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What's your opening song(s) and why?


Vito Corleone

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For us....

...at weddings we usually start with "Celebration". Obvious.

At "dance party" events it's usually "Boogie Oogie Oogie". Easily recognizable to most age groups and a good dance-floor filler without being too raucous or jarring for their ears. Plus the arrangement is a good one for the sound guy to get the mix happening.

If it's a more rockin' or concert-type event, we'll usually start with either "Heartbreaker" or "Raise Your Glass" depending on the general age of the audience.

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if its an early gig we start with something a bit mellower like Margaritaville, what I got, or Home by philip Phillips or something like that.

If its a later start (9 or 9:30) depending on the crowd/place we may still open with something mellower or just something straight and non-cheesy/goofy like recently we have been doing one of these:

* Hey Jealousy/Two princes
* Drive-by
* Animal/everybody talks
*Inside Out/ What I Got
* Laid

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We're a straight up rock cover band, going on about 9:30. We still start on the quieter side of our set most of the time, though:

Black Crowes - "Hard to Handle"
Spin Doctors - "Two Princes"
Jet - "Are You Gonna Be My Girl?"
Lenny Kravitz - "Are You Gonna Go My Way"

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Here are the setlists for the next two gigs, a Halloween Party and a wedding. In both instances, an older crowd will be there so the first set will have more of the older classic rock than the middle set. Almost always start off with the first ones listed below except for weddings, the only change is Walkin on Sunshine is moved up to first with Smooth second.




Set I 9:00

Hit Me with your best shot
Smooth
Jessies Girl
Are You Gonna go My Way
Jenny Jenny
Bad Case of Lovin You
Old Time Rock and Roll
Hold On Loosely
Hard To Handle
I love Rock and Roll
Honky Tonk Woman
You Shook Me All Night Long






Set II 10:30

Jump
Workin For the Weekend
Just Dance
Billie Jean
Don't Stop Believing
Brickhouse
Rebel Yell
Rock N Roll
Sweet Child of Mine
Just Like Heaven
Beat It
Play that Funky Music
Anyway you want it
Your Love
Firework



Set III 12:10
Every Rose Has It's Thorn
Pour some sugar on me
Respect
Walking On Sunshine
Sharp Dressed Man
Summer of 69 *
R & R All Night Long
Walk This Way
What I like abt U/Medley

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We are a country band with a somewhat "different" sound than the typical country bands in our area. Many times we start out with an old Waylon Jennings song called " Lonesome, Onry and Mean". It has a good driving beat with an attitude. Other times we will start with "Redneck Girl" or a more milder song like "some Beach."

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Depends on the gig ... but in general, for bar gigs - we open with something on the "lighter" side of the list. More often than not we're starting as the crowd is transitioning from being a dinner crowd to being a drinking/dancing crowd. Start out too hard - and the dinner crowd tends to bolt. A couple of middle of the road tunes ... and we're up to speed. If the drinking/dancing crowd is there waiting for us to start ... we'll come out with both barrels blazing.

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For one band, it's usually The Killers' When You Were Young. We open with it because it's a pretty good opener, but whenever we tried putting anywhere else in the set, it never felt like a good fit. So it's kinda become our opener by default.

For my other band, it's usually Nothin' But a Good Time. We like to open with a good, uptempo rocker, and it features a decent amount of backing vocals, for fine-tuning the mix.

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Quote Originally Posted by n9ne View Post
For one band, it's usually The Killers' When You Were Young. We open with it because it's a pretty good opener, but whenever we tried putting anywhere else in the set, it never felt like a good fit. So it's kinda become our opener by default.

For my other band, it's usually Nothin' But a Good Time. We like to open with a good, uptempo rocker, and it features a decent amount of backing vocals, for fine-tuning the mix.
I might try putting that song by The Killers' in front. We do that one too, but it always seems to go nowhere fast. Maybe if we started the night with it, the response will be different. "Nothing But A Good Time" would be a great opener. My impression of a band that would start with that song is that of a decent rock band and that I'll be hearing a good night of solid rock tunes. Unfortunately, I don't think our band would get hired in a lot of the places we play if we just played rock all night long. Most of the bar owners I called lost interest when I told them we're a rock band until I mentioned that we do some country as well. It's just the way it is in our little bar circuit. Maybe if we played different places, we could flex our wings and be more rock (which is essentially what the three of us are, rock/hard rock/metal guys).

Most of the time, we've been starting with "Memphis" (Johnny Rivers style). It's kind of deceptive, because people then think we're a mellower band, but we'll gradually amp things up throughout the night, closing with Judas Priest and Poison. I like to start with it because it's easy on my vocals which I need to warm up with for a few songs. I might start with "Tired Of Waiting For You" from now on (which we just learned), since that song is perfect for my vocal range.
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"Machine Head" Bush
"Loser" 3 Doors Down
"TNT" AC/DC

Which are no brianers for us to warm up being we really don't have to think about the songs unlike doing Zack Wylde's Pride and Glory "Losing my mine" which
drummer still have a slight prolem with. mad.gif

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Quote Originally Posted by twostone

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Which are no brianers for us to warm up being we really don't have to think about the songs unlike doing Zack Wylde's Pride and Glory "Losing my mine" which drummer still have a slight prolem with. mad.gif

 

That is a GREAT song... what's the drummer's problem with it? Pretty straight ahead if I recall. Brian Tichy laid some great beats in that band.
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