The Adventures of Doug and Will - Round 1

[DMX Will]

On saturday Doug (Fresh) and I met up after he contacted me through the forum as he needed a roadie for then night. Which (Obviously due to this post) I accepted.

So once we had met up and arrived at the client's house and seen a very nice steep drive way we would have to cart a load of kit up and down, we positioned Doug's trailer at the top of the hill relying on the kerb to keep it in place.

We'd moved most of the kit to the next house at the bottom of this very nice hill. Doug was at the bottom of the drive, and I was pulling his "All-In-One" console (a double 19" rack mount system holding well, everything excluding amps) from the back of the trailer to the front. Well it turns out the console was the only thing stopping the entire trailer from rolling down this nice driveway :teeth:.

So picture this....
Me crouched inside Doug's Trailer hanging on to a 40" + tall console weighing...well alot, and it making high speeds down a driveway.
In Doug's words "I heard Will yelling "wooooooaaaaaahhhhh" looked, up and saw the trailer coming towards me!". The trailer then hit the house (nice chunk out of it I might add) and toppeled over onto one side rolling over and landing on the corner of a flightcase.

I was fine, the house wasn't and the trailer suffered a few scrapes and bump on the back. Apparently Doug tried to catch the trailer :eek: and now has a nice bruise. The flight case, containing two Acme Scimitars, one of which squashed to high hell...but being acme...till worked perfectly, not even a broken lamp! (Pictures soon). Hopefully Doug will post up some pictures of the trailer. Moral of the story, don't empty your trailer at the top of a hill, no matter how you secure it!

As for the rest of the night, Excellent, and very enjoyable. We had a good chance to sit down and discuss both music (something I need to learn more about) and DMX Lighting (something Doug wanted to learn more about), so we both gained lots :teeth:.

I'm looking forward to our next gig together planned for later this month, where hopefully no hills will be involved :). So cheers Doug, definitly an interesting night and I'll leave you to fill in with anything i've forgotten!

Bring on round 2....

[Paul James Promotions]

All good fun :D

[Corabar Entertainment]

Yikes! :omg: How did the owner of the house take it?

[DMX Will]

Very well considering, Doug was quick in there to tell them that his PLI will cover it. The disco was just a party, but turns out was what turned into half a wedding as the house owner got married the day before, so it wasn't top of his priorities.

[CRAZY K]

Im glad im not the only one to have a lighting crash over the weekend! :sad:

Saturday night my lights toppled over on DJ stand whilst erecting them in a Marquee with a sloping floor and smashed into the plastic dance floor---ooops ! :omg:

Two Dynatwins, Moonflowers and Par cans.

To my utter amazement the only damage was a bent metal light clamp, broken dmx lead and very very slight body dent to a Dynatwin---BUT the whole lot worked all night--no broken bulbs--no damage to mirrors either!

Another excellent night.

I still cant believe the lights survived this impact:]-

CRAZY K

[Fresh]

I can HOPEFULLY add some more.

For those that are going to say about the trailer at the top of the hill ... it was actually quite secure (although obviously not due to what happened) the road it was on was flat and so was the path so there was a fair distance before the driveway. We could not put the trailer anywhere else, it was a small road full of cars and only a small gap to unload, so we had to unhitch the trailer or face an additional 100 m walk with the gear.


The venue was pretty inaccessible as it was a marquee in a rear garden, Firstly it was lightly raining and had rained hard at parts of the day. The first part was this sloping drive (25ft long with a 1:2 slope, then a very off camber section, over some (very slippery) paving slabs round the front of the house, down the side (down 4 garden) steps that had a wooden ramp on it (that worked well it the wet !) down along the grass, again a grassy off camber section and eventually into the marquee.

So we decided to do it in sections, offload everything to the bottom of the drive and then second shift it to the marquee.

So as will says, everything was offloaded down to the bottom of the drive apart from the main console, I had just run the RW3's down to the bottom, put them down and was turning to go back up and help with the console ( a 2 man lift really) when i heard ... wooah .... wooooaaah ..... wooooaaaaaaaaaah, i looked up to see the trailer coming down the hill, with Will star shaped inside. with the gradient it was really picking up speed, your first instinct is to stop or slow it down, i could just see will being thrown out or getting crushed against the wall if he fell or jumped out.


I ran to catch the trailer (duh !) it hit me, (which in fact pushed it off course a bit) spun a little hit the corner of the house and tipped over with me underneath it. Then silence; the client (and his friends) came rushing out to the underneath of a trailer and 4 wheels to look at. I had managed to get out and the client "my god are you OK" I said "yeah I think so" and moved round to the back of the trailer and said "will are you ok". "There is someone in there" said the client, "errr, yeah .... will are you OK" i said .... "yeah yeah I’m fine" said will, "are you sure" I said ... "yeah I'm OK".


OK the trailer is on it's side, the door is 20% open and cannot be opened any further as the back end of the trailer was resting on a flight case (2 * ACME scimitar case). We lifted the back of the trailer up to get the case out, to free the door allowing Will to get out, then slide the console out, then proceeded to drag the trailer over to the edge of the drive so we could try and get it back on it's wheels. With a push and a shove it was over and we pushed it back up the hill.


Then after both announcing we were fine and the PLI discussion with the client, we carried on setting up.


Then night itself was different from the normal wedding, I was given a CD of the lyrically bizarre Dr Hook that the bride and groom proceed to verbally act out on the dance floor, and has been the first time i have played the Pussycat Dolls, Rihanna, Lynard Skynard, Donna Summer, Runrig The Shamen, Tori Amos, Iron Maiden and Motorhead in the same night.


The packing away went without a hitch (apart from me losing my keys and us having to traverse back up the garden and up the slope).


I spoke to will on the Sunday and because he is young agile he is perfectly fine from the trailer incident (thank god), I am however, bruised and battered and still recovering with aches (although that maybe down to the rest of the setup and pack up !) and i can maybe some pink flesh near my elbow today so must be getting better. Mind you this could be a new adrenaline sport .... trailer surfing :teeth: .


Will, is a great guy, intelligent, keen, great attitude, willing to learn. You will go far will your mobile disco business keep it up ....... I also learnt and hopefully will continue to learn a great deal from him so Will, thanks for the help and good night out .... as you say .... part 2 on the 30th ... bring it on.

[Shaun]

Wow!

Things could have turned out so much worse. I'm glad to hear your both OK!.

[Jiggles]

So i take it yopu had a smashing time :teeth:

[Corabar Steve]

Wow!

Things could have turned out so much worse. I'm glad to hear your both OK!.
Ditto

[Have a disco]

So we expect your first song in future to be the beach boys - surfin USA

[Corabar Steve]

I'd've started with

Tommy Steele - Crash Bang Wallop
The Primatives - Crash
The D@mned - Smash it up

[NeilP]

You didn't get a 'Trailor Trash' reputation then!! :teeth: