It's interesting, I had a dogs dinner of gig (maybe no quite as bad as that but felt like it) last night but had really good ones on Friday and Wednesday. Must of been the night for it.
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It's interesting, I had a dogs dinner of gig (maybe no quite as bad as that but felt like it) last night but had really good ones on Friday and Wednesday. Must of been the night for it.
Technically you didn't. You played Pato Banton featuring 2 members of UB40, not the entire group, unless the band released a version of it featuring Pato.:devil::whome::sj:Quote:
Originally Posted by Shakermaker Promotions
I was waiting for someone to pop up with that one.
I know that, you know that but she didn't and (from what I can imagine), she, possibly 20 years old at the most, probably expected either Red Red Wine or Kingston Town (which she asked for in the end).
Ha, Ha...I don't need educating Steve....It's people like her that do especially when she said "Can you play UB40?" - Do they just expect the usual? Probably!
Of course, I could have played Red, Red Wine and she may still have come over and asked for Kingston Town.
On the other side, she may well have known her UB40 stuff? I'd much rather play stuff like the Earth Dies Screaming or One In Ten but I had a full dance floor and they'd probably have killed it.
Same as when someone came over and asked "Can you play Dexys?" - I chose the usual but I'd rather play There, There My Dear as it's MY personal favourite.
(and I like Baby, Come Back too) :beer1:
I'm not a fan of the ordinary version of Red Red Wine but beware of a version on a Mastermix Classic Cuts album. It's extended & has an awful rap. Avoid at all costs.
Similarly I found a glaring issue with a version of 'my girl lollipop' on Saturday, also from a Classic Cuts series. Horribly extended. I'll be sacking both extended cuts in favour of the better known versions.
I HATE Mastermix now!
I thought you'd been doing this long enough to know you should never stereotype your audiences due to appearances or assume they're all idiots (especially not to say such on a publicly viewable forum that comes up well in Google searches)Quote:
Originally Posted by Shakermaker Promotions
I did a 30th on Saturday, the birthday girl was a major Rolling Stones fan, when she asked me to play some, by your logic I should've stuck on Satisfaction & been done with it.
Not at all!:mad:
Well, last night I went to the hotel staff Christmas drinky thing and partied. HARD. According to my phone I got in my front door at 3.30am slightly worse for wear & £70 lighter than when I went out.
Then today I helped out a local branch of a nationwide charity by providing their Christmas disco. I honestly didn't know what to expect, but the staff helped collect requests on post-it notes for me & I worked my way through the more upbeat ones over the course of 2 hours. There was frenetic dancing, much singing along and a very large thankyou from their regional director. Requests were varied & interesting (and not very Christmassy, yay!) and I had about as much fun as they did. The rig comprised of my 4 foot Ultimax, front lycra screen, Teutonic LED PAR bar, Mackies (on the floor behind the screen, which worked a treat since it was a small gathering) and my ancient Formula Sound FSM-400 mixer.
Attachment 17599
Behind the screen, my Chauvet RGB cluster laser and the Chauvet WashFX.. the pic doesn't really do it justice - the hot spot wasn't as bad as it looks there.
Lest I forget the very loud round of applause for me at the end.. And now I'm feeling all warm & fuzzy.
Looking like a grim one. Venue owner has just stood in front of me, and offered to the client to play background music from people's phones! :mad: Don't think me and him are going to get on.
Even worse than I feared when I turned up. Venue owner wasn't at all friendly, and that would have a bearing on the evening.
It was a last minute one, I'd been recommended by a friend, and gave them a silly price over the phone. It was local, and I wanted to perhaps get a foot in the door of this venue, which seems to be doing weddings hand over fist.
Lack of communication bedevilled the whole affair. It turned out not to be a small intimate one for friends and family, but by a quick count, over 200 people in a big venue. In they came around 7,30, and by the time the meal was done, it was well past 10pm. Even then, no lights were dimmed, and I wasn't given the all clear to get started in earnest for quite a long time.
I had a playlist of sorts ( more of a suggestions one, really ) and I cherry picked from it. With it being a joint 21st and 50th, we had two crowds in, and balancing them was a tad tricky. At this point, I must mention I was having a bad time. The young ones had necked a large amount of fizz and vino before the meal started ( cos it was so slow ) and worse still, they were being very boisterous on the dancefloor, drinks in hand. I couldn't concentrate on the job in hand, cos I was watching drinks, speakers, and everything else.
We had two breakages very early on, and once the owner had seen the problem, he told them face to face not to bring drinks on the floor. Once he'd done that, I had much more success with my appeals. We were still in my nightmare scenario, young rowdy punters with drinks in hand, and inside.
Anyway, I slowly began to get the upper hand, and some of the older guests asked me to bend the music more to them. This packed the floor, and we were getting somewhere at last. Midnight crawled round, and I was counting down the minutes, when the owner came up, and tapped my watch, asking why I was playing past the finish time. :confused:
Answer, cos I was booked till 1am.
Oh no, I'm not, licence is till twelve.
This is where it all goes pear shaped. He says finish on this one, I say no problem, and announce I've finished. Client says I can play on. I say I can't, and she goes off to get the owner to give a pronouncement. By now, we're into the one more bit, and it begins to get insistent. Anyone who knows me will attest that that cajolery works far better than confrontation, if you want something from me. I had left the gear switched on, in case of some form of restart, and their baying for more was the final straw. I switched off, and started packing up, even though I probably shouldn't have done. I was :mad:
Because the owner hadn't been very welcoming initially, I hadn't done my usual check of timings, and it seems that the correct course of action should have been bar and disco close at twelve, and music can continue at background level. Well considering I'd had the dials round at eleven most of the night, that would have been a waste of time. Had I been apprised of the cunning plan, I would have lowered it from 11.30, so that the change wasn't as abrupt. If anybody had spoken to anybody else early on, this could have been avoided.
Anyway, I packed up, I got paid, and I'm now reasonably calm. I wasn't when a young " lady " decided that if I wasn't going to play more music for her, I deserved some very fierce personal insults. Charming!! :eek:
That might be it till NYE, I may perhaps be in the local social club for a couple of gigs, I don't know, it's fluid.
Happy Christmas folks.
Ouch, that's horrible tale Peter. Glad it wasn't my gig. Though mine tonight wasn't much better.
You guessed it.. I had a GRINCH tonight. It was bad enough that it was a murder misery night. It was bad enough that half the guests put their coats on the minute the final scores had been read out. It was bad enough (you get the idea)... Anyway, so I got some people up dancing & they were having a right old time of it boogying away - when a woman from a corner table said that she thought people were looking like they were having fun, so could I play some tunes to (I quote) :Censored::Censored::Censored::Censored: them off? She did this repeatedly, coming over to ask for The Military Wives, Aled Jones.. you name it - if it'd in all likelihood decimate the place she asked for it. I didn't humour her.
And then a gent from her table came over to explain his lot were a right load of miserable old buggers & that only fairly dull tale of NY would get them up. "but it's a proper Christmas song...". Just wait a bit, okay? Time marched on, we had cheese by the pallet load & if people weren't up on the floor they were at least chair dancing.
Last orders time eventually arrived & on came The Poggles.. and as if by magic (he shouted at them to get off their chairs because he was the boss)... all his table got up & danced to it, and a couple of other people. Ah, I get it now. All his lot WERE miserable old buggers - and I'm guessing it was because they were out with HIM (and the woman from earlier). According to my mates the staff he was a right.. er.. winker all night. Who whistles at staff members to call them over (and doesn't want a slap?)... He & she didn't half give me a bucket full of grief for finishing on time too. My customer service remit very nearly went out of the window this time. Condescending .... grrrr.
With that, I'm massively glad this round of Christmas parties is all done & dusted. Invoice is emailed off (I've cut out the middleman this time) and I'm looking forward to a nice restful few days.
Merry Christmas, one & all! :D :beer1::beer1::beer1::beer1::beer1::beer1::beer1: