Members benzem Posted March 8, 2013 Members Share Posted March 8, 2013 Stratguy22's comments in the "weird situation with 2 singers" thread got me thinking. Mine? Technically a outdoor biker party that went 'til about 3 am. BUT, we started around 5 pm! But it didn't really get going until almost midnight. Of course there were some long breaks in there. It was a casual band and our first gig. Our setlist was maybe 22 songs so we played them each several times! Ha. Drunk and freezing at the end..could barely move my fingers. Officially it was a NYE gig. The other lead singer didn't show so I sang the whole night, which extended til 2 am(at least). 5 sets! Couldn't hardly speak the next day. Yours? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members modulusman Posted March 8, 2013 Members Share Posted March 8, 2013 Back in the 80s i was playing clubs in Alaska from 10-4am 6 nights a week. I think the longest single day was when my band was the back-up band for the country showdown. We set up at 8:00am and rehearsed with the contestants for 2.5 hours ate lunch then played the actual show which was about 90 minutes. We then had a few hours off then played on the same stage from 8-midnight. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members tlbonehead Posted March 8, 2013 Members Share Posted March 8, 2013 I've played 2x4 hour gigs in a day a number of times. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members n9ne Posted March 8, 2013 Members Share Posted March 8, 2013 The two that come to mind:A private after-hours place in Tuscaloosa AL. The club manager told us, "You boys start around 9:00-10:00 PM, and play whatever you want and take as many breaks as you want....I don't care. There won't be hardly nobody here. But as the other places shut down, we'll be packed with people....so at 1:00 AM, you have all your best stuff ready, and you play straight through until it slows down around 4:00-5:00 AM." I remember finishing our set and walking out of the club just as the sun was about to come up. Seemed very surreal, loading out of a club when it felt like we should have been eating breakfast.Also played a club that rotated three bands per night starting at 8:00, with each band playing two sets. So after you played your first set, you had to wait three hours to start your second set. Plus, you had soundcheck from 6:00-7:00. It wasn't too bad if you were the first band to go on, because you were done around midnight.....but the third band had to soundcheck at 6:30 or so, then start their first set around 11:00 PM, then their second set at 2:00-2:30 AM. Made for a long, slow night. (Hardly surprising that most of the bands were half-drunk by the time they started their second set. But that's what happens when you ask folks to sit and wait in a bar for three hours.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members delaware dave Posted March 9, 2013 Members Share Posted March 9, 2013 In 2009 I did a 12-3 show with a dead band, a 6-9 live studio recording and a 10-1 gig in a club next to the studio. We had to carry our equipment from the studio to the club. Fortunately a bunch of people helped us with the equipment. I was exhausted. About 7 years ago I played with a dead band and we did a 9-2 gig with one 35 minute break. My fingers, back and legs were killing me. It was an hour drive home to boot. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SpaceNorman Posted March 9, 2013 Members Share Posted March 9, 2013 There's a local town festival that we play every year that is definitely a marathon. The event is an Art/Crafts festival that shuts down the entire main street business district ... roughly two blocks long - as well as the city park that sits at one end of the business district. There's a "festival" beer tent located in the park that has constant music - as well as a couple of local bars that set up a tent in the street that do live entertainment as well. We play a concert in the park (2 - 1 hour sets with a 10 minute break) on Thursday night, a full 4 set night under outdoor tent in front of one of the bars in town on Friday night. On Saturday it's 3 one hour sets in the festival beer tent at one end of town ... followed by a full 4 set bar night under the outdoor tent that we play under on Friday night.The two full "back-to-back" gigs on Saturday - coming on the heels of a full 4 set night on Friday and a pretty decent two hour show on Thursday is definitely an endurance event for us - especially the vocalists. It's a fun weekend though ... especially if the weather is good. We consistently see 4-6 private event bookings as a result of having been seen at one of our festival performances. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members WynnD Posted March 9, 2013 Members Share Posted March 9, 2013 We used to play at one of the casinos. That day after loading up the van started at 3 PM with the drive up, the ugly unload and setup. Dinner, show, tear down, ugly loadup and return home by 2:30 AM 11.5 hours not including loading and unloading my van. (Another hour.) Glad they quit calling us. (Think my concern for my equipment that they insisted had to be unloaded and the car moved before dragging it all inside may have pissed them off. The policy pissed me off. It wasn't their livelihood sitting on the floor outside the casino door.) Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members n9ne Posted March 10, 2013 Members Share Posted March 10, 2013 The most brutal 24 hour stretch I've done was loading the truck early Saturday , driving 6 hrs to the gig, doing a full load-in and setup, playing 10-2....then loading everything back up and driving all night to make a 10 AM load-in for a 2-6 Sunday afternoon gig, then loading everything back up and taking it back to our warehouse so we could get the rental truck turned in on time Monday morning. Started working around lunchtime Saturday and worked pretty much straight through until about 10 PM Sunday. That was rough. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members SeniorBlues Posted March 10, 2013 Members Share Posted March 10, 2013 n9ne wrote: The most brutal 24 hour stretch I've done was loading the truck early Saturday , driving 6 hrs to the gig, doing a full load-in and setup, playing 10-2....then loading everything back up and driving all night to make a 10 AM load-in for a 2-6 Sunday afternoon gig, then loading everything back up and taking it back to our warehouse so we could get the rental truck turned in on time Monday morning. Started working around lunchtime Saturday and worked pretty much straight through until about 10 PM Sunday. That was rough. That's a serious round trip . . . . While we're looking at variations on the "most grueling" theme, how about the longest drive from one gig to the next. No overnight layover.Five of us packed up after a gig in Williamsport, PA, drove to Tampa, FL and played that night. Seventeen hours, IIRC. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.