A lot of two piece or solo pub musicians use backing tracks these days. As a guitar player of sorts, it unnerves me to see a singer armed with an acoustic guitar, sounding like a six piece band complete with percussion! Of course the punters don't notice or perhaps they don't know any better. But to me that is cheating. Just because the musician or duo 'get away' with it, does not make it right. IMHO. Music should be real, that is played live. Otherwise pubs ought to hire a disco.
Discuss.
Insanity: doing the same thing over and over again and expecting different results. [Albert Einstein]
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We are both in our 50s, newish players and finding our way however we are motivated and want to do things as well as we can. Drummers and bass players seem to be in short supply and those of our own age tend to be very experienced and are not interested in working with a bunch of newbies, equally younger ones are not interested in working with old gits like us. We did try out a few but basically they were awful or unreliable or both and it was very frustrating indeed. Our choice was very simple, give up or use backing tracks. We chose the latter.
As to whether it is cheating is a matter of opinion but I'd rather cheat than not play at all. What I will say is that no-one is going to turn up to hear to one of our backing tracks. They do however turn up to hear our guitar playing and singing.
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We use wav files not mp3s.
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Bandcamp
Spotify, Apple et al
Agree completely.
I think for people trying to make a living or reasonable second income out of playing the pub/club circuit then solo or duo plus backing tracks probably makes more sense than a full on band. There's a chap I know a little who plays similar venues to us but has a lot more gigs than us so I guess he's earning £600 most weeks by himself. I think what he does is a bit shit (so so vocals, guitar strum along, backing tracks) but there's obviously an audience. I've seen people who do similar stuff for weddings - it's smaller, cheaper, easier to control (no drum kit or major sound mix issues) and playing to people who wouldn't know a live band from a hole in the ground.
It is what it is although live music for me is very much about people playing warts and all so someone singing to backing tapes has limited appeal. Our keyboardist plays in another band and says they make less mistakes than us (although that's no major achievement) but because they are so concerned with hitting the right notes it's a bit lifeless. Rocknroll people, not a chamber recital. \m/
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I have had the pleasure (and pain) of playing in an 8 piece band with brass and when that band and 4 part harmonies cut in the hairs stand up on the back of your neck even if you do the same song 50 times week after week. But feeding those people and keeping them 'together' is a massive pain and the size of the band precludes mast pubs and some other venues which others consider fun.
Backing tracks, I have done a duet (self on vocals and acoustic guitar) plus female vocalist. We used to do the first set with just the guitar, but as things moved on and rocked up we added tracks, by the end of the night I'd be mime/playing guitar solos on the acoustic ;-) Like I said people have been brainwashed.
I have seen pro bands that are three piece outfits that need nothing more, The Ivy League come to mind. Bass, drums, guitar and all three sing. The harmonies were full, tight and completely orchestrated the soundscape, you wanted for nothing. OK they did old school songs but they were so far from the quality of most pub bands you could see how they lived off their craft for decades.