"My" (it's not "mine") band is going well. Good mix of songs. We're getting another gig off the back of the last one.
Now it's time to add more songs. We're held captive to the female singers as they don't like some rock tunes, and we're starting to veer toward Adele/Donna Summer territory, which you'll know isn't really my thing. That's cool, but the number of rock tracks getting picked now seems to be zero. I reckon it should be a joint process to accept a song, and each member should have roughly the same amount of songs chosen. What do you think?
Hopefully it's not the first signs of cracks forming but I don't want to be just some tool without much input, yet at the same time I've found it so difficult to get into a band over the years.
Comments
Agree what type of music you all want to do - either a tight theme (soul, ska, 80's rock etc) or a mix anything so long as it goes down well.
Then let everyone have the right to say if they hate a song - a bit of give a take is needed and you sometimes play songs you aren't a huge fan of but I don't like the hassle of forcing someone to reluctantly do a halfassed job of playing a song and looking grumpy - there is no shortage of possible tunes so why insist.
The other thought is that is does need to suit the whoever is going to sing it.
If people can't fit in with that and still have a setlist of 30+ songs (preferably loads more) then they are in the wrong band.
My YouTube Channel
Eqd Speaker Cranker clone
Monte Allums TR-2 Plus mod kit
Trading feedback: http://www.thefretboard.co.uk/discussion/60602/
My YouTube Channel
It's a lot easier to find new bands when you've done a lot of gigs and people know who you are and you built up a network of local gigging musicians.
It all depends what you want out of the band - I'll play almost anything these days if it goes down well because I love gigging and it's worth compromising and playing tunes that years ago I might not have been keen on, if it means a paid night out with a full dancefloor.
Might be worth a bit of naive questioning.
On a positive note there can be a difference between what you like as a listener and what you can find interesting as a guitarist. And a good audience reaction can overcome the shittest of songs.
I'd also guess that whilst the rock stuff goes down well there maybe a point of diminishing returns - if your set became mostly rock you wouldn't get a reaction to it.
My YouTube Channel
My YouTube Channel
Or, like the man says, being in two bands is refreshing.
Play fair, though - the songs you DO play, give them all equal billing in terms of effort, so your bandmates can't accuse you of only properly learning the ones you like.
That aside,there is a point where a band deviates too far from what you want it to be, and that's when you know it's time to leave...only you can make that call, but remember, only a solo artist or a band dictator gets to pick all of the songs, so unless that's what you want to be, there's an element of compromise ever time.
In the past songs have been rejected for various reasons - strong dislike of song/artist, emotional connections to songs, being beyond someone's ability.
I try and give any suggestion a fair go but I've put a bit of a filter in place. Too often someone would suggest a song, I'd go away and learn it only for the person who suggested it to turn up unprepared. Now it's up to the suggester to provide at, the very least, a lyric sheet with the basic song structure on it before the real work starts. Generally it only needs a quick google of the lyrics and listening to the song a couple of times to sort it out but you'd be surprised how few suggestions end up being handed out at the next rehearsal.
My YouTube Channel
I find simplified chord sheets help a lot for jogging my memory if we've not played something for a while. I also try to maintain a playlist on spotify of everything in the set and play through it every so often. It's a bit of a pain if we don't stick to the original tuning or structure but it means most things stay fresh.