From: khaberl@bbn.com (Karl Haberl)
Newsgroups: rec.music.makers
Subject: A gig from heaven
Date: 20 Aug 92 21:31:04 GMT
Article-I.D.: news.l983ooINN8v5
Reply-To: khaberl@BBN.COM (Karl Haberl)
Distribution: world
Organization: Bolt Beranek and Newman Inc., Cambridge MA
NNTP-Posting-Host: bbn.com

Anybody remember the "gig from hell" thread?  Here's a story about something
that happened to me just this past weekend. Definitely a gig from heaven...

I was about to leave for work Friday morning when the phone rings. "Hi Karl.
We had to fire our guitarist last night, but we have two more gigs to do this
weekend. What are you doing tonight? Would you be willing to give it a try?"

Now, I haven't played my guitar in at least two months (too busy playing with
my K2000) and I haven't played in front of an audience in something going on
ten years. But, I thought it might be fun. "So what's your set list?" I asked.
Well, it turns out I knew probably 10-15% of the tunes, though most of the rest
were familiar from hearing them on the radio. And he wanted to do a few of
the old tunes that I knew that weren't on their list. I swallowed real hard,
and said "O.K. I'll do it." We exchanged details on where the place was and
what time to meet, and then we spent a half-hour or so going over some chords
for the tunes I didn't know. [Of course, getting the guitar chords from a
keyboard player over the phone 10 hours before a gig is a less than optimal
way to learn new tunes].

So, the first thing I decided to do was take the day off to learn some stuff.
I had some of the tunes on tape, and I asked my wife to go out and buy a couple
of CDs that had newer stuff on them (for example, they played "Love and
Happiness" and "Get A Leg Up" from Mellencamp's new CD). Then I went downstairs
and plugged my Strat into my Quad GT and started wailing.

After a couple of hours, two things became obvious. First, I was having an
absolute *blast* playing, and the second was that I didn't know how I was going
to get through two four-hour gigs without completely ripping my now baby-soft
fingertips completely off my fingers. ("Why oh why didn't I keep playing, even
just a little bit, to keep up my calluses?" I mumbled to myself the whole day).

At the end of the day, I knew about a dozen new tunes to a fair level of
competence, and had even put together some of the leads (like the first lead
in "Comfortably Numb"), and it was time to pack up my stuff and move out.

My wife was very supportive, wished me good luck, and told me to watch out for
groupies. [Right, I thought. There's got to be a ton of groupies out there
just hanging out in the lobbies of Chinese restaurants waiting to descend on a
married 30-something former rock'n'roller with 4 kids and bloody fingertips.]

So I got to the place and set up my stuff (Strat, Quad GT, Lab Series L7 for
power, and my mic). I met the rest of the band members, and they were all
really great. "Hey, man. We'll just do the best we can. Let's just have fun!"
We went over the set list a bit, pretty informal. Reviewed some chords and
wrote them down in a notebook I had brought. We decided to do a few of my old
standbys like "Rock and Roll Hoochie Koo" and then it was suddenly time to
start. No sound check. No level check. Big-time gut check, though.

Suddenly the band starts up, pumping a D chord while the lead singer introduces
the band to the audience. "What the hell song are we doing?" I yell to the
drummer. "Sold Me Down the River," he shouts back. "Great," I thought "they had
to pick one of the new tunes that I had about ten minutes to go over earlier 
in the day for the first tune of the night (at least I vaguely remembered going
over it)." So the lead singer looks at me to start into the opening riff, which
I obediently did. Turns out, though, that my volume level, though appropriate
for late-night home practice sessions, was about 200db below the rest of the
band. "Turn up!" yells the singer (out of mic range of course). Normally, you
don't have to yell *that* phrase more than once to too many lead guitarists,
but under these circumstances a little anonymity wasn't a completely bad thing.
But I turned up, and turned up some more (trying to get through the opening
riffs at the same time) and finally got the volume up to a reasonable level.

So we pump our way through the song, though I have basically no idea where
we're going, having forgotten the chords seven hours ago. I just kept watching
the bass player, and he'd mouth the chord changes as we went. [An aside, for
all of you young budding guitar players out there, two essential skills for
playing in a band are (1) being able to read other people's fret positions, and
(2) being able to read lips]. Halfway through the tune, something flakes out
with the lead singer's mic. "Do a solo," he yells, "I gotta try to fix this
damn thing." The moment of truth had arrived. Just me and my guitar, a drummer,
a bassist, a [quiet] keyboard player, a roomful of people, and a sucking, 
swirling maelstrom of mass confusion going on inside my head. "Plink, plank, 
plunk, twang, twang" was about all I could muster, though I think I hit some
notes that landed on the chords a couple of times. The tune finally ends, and
wouldn't you know it, people clapped!

Well, things smoothed out a *lot* after that. I got in the flow of the tunes,
and my stomach unwound itself (somehow it had gotten tangled several times
around my spine, which was definitely affecting my playing ability.)

In fact, on some things the band really *cooked*. The time came to do "Rock
and Roll Hoochie Koo." I had a great sound on the Quad, my voice felt strong,
and I was really into it. The lead singer (who was also a fine lead guitarist)
played lead in the middle part and was having a great time. I was belting out
the riffs and singing my heart out. The bass guitar was thumping and pumping,
and the drummer and the keyboard player were all right there. People in the
audience were bopping and rocking and screaming. A group of them up front
were close friends of the band, and they were really getting off on hearing
this great old rock tune from a bunch of guys that had never played it together
before, never mind play it in front of an audience! And I remember grinning
ear-to-ear and thinking to myself "Man, have I missed this!" It was just an
extraordinary night. It brought back so many great memories from my old band.

Anyway, we finished the first set, and the guys came over and said "Man it
sounds great! How'd you like to sign up as a permanent member?" We talked
about it a bit. The only problem for me is *time*. Full-time job+, wife,
four kids, 1-hour commute to work, house chores, etc. It turns out they were
all in the same boat, with families and responsibilities, and they play only
once or twice a month. So I told them I'd talk it over with my wife (though
I knew they had me hooked).

We came back the next night, played a good set, and had another great time.
Everybody had a great time, in fact. I guess their former guitarist was a
whiner, and had been making everybody miserable for quite some time. "I haven't
had this much fun playing in months," said the drummer.

Well, anyway, I hope you enjoyed the story. It was so much fun, I thought
I should tell it to rec.music.makers, because those of you who still play
live, or perhaps more importantly those of you who *wish* you still played
live will understand the feeling I'm talking about. The thrill of performing,
the excitement of live playing and live music-making, is just an indescribable
feeling. Boy, have I missed it these last ten years!

One of my favorite moments came during a break in the first set of the first
night. A guy came up to the drummer and said "Hey you guys sound great! How
long you been together?" to which the drummer responded "Well I've known the
bass player for about 4 years now, the lead singer and keyboardist about 2,
and I met Karl our guitarist here about ten minutes ago." I'll never forget
the look on that guy's face, as I just stood there and smiled at him without
saying a word.



Karl Haberl               | "Hey, you guys sound great.
Internet: khaberl@bbn.com |  How long you been together?"
Newsgroups: rec.music.makers,rec.audio