Members wheresgrant3 Posted September 23, 2005 Members Share Posted September 23, 2005 A few weeks back we were booked to play at this bar during a local town festival. Like many town festivals, this one started out small but over the years this one has become a huge draw, primarily because the town permits open container and it's the hometown of local Reality TV Celebs Orange County Choppers. The whole event looks a cross between Madi Gras and Bike Week Daytona. The day kicks of with a formal Fireman's Parade and they have various trailers and floats pulling all kinds of parade sponors. On Wednesday three days before the gig we get a call from the local FM rock station we a ton of promotions with. They decided (on short notice) to sans having their DJ's on a float and have us play instead. We huddled said "sure" and asked for the details and dimmensions of the float. We didn't get past the trailer. 12 FT!??!?? That wouldn't even fit our drummers full kit. So we said for this to work we would need a bigger trailer. They said they would work on it and get back to us the next day. On Friday they contacted us with some promise that they found a bigger trailer but wasn't completely sure how big. We agreed to meet them in the staging area at 8am and would try to work with what they delivered. They showed up a half hour late with a Nissan Xterra pulling a .... 12 ft landscapers trailer! Our first response was ... "No way is that gonna work". We were looking at the radio intern like he was on crack, and shook our heads.... "Nice idea". So we started thinking about stripping down and doing maybe an acoustic set. That wasn't really represenative of the whole band... and acoustic wasn't really in with the theme of a loud FM rock station. So with less than an hour to spare we started thinking of ways we could rig our gear, full PA and perform on this little trailer. Within minutes we had a plan, and sprung into action. Luckily we had brought plenty of bungies and locking straps. We are a 5 piece and I play guitar and keyboards. The radio station had provided a 3000 watt gas generator and we were determined to run our full PA, subs and all. Starting from the back of the trailer we placed our bass player and lead guitarists rigs facing front. On top of those rigs we placed two vocal monitors (at head level). Then in front of that was our drummer's kit... stripped down to a snare, kick,two toms and two cymbals. All three (our bass and lead guitarist on either side of me) of us stood right in front of the drum kit. We barely had room to move. Above the trailer hitch I strapped one of my keyboard flight cases perpendicular to the trailer. On top of that fit two 18"inch sub cabinets perfectly. On top on that I strapped down another keyboard case and placed my Triton on top... viola' a perfect keyboard stand. Since I didn't have any room for my amp setup I used my POD (duct taped to the subs) and along with the Keys went stereo direct into our main mixer board which was housed inside the Xtera next to the generator. Finally our singer sat on the roof of the Xtera with our two main's strapped to the roof. We ran the bass, keys and both Line 6 guitar setups direct. We mic'd vocals, the kick and snare. The sound was pretty good even though it looked riducules. It was really an example of turning {censored} into sugar. It also helped us to rebond as a band again. We had a pretty stressful schedule over the summer. Tensions were building.... and we really needed a situation where we would work with and not against each other. Later that night we had a great show at the Festival. The tightest we ever played. So the event put us in the right direction. BTW... I don't why, but I thought the Captain's hat was appropriate because... well our float was so sad looking. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Mr. Botch Posted September 23, 2005 Members Share Posted September 23, 2005 Cool that you could make it work, and it looks like a lot of fun! I just hope no one else from my band sees this, or they'll be wanting to buy more equipment "because we can make it fit!" Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Bones Posted September 23, 2005 Members Share Posted September 23, 2005 Glad it all worked out for you guys. Excellent way for tons of people to get to know the band - solid promo. BTW - Who's the Al Bundy looking guy standing in the road? Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members tucktronix Posted September 23, 2005 Members Share Posted September 23, 2005 Grantmeister, That's an excellent example of putting your heads together:) I've ran into similar situations(with the blues band) with fitting a four piece into a tin can, a real pain in the ass. Great job, dude! You guys rawk! BTW - have you guys met any of the OCC? I'm a big fan of theirs! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wheresgrant3 Posted September 23, 2005 Author Members Share Posted September 23, 2005 Originally posted by tucktronix Grantmeister, That's an excellent example of putting your heads together:) I've ran into similar situations(with the blues band) with fitting a four piece into a tin can, a real pain in the ass. Great job, dude! You guys rawk! BTW - have you guys met any of the OCC? I'm a big fan of theirs! Actually Paulie Jr & Sr were out of town this year, but here is a pic from last year's parade. I see Mikey occasionally at our gigs. Their shop is less that an 1/8 mile from my girlfriends Mom's house. They are pretty cool and down to earth. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members wheresgrant3 Posted September 23, 2005 Author Members Share Posted September 23, 2005 Originally posted by Bones Glad it all worked out for you guys. Excellent way for tons of people to get to know the band - solid promo. BTW - Who's the Al Bundy looking guy standing in the road? Well it was even better than that. We slipped our trailer right behind the radio station float So it was free adverstising all the way! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members MDLMUSIC Posted September 23, 2005 Members Share Posted September 23, 2005 Great story and a great website, BTW. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members JameGumb Posted September 24, 2005 Members Share Posted September 24, 2005 Yeah, nice work! It's nice when the band comes together in teamwork. Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Members Terry Allan Hall Posted September 26, 2005 Members Share Posted September 26, 2005 Very, very ! Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Recommended Posts
Archived
This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.