Played a blinder of a gig last night (well, we enjoyed it, the crowd enjoyed it, and the landlord enjoyed it anyway...).
But we nearly didn't as the bass player plugged in his Orange Terror Bass amp and nothing happened. Much frantic swapping of mains leads, power distribution boards, and mains sockets later still nothing.
So I nipped home (15 minutes down the road), grabbed my trusty Mesa 5:25, and (after a further panic involving speakon sockets) the bassist did the gig with my recently acquired Blackstar S1-104EL34 (which it turns out actually makes a Pretty Damned Fine bass amp - I thought it actually sounded better than the Orange in a slightly growly old-school manner....) plugged into his cab and me playing through the Mesa.
There's a lesson there I think. From now on and the little Mesa goes in the car for every gig from now on....
The chances of more than one of us (2 x guitars and the bass player) suffering amp failure on the same night seem fairly low, our monitors are actually beefy Peavey units designed to double as FOH (and will take a couple of mics straight into them if push comes to shove with the mixer), we've got a second much smaller pair of monitors for tight stage areas, we've got loads of leads, and the drummer carries a big bag of spares around with him already so that'll be us covered for anything less than a helicopter crashing into the venue I reckon...
Don't ask me, I just play the damned thing...
Comments
Reminds me, must get the TSL fixed.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
That's a great story and lesson learned regarding back ups.
However, "a helicopter crashing into the venue..." - you clearly don't play in Glasgow.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2013_Glasgow_helicopter_crash
I wasn't at the gig but it was bloody scary to hear about.
Well, there's the thing. It was golden, then it went. I took it to an amp tech, who had it for ages (more my fault than his), said he could find nothing wrong with it, and had gigged it. Despite when it 'went' for me mid gig it popped banged and stank.
So I took it back, and gigged it. 'Went' at the sound check. Fortunately gig was 5 mins from home so easily replaced amp. On paper such a versatile amp. Must get it attended to. And the wee Laney.
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
Say goodbye to resale value...
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
"Take these three items, some WD-40, a vise grip, and a roll of duct tape. Any man worth his salt can fix almost any problem with this stuff alone." - Walt Kowalski
"Only two things are infinite - the universe, and human stupidity. And I'm not sure about the universe." - Albert Einstein
I am now filled with an abundance of Not Joy....
I played the Clutha 3 weeks before that happened... as you say you can prepare for most things!