# Any "first gig" stories?



## gtone (Nov 1, 2009)

Not terribly interesting, but memorable all the same:

20 yrs ago, myself and 3 other guys had been jamming in a buddy's basement for a several Sat afternoons. Only the bassist had any real gigging experience, while the rest of us were green with varying levels of talent. One Saturday, our host informs us we're packing up/heading down to a local bar for a 3-song open mike mini-set in return for free beer. Sheer panic set in and the boys had to coax me down there as I was TERRIFIED! 7 quickly downed beers later, it's our turn to go on and I'm still shaky as hell and not feeling _any_ relief from the beer. Apparently, I wasn't the only one with nerves - our drummer DROPS both sticks 2 bars into our first song (I just about died!!).

Anyhoo, got through my intense stage fright by "shoe-gazing" (don't think I invented it, but was definitely an early practitioner) and played my 2nd guitar parts just fine after the initial hiccups were out of the way. Remember two comments after our set - one of the house-band members complimented me on my tone; a bar patron told me to just smile more while I'm performing (if only he'd known what a monumental task it was getting me on a stage in the first place!).

I still see one of those guys around, even play with him now/again - we have a laugh about that "gig" every time...


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## david henman (Feb 3, 2006)

...it was 1965 in timberlea, nova scotia. i was seventeen. i got a call from a local guy who couldn't do his gig on saturday night and asked if i could sub. how could i say no? saturday afternoon a trashy convertible driven by a black guy with a white girl by his side showed up in front of my nice little white, middle-class suburban house. my mom and dad wished me well and off i went.
the gig was in windsor junction, in a church basement. the singer was an r n b guy i had seen on tv - he was well known. the drummer and i were the only white folks there. not surprisingly, we were welcomed warmly and treated wonderfully, despite nova scotia's horrible record of discrimination and mistreatment of non-whites.
it was an amazing night. we played everything from 'walkin' the dog' to 'kansas city'. fortunately, there was another guitarist, because after a couple of lead solos, my fingers were bleeding profusely. i hadn't yet learned how to restring my guitar, so my strings were really corroded.
at the end of the night, the singer paid us each $6.42.


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## jimihendrix (Jun 27, 2009)

Who was the well known "r n b guy i had seen on tv"...???...Inquiring minds wanna know...Smokey Robinson...???...Sam Cooke...???...Marvin Gaye...???...Ray Charles...???...


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## Robert1950 (Jan 21, 2006)

October 1965. Some teen club at the community centre. All of us were 15. All neversous as shit. Opened with the Stones cover of "Everybody Needs Somebody". All three cord progression stuff, but we did well - we were tight and had a natural for a front man.

Oh, and there were go-go dancers at each end of the stage. Both were 14. I remember that there was one to die for.


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## david henman (Feb 3, 2006)

jimihendrix said:


> Who was the well known "r n b guy i had seen on tv"...???...Inquiring minds wanna know...Smokey Robinson...???...Sam Cooke...???...Marvin Gaye...???...Ray Charles...???...


...local guy. my brother may remember his name.


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## Guitar101 (Jan 19, 2011)

Late 60's, we did a dance for the grade 7 & 8's. I can't remember why, but the drummer and I wore my mother's clamp on earrings on stage for this dance. One each. The kids were awstruck.
To this day, I tell people that we started the "guys wearing earrings" phase that's so prevalent today. I'm not sure if their buying it though. I never did get a real one. My goal is to leave this earth with the same number of holes I came in with.


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## shoretyus (Jan 6, 2007)

Guitar101 said:


> I can't remember why, but the drummer and I wore my mother's clamp on earrings on stage for this dance. One each. The kids were awstruck.


That's one the best stories I have heard. First gig.. can't really remember. Had some funny ones... there was this gig where when the band started to play the "wifes" table kept getting hit on... not unusual in itself except.. they were the same gender.


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## snacker (Jun 26, 2008)

my first rock gig was in 1987 at the (now demolished) desert inn in guelph - it was three band bill put on by a scary dude named "RATCH".....yup, one word....."RATCH" - it was fun until afterward when it came time to hand over our unsold tickets, our drummer had forgot them at home, so "ratch" had him stay behind afterward to discuss it - i assume it went ok since the drummer was alive and at school the next day - lots of classical gigs before that, but the stories are much more boring


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## Bevo (Nov 24, 2006)

The guys and I were jamming one night 5 years ago and went out for a beer after at this local bar that also had live music. We didn't know at the time that it was a jam night.
We had our guitars in the cars then one of our guys signed us up, he walks over and says, we are on in 5 songs, get your guitars!
Shock, terror and excitement all rolled into one.

We decided on what to play which was what we just jammed with so no worries we were fresh. The place looked kinda empty but after the house guys got the amps set up for us I turned around and it was jammed full of people.
As soon as we hit the first note we were all ok and just had fun!


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## Guest (Mar 5, 2011)

Back in '77(?) grade ten. I was in a band that played at the
bassist's former elementary school grad dance. After the
third song, the teacher/chaperone told us the kids don't
like us .. please stop. Kinda gut wrenching for a 16 yr old
to hear. Anywho .. we sat in the change room sulking while
our friend/roadie packed up all the equipment by himself.
It was after he finished that a couple of girls came in and
explained that it was the 'popular' girl of the class (egged
on by her grade 9 boyfriend standing outside the gymnasium)
who coaxed everyone to say we sucked. The two had the
courage to confront her and we were asked to come back
on. We didn't.


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## Chopper (Feb 3, 2011)

My first real rock show outside of school events:
I was sixteen, the band I was in got booked at the Transit Union Hall on a Friday night....which is where bands like Alexisonfire and Silverstein got their start. We showed up super early, even before the promoter because we wanted to make a good first impression. When the other bands started arriving, we discovered that friends of ours from school were on the bill too....this meant some friends would at least be there watching the set. We nervously played the set, but from what I remember, it went okay. The promoter's friend was booking The Casbah at the time and asked us to play there on the Monday after the weekend. So, first gig = a quick second gig in a better club.


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## Chubba (Aug 23, 2009)

first real gig i remember - i was about 17 - we had played in front of our school once or twice before, but we got invited to play a dance at some elementary school (or it was some weird school that combined elementary and some of high school) - looking back at how much (or little) any of us could play then, it went surprisingly well - we had one or 2 originals and a weird mix of covers...i remember playing a relatively unrehearsed 'Patience' (GnR) with our singer sitting on the edge the stage...lol..at the dawn of grunge, i likely thought it was kinda overdone - what stands out from that night was that it was the first time i had really kissed my girlfriend at the time...i don't nostialgiate very much, but that was a good time...


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## Mooh (Mar 7, 2007)

For a few years I kept a list/diary of my rock gigs, but they got to be so many that I gave that up. I remember thinking at the time that there wasn't much point to keeping a record of such things. Sure wish now that I had, but after the first couple of hundred, I thought nothing of it.

I remember singing every week in the church choir as a child. I was a trained singer with an English choirboy sort of voice and I sometimes had to sing solo parts. I also remember vocal and piano recitals, some of which terrified me...very stern events, dress up, serious and strict adjudicators, vicious competition...

By my teens, after my voice changed along with my attitude, I was playing rock and folk/rock covers, some originals, and some classic rock, but not very well. Enthusiastic, yes. Good, no. I don't remember my first teen gig outside of church, but it wasn't likely a pretty sight. However, I do remember that it took me years to overcome stage fright, and I still deal with it sometimes.

My first post high school gig was with a country/rock band that paid well and was run professionally except for the marathon binge drinking. Booze was how I dealt with my early stage fright issues, something I'm ashamed of now. Got so blotto at one of those early shows that I did a spontaneous blues harp and slide with the mic stand solo that the crowd loved but that the band leader almost fired me for. Surprised he didn't.

Peace, Mooh.


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## shoretyus (Jan 6, 2007)

Damn booze .... In the 80's a played with a few folks that started with a few beers at practice. This slowly creeped to 2 24's. We then had a fairly broke winter beer wasn't an option. It quickly became apparent that we where much better sober. 

Being the equipment guy I always seem to be too busy to get stage fright. Pretty relaxed these days.


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## Big_Daddy (Apr 2, 2009)

My first gig was the summer of '66 (I think) at the CBD Club in Wallaceburg. The main act was a band from London (can't remember their name unfortunately) and they were really good with great equipment. We were supposed to just go up and play a few songs after their first set but when they were finished, I was so intimidated that I wanted to run, especially because our gear was so awful. Their lead guitar player came offstage and asked me if we were ready to go. He must have known how petrified we were and offered to let us use their amps and help us get set up. So we got started and after a couple of tunes got over the nerves (more or less). We ended with a rocked up version of Summertime Blues and the crowd loved it. The other band even came up en masse after we were done and congratulated us and asked if they could play our version coz they liked it better. At that moment, I was hooked. The funny thing is that, after we were off stage, our bass player came up to me and said that he had forgotten how to play every one of the songs coz he was so nervous, so he just turned off the volume on his bass and danced around, faking it. None of us had even noticed, LOL.


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## zontar (Oct 25, 2007)

I don't have a lot of experience in this way, but first time with a band was when I took lessons, and we had a band made up of the remnants of three bands that had people drop out before a festival. So without enough practice we took the stage. While we were getting set up I was doing the chord changes to one of our songs with just my left hand, and my strap knob pops off my guitar and goes flying--I never found it. Fortunately I had my left hand on the neck and the guitar didn't drop--but two strings broke--so with a guitar missing two strings and a strap knob, and we had to play pretty quickly, my teacher let me us his SG Custom--which would have been nicer if we'd actually known the songs better. My mind went blank, and I forgot the chords to one of the songs--so I just turned down my volume for that song, and faked it. (nice to see I'm not the only one who ever did that.) We had another guitar player, so most people didn't notice. Afterward I found out the drummer couldn't hear us properly due to how the drums were set up (They had two drumsets, but he was told he couldn't use one of them, and that one was the one the monitors were set up for.)

I won't name the songs we played--but it was a long time before I could listen to those songs without ringing, now I laugh.
But that didn't kill it for me--after all it had to get better, and it did.


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## bcmatt (Aug 25, 2007)

I was in College in the winter of 2002 and my section of the 4-plex dorm had three of us that didn't know each other before, but decided to form a punk trio. Our frontman owned all the gear, played rhythm guitar, and wrote all the songs. He used to be only a punk-rock drummer so he bought nice drum-set for our 3rd roommate to use who was also a drummer but had to learn punk beats, and rented me a bass amp (I played bass at the time). We were all in our early 20s but our frontman had a high-paying summer job driving tonka trucks in a coal mine. Anyways, we practiced in our shared kitchen a couple times a week to the dismay of the neighborhood. A music major named "Smokey" from the other side of the 4-plex became our guitar solo-ist and would play with us when he had time. We did a few songs here and there in front of our school (probably double the speed of our practices), but one day we got asked to play for a bunch of youth doing a 30-hour-famine fundraiser and the church paid us about $100 I think. (a good chunk of which went to our traditional pre-show pig-out at McDonald's and the rest went to some funny hats and wigs).
Anyways, the show went well. OUr frontman acted crazy (always trying to work up the crowd) and the kids seemed to have a lot of fun jumping around and such. At one point our frontman decided he needed to get on top of his Halfstack and jump off it to the final chord of a song. Of course, the amp head and cab fell over backwards as he jumped forward and his sound died immediately as the whole place gasped. Smokey kept yelling "Oh NO!" over and over into his mic. But our frontman was not phased. He lay his Hamer on the stage and started stacking the amp back up and plugged the patch cable back in. The guitar was still ringing out with the remnants of the last chord. The crowd cheered with delight and Smokey started shrieking "it's Alive!" into his mic. We even had that show on VHS, which I need to find. I think we only ever did 2 other shows outside of playing a few songs here and there at our school, but all our memories of that band are seen in a rose-colored hue.


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## david henman (Feb 3, 2006)

...wallaceburg! do you know ralph murphy? i'm pretty sure that is his home town.
he's a songwriter, singer, record producer and president of ascap nashville.
he produced a couple of april wine albums.




Big_Daddy said:


> My first gig was the summer of '66 (I think) at the CBD Club in Wallaceburg. The main act was a band from London (can't remember their name unfortunately) and they were really good with great equipment. We were supposed to just go up and play a few songs after their first set but when they were finished, I was so intimidated that I wanted to run, especially because our gear was so awful. Their lead guitar player came offstage and asked me if we were ready to go. He must have known how petrified we were and offered to let us use their amps and help us get set up. So we got started and after a couple of tunes got over the nerves (more or less). We ended with a rocked up version of Summertime Blues and the crowd loved it. The other band even came up en masse after we were done and congratulated us and asked if they could play our version coz they liked it better. At that moment, I was hooked. The funny thing is that, after we were off stage, our bass player came up to me and said that he had forgotten how to play every one of the songs coz he was so nervous, so he just turned off the volume on his bass and danced around, faking it. None of us had even noticed, LOL.


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## Big_Daddy (Apr 2, 2009)

david henman said:


> ...wallaceburg! do you know ralph murphy? i'm pretty sure that is his home town.
> he's a songwriter, singer, record producer and president of ascap nashville.
> he produced a couple of april wine albums.


He was about 6 years older than me and left Wallyburg before I even started high school there (according to Wiki anyway). So, no, I never met him.


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## Big_Daddy (Apr 2, 2009)

Duplicate removed.


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