Whether
you're Bon Jovi playing three sell-out shows at
Wembley Stadium or Bob's Blues Experience doing the
regular Friday night at the 'Kebab & Mushroom',
you're going to be obliged to rope in another band as
'The Support Band'.
The
reasons for this depend on the stature of the
headline act. Bon Jovi, for example, will be happy to
invite several name acts of a lesser status to help
them shift even more tickets to ensure the relevant
Enormodome is bulging at the seams - Van Halen and
Thunder were on the bill for the UK leg of BJ's 1995
jaunt and helped make the day seem more like an
event.
At the
other end of the scale, venues may put on talent nights where three or
four bands play in an order decided by the toss of a
coin, and it is in this situation that the most care
needs to be given to insure a beneficial night for
you and your band. Also, a signed band on their first
or second UK tour will be very keen for local bands
to support them at each venue to help push tickets
sales and, good though this is for the band in
question, you really do need to think about what
you're doing.
Checkout
The Venue:
If the gig is local, checking out a new venue will
allow you to see for yourself what the situation is
before you turn up to play. Have a word with bands
playing there and find out what the load-in is like,
what the general attitude of the staff is like, where
you can park the van and so on. Also, you'll be able
to ascertain how much of your own gear you'll need to
bring. If your drummer insists on bringing a huge
rack of tubs or the guitarist wants to bring all
three of his amp stacks, but you've found out that
the stage is the size of a postage stamp, there's
some negotiation to be done. Imagine if you'd spent
hours wedging a huge amount of stuff into the back of
the van, only to discover that 90% of it is surplus
to requirements.
Be
Polite:
This seems like a patronising one, but even basic
manners can endear you to the people responsible for
making the gig worthwhile. A smile and the odd
'please and thank you' to the sound guy, the venue
manager and even the girl on the door will prove to
be worth their weight in gold. If you've turned up
with an attitude, these guys are far less likely to
be willing help. If you've forgotten the mains lead
for your amp, the guy behind the bar you took the
piss out of earlier is hardly going to take one out
of the kettle for you to borrow.
More
importantly, your impact will depend on the sound,
and the engineer behind the board is your best
friend. Believe it, he knows the venue and house
system infinitely better than you do, and is probably
far more experienced too. These guys will rarely, if
ever, deliberately sabotage your sound whatever you
may have heard, but they're not going to go that
extra yard to help you out if you get into tonal
trouble simply because you thought it was 'cool' to
treat him like a sub-human because you could see his
arse-crack!
General
respect, not to mention clubbing together to buy him
a beer or two before you play, can turn into a huge
investment.
Soundchecking:
Learning how to soundcheck efficiently is
as important a part of playing live as getting your
songs right. This does depend on experience, but any
musician who has got to this stage must have at least
some inkling of how to get their sound and, when your
allotted soundcheck minutes come around, you don't
want to be wasting them fiddling with your effects
processor. Listen to the engineer and do what he
says. If he wants just the snare drum for a
level-check, practising that guitar riff to 'Doom
Bitch' at the same time is not going to help anyone,
don't forget that the engineer is there to help you.
If you
have the time, play just parts of a couple of songs
that have different tempos or sounds, but don't use
the time to practice, it's too late, basically. Make
sure you can hear everything you want to through your
monitors and, if you can't, stop playing immediately
and ask the engineer to rectify the situation, don't
wait until you've finished the song as that just
wastes time. As soon as each member of the band is
happy, get off and go and have a beer, remembering to
thank the engineer on the way to the bar.
Gear
Share:
If you can organise the sharing of certain pieces of
gear with the other bands on the bill, you'll be
quids in. Drummers of established headline acts on
small local circuits are usually prepared to allow
the support band the use of his basic kit, but don't
expect to be allowed to use his cymbals, stool, snare
or bass drum/hi-hat pedals, bring your own. Track the
main band down before you get to the gig, the venue
itself will almost certainly possess contact details,
and ask if this situation would be OK. Never assume.
It's
the same for guitarists and bassists too. If you can
arrange to use the same amps and speaker cabs as the
headline act, you'll be sorted. After all, they've
got to bring them anyway and anything that saves time
on the night is going to be an attractive proposition
all round. Of course, it's not all peace and love,
and some bands won't want a bunch of upstarts bashing
away on their new Sonor kit or through their
sparkling Boogie cabs but, if you don't ask, you
don't get. Again, the purchasing of the odd pint or
two for the co-operative band members can help to
miraculously smooth the way.
Guest
List:
Most venues offer a limited policy of free entry to
persons who are 'with the band', but the abuse of
this service often leads to real confrontation and a
general feeling of ill will. A good rule of thumb
that I've found to be generally acceptable is that
the band members have one place on the list and
that's it, this allows for free entry of partners,
best mates and/or the bloke who drives the van, and
everyone else who comes along pays.
More
often than not, any door money the venue makes is the
pot from which the bands are paid (if at all), and
demanding that your whole Sunday morning footy team,
plus their girlfriends, get in for free will remove a
significant amount from this pot, much to the
distress of both you and the other bands playing.
Again, it's all down to co-operation.
Basically,
all of the above is common sense and, unless you are
actually a band of some note, tantrums are
inexcusable, simple as that. As a support band, you
shouldn't expect to be treated as if you're only
there to make up the numbers but, at the end of the
day, if you're in this position, then it isn't, after
all, your gig. Be professional, be polite and be
prepared, and any brown stuff will avoid the fan it
was heading for.
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