Backstage With the Band

[guido61]

Originally Posted by tlbonehead

My spare power amp weighs about 14lbs.And, no, a couple drivers here or there over the years but I haven't lost a power amp in my last 1000 gigs or so. A mixer a couple times, when I was stupid enough to trust a Behringer, but that's about it.

Yeah, that's why I think all this talk about "failure" is sort of off the mark. Buy decent gear--either active or passive, and you shouldn't really have to worry about failure too much.

Except, as I said at the outset, that passive gear almost certainly has a higher failure rate due to consumer mis-use. Just ask the speaker re-cone guys about how much less work they have these days.

[guido61]

Originally Posted by jimiv

Speaking of fails, my mesa-boogie simul 2:90 crapped out on me at sound check at our Nov 3 gig. This was the biggest wedding gig we had booked this year last Nov 3rd. We even rented additional lighting. Large stage, big room. Great pay and lots of potential future clients and our first gig with a high profile wedding planner. Switched on, power lights came on.....nothing, no sound nothing. What a shitty feeling. I use a little crate power block for back-up but only used it one other time a long while ago. I don't think anyone really noticed, but I was so bummed after the gig because my tone sucked so bad. Sounded so digitized out of that block. I'm still sorta bummed when I think of it. Thanks for reminding me of it btw. Hahahaha.

Yeah, we've had far more problems with backline gear failing that active PA gear. Luckily we keep a certain degree of 'backup' gear too, but, like you, most of it sucks.

I felt good about our PRX system last summer though when we did an outdoor gig in 100-degree heat for 2 days for a Tough Mudder event. Sun was beating right down on them and I thought for sure they'd shut down or worse from overheating. But they barreled through like champs. Wish I could say the same about the melting musicians onstage....

[StratGuy22]

Originally Posted by tlbonehead

man, that would suck!

Our contract was with a different group who was renting the hall. Good thing we mentioned coming back to load out to the manager of the hall. He was going to be gone until the Tuesday, which really would have put us in a bind. But it all worked out and we will make sure to confirm the Sunday load out next year.

Originally Posted by SpaceNorman

Just curious ... how long does it take you to tear down. Both of my "big" projects (one is a 6 piece group, the other an 8 piece group) are usually packed and loaded out in a hair under an hour from the time the last note ends. In both of my scenarios - there's a significant keyboard rig, a full drum kit, a full PA (2 sub, 2 main, 4 monitor wedges, amp rack, FOH rack .. and all the cabling...) - as well as lights (a stand and a simple "4 bar" of lights on each side of the stage). It's rare that the wait staff isn't still picking up bottles and cleaning as we're walking out with the last piece of gear.

Getting it done that fast means that we all walk of the stage after the final tune - take a minute or so to take a leak - and then get straight to tearing down. Our vocalists (female in one project, male in the other) are the only members of the band that do any "smoozing" during teardown (that's by design ... their job is to keep the patrons occupied so the rest of us can tear down our gear). Everybody approaches teardown and loadout with a sense of urgency.

True. We are a typical setup.

2 tops
2 subs
5 monitors, centerfill
Mixer
4 - 6 Power amps
Lights
2 guitars
Bass
Drums
Keys
4 vocal mics
2 wireless mics
Lights

I'm a bit anal with the cords, I over/under to a specific size so they fit in the cable trunks. We tear down our instruments, then after the drums are done they lower the lights, take then off and into the box, truss down and apart, stands down

Then at the same time someone helps pull cords, out into a straight line do I can over under. Also have to take down the mixer, the power amps, the computer.

It does take some doing. Load out the next day goes pretty quick. I quarterback the pack and everyone brings me the gear in order.

[New Trail]

OP, please let us know what you quoted the gig for, if you got it, and, if so, how it went!

Thanks!

[New Trail]

Any news?!?

[SpaceNorman]

Originally Posted by StratGuy22

I'm a bit anal with the cords, I over/under to a specific size so they fit in the cable trunks. ...someone helps pull cords, out into a straight line do I can over under.

We handle the cords thing a little differently.

My FOH rack is pretty much 100% prewired. It's a slant rack - with a MixWiz mounted on the slant, all our signal processing on the vertical - with roughly 4u of unused space at the bottom of the rack. I use two 30' Hosa Little Bro' 8 channel snakes - one of which gets placed at the rear of the stage to host all backline connections and one that gets placed at the front of the stage to host all frontline connections. I also have an 8 channel patch snake to carry all the FOH/Monitor outputs to the amp rack. The three snakes are 100% prewired within the FOH rack - and "live" coiled in the bottom of the rack during transport and storage.

The arrangement I have with my bandmates is simple. I provide all the PA from the "drop box" back. Each band member is responsible for providing their own microphones (and/or DI boxes), mic stands and whatever cabling they need to connect whatever they need amplified (i.e. vocal mic, instrument) to their assigned input(s) on the drop box(s). Because of the physical location of the drop boxes - a single 20' mic cable is all that's needed to connect ANY mic or DI to the PA. Each band member is responsible for setting up their own gear - including patching it into the drop box during setup - as well as packing, transporting and storing their own MICs, cables and stands when we tear down.

At setup time - I simply open the back of FOH rack, extend the snakes - placing the drop boxes in the appropriate place on stage - and making the patch snake connections into the back of the amp rack.

When it's time to tear down - I disconnect everything from the two drop boxes, disconnect the patch snake from the amp rack - coil the snakes for storage in the bottom of the FOH rack - and close the door. Everybody deals with their mic cables as they see fit.

I have a dozen or so mic cables in my case - but only use them if/when somebody forgets a cable or the rare occasion that a single 20' mic cable isn't quite long enough to reach the drop box.

Since the lead vocalist only has a single mic to deal with - he's been assigned the task of dealing with the speaker cables. He runs them from the Amp rack to the speakers during setup - and then for disconnecting them from the speakers, then coiling and packing them during teardown.

The result of all this means that instead of one guy dealing with a whole band's worth of individual mic cables - each bandmate deals with the 1 or 2 mic cables they use. While they're dealing with their stuff - I've simply got 3 snake cables to coil and store.

The way our division of labor works out - we virtually NEVER find ourselves with guys standing around waiting for somebody else to finish packing PA stuff.

[TIMKEYS]

we are pretty low tech on set up and tear down. We have two ATA road cases. All the power supply stuff in one. All the signal stuff in the other.

[StratGuy22]

Originally Posted by SpaceNorman

We handle the cords thing a little differently.

My FOH rack is pretty much 100% prewired. It's a slant rack - with a MixWiz mounted on the slant, all our signal processing on the vertical - with roughly 4u of unused space at the bottom of the rack. I use two 30' Hosa Little Bro' 8 channel snakes - one of which gets placed at the rear of the stage to host all backline connections and one that gets placed at the front of the stage to host all frontline connections. I also have an 8 channel patch snake to carry all the FOH/Monitor outputs to the amp rack. The three snakes are 100% prewired within the FOH rack - and "live" coiled in the bottom of the rack during transport and storage.

Nice. I'm a I one man show, providing sound for others. So I have all my poweramps, wireless mic receivers etc all in their own cases. Then I can also mix and match, depending on what the gig requires.

I do carry a spare FOH & Monitor amp to my gigs.

[New Trail]

Whassup?!?

[race81]

Im having a meeting with the powers that be on new years eve at our gig.....Im gonna tell em $1200, that will cover our expenses and we will still make a little better cash than a normal gig. I will let ya know as soon as I know..

[New Trail]

Best of Luck!