Embarassing gig moments

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StratLover2
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Joined: Wed Apr 14, 2010 7:33 pm

Embarassing gig moments

Post by StratLover2 »

Just curious, what are your top embarassing gig moments? I am sure everybody has at least had a few, and thought that this might be a good topic. To start off, here are some of mine:

One of the first times that we did the jams on the corner, I was playing rhythm and then a young girl my age or so at the time, caught my eye and I fell off the beat. Stricken, I just quickly jumped back in on rhythm, feeling embarassed.

Another time, last summer, I was playing Smooth by Santana, playing rhythm again, while my teacher soloed, when all of a sudden this girl in a car drives by (passenger btw.), stands up and reveals the fact she has a bikini on, and was pressed up against the glass. Result, I lost the rhythm, and once again feeling embarassed, I jumped back in. Both times, nobody noticed fortunately.

On one of our jam nights, I plugged in my wah, running it through the microcube, to my guitar. When I went to play, it seemed to cut off. Fortunately, this was before we got underway. I quickly unplugged the wah wah and went straight in with the micro cube. In that same jam, I realized that somehow even though my mind was thinking a "C" chord, I was some how a half step down... Fortunately, I rectified this quickly and I don't think anybody realized.
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Blindboy
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Re: Embarassing gig moments

Post by Blindboy »

Hell, I've had more than I can count.
I once yanked the neck off of my Strat doing a neck bend on a Hendrix tune. Another time, in a grungy little biker bar, I was unslinging my Strat and stuck the headstock into a ceiling fan above the stage. In another bar, in Oklahoma, I was playing a gig so sick with walking pneumonia, that I was literally leaning on a wall while playing... during our breaks, I just slid down onto the floor, but while we were playing, they propped me up and stuck the guitar in my hands. I still have no memory of that night, but they told me I played like mad. :icon_whoknows:
I have emptied out bars with my playing, knocked over my archtop and busted off the headstock. Once, in the kind of bar my Grandpappy used to call a "gun and knife club" because as a country doctor, he spent Saturday nights stitching up the patrons, we were on stage and this totally hot young woman in a short short miniskirt was playing pool. She was wearing no underwear, and every time she would bend over the pool table, the whole band would completely lose the beat. The worst part of that was that the bass player/singer and I both had wives in the audience. :yikes: We were playing at a notorious biker bar/strip club in OKC one time, and there were dancers on stage with us. One cute young thing wearing nothing but freckles and a smile was doing a bump and grind all around me, and what with her, and my wife in the audience glaring at me, it was very hard to play. Back then in Oklahoma, if you weren't a country band, it was very hard to find paying gigs... you took what you could get. We even played in a Wall Mart parking lot and tailgate parties at Sonic. (Talk about embarrassing!)
"Throw yo' big leg over me Mama, I might not feel this good again!"
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VikingBlues
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Re: Embarassing gig moments

Post by VikingBlues »

Well Blindboy - you've just reminded me what a quiet conservative little town I live in! :D

I've no proper gigging experience and strongly suspect if I tried my most embarassing moment would be me throwing up on stage in fear before playing a note.
Blindboy wrote:I was playing a gig so sick with walking pneumonia, that I was literally leaning on a wall while playing... during our breaks, I just slid down onto the floor, but while we were playing, they propped me up and stuck the guitar in my hands. I still have no memory of that night, but they told me I played like mad. :icon_whoknows:
Shows how the spirit of true music runs really deep in the better guitar players. :thumbsup: Like I'm sure I recall seeing his wife say she found SRV playing his guitar while asleep in his bed - and playing very well too.
An improv a day keeps the demons at bay!
StratLover2
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Re: Embarassing gig moments

Post by StratLover2 »

Whew boy BB!

I certainly look forward to the day where I can accumulate more "gig" experience if I tell stories like that, or maybe not. :P Certainly makes mine seem not like a big deal. One time I just blanked out and then realized my guitar teacher was signing, so perhaps it would be a good time to cut the soloing.. ;)

I have accumulated a little bit of fun stories, but I certainly hope there will be more to come!

SL2
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ratfinkdan
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Re: Embarassing gig moments

Post by ratfinkdan »

I have had more than I can remember also, I think after you get comfortable playing out live you just shrug all those oopps moments off plus usually no one else even notices. Once was given music for a tune we were playing at a conference of course the sheet I was given was in a different key than everyone elses, not very pretty! One band I was in we were playing in a little club in the summer and it was really hot and I started a tune totally wrong intro ryhthem singer turns and gives me that look, I just stopped turned to get some water the singer picked up on it quick and grabed some water also and made a coomment about the heat, I turned around and just nailed it which was cool cause I had totally forgotten how the tune went! Dan
MichaelRobinson
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Re: Embarassing gig moments

Post by MichaelRobinson »

BB. I have no exsperins playing in front of an audiance, but ones me and a guy was drinking and smooking somthing ilegal. I don' remeber a shit but afterwards he said I playd like a God, witch I have a suspisious mind about.
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ElMano
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Re: Embarassing gig moments

Post by ElMano »

I have been gigging from the age of 17 years (i am 61 now) The first embarrassing moment on stage was that we (the bluesband i play in at that moment) where the support act on a huge festival at 1972, and we play before Chicken Shack, and my bass amp failed, and i had to rent an hardrock stack from an other guy before we can get on stage (never ever play an tube amp after that!) An other time we play on a highschool and a teacher don't like a improvised solo i give and pull the main plug out of the electric system! :angry:
more recent i was ask to play for an benefit concert to raise money ( long disease ) and the gang i brought together was smoking on stage :wall:
Beside the rhythm guitar was playing in whole notes in stead of the sharp that was needed for the sax-player :yikes: And there are many more incidents whit women out the audience and so on.
I don't think you can play in a band whiteout that :tease: :naughty: :whistle: :yikes: :wall: :wall: moments :whistle:
You can't bend the rule, Every man is some womans fool
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12bar
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Re: Embarassing gig moments

Post by 12bar »

Blindboy wrote: Back then in Oklahoma, if you weren't a country band, it was very hard to find paying gigs... you took what you could get. We even played in a Wall Mart parking lot and tailgate parties at Sonic. (Talk about embarrassing!)
:lol: Reminds me of my favorite movie ("We play Country AND Western" - Rawhide...) :thumbsup:
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