Talking to the Crowd

HAL9000

Don’t mind a bit of talk between songs but not too much. I’m there to listen to the music, not the singer’s life story. A little of banter can help to engage with the audience though.

One line of stage chat I remember was from Paul Jones (The Blues Band) between songs: At this point I’d like to introduce you to the band members, but that would take far too long so instead I’ll introduce the band members to you.

Catalyst77

I guess if you are famous people are probably more interested in hearing the backstory of songs, although of course for us normals most of the crowd are often our mates so it seems rude not to speak to them a bit

BenSirAmos

The point of talking between songs is to increase the engagement with the audience and increase their enjoyment so whoever can engage best at each point is the person who is most engaging. But at all costs avoid in-jokes and any banter that doesn't contribute to engagement with the audience - that's just arrogant and boring

p90fool

Unless you can di it like this guy, don't bother

PolarityMan

Depends on the charisma of the frontman. Devin Townsend is hugely engaging for example and have seen him on acoustic shows where he chats a lot. I think you'd be missing out on some of the experience not to have that engagement at a DT show. 

By contrast some inter-song banter from Mikael Åkerfeldt from Opeth about how he was inspired to talk more to the crowd by watching Devin Towsnend was cringy in the extreme and following up with a 20 min ramble about interesting rare vinyl that came out in 1972 was even worse...that guys a boring fuck and should just shut up and play the songs. 

Either approach is fine as long as you have the ability to pull it off.