How to look dumb 101

Last concert my sound engineer took me both direct stereo to mixer and I also had a 1x12 mesa boogie cabinet on an different output, I like to have options when possible, anyways so the concert starts and NOTHING sounds the same, after trying to do some quick tweaks and raise my outputs and all that jazz, I came to the conclusion that it won't work out and I should just enjoy as much as I can, while start mumbling to myself "****ing sound engineer ****ed up my sound, note to self don't trust them again" a couple of songs later found out the cabinet was on standby *facepalm*
 
I walked over to the other side of the stage to play some of the dual guitar parts (overdubs that is ) of War Pigs with my other guitar player.....wireless cut out for a brief sec...I paused...continued to walk over and jam with him. Then I realized I couldn't hear myself at all on his side through the mix ...I was playing in the wrong key the whole time since I was dead in the mix.
Run fast back to my own side.... :( ..and also realize my WAH is auto-engaged to boot
 
Mine was quite embarrassing.
We were playing in a small bar with the local FOH and no sound guy. Connected our main mixer to the local one, voice, kick drum and we were ready to go.
Gig started and everyone was looking at us. I mean staring, really staring at us. Some friends were telling us to raise the voice. we kept playing, one song after another.
And they keep telling us that the voice is tooooo low. we were like wtf?!?! I can't even hear my guitar anymore. The monitors were soooo loud. Our mixer was clipping everywhere.
After 4 or 5 songs I just stopped, took a deep breathe to discover that the damn local DJ had muted the FOH mixer after the sound check. The stage monitors were connected to the Aux inputs so they were fine. we played like 20 minutes without FOH. Jeeez.
 
my worst moment.... doing the solo break to a song with a solo from a totally different song.... after about 10 seconds of trying to shoe horn it in I finally gave up and just stood there making funny faces and turning beet red!

To top it off it was a solo I really liked playing so I had the band go back and do a chorus - solo - chorus deal so I could get it in... crowd loved it! I wish I had video!
 
There was a jam night and a drummer who saw me playing before really wanted to jam together. I didn't know how good he is, but it's jam night, right? Started playing, sounds pretty good. He is not really good, but puts lot of effort in it. Respect. So playing the same chord progression for 10 mins I look back at him as "hey last round" so we can finish. We get to the end ..., but he didn't stop, so I kept playing. I nodded again,"so this the last round". I was expecting a confirmation from him this time, but all I saw his getting nervous. Well, he didn't stop either. Nodded again, but strangely he started speeding up. I just had enough this point and stop paying, actually the whole band did, but the drummer just kept playing by himself, faster and faster.
He was looking around begging for help, like he was stuck. He speed up almost double time finally he fell off the chair, which actually rescued him.
 
My latest gaff was forgetting to change out of a de-tune patch, and starting the next song a semitone down. Drummer and singer are blissfully unaware. Bassist is staring at my fretboard trying to count frets (it's a Parker, so there are no front facing position markers).
 
poor guy that drummer, levipeto! You should have just served him some blues turn arounds you know, play slower and slower... like rubbing it in. I guess there was no need for rubbing it in since he was oiled enough to fall off his chair. Shit happens.
 
I hadn't played with my old buddies in a band i left for about 8 months. Asked me to join them for a few songs, so i practiced up the 9 songs i'd play that night. I had forgetten that we changed the key of one song from A to E......needless to say, my playing was in the wrong key. Every note i played was HORRIBLE...and I couldn't figure it out "I know i'm playing this right, sounded GREAT jamming with cd last night".....luckily about 30 sec in the other guitarist slides over....yells "WE'RE IN E!!!" and smiled real big....nailed the rest of the song, but damn was I red-faced.

Oh, and another time....first gig with these guys in over a year (yup, same guys, this was last new years), trying to show off my awesome Axe II. Had a BEAUTIFUL string patch (courtesy of someone on here, can't recall who) Had an IA set-up to change from Major to Minor chord of the strings patch, worked great, the song went D, G,D,A,Bm,G,D,A so just held IA during the Bm and it sounded badass. Somehow when re-ordering my patches for the show, I screwed up the IA and had it backwards......All the Majors sounded Minor, and the Minor was major....i only tried one of the 20 choruses....it was BAD...just changed to dirty guitar and jammed that way, but man that was a rough first chorus. The death stare from Lead singer was priceless!
 
My friend had a 3 piece wedding band. Bass, drums, keyboard and they all sing. European folk stuff. The vibe was peeking in the middle of the night, nobody left thirsty, even the band got hammered. My friend was just playing the bass, tipsy, zoned out, when he noticed the keyboard stopped playing. He turned his head towards the keyboard player... but he wasn't there. Finally spotted him in the crowd dancing it off with the ladies, why the drum and bass kept playing.
 
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one time I was going to change guitars, I took off my brand new Ibanez, when the other guitar player walked towards me.

He was one of those guys who didn't clip the ends off of his strings, and one of them stabbed me in the left arm while my guitar was in my right hand holding it by the neck.
Due to a grounding issue, I was jolted with electricity that made me involuntarily throw my guitar about 10 feet onto a concrete floor.
Now I go wireless
Good times
 
Well, this is a hilarious drummer moment that I witnessed as a sound guy: "Turn up the monitors, I can't hear my drums!" Audiences in very small pubs all over the world are known for loving 160dB stage SPL, and that's before the FOH is even turned on. Yeeeaaa, rock on!
 
My latest gaff was forgetting to change out of a de-tune patch, and starting the next song a semitone down. Drummer and singer are blissfully unaware. Bassist is staring at my fretboard trying to count frets (it's a Parker, so there are no front facing position markers).

Been there...done that!:eek:ops More than once... LOL! We have 2 guitars, one in standard tuning, one in E Flat tuning. Have forgotten which is which at the beginning of a set...ouch! Also, have done some manual drop D tunings (low E string), and then at the end of the song, enjoying the moment, have forgotten to bring the tuning back up to "E". Man does it suck when the first note of the next song is...you guessed it...on the low E string! I blame it on all a brain cell-killing decade known as the 1990s.
 
I originally posted this on the Hamer board a while back when a similar thread was created, thought y'all might enjoy the larf as well...

"I got that beat" (feeling like Hooper from Jaws during the late night "scar bragfest" on the boat)....

Back in the heyday we used to have an illusionist that travelled with us who did big, dark Copperfield type gags on stage as we played, and on occasion I'd set up other extra "freakshow" talent to perform on stage with us as well. On one such occasion I hired a fire-eating stripper to do her thang on a couple songs, and it was pretty sexy and cool... until she set me on fire.

It went down like this- it was my big jump-down-off-the-big-stage-into-the-crowd number, where I do the "play with the teeth" extended solo and grind the ladies schtick. I used to be a pretty good looking chick (before age turned me into this wreck of an old man), thin, fit and all that, and had a habit of getting pretty close (if not all the way) to naked on stage. Well, the band was rockin' hard, the illusionist was doing his "needle thru the neck blood gag" on some hapless assistant, the fire-eatin' stripper was gyrating nicely and waving her big lit torch all over the joint and I was down to my beyond skintight pleather pants basically hanging well below my hips, held on solely by sweat. I do the 6 or so feet jump down to the theaters main floor and proceed to solo my ass off. I get to the big show-off point and raise the guitar to my mouth and start bitin' away, the pleather pants now below my hips (thanks to a couple helpful ladies in the audience) and my entire ass is exposed in the back along with a decent portion of upper thigh. I'm wailin' and the crowd is going nutz, and all of a suddenly I feel an ungodly searing heat hit me on the thigh and quickly spread up my ass and onto my lower back. Not missing a beat of the solo I turn my head while I hammer on with my left hand and see my right leg, ass cheek and lower back completely engulfed in flame. I immediately bring the guitar down, keep hammering on and proceed to smack my ass, back and leg with my right hand trying to put the fire out. Now, this shit she spit must have been (and definitely felt like) napalm because as I smacked at it it just stuck to my hand and arm and spread.

Now, you would think that someone (at least one of the lovelies who so sweetly pulled my pants off) would come to my rescue, but noooo- they all think it's part of the act and watch me burn. Some of this is my own fault- I probably should have stopped soloing and screamed "HELP, I'M ON FUCKING FIRE!!!" or something, but I was a pro, ego was king and the show had to go on. My crew couldn't get to me fast enough, so it was up to me to put the damn fire out, which I finally did. I then made my way back to the stage, pulled up what was left of the pleather (some of which was now melted onto my ass) and finished the show... in a crazy amount of pain.

Every show/tour I did had it's share of "Spinal Tap" moments, and believe it or not some were even crazier than this, but this one was my fave (yes, I am a sick man). A quick footnote- to top off the evening, after the show I was assaulted by my best friend with a bottle ala every western barfight scene you've ever watched and had a knockdown, dragout with him, and was robbed at gunpoint for the evenings gate. But that's a tale for another time...
 
My singer introduces me to the crowd right before my big flashy solo in the set, then turns and swaps places with me so I am center stage. He takes his mic stand with him. I'm milking the moment - you know, leaning back with my best guitar face on. Toms build up dum dum dum dum Dum Dum Dum Dum DUM DUM DUM DUM and then right on the first beat of the solo the singer throws one fist in the air and slams his mic stand down on my volume pedal.

Anticlimax anyone?
 
I originally posted this on the Hamer board a while back when a similar thread was created, thought y'all might enjoy the larf as well...

"I got that beat" (feeling like Hooper from Jaws during the late night "scar bragfest" on the boat)....

Back in the heyday we used to have an illusionist that travelled with us who did big, dark Copperfield type gags on stage as we played, and on occasion I'd set up other extra "freakshow" talent to perform on stage with us as well. On one such occasion I hired a fire-eating stripper to do her thang on a couple songs, and it was pretty sexy and cool... until she set me on fire.

It went down like this- it was my big jump-down-off-the-big-stage-into-the-crowd number, where I do the "play with the teeth" extended solo and grind the ladies schtick. I used to be a pretty good looking chick (before age turned me into this wreck of an old man), thin, fit and all that, and had a habit of getting pretty close (if not all the way) to naked on stage. Well, the band was rockin' hard, the illusionist was doing his "needle thru the neck blood gag" on some hapless assistant, the fire-eatin' stripper was gyrating nicely and waving her big lit torch all over the joint and I was down to my beyond skintight pleather pants basically hanging well below my hips, held on solely by sweat. I do the 6 or so feet jump down to the theaters main floor and proceed to solo my ass off. I get to the big show-off point and raise the guitar to my mouth and start bitin' away, the pleather pants now below my hips (thanks to a couple helpful ladies in the audience) and my entire ass is exposed in the back along with a decent portion of upper thigh. I'm wailin' and the crowd is going nutz, and all of a suddenly I feel an ungodly searing heat hit me on the thigh and quickly spread up my ass and onto my lower back. Not missing a beat of the solo I turn my head while I hammer on with my left hand and see my right leg, ass cheek and lower back completely engulfed in flame. I immediately bring the guitar down, keep hammering on and proceed to smack my ass, back and leg with my right hand trying to put the fire out. Now, this shit she spit must have been (and definitely felt like) napalm because as I smacked at it it just stuck to my hand and arm and spread.

Now, you would think that someone (at least one of the lovelies who so sweetly pulled my pants off) would come to my rescue, but noooo- they all think it's part of the act and watch me burn. Some of this is my own fault- I probably should have stopped soloing and screamed "HELP, I'M ON FUCKING FIRE!!!" or something, but I was a pro, ego was king and the show had to go on. My crew couldn't get to me fast enough, so it was up to me to put the damn fire out, which I finally did. I then made my way back to the stage, pulled up what was left of the pleather (some of which was now melted onto my ass) and finished the show... in a crazy amount of pain.

Every show/tour I did had it's share of "Spinal Tap" moments, and believe it or not some were even crazier than this, but this one was my fave (yes, I am a sick man). A quick footnote- to top off the evening, after the show I was assaulted by my best friend with a bottle ala every western barfight scene you've ever watched and had a knockdown, dragout with him, and was robbed at gunpoint for the evenings gate. But that's a tale for another time...

Man you get the prize ! What a story... should be in a movie
 
Man you get the prize ! What a story... should be in a movie

It kinda is- my publicist at the time had her assistant (who was a film major) come out to film the event (my entertainment company used to put on major events with multiple bands/entertainment/ect, like mini-Lollapolooza's before there were any Lollapolooza's, and we used to film a lot of the shit). Someday I have to go through the archives and find the VHS tapes if they haven't turned to dust (this was waaaaaaaaaay back in 1992, and I can't claim to be an archiver, unless Rubbermaid totes in forgotten storage units now are considered archival storage methods).

And I'm not even kiddin' ya- this is just the tip of the iceberg when it comes to crazy shit happening to a fella. One of my old bassists has been chronicling my adventures and thinks we should write a book. My title? "AND THEN I ALMOST...."
 
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