killed the power (which freaked me out because I read that you need to let you tubes cool before turning off and I was scared shitless that my Peavey Stereo Chorus was fried!).

But we were gods at lunch for like 2 days after.

[Chad Fuck 17566]

Strat O Sonic calling...

https://reverb.com/item/58648255-fender-american-special-series-strat-o-sonic-dii-made-april-2003-first-run

Quote

Please don’t try to sell me broken or overvalued stuff. I can’t handle getting ripped off for this guitar, my fragile psyche will finally collapse under the weight of decades of exploitation and miserable, undignified, wage slavery. It will collapse and I’ll end up murder-suiciding the Earth’s remaining Pandas because I hallucinated someone telling me Gibson was gonna release a bamboo Explorer, so please, please, seriously please don’t do that or that blood will be on your hands because I warned you, here and now. That’s what this is, a warning, to not try to rip me off because I WILL FIND AND END YOU, if the ghosts of pandas past do not, Thanks. 
 

^seems like a reasonable fellow.

[Paul Wesley 3277]

On 8/29/2022 at 9:12 PM, hullabelew said:

Nabo Koff is really funny. I looked him up after he was named checked by The Police.
 

Yeah, the Russian surnames give you a lot to work with.

Barishny

Check

Kalishny

[Paul Wesley 3277]

16 hours ago, BoomMF said:

 

But we were gods at lunch for like 2 days after.

Reminded me of this:

 

[Bogeywon 2518]

might fuck around and find out

[hullabelew 3705]

I'm in Texas again, helping with some family shit. Brought my hollow body Gretsch to pass the time. As therapy, I've been looking around on various music sites for some new wish list items.

My candy arrived today.

[tbone_ 14025]

Strat O Sonic calling...
https://reverb.com/item/58648255-fender-american-special-series-strat-o-sonic-dii-made-april-2003-first-run

Please don’t try to sell me broken or overvalued stuff. I can’t handle getting ripped off for this guitar, my fragile psyche will finally collapse under the weight of decades of exploitation and miserable, undignified, wage slavery. It will collapse and I’ll end up murder-suiciding the Earth’s remaining Pandas because I hallucinated someone telling me Gibson was gonna release a bamboo Explorer, so please, please, seriously please don’t do that or that blood will be on your hands because I warned you, here and now. That’s what this is, a warning, to not try to rip me off because I WILL FIND AND END YOU, if the ghosts of pandas past do not, Thanks. 
 

^seems like a reasonable fellow.

Haha yea I’ve seen that. It’s been around a while. As much as I want one of those I’m not dealing with that guy. Or his shitty looking guitar.

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

Fuck tapatalk

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

[mention=6169]Paul[/mention] Wesley Tried quoting your post but it wouldnt format right.

That Onion article hit a little close to home! Last 2 shows we did indeed each get 2 drink tickets.

[Paul Wesley 3277]

Reading that "I will find you and end you" reminded me...  

About 10 years ago, I came very, very close to getting scammed on some musical gear.  

I was gathering gear for the soon-to-open studio, and one of the things on my wish list was a tape machine.  A friend of mine (an audio engineer in LA) who knew what gear I was looking for forwarded me a promotional email from a gear broker in LA, and he happened to have the machine I wanted.  I contacted him, we negotiated a bit on price, I wired him the money --  it was over four grand. 

About four or five weeks later, after a series of broken promises and ever-changing excuses for why he didn't have a tracking number - and NUMEROUS unanswered inquiries, I realized that I was getting ghosted.  I emailed my engineer friend "WTF is the deal with your gear broker friend?"  And he tells me, "I don't even know that guy, I just got on his email list."  Oof.  I remember the gut-punch I felt when my buddy told me that.

So I start googling this gear broker's name and I find several people online who he had also scammed, and those people had posted "do not deal with this guy" warnings on some audio forums.  He was a real gear broker, but apparently one who had a history of totally screwing people over from time to time.  

I was livid.  I found his home address.  I wasn't sure how... but I was going to have my vengeance.  I came very close to a rage-fueled threatening email, but I didn't send it.

Instead, I sent him another friendly email telling him, "Hey, I just refinanced my house" (not true) "... and I'm getting a big cash-out from the bank in a couple weeks" (not true) "... and I really want that pair of soffit-mounted ATC mains on your gear list" (not true).   The monitors I told him I wanted were like 25 grand.  

About a week later, the tape machine arrived.  He shipped it a couple days after that email.

I was lucky. 

 

[DougO 5239]

Do any of y'all have an outdoor chair with no arms that is good for guitar playing on the porch? I've been thinking that's something that might get me to play more on mornings and evenings. But all my chairs have hard arms that get in the way. Need something that would withstand weather.

[DougO 5239]

Nothing wrong with feeling like a legend in the afterglow of a successful opening gig. It's probably one of the reasons you do it. It's only bad if you start ripping the headlining band of actual professionals about how snobby they were and didn't go out of their way to schmooze with you, and you blew them off the stage anyway even though they left three songs into their set. I had some friends like that that opened for King's X. King's X came out and played a 2 1/2 hour set in front of about 30 people like they were playing at Madison Square Garden and hung around after the show to hang out with the fans.

Edited August 31, 2022 by DougO

[Deej 76568]

30 minutes ago, DougO said:

Do any of y'all have an outdoor chair with no arms that is good for guitar playing on the porch? I've been thinking that's something that might get me to play more on mornings and evenings. But all my chairs have hard arms that get in the way. Need something that would withstand weather.

Shouldn't you get one the couldn't stand the weather?

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

I always stay to support whoever plays after us.

I was happy playing 1st the other night because i was intimidated by the other 2 bands on the bill. Both metal bands full of well known local musicians. Thats why I brought the big orange Gretsch, i was trying to present as not that. Turns out I needed not to be concerned. Vary Mary packed the room, and it was half empty by the time the headliner went on.

In fact, i kind got into with the stage manager because id told him we'd go on at 8:30 sharp as he requested. At 8:25 the room was half empty. I look outside and there's a line down the street of our people and I learned they just opened the doors at 8:20. I told him we needed more time and he said he could give me 5 mins or he'd get i trouble w his boss. I said to tell the boss to open the doors sooner and he wouldn't have that problem, im not asking my friends to pay $12 a head to get in only to play while they're still in line. I dont think they're used to an opening band who can draw.

The biggest compliment I got was later that night when the same guy apologized for having to be the bad guy and complemented our sound and said SF needs more bands like us.

Oh, and I like playing 1st or 2nd. It exposes you to the other bands audiences. When you go last, they've often left.

[noharleyyet 2837]

1 hour ago, DougO said:

Do any of y'all have an outdoor chair with no arms that is good for guitar playing on the porch? I've been thinking that's something that might get me to play more on mornings and evenings. But all my chairs have hard arms that get in the way. Need something that would withstand weather.

Lag bolt or wedge anchor this bad boy down...weatherproof and sturdy. Your neighbors will love it. 

[DougO 5239]

1 hour ago, noharleyyet said:

Lag bolt or wedge anchor this bad boy down...weatherproof and sturdy. Your neighbors will love it. 

 

I don't have neighbors. If I did I wouldn't be thinking about playing my guitar outside.

 

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

I just have one of those old brown, folding metal chairs.

[Celery Man 20886]

Just don’t be the local band that has 10 people in the green room drinking the beer and eating the veggie tray when the touring band pulls up to the venue and falls out of the van they are living in.

[G650 14107]

 

[AnotherUTFan 9681]

Just don’t be the local band that has 10 people in the green room drinking the beer and eating the veggie tray when the touring band pulls up to the venue and falls out of the van they are living in.

Is that wrong?