So, I guess I'm in a band. Any advice?

[sisu]

Oh if they boo you or chuck bottles at least thy are listening, nothing worse than being on stage to a bunch of people who ignore you!

Oh and leave them wanting more!

[Roadfood]

@scabpicker

The most basic thing I can say is: never, ever stop playing the song until you’ve come to the end. Too many people don’t learn this before their first performance, and when they make their first inevitable mistake they panic and stop.

I’m not a performer, but as an audience member I second this. When you’re listening to a live show, nothing says “amateur” more than “Oops, we messed up, everyone stop, apologize to the audience, and start over from the beginning.” On the flip side, nothing says “professional” better than being able to keep going through any mistakes. If it’s a particularly major goof, so that the audience would have to be asleep not to notice it, I’d say go ahead and acknowledge it lightheartedly, make a face to one of your bandmates or something. Let the audience laugh with you instead of at you, while also showing that you’re good enough to keep going.

[pulykamell]

@Roadfood

I’m not a performer, but as an audience member I second this. When you’re listening to a live show, nothing says “amateur” more than “Oops, we messed up, everyone stop, apologize to the audience, and start over from the beginning.” On the flip side, nothing says “professional” better than being able to keep going through any mistakes. If it’s a particularly major goof, so that the audience would have to be asleep not to notice it, I’d say go ahead and acknowledge it lightheartedly, make a face to one of your bandmates or something. Let the audience laugh with you instead of at you, while also showing that you’re good enough to keep going.

That’s exactly what happened to us at one gig in Germany. Completely my fault, too. Every song we had in our set was down a half step from the written score, as the guitars and bass were tuned E flat, but I memorized the tunes (as a keyboardist) in terms of the guitar chart (which was written to standard tuning). Except for one song, which was actually in the written pitch. So there’s a song with a piano intro for about 16 bars before the bass comes in for 8 bars and then the guitar and the whole band. I start out the song with the piano part, the vocalist matches the pitch, then 16 bars later the bass comes in with a sour note, adjusts up a half step and just gives me this look of panic. “Oh, fuck” I think, realizing I’m a half step off and trying to figure out if there’s a way out of this. Or,shit, will the guitar/singer be able to catch it and cover? So we build up to the big crescendo where the guitar comes in and it’s just a giant cacophonous mess of sound, with piano and bass playing one half step lower than the loud, distorted guitar. I mean, this was the musical equivalent of a car speeding into a brick well.

Everybody stops playing except for me. I continue playing the “rocking” chord-single-note-chord-single note part (think something like Lennon’s “Imagine” piano part) for about 4 or 8 bars, and then emphatically go up a half step (as a way to say “hey, it’s MY fuck up you guys”), the crowd laughs, the band laughs, and we go on with the song, with even better energy than before.

Fuck ups can be fun.