I ran the PA board, and lights, for my buddy's band in High School. The year was 1975. It was so much damn fun and some of the best times. I think I did a good job, and even in that simple basic setup there were a thousand subtleties you had to heed to make it work. Cheers to sound guys.
thanks man for making videos like this ❤️ lately ive been binge watching the hell out of your channel. your channel is perfect for someone like me. i'll admit it i am a gen z kid who thinks she was born in the wrong generation lmaooo, anyway ur such a cool and amazing teacher. i wish i lived where you lived so i could have take REAL classes from you but keep doing the amazing work and keep uploading videos it helps us out a lot.
These are the exact thoughts I have when I watch his videos. Especially that part where I wish I lived near him and that born in the wrong generation part😂
@@anik4440 i also wish that i had a crazy ass dad who grew up on metallica and shit, who'd give me my first guitar at the age of 3 and take me from class to class so i cud learn how to play.
Another thing is bad monitors. I love it when I`m playing drums and singing and actually HEAR something which is so rare. I`d let other drummers play a set sometimes and the sound was so clear out front, but on stage I couldn`t hear anything. A club in Bossier City, La had a great sound guy and I heard that same crystal clear sound on stage. It was just incredible. Plus we didn`t have to bring our PA system.
This. I've been gigging for decades like you. I play in 2 tribute bands and a few other groups. The sound man is everything. I treat them with respect and kindness. I also have a good friend that is an amazing sound man that will do our shows when he can. When you're onstage you have no idea what you sound like out front. You have to trust a good sound person.
Somewhat relevant... When I was about 16 or so, I went to my first Rock concert. The Smashing Pumpkins in our local arena that only seats 10k. The sound is always terrible there because it's a giant concrete and steel dome. But there is a sweet spot right at the center of the arena where it actually sounds good. Luckily, I had tickets there. (they had seats ironically?) Anyway, halfway through Bullet with butterfly wings, right where the build up finishes, there was a giant boom and all the sound cut out. Apparently they had an amp actually blow up that was driving most of the speakers. Luckily, they had it fixed in about 5-10 minutes and finished the song. It was crazy loud, even though it was already loud normally. The sound tech had the music dialed in pretty well for such a terrible non-acoustic venue. There was a while there for a few years where they wouldn't allow big bands play there because it was too loud for the venue, so big bands were playing at our local Shriners gymnasium. It fit maybe 1,000 people if that. It was basically a high-school gym. I saw Living Colour and Megadeth there. I'm pretty sure I lost part of my hearing as well, due to the front row and the right side speakers being 4 feet away. The sound wasn't that great there, very shrill, way too much treble, but I got to see awesome bands. That's all I cared about.
Just started my sound course, and I’ve had a bit of experience running sound in the past. I’ll use this video as a reference of what not to do. Thanks for singing about the unsung heroes as always
Great message. Thanks, Mike. It's absolutely true that a good sound person will make or break your set. Being a fan of Ovation guitars, I was sure hoping to hear that guitar being played.
Just want to say one of the best qualities in a sound tech is being humble. One of the best techs I had for a local show was just the promoter filling in for his tech who was away on tour. Told us he wasn't too great, but he also made sure that the band could hear everything we needed and made a solid mix. One of the worst tech was a guy who had just finished a music tech course at a local university (he made sure we knew about it), told me a dynamic mic wouldn't work on a glockenspiel, and got snarky with me when I asked if he had a spare power cable for a guitar amp. You'd think most techs would know the common cables for these things, of course when I showed him, he said "Oh, you mean an IEC cable" in a very sarcastic voice - so I guess he knew the name, but wasn't smart enough to know what it was used for. Also, he insisted that it was more important to mic the toms rather than the backing vocals because we didn't have enough channels on the board. Anyways, his mix was kind of meh; the glockenspiel actually cut through just fine with the mic he said wouldn't work, but he seemed to have some trouble turning up the keyboards to an appropriate level (I don't know if he was scared of them feeding back?). But the drums sounded great!
I played gigs without floor monitors & even soundchecks as a warmup band! That was the ones I hated, especially on big stages (drums echoing off stage walls throwing us off; turning and looking back at my drummer and bass player seeing the fear in their eyes 🤣😂). Even had the best soundcheck ever and the place being shutdown right before we came on due to a permit license being past due... 🔥🎸🔥
One show I was at the singer was really quiet and the guitar was too loud and the crowd kept telling the sound guy to turn up the singer, but the guitarist considered it HIS band and one way or another the levels would get fxcked up again, by the guitarist telling the sound guy to turn up the guitar again, or just doing it himself. It was a real struggle...
Not me but my brother-in-law. His band used to play a lot of little dives and sometimes the soundtrack was also the bartender and you'd be lucky if you could get anything good out of the entire mix. But then there is the one time they got to play a local venue that was a little bit more established and that was the 1st time that they sounded exactly as they did on their record. He kept dialing them in the entire set which I thought was awesome And afterwards the look on their faces was something that I hadn't seen before
The first show I ever did with the sound company I worked for was called The Best. It was Keith Emerson, Joe Walsh, John Entwistle and Simon Phillips. They did a couple shows in Japan and one in Honolulu. It was the worse sound I ever heard in my life. When Sting came to Honolulu in 1992 it was the best sounding show I have ever heard even to this day. How the exact same PA can sound so differently is amazing. When we would do festivals the sound would be different for each band. I would do side gigs with my own equipment and I always did the best I could. I really enjoyed doing it.
Most sound guys are probably half-deaf, which would explain why they can't hear certain things and why the sound sucks at a lot of shows - large and small.
I noticed a big difference between our shows in the 90s and that show that we did together in 2016. You could always depend on Ramsey being behind the board from Soundcheck all the way through the end of the night, and I felt he always did a great job. Unfortunately the show we did in 2016 the sound tech was trying to run two rooms at one time and was not around when there was an issue. He would set it on the iPad and then be gone for the majority of the show I’m guessing that’s why he’s not there anymore ha ha.
In my misspent youth I played clubs in a band and worked for a production company doing sound and lights. Each job made me better and more appreciative of the other.
As a professional sound engineer, but also someone who plays in a band everything you said was spot on. A sound engineer can make a great band sound good or bad, but can't make a bad band sound good. When I get compliments from the audience after gigs it is always when the band is very good. Those are usually the easiest gigs to do sound for. The band have their sounds sorted and control their sound well. I tend to spend a lot of time getting the monitor mix right for the band because without that they'll not have a good time and will struggle to play well.
Very fortunate to have had sound techs for most shows when i was in my high school cover band. Even our last minute multi band ( multi-band haha) back yard parties had sound techs!!! There were like 5 in town and sometimes 2-3 of them where at 1 gig. The drummer of 1 band and the bassist of another band were techs...so they would go play and then do sound for the next band. It was a music community thing and so great for kids learning the gigging ropes! Bands that want to play live should find a sound tech and add him or her as a band member. Cheers !
we got our own sound board after a while and brought our own guy we trained. we did sound for everyone that played the same stage, free, with no sabotage. A good sound person is a godsend. When all the bands sound good, all the bands sound better.
As a music fan with only some extremely limited experience running a soundboard (mostly singer songwriter, 1 mic 1 guitar or full band expected to run their own sound while playing which I couldn't watch them be forced to do) the thing that drives me absolutely nuts is sound so bad that I know I could do better with my limited experience. As a result when I see a band with a really great live sound, I'll go thank the sound person. The sound tech is something most people don't think about when they do their job correctly. For horror stories there was the show where the sound tech hooked up the speakers with guitar cables and didn't notice the 60 Hz hum throughout the show. Or the local concert for the fireworks show where, despite being 9 hours into the activities for the day, they couldn't get the bass players vocal mic to not feedback when my friend's band played. And then there was the knob twiddler who couldn't just get the sound dialed in and leave it, but would change everything essentially on every song. The entire night sounded like what the first song or two can sound like while things get dialed in. And so many people that don't understand anything other than turn everyone up as far as you can without clipping. And you end up with backing vocals overpowering the lead vocals. Or a muddy sound from vocals and instruments being in the same frequency bands and no room carved out in the eq for the vocals. There are some really great sound techs out there, but there's also a lot of inexperienced people with fragile egos who 100% will make you sound like shit on purpose if you offend them. This is why appreciate, and show appreciation for, good sound.
A sound tech really can make or break your show. A bad sound tech can make even the best equipment seem totally worthless, while a great one can can work with almost anything and make you sound good. The venues my band plays at locally both have great sound techs. One of them works with a pretty barebones setup, just the bare minimum on the kit, vocal mics and everything else is stage sound and it always sounds great. My band gives him a challenge too, because we have the hardest hitting metal drummer in the city and his PA struggles to keep up, but he always makes it work.
Mid 90s I was in an alternative band doing mostly originals. We were playing new band night at The Mirage nightclub in Minneapolis. We were pretty new to the live show thing with a sound guy. We’d done lots of parties and a few weddings but we were the sound guy. Anyway we were the 3rd and last band to go on that night. We started out and most people were just ignoring the music. After our first song the patrons were like wow these guys are good. And starting gathering round the stage. So the middle of the second song there’s a volume swell that I’d use my pedal for. This pissed the sound guy right the F off he pushed my fader to max and and dumped just that into the stage monitors then walked away. I tried compensating on the stage with my the volume on my guitar, board and amp but couldn’t get back to that sweet spot. Needless to say the crowd quickly thinned out. After the show one of the guys from the other band, came up to us and said “you didn’t give him any cash did you?” And we all looked at each other like “what? We’re supposed to pay him?” “Or give him weed” says the other guy. We all just hung our heads and went fuck lesson learned.
Oh man. We played Mirage a lot back in the day. I think I know who it was. Took us a long time to get on some of these soundguy’s good sides. Which band?
@@TheArtofGuitar Our name was Koan. Pronounced Koh-ahn. We were together for about 2 years mid 90s broke up because singer was suffering from LSD. Lotta fun was had though. Love your vids and posts BTW.
If your band is making any money at all having your own front of house makes such a huge difference. And if they can bring some gear even better. So many shows, like nearly every show, we have thousands of dollars of amazing gear on stage and then the sound engineer has to make due with old beer soaked Peavey wedges with chicken wire stapled on them from the '70s and some old bass bins and some old power amps that are all clipping and a board with 70% working faders and somehow make it sound studio quality.
Most of my early live gigs had no sound tech -- somebody in the audience would give us hand signals for who needed to turn up or down. Lately, stage volumes are low and people tell me after the show they couldn't hear me play except for leads, and that makes me sad, because I'm riding my volume knobs all night for tone and blend.
We were going to headline the Cow Palace in April with a Pink Floyd band I'm in. The promoters then told us we couldn't use our sound and light companies, something to do with the California unions, which I'm all for, BUT.. we cancelled. 6 people in the band, 56 inputs. Not only can we not play without them.. we WON'T
I think we've all been frustrated with this. Not just being the performer, but also when you're just watching. The grumpy sound engineer is famous, but more often than not you listen back to recordings and it's all drums, almost no bass, a faint whimper of guitar (when boosted for lead) and some vocal. I had one long-term gig in particular, where this was the problem and the sound-engineer just would not make the necessary fixes. After the first week of gigs, I told him to get a plexiglass screen for the drums, he said he basically had whatever budget he wanted from the boss... but nope. And he insisted on having like 12-16 mics on the kit where Kick and snare probably would have done it. It was really frustrating, but when you have to work there for the next couple of months, you can't really do any more than make suggestions
Congrats on 785k Subscribers! Great topic! Love that you've got the Nancy Wikson guitar here, can't wait for the video on it. Love the American Psycho shirt! I might have to get one too now haha 😂
I saw This Train in concert years ago and the vocals were un-amplified for the first half of the show. Turned out they had no sound tech that day so they had to run back and fix it themselves.
I went to a show at the Barclays Center I think in 2015 or 2016 to see Iron Maiden. For most of the show I couldn’t hear the bass 🤬🤯 I haven’t been back there for anything since then.
Beastface drove 4 hours to play with All Hail The Yeti and it was one of the worst shows we ever played. The sound tech was also the bartender and he did both at the same time. Our entire set had no vocals and he never noticed or fixed it as he was behind the bar that was in a separate room. It was cool playing with All Hail The Yeti but it was so embarrassing at the same time.
The sound guy/gal WILL make or break your show. I play in a couple bands in Portland, OR and it’s always a relief when you see someone you know is good behind the board. They’re easy spot because I think there is like only 10 people tops in the whole city that do live sound lol. (I’m joking obviously, but it’s a little true)
Hey man I’ve been subscribed to your RUclips channel ever since I found out about you and I wanted to see if you could make a RUclips video dedicated on how to play nothing else matters by Metallica It’s special to my dad and I wanted to learn how to play it so If you could that’ll be great
Sorry for the stupid question but can't a computer, robot or AI adjust the sound for you? Or can't the sound settings be uploaded into a computer that adjusts automatically song by song? Again apologies, pure ignorance and curiosity speaking here.
@@TheArtofGuitar haha fair enough. At some point there will be a "Skynet" singularity and AI will remix all metal songs into pop just to piss us off 🤣 thanks for the content, you're really cool 👍
What some bands do is have a portable digital mixer with their mix already loaded in. Assuming they feed it the same levels every night, it could give them a pretty consistent mix that needs minimal tweaking. Song by song, they can just have presets on their equipment, especially if the guitarists are using things like AxeFXs or Helixes.
@@TheArtofGuitar I know. It doesn't necessarily really fit the mix even if you just turn it up because you could just be louder than every one else and then be the ONLY person that is heard. But I've done that once or twice out of frustration over not being heard enough and the sound guy ended not being able to do anything because I was louder than the PA. Mine is 120 watts as opposed to 100 - wouldn't think that makes a big difference in its volume capabilities, but maybe it does. In any case, good video and the truth is I think bands - if they can afford it - should have their own sound guy as a member of the band so they are always safe because they can be really inconsistent like you said.
i work at a small concert venue as an assistent to the sound guy (and on certain ocassion ill do the sound myself). there used to be one sound guy who came in pretty much every day for over 12 years. he knew the place inside and out and everything usually sounded phenomenal (when it didnt it was the band's fault LOL). he left recently, and now there's 3 or 4 new soundguys in rotation and you can hear them struggling in the mix. not all of them but some of them. gives you perspective on what an art form it truly is.
Yes let's go, we got the video back but this time with audio 😂 anyways love the content and I've been binge watching all of your videos 🙂 first comment too 🙂 yay 😁
❤❤ Don’t know “ IF” you already played it on ONE ☝️ of your vids?? BUT ALL GUITARISTS HAVE TOLD ME - The Ending LEAD GUITAR 🎸 PART AT END OF PRINCE “” LETS GO CRAZY”” is impossible!!!! Haha 😂 They’ve all told me NO ONE ☝️ has ever been able to play it like Prince! Let me know if you agree or you think 💭 it can be Done ✅? Thanks
Not impossible... I did it at a show last night. Fuzz into wah into dirty amp, lots of chromatic blues movement, and give it attitude. And you have to hold that first bend until the crowd starts yelling. 😎
I wasn't getting any audio over the phone app with the video when it was originally up, and the desktop page had the video stuck at 320p. I think RUclips needs to go home and sleep something off.
Being a good sound man is like singing...yeah, anyone can technically sing because we all have vocal chords, but not everyone can sing, like me. Sound men sometimes become sound men simply because they're willing...
I ran the PA board, and lights, for my buddy's band in High School. The year was 1975. It was so much damn fun and some of the best times. I think I did a good job, and even in that simple basic setup there were a thousand subtleties you had to heed to make it work. Cheers to sound guys.
thanks man for making videos like this ❤️ lately ive been binge watching the hell out of your channel. your channel is perfect for someone like me. i'll admit it i am a gen z kid who thinks she was born in the wrong generation lmaooo, anyway ur such a cool and amazing teacher. i wish i lived where you lived so i could have take REAL classes from you but keep doing the amazing work and keep uploading videos it helps us out a lot.
These are the exact thoughts I have when I watch his videos.
Especially that part where I wish I lived near him and that born in the wrong generation part😂
i was borned in the weong generator 🤪
@@anik4440 lol ikr
@@anik4440 i also wish that i had a crazy ass dad who grew up on metallica and shit, who'd give me my first guitar at the age of 3 and take me from class to class so i cud learn how to play.
Another thing is bad monitors. I love it when I`m playing drums and singing and actually HEAR something which is so rare. I`d let other drummers play a set sometimes and the sound was so clear out front, but on stage I couldn`t hear anything. A club in Bossier City, La had a great sound guy and I heard that same crystal clear sound on stage. It was just incredible. Plus we didn`t have to bring our PA system.
In-ear monitors are a GODSEND.
This. I've been gigging for decades like you. I play in 2 tribute bands and a few other groups. The sound man is everything. I treat them with respect and kindness. I also have a good friend that is an amazing sound man that will do our shows when he can. When you're onstage you have no idea what you sound like out front. You have to trust a good sound person.
Somewhat relevant... When I was about 16 or so, I went to my first Rock concert. The Smashing Pumpkins in our local arena that only seats 10k. The sound is always terrible there because it's a giant concrete and steel dome. But there is a sweet spot right at the center of the arena where it actually sounds good. Luckily, I had tickets there. (they had seats ironically?) Anyway, halfway through Bullet with butterfly wings, right where the build up finishes, there was a giant boom and all the sound cut out. Apparently they had an amp actually blow up that was driving most of the speakers. Luckily, they had it fixed in about 5-10 minutes and finished the song. It was crazy loud, even though it was already loud normally. The sound tech had the music dialed in pretty well for such a terrible non-acoustic venue.
There was a while there for a few years where they wouldn't allow big bands play there because it was too loud for the venue, so big bands were playing at our local Shriners gymnasium. It fit maybe 1,000 people if that. It was basically a high-school gym. I saw Living Colour and Megadeth there. I'm pretty sure I lost part of my hearing as well, due to the front row and the right side speakers being 4 feet away. The sound wasn't that great there, very shrill, way too much treble, but I got to see awesome bands. That's all I cared about.
Just started my sound course, and I’ve had a bit of experience running sound in the past. I’ll use this video as a reference of what not to do. Thanks for singing about the unsung heroes as always
Great message. Thanks, Mike. It's absolutely true that a good sound person will make or break your set. Being a fan of Ovation guitars, I was sure hoping to hear that guitar being played.
Just want to say one of the best qualities in a sound tech is being humble. One of the best techs I had for a local show was just the promoter filling in for his tech who was away on tour. Told us he wasn't too great, but he also made sure that the band could hear everything we needed and made a solid mix. One of the worst tech was a guy who had just finished a music tech course at a local university (he made sure we knew about it), told me a dynamic mic wouldn't work on a glockenspiel, and got snarky with me when I asked if he had a spare power cable for a guitar amp. You'd think most techs would know the common cables for these things, of course when I showed him, he said "Oh, you mean an IEC cable" in a very sarcastic voice - so I guess he knew the name, but wasn't smart enough to know what it was used for. Also, he insisted that it was more important to mic the toms rather than the backing vocals because we didn't have enough channels on the board. Anyways, his mix was kind of meh; the glockenspiel actually cut through just fine with the mic he said wouldn't work, but he seemed to have some trouble turning up the keyboards to an appropriate level (I don't know if he was scared of them feeding back?). But the drums sounded great!
I played gigs without floor monitors & even soundchecks as a warmup band! That was the ones I hated, especially on big stages (drums echoing off stage walls throwing us off; turning and looking back at my drummer and bass player seeing the fear in their eyes 🤣😂). Even had the best soundcheck ever and the place being shutdown right before we came on due to a permit license being past due...
🔥🎸🔥
One show I was at the singer was really quiet and the guitar was too loud and the crowd kept telling the sound guy to turn up the singer, but the guitarist considered it HIS band and one way or another the levels would get fxcked up again, by the guitarist telling the sound guy to turn up the guitar again, or just doing it himself. It was a real struggle...
Not me but my brother-in-law. His band used to play a lot of little dives and sometimes the soundtrack was also the bartender and you'd be lucky if you could get anything good out of the entire mix. But then there is the one time they got to play a local venue that was a little bit more established and that was the 1st time that they sounded exactly as they did on their record. He kept dialing them in the entire set which I thought was awesome And afterwards the look on their faces was something that I hadn't seen before
The first show I ever did with the sound company I worked for was called The Best. It was Keith Emerson, Joe Walsh, John Entwistle and Simon Phillips. They did a couple shows in Japan and one in Honolulu. It was the worse sound I ever heard in my life. When Sting came to Honolulu in 1992 it was the best sounding show I have ever heard even to this day. How the exact same PA can sound so differently is amazing. When we would do festivals the sound would be different for each band. I would do side gigs with my own equipment and I always did the best I could. I really enjoyed doing it.
I remember at the first concert I ever saw all you could here were the drums and the vocals! It was still a pretty cool experience.
Most sound guys are probably half-deaf, which would explain why they can't hear certain things and why the sound sucks at a lot of shows - large and small.
I noticed a big difference between our shows in the 90s and that show that we did together in 2016. You could always depend on Ramsey being behind the board from Soundcheck all the way through the end of the night, and I felt he always did a great job. Unfortunately the show we did in 2016 the sound tech was trying to run two rooms at one time and was not around when there was an issue. He would set it on the iPad and then be gone for the majority of the show I’m guessing that’s why he’s not there anymore ha ha.
In my misspent youth I played clubs in a band and worked for a production company doing sound and lights. Each job made me better and more appreciative of the other.
As a professional sound engineer, but also someone who plays in a band everything you said was spot on.
A sound engineer can make a great band sound good or bad, but can't make a bad band sound good.
When I get compliments from the audience after gigs it is always when the band is very good. Those are usually the easiest gigs to do sound for. The band have their sounds sorted and control their sound well.
I tend to spend a lot of time getting the monitor mix right for the band because without that they'll not have a good time and will struggle to play well.
Very fortunate to have had sound techs for most shows when i was in my high school cover band. Even our last minute multi band ( multi-band haha) back yard parties had sound techs!!! There were like 5 in town and sometimes 2-3 of them where at 1 gig. The drummer of 1 band and the bassist of another band were techs...so they would go play and then do sound for the next band. It was a music community thing and so great for kids learning the gigging ropes!
Bands that want to play live should find a sound tech and add him or her as a band member. Cheers !
we got our own sound board after a while and brought our own guy we trained. we did sound for everyone that played the same stage, free, with no sabotage. A good sound person is a godsend. When all the bands sound good, all the bands sound better.
As a music fan with only some extremely limited experience running a soundboard (mostly singer songwriter, 1 mic 1 guitar or full band expected to run their own sound while playing which I couldn't watch them be forced to do) the thing that drives me absolutely nuts is sound so bad that I know I could do better with my limited experience. As a result when I see a band with a really great live sound, I'll go thank the sound person. The sound tech is something most people don't think about when they do their job correctly.
For horror stories there was the show where the sound tech hooked up the speakers with guitar cables and didn't notice the 60 Hz hum throughout the show.
Or the local concert for the fireworks show where, despite being 9 hours into the activities for the day, they couldn't get the bass players vocal mic to not feedback when my friend's band played.
And then there was the knob twiddler who couldn't just get the sound dialed in and leave it, but would change everything essentially on every song. The entire night sounded like what the first song or two can sound like while things get dialed in.
And so many people that don't understand anything other than turn everyone up as far as you can without clipping. And you end up with backing vocals overpowering the lead vocals. Or a muddy sound from vocals and instruments being in the same frequency bands and no room carved out in the eq for the vocals.
There are some really great sound techs out there, but there's also a lot of inexperienced people with fragile egos who 100% will make you sound like shit on purpose if you offend them. This is why appreciate, and show appreciation for, good sound.
A sound tech really can make or break your show. A bad sound tech can make even the best equipment seem totally worthless, while a great one can can work with almost anything and make you sound good. The venues my band plays at locally both have great sound techs. One of them works with a pretty barebones setup, just the bare minimum on the kit, vocal mics and everything else is stage sound and it always sounds great. My band gives him a challenge too, because we have the hardest hitting metal drummer in the city and his PA struggles to keep up, but he always makes it work.
Mid 90s I was in an alternative band doing mostly originals. We were playing new band night at The Mirage nightclub in Minneapolis. We were pretty new to the live show thing with a sound guy. We’d done lots of parties and a few weddings but we were the sound guy. Anyway we were the 3rd and last band to go on that night. We started out and most people were just ignoring the music. After our first song the patrons were like wow these guys are good. And starting gathering round the stage. So the middle of the second song there’s a volume swell that I’d use my pedal for. This pissed the sound guy right the F off he pushed my fader to max and and dumped just that into the stage monitors then walked away. I tried compensating on the stage with my the volume on my guitar, board and amp but couldn’t get back to that sweet spot. Needless to say the crowd quickly thinned out.
After the show one of the guys from the other band, came up to us and said “you didn’t give him any cash did you?” And we all looked at each other like “what? We’re supposed to pay him?” “Or give him weed” says the other guy.
We all just hung our heads and went fuck lesson learned.
Oh man. We played Mirage a lot back in the day. I think I know who it was. Took us a long time to get on some of these soundguy’s good sides. Which band?
@@TheArtofGuitar Our name was Koan. Pronounced Koh-ahn. We were together for about 2 years mid 90s broke up because singer was suffering from LSD. Lotta fun was had though. Love your vids and posts BTW.
Also..the better it sounds on stage, the better the sources, the easier it is to mix. NICE VID MIKE
If your band is making any money at all having your own front of house makes such a huge difference. And if they can bring some gear even better. So many shows, like nearly every show, we have thousands of dollars of amazing gear on stage and then the sound engineer has to make due with old beer soaked Peavey wedges with chicken wire stapled on them from the '70s and some old bass bins and some old power amps that are all clipping and a board with 70% working faders and somehow make it sound studio quality.
Most of my early live gigs had no sound tech -- somebody in the audience would give us hand signals for who needed to turn up or down. Lately, stage volumes are low and people tell me after the show they couldn't hear me play except for leads, and that makes me sad, because I'm riding my volume knobs all night for tone and blend.
"Do you like Huey Lewis and the News?"
Never piss off the sound guy. He can destroy you with a minimum of effort.
Yes a new art of guitar video!
We were going to headline the Cow Palace in April with a Pink Floyd band I'm in. The promoters then told us we couldn't use our sound and light companies, something to do with the California unions, which I'm all for, BUT.. we cancelled. 6 people in the band, 56 inputs. Not only can we not play without them.. we WON'T
I think we've all been frustrated with this. Not just being the performer, but also when you're just watching.
The grumpy sound engineer is famous, but more often than not you listen back to recordings and it's all drums, almost no bass, a faint whimper of guitar (when boosted for lead) and some vocal. I had one long-term gig in particular, where this was the problem and the sound-engineer just would not make the necessary fixes. After the first week of gigs, I told him to get a plexiglass screen for the drums, he said he basically had whatever budget he wanted from the boss... but nope. And he insisted on having like 12-16 mics on the kit where Kick and snare probably would have done it. It was really frustrating, but when you have to work there for the next couple of months, you can't really do any more than make suggestions
Congrats on 785k Subscribers! Great topic! Love that you've got the Nancy Wikson guitar here, can't wait for the video on it. Love the American Psycho shirt! I might have to get one too now haha 😂
Wow, great story Mike!
I saw This Train in concert years ago and the vocals were un-amplified for the first half of the show. Turned out they had no sound tech that day so they had to run back and fix it themselves.
I went to a show at the Barclays Center I think in 2015 or 2016 to see Iron Maiden. For most of the show I couldn’t hear the bass 🤬🤯 I haven’t been back there for anything since then.
Hey man just want to say keep up the amazing work and stay awesome my man 😁🤘🏻🤘🏻🎸🎹🔥🔥🔥🔥
Our sound guy is a full-fledged member of our band.
Beastface drove 4 hours to play with All Hail The Yeti and it was one of the worst shows we ever played. The sound tech was also the bartender and he did both at the same time. Our entire set had no vocals and he never noticed or fixed it as he was behind the bar that was in a separate room. It was cool playing with All Hail The Yeti but it was so embarrassing at the same time.
Been playing live for over 30 years? Damn, kid. How old are you?
I know, recently The Warning opened for Muse in México City, the camera show how the guitarist was giving it all, but it almost did not sound
my man took his ovation only to flex on us
The sound guy/gal WILL make or break your show. I play in a couple bands in Portland, OR and it’s always a relief when you see someone you know is good behind the board. They’re easy spot because I think there is like only 10 people tops in the whole city that do live sound lol. (I’m joking obviously, but it’s a little true)
I love how this guitar looks
I don't gig, so do they do any sort of sound check for the band after they mic up?
Hey man I’ve been subscribed to your RUclips channel ever since I found out about you and I wanted to see if you could make a RUclips video dedicated on how to play nothing else matters by Metallica It’s special to my dad and I wanted to learn how to play it so If you could that’ll be great
Sound Man.
Period……..
I'm convinced that sounds techs have completely ruined 80% of the concerts I've ever attended.
Sorry for the stupid question but can't a computer, robot or AI adjust the sound for you? Or can't the sound settings be uploaded into a computer that adjusts automatically song by song?
Again apologies, pure ignorance and curiosity speaking here.
I’m sure. But for now non that’s why I get so mad at lazy sound engineers. You’re making it easy for AI to take over!
@@TheArtofGuitar haha fair enough. At some point there will be a "Skynet" singularity and AI will remix all metal songs into pop just to piss us off 🤣 thanks for the content, you're really cool 👍
What some bands do is have a portable digital mixer with their mix already loaded in. Assuming they feed it the same levels every night, it could give them a pretty consistent mix that needs minimal tweaking. Song by song, they can just have presets on their equipment, especially if the guitarists are using things like AxeFXs or Helixes.
This is what I have a half stack for. What? You can't hear me? You can now.
I used a half stack at this show. But you never know how it’s being mixed in.
@@TheArtofGuitar I know. It doesn't necessarily really fit the mix even if you just turn it up because you could just be louder than every one else and then be the ONLY person that is heard. But I've done that once or twice out of frustration over not being heard enough and the sound guy ended not being able to do anything because I was louder than the PA. Mine is 120 watts as opposed to 100 - wouldn't think that makes a big difference in its volume capabilities, but maybe it does. In any case, good video and the truth is I think bands - if they can afford it - should have their own sound guy as a member of the band so they are always safe because they can be really inconsistent like you said.
What guitar is that you are holding please let us know model number
It's Nancy Wilson's actual guitar that she sold on Reverb. Video coming soon.
I double as a lead guitar player and sound tech in bands I play with at the same time. Let’s say, I get stressed out most of the time.
The story about not hearing your guitar is why we need cranked amps on the stage.
Can’t give the sound guy ALL the power.
i work at a small concert venue as an assistent to the sound guy (and on certain ocassion ill do the sound myself). there used to be one sound guy who came in pretty much every day for over 12 years. he knew the place inside and out and everything usually sounded phenomenal (when it didnt it was the band's fault LOL). he left recently, and now there's 3 or 4 new soundguys in rotation and you can hear them struggling in the mix. not all of them but some of them. gives you perspective on what an art form it truly is.
Whenever you see a guy holding a guitar and not playing a note and just talking you already know who it is lol
Yes let's go, we got the video back but this time with audio 😂 anyways love the content and I've been binge watching all of your videos 🙂 first comment too 🙂 yay 😁
Thanks for letting me know. It must have been an uploading glitch.
@@TheArtofGuitar yeah, and I was a little sad when you took down the video at first but got super excited when you re-uploaded it 😁
❤❤ Don’t know “ IF” you already played it on ONE ☝️ of your vids?? BUT ALL GUITARISTS HAVE TOLD ME - The Ending LEAD GUITAR 🎸 PART AT END OF PRINCE
“” LETS GO CRAZY”” is impossible!!!! Haha 😂
They’ve all told me NO ONE ☝️ has ever been able to play it like Prince!
Let me know if you agree or you think 💭 it can be Done ✅?
Thanks
Not impossible... I did it at a show last night. Fuzz into wah into dirty amp, lots of chromatic blues movement, and give it attitude. And you have to hold that first bend until the crowd starts yelling. 😎
How was the Quarter Pounder bro? 🍔🥤🍟
I never found a 24 hour McD's.. Ended up getting a sandwich at Cub and crying myself to sleep, haha.
I was early and then Mike took it down and put it back up
I wasn't getting any audio over the phone app with the video when it was originally up, and the desktop page had the video stuck at 320p. I think RUclips needs to go home and sleep something off.
Was at a bar one (ok… more than once) time and I’m convinced the person working the sound board was tone deaf. Terrible sounds
Being a good sound man is like singing...yeah, anyone can technically sing because we all have vocal chords, but not everyone can sing, like me. Sound men sometimes become sound men simply because they're willing...
It's like a song that's poorly mixed - sounds bad.
I’m so early look at me
These "sound techs" are failed musicians