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Musician's Thread

Anonymous
Not applicable
I am wondering if there are any other musicians on these forums - if so what do you play? Do you write / record music? What got you into playing music? What is your gear?

I play bass guitar, guitar,synth and function as the audio engineer for my band.

It was Nirvana and Much Music (Canadian MTV) that got me into music - though I moved on from that influence early on after starting to learn how to play. I started on bass guitar at 13 and playing guitar at around 22 (I am 31 now) - when we play live I function as the bass player and in the studio I remain multi-instrumental focusing on support parts.

My main gear is:

'97 Fender Precision Lyte Deluxe
Ampeg Micro-VR with DI
Ampeg V6B
Presonus Studiolive 16.4.2 running through Logic X


175 REPLIES 175

Anonymous
Not applicable
Both those are great - I kinda like his voice, kind of sounds like a funny Gregg Allman. The second was awesome!

I haven't gotten the chance to play with too many other bands or musicians outside the trio I'm in - the only real experience I have there is we played a show supporting our guitar teacher Brian Griffiths and recorded the rehearsals leading up to the show for an album.

https://theheavyjack3.bandcamp.com/track/some-other-guy

Outside that just as a stand in at open mics for a jam here or there.

JohnnyDioxin
Expert Trustee
Yup - good stuff. Would be very popular with the guy who lives two doors down from us - he used to play rhythm in a band making similar music. He's nearly 80 now, though - and I got a lot of his old gear very cheap 🙂

Heinz always wants to help out younger (than him) musicians and give them a boost on their way - that's how I ended up in his band. I had been playing for 4 years when I met him - he had four guitarists, apart from himself, all playing slightly different parts (I usually did electro-acoustic arpeggio picking) in addition to himself on lead guitar. That was 15 years ago.

Seems he still does that, from recent videos - but like all of us, he's getting on a bit now. I lost touch after I came back to the UK in 2004.

https://youtu.be/2ZSFT5nv2jo


i5 9600k @4.5GHz; 16GB DDR4 3200; 6xSSD; RTX2080ti; Gigabyte Z390D Mobo
Rift CV1; Index; Quest; Quest 2

Anonymous
Not applicable
That's awesome - my experience on the music scene where I am from is that most people don't want to help out the younger artists. This is due in part to the live music scene being pretty stagnant up here - partly because the population in Canada is low and unlike America / UK, most successful Canadian artists have had to leave to "make it".

Up here everybody fights for gigs - and it is almost a pay to play
mentality from the clubs now. They won't do anything but the bare
minimum promotion and expect the bands they book to fill the venue - and
nine times out of ten the band is paid in a cut of the ticket sales
that they have to sell. I mean I love playing live - but I also work a
day job, and honestly selling tickets to your friends / coworkers or
random people you meet is not really my thing. So we play out very rarely
now and are more focused on just writing and recording music unburdened
by the cost of paying someone to do it for us.

Brian was from the UK and played in one of Liverpool's biggest bands The Big Three managed by Brian Epstien at the same time as The Beatles. So it was a bit different with him - he wanted to pass his knowledge on. I took about 2 years of lessons with him when I was 13 - and then didn't hear from him again until he reached out to play a fundraiser for a documentary some film crew was doing about him and The Big Three. I knew to record the whole thing because there is very little recordings of him - and he is a guitar player who Steve Howe, Rory Gallagher, etc. have all cited as a major influence.

Anonymous
Not applicable
One big problem that musicians have these days is places to play. 30 years ago there were ALWAYS plenty of pubs and clubs all over the place that had live music but these days these places are very few and far between. 😞

Anonymous
Not applicable

snowdog said:

One big problem that musicians have these days is places to play. 30 years ago there were ALWAYS plenty of pubs and clubs all over the place that had live music but these days these places are very few and far between. 😞


100% true - and the places that are available to play are usually booked by a self-sustaining local scene that doesn't really want to give up time for new acts. At least that has been my experience in the cities up here that I've lived in (Vancouver, Calgary and Toronto being the main ones) - not that there is a shortage of talent in any scene, I've seen good live local music in a variety of venues. But the acts that get the most stage time are DJs, Top 40 bands, and tribute acts - original music is relegated to open mic nights and early weeknight multi-act shows if any at all.

I have also found that most venues that host original music won't pay flat rates for shows and instead print tickets and tell the band to sell them - most also take a cut of the tickets sold at the door. The venue does nothing more than put up a few pamphlets and maybe a poster in the club if you are lucky and tell you to bring the crowd. Then when you have dragged out your few friends either by guilt or by paying for their ticket... the club is usually disappointed with the 5-10 people you were able to wrangle out to the club - and they do everything they can to get the band to spend their money on getting drunk  to further their bottom line. Which most times results in a lousy performance from the band and no profit from ticket sales. Most clubs do not also give a cut of the liquor sales anymore as well.

On top of that - people are going to clubs less anyways because there is stricter enforcement of drunk driving laws, smoking has been banned in doors and there is an over abundance of home entertainment.

JohnnyDioxin
Expert Trustee
It's the same here, too - this area used to be abuzz with gigging bands, nights out etc and now it's just a dive. I actually had bands that I have had auditions for ask me if I know where they can get a booking.

Funny thing is, the pub not 100 yards from my house has band on every weekend (as does the local social club) yet just try even getting to talk to them about a gig - ain't gonna happen, they book the established national bands instead. Many say the government screwed local gigging in the UK with their maximum of two musicians policy (more than two and a charge is levied - don't remember the exact details) but I disagree, as dumb a rule as it was. I think it's a sea change in the mentality of British society and tbh I sincerely dislike it.

Thankfully I'm not dependant on music for an income any more (well, I never was - but it was a welcome bonus) - but it means it's much more difficult to even just get a few people to play together for fun.

i5 9600k @4.5GHz; 16GB DDR4 3200; 6xSSD; RTX2080ti; Gigabyte Z390D Mobo
Rift CV1; Index; Quest; Quest 2

Anonymous
Not applicable
At least it is comforting to know that it isn't just this way in Canada for local music. We don't have a policy on how many musicians can play - but that does sound like the most useless of rules. It is mostly the same here to in as far as our national long-standing Canadian bands get most of the decent halls, clubs, casinos, etc. - after that there is a local established scene that controls all the smaller venues, and after that there are few off the grid pubs and such that allow musicians to run open mic nights or shows out of their venue so long as the person hosting the jam or show provides all the sound equipment and does all the promotion.

Like you I am not dependant on music for income - I wised up and learned pretty quickly that the music scene was not a ladder I could climb and so instead I chose to work and to self-fund our first album and to buy the equipment that allows me to continue to record albums.

I totally agree about the sea change of not just British society - but pretty much everywhere. Most people do not go out to be entertained anymore - and I can admit I am part of the problem for this as I love me my home entertainment (Oculus, Netflix, video games, movies, etc.).

Part of the problem is also that music has become an expectation - especially with streaming services like Spotify. People pay a monthly fee to have access to all / any music they want. Unfortunately this means that it is easier to get stuck into a rut when listening to music and the streaming services mostly only promote the music that the record companies push anyways. I was on Spotify / iTunes for 2 years with our last album - and did a fair amount of promotion for which I made 90 cents and spent over 200 dollars in annual fees. Our album had no chance of getting noticed - and I don't personally know a single person who goes onto Spotify looking for new independent music.

It is kind of what made us decide to give away all of our music for free download - not because I don't value it, but because I value it enough that I want it to be heard and there is more of chance for that if there are less obstacles (re: money) in the way of it and any potential listener. To be honest - it has been a relief not having to promote our music as a sale.

lord_of_shred
Adventurer
Yeah cool. I'm a 6 string guy myself...and have been playing for 24 years now (started on my 6th birthday).
But work has forced me to lay off quite a bit for the last few years...in my teens I was bitten by the shred bug and had a guitar strapped around me every free minute.
If we're showing axe pics @Zenbane I always wanted to have a Kelly with the swirl paint and an ML...but I've settled for this beauty (the neon pink is way more vibrant in reality) instead.

As well as several super strats from Yamaha and Ibanez.
I had a progressive melo death band ("Bleak") from 2004-2013 before it "fell" apart due to everyone studying/working around the country.
As well as a recording project for the last few years and am currently working on the second album for it. The first was in the vein of Bleak, the second is a completly differen beast, I call it "soundtrack" black metal. Recording of most instruments is done (hired studio drummer, bass from my brother everything else myself) but mixing and vocals are not my strongest suit so I'm whiddling away in the few free hours I got every other weekend to put the finishing touches on it.

Wanted to link some music on Bandcamp but it wont post it, maybe I'm too stupid.
https://bleak-band.bandcamp.com/album/waterflow
https://nocturnalescape.bandcamp.com/album/nocturnal-escape

Anonymous
Not applicable
Sounds great - good mix, especially on the Nocturnal Escape track.

Even though the first band broke up - glad to see you continued with music afterwards! I have been playing with the same group since '99 but we officially became a band around 2005 when we released our first demo. In that time I have seen so many of my friends bands come and go - and I'd say maybe 3 or 4 of the musicians out of the 30 or so bands I have known personally have stuck with creating music.

lord_of_shred
Adventurer
Thank you, if started listening to your stuff but it's nothing I can take while trying to solve some bugs in C++, will keep it in the bookmarks for less tasking work ;-). Like the clean guitar sound though.
I know that feeling. My band started around the same time as some other friends, they are still doing it and they kick ass as much as they can, the other bands that started after us all faded away before we called it quits.
I taught guitar for a while, and 3 out of my 7 students still play (one still has a band, two others are doing solo stuff). I guess if you're bitten by the bug you can't leave it.
Also my father's a lifetime musician (private music teacher with around 20 different instrument choices you can pick to learn from) so it must be in the genes ;-). My brother still plays as well (bass and tuba). 
I miss playing live and band practice and the comradery quite a lot but I got a timewise demanding job and girl...so somethings gotta give I guess.