Sunday, November 12, 2006

The musician's most valuable assets.

Last night's - early morning gig brought up topic I wanted to talk about.
I came in for packdown late Saturday evening for what we expected to be a quick job but turned out to take much longer than we expected.
The band (15 piece jazz with a nice brass section) had finished their playing which was great (the crowd was a huge mining company listed on the stock exchange and this was their annual ball so a large number of guests were on the dance floor).
Then came the DJ and disaster.
We had the crowd climbing on stage and dancing away - whie we were trying to pack mics, leads, front of house speakers and foldbacks.
Result- we didn't get the quick getaway we were hoping for.

All that aside we noticed the DJ doing some things you should never do.
His system was pumping out so much sound it was painful and he was running the amps to overload - slowly cooking his electronics.
Louder is not better.
Guys and gals, pleas ,please, please, please remember this (so many bands make exactly the same mistake this DJ did and wonder why they are not taken seriously by the professionals in the music industry).

Two of your most valuable assets are your hearing and then your gear and you need to look after both.
Both can cost you greatly if you arc up the sound to high levels.
Ease up on the volume and you'll save your hearing which can quickly become impaired and even permanently damaged, and don't run your amps at maximum or they will cook and fail at the time you need them most.
Also if your levels are lower, you'll get a much cleaner sound that isn't dominated by bass and guitar which has a tendency to muddy up vocals if it is simply too loud.
Avoid the overkill, keep your ears, your gear and look after the health and happiness of your fans.

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