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heyhey! Been itchin' to blog but I have nothing to write about =.= well now I have!!!

I had a gig last night in campus. It was conducted by the uni's music society. This event has been held every academic year and finally I got to play in that event!! I played with my fellow rubbers--another 'finally!!!' moment-- and I got to play with fellow 2nds. I subbed for their bassist who is currently studying abroad. 

That was fun! Although a lot of mishaps, wrong chords, and unbalanced sound system, it was a gig worth remembering. Every gig teach me different lessons, so yeah. This will be another lesson :) Here's what I've learned:

First, playing as an opening band is actually not so bad after all. Me and fellow rubbers didn't expect to play as opening band because we were informed that we'll be playing 2nd or 3rd. And when we reconfirm, we were supposed to be the 1st. So we were kinda surprised. The thing is, you'll get more time setting up gears on stage and that's a big advantage! Because of that, I didn't feel nervous anymore. 

Second, GO BUY A LOOOOONNG JACK, or maybe a wireless one if you can afford it. This will come in handy. I bought a 6m jack the other day --well it's not actually that long, but it came in handy last night. The amps position last night was like: guitar amp-drum-bass amp-guitar amp. When I play with the 2nds, the guitarist was using the rightmost amp. So, if I stand in front of my bass amp, the position on stage will be verry awkward because that will cause the vocalist not to be at the center. That's why I need to move to the left side in front of the guitar amp. The stage is quite wide, but thank God my jack is long enough and I still can play freely at the other side.

Third, playing for 2 bands at the same gig is EXTREMELY STRESSFUL!! I don't know. Maybe this is just me. Or maybe because this is my first time for such situation. I got verrrry busy because of the double jamming, spent a looot of money for studio rent, and all the songs and sequences were mixed up in my head just like when I was having 2 exams on the same day. Also, not to mention the sound setting! The settings for some songs are different, so I got extra stuff to remember. Plus, I am a sub for the 2nds, so it kinda gave me extra pressure because if I didn't do well, I'm afraid that I might ruin their reputation >.<... Man...

Fourth, the sound that you are hearing on stage is TOTALLY DIFFERENT than the one off stage where the crowd is. I think it's because the sound of all instruments are combined and come out through another speaker which totally has different equalizer or something. During the sound check, the sound on stage was awful, but Mr.Manager said that it sounds good from his stand point. But the thing is, during the real performance, the one on stage sounded good to me, so I really hope that it didn't sound awful for the crowd (x.x). It will be better if you have somebody who can direct you from the crowd stand point. Thank God we have Mr.Manager to do that :) For amateur gigs, we can't control the equalizer of the main speaker, and worse, we can't really coordinate with the sound man or complain the drum's bass is too bass-y or the lead guitar riffs is so faint. I don't really know how these things go in a professional gig though. Y'lemme know

Fifth, own a pair of earplug. I've been to heavy jamming sessions these past few weeks, and because most of the studio I went to only have small jamming rooms, we stood really close to each other and I was always stood near the drums. Actually, wherever I stood didn't really matter because the drum will still be loud. I usually become deaf after jamming, and my hearing will be normal after 15 minutes. Months ago rubbers' drummer gave me 3 pairs of earplug heheh and those things came in handy. I didn't turn deaf after jamming anymore. Even if it's a very loud one. The earplug also came in handy during the gig. We didn't have monitor facing the band, so basically we can't hear ourselves singing. But when I use the earplug, I only plug my right ear so that I can still hear the music and listen to myself at the same time. Don't plug both ears if you will be singing because you might not be able to listen to the music and ended up singing off key. My first time using an earplug, I went off beat (=.=").

Alright, hope it helps! :D

orgasm

Just came back from the musical practice, and the musicians didn't do really well tonight.. But there is this one song that we just learned a couple of hours before the rehearsal which is really uplifting. I was feelin 'high' while playing. When it came to that part during the rehearsal, we play our hearts out without even care about the dynamics and stuff, we just blast and our lead guitarist was having the 'guitar face' all the time. After we finish playing the outro, we ended with a loud "JEEENNNNGG!!", then he put down his guitar and said "I just had an orgasm." I cracked. LOL

That was so unexpected hahahh but that was today's highlight. Nothing really significant happened.

Oh ya! On the way home, we were listening to the radio and apparently they were playing some old school rock and roll. The song at that moment were sooooo goood so we were trying hard to listen to the lyrics so later we can google it at home. One of my friend actually loves that kind of song that's why he was soooo excited to find out, but then suddenly our pianist realized that he forgot his ipod at church so we gotta call another friends who are still at church. When my friend was on the phone, we turned off the radio.... By the time we turn it on again, it was during that song's instrumental part. So we waited for so long in anticipation of the lyrics but then it never came.The song ended. WHATTHEFRACK?!?! We'll never gonna know what song was that. Too bad.

Anyway, I should be doing reviews about bands or songs or whatever, but I'm friggin busy these days. The only time where I managed to turn on my mp3 player was only when I'm about to sleep or on my way to musical practice, or on my way to class which is very short. =( I have no time to properly listen and digest... Well, I gotta play at a gig soon, hopefully it'll be such a gig that is worth writing.

Edwards vs 190

Heyy all!

So I had a visual programming class yesterday, and I was bored so I decided to check out IKUO's blog. I found this :

I went gaga. First was because finally people can buy the bass that is similar to his LONG WAY 190 Red bass. Second, he look HAWT in that pic lol. The fella worked again with ESP to produce this bass which is practically the siblings of his LONG WAY 190 one. You might ask, why "Edwards" then? Well, Edwards is ESP brand made only for Japanese market. ESP and Edwards are produced in different factories, and Edward's quality is said to be equal with ESP originals. The difference was in the hardware as stated by Wiki.

Too bad they don't produce the red one, it means no LED lights, and no 190 on the fretboard on the Edwards. Well, the red one is his signature model and it's ESP not Edwards. The Edwards' pickups are Seymour Duncan with active circuits, same like the red one. Those two have different body, the red one is swap ash while Edwards has alder body. You can check out the complete specs HERE. I don't know how does it sound though, and  It's sad that the color options are verrrryyy limited and those Edwards aren't as sophisticated as the red one.  The price is quite reasonable, which is around RM4000. If they were to sell the red version, hmmmmm. I think it'll cost much more than that... Btw, here's the red one..

 Oh yah, what I meant by the LED lights and 190 on the fret board was this..

Awesome rite? Heehehe.. I hope people will buy it, play with it and then post it on Youtube so I can listen to the sound... Btw, last time IKUO was endorsed by ESP and he had quite a number of basses made. You can check out the his bass gallery HERE complete with their specs.

Alllriiight, 1 sizzling pic of him to end the post ^^LOL

Image credits to:
http://www.espguitars.co.jp/gallery/ikuo/
http://ameblo.jp/grooving-myself/

Arranger -- mind u, another long post :P

I know this guy who is an arranger. Y'know, the one like David Foster, or Erwin Gutawa, or.. Err.. You can wiki the rest :p This guy works with my dad. My dad usually compose the songs and then he will be the one who settle the music arrangements, mastering, and other stuff.

He is pretty cool. He can create a very rich kind of accompaniment by using only software and keyboard. Well, I can't really describe his music with words because it is complexly beautiful. Let's put it this way, he can make my dad's songs sound like being accompanied by an orchestra and a huge choir by only using software, and less than 6 additional singers. N0ne of them s0unds fake.

Towards the end of my holiday, he came to my house to work with my dad as usual and that night when I was watching TV my dad said "You haven't listen to my songs have you? Let's go upstairs and check 'em out."  So I went upstairs and this guy was there. He let me listen to the stuff they are working on, and afterward I got to talk with him about a lot of stuff for several hours while my dad entertain grandma and grandpa who came halfway . He taught me a lot of things as well. Last time he did music for a living and he was a band leader for over 10 years.

He told me that if we play as a band in a cafe, we need to play with the audience's emotions. It will be wise if we play songs with major chords as starters so that the audience's mood will boost a bit. Towards the middle, we can play minor songs and then end with major stuff. We gotta differentiate between major fast, major slow, minor fast and minor slow.

He doesn't really like copy paste as well. I mean, playing a song exactly like the original. He said that he likes to rearrange it, add some stuff or sometimes he turn it into different beat. But he said that we gotta be careful not to add too much or change too much because the audience might think that we play it wrong or simply don't like it. His band usually medley top 40 songs with the traditional ones. It was pretty funny I think. He said it was pretty ridiculous but the audience liked it because it was unexpected.

He added that being an arranger, you gotta have a good taste of music. Somehow your music preferences will be reflected in your music arrangements. He told me about one of his friend who likes live music that all the music that he created for his clients are all sounds like being played in live performances. Then I was like, oh snap. I like metal. So how about that? He said "Don't. You gotta listen to David Foster... You're gonna have to listen to many kinds of music, don't stick to just one."

 

That dude is very talkative, so he told me a lot of stuff and I really regret it that my phone wasn't with me because if it was, I would've recorded every single thing he said. Well, towards the end of our talk, he told me a number of important lessons.

1. Don't be stingy. Share your knowledge to everybody, and help those who need help. One day you might need help from them.

2. Don't be judgmental and looking down on others. When you see people playing on stage, don't start criticizing them by getting all "oh man. It'll be better if they play like this and like that..." or "dude, they suck" or anything because there must be something they can do in which you can't.

3. Be humble. No one will get along with pig head no matter how great the skill is. People will be pleased to work with you if you maintain good attitude. No cocky pig heads will be successful.

4. Be active in the community. Befriends everyone especially musicians. You can learn a lot from each other.

A couple of hours well wasted :)