Most new bands (and just about all first bands) are the Marxist Three (or Four, or whatever) Musketeers: all for one, one for all, from each according to his abilities, to each according to his needs. This tends to create a crisis down the road, because human nature being what it is, that is not a sustainable model. You can potentially avoid that crisis by taking steps when forming or joining any musical project to make sure that expectations are realistic.
In any band, especially a new band, there will be an unequal distribution of work. This can manifest in a number of ways. Sometimes it's a single person who handles all the administrative stuff, doing all the booking and publicity and running the band's social media. Or maybe it's a single person who takes care of technical support, providing/running the PA, maybe lights, and perhaps even providing instruments/amps for other musicians. Someone may provide a rehearsal space, or a vehicle to haul the big stuff. Then there's disproportionate actual work: loading in and out; setting up; tearing down. During the initial wave of enthusiasm for a new project, often the people taking on the disproportionate amount of the work load just do it, in the interest of getting it done, and because, in the haze of new-band euphoria, it doesn't feel like work.
But fast-forward a year, and it probably IS starting to feel like work, especially if the band is playing a lot and making money. Whoever has been providing various free services starts to feel that an even split of the gig proceeds is not fair since they are doing more work. Or maybe they just tired of doing so much. For whatever reason, there comes a point at which someone who has been doing something for free no longer wants to do so.
This can present an existential problem for a band. Despite the fact that, logically, the other band members have no reason to expect bandmate A to do something for free, if a pattern has been set under which bandmate A had been doing thing X, and then says that henceforth he either needs to be paid to do thing X, or he is no longer going to do thing X which means the band has to pay somebody else to do it, experience and anecdotal information suggest that the other bandmates will resent that. It can generate bad feeling that can tear a band apart.
So, it is VITAL to manage expectations from the beginning. It can be helpful in that context to sit everyone down and make a list of all the ancillary jobs that come along with running a band and all the technical stuff that will be required, and either (a) assign tasks and responsibilities so that everyone is carrying an approximately equal load, or, (b) assign values to various tasks and come up with a formula for how proceeds will be split up based on who does what.
Note that if you go purely on market value of services, it it quite easy for that to eat up all proceeds of many low-level gigs---renting a PA, a van, and a rehearsal space could result in zero income for anybody but the people providing those things. Particularly if it's something that you have anyway, and there is minimal marginal cost to you for the band to use it, you should not expect people to be willing to let you take all the gig money. But that also doesn't mean that you should be expected to provide stuff for free in perpetuity.
There are all sorts of concerns and formulas that could be applied when you start getting into the specifics. My point with this blog post is to raise the issue and hopefully get people thinking about it. I'm happy to discuss specific issues if people would like that.
Tuesday, October 23, 2012
Expand the Scope of Your Pride in Your Gear
It's only natural that many musicians take pride in having good gear. For better or worse, a musician's instrument is usually part of his/her identity as a performer, and aside from any image/perception concerns, who doesn't feel better knowing they're playing a really good (guitar, etc.)?
But unfortunately that pride rarely extends beyond each individual player's little corner of the stage. That's a shame because by far the most important gear when it comes to a band's relationship to its audience is the PA, but many, many bands barely get by with an absolute minimum amount of lower-tier PA gear, although the players individually may have really top-shelf instruments and amps.
The thing is, even if you're getting a great guitar tone, you're coming to the plate with two strikes against you if the overall sound of the band is muffled or distorted, or vocals are unintelligible, or the band can't hear themselves on stage. Almost nobody will leave the show thinking, "Well, I couldn't really hear the vocals or the kick drum, but the lead guitarist had great tone!" And you know who the few people who will think that are, don't you? Other musicians, and it is pretty much impossible to become successful as a band if that's all you appeal to.
So I highly recommend---indeed, I challenge everyone to try to do this---expanding that feeling of "pride in your gear" to include your PA. Make THAT a part of your identity as a musician. Assuming you've got an at least adequate instrument/rig, before you spend that next thousand dollars getting a new (or another) guitar, drop some money into a pair of decent powered speakers---there are lots of nice ones that will work either as mains or can be tilted back or laid on their sides and used as monitor wedges. You will always be able to find a use for them! And don't get something cheap. Go with mid-level or higher from a good brand.
Or, before you get a new amp or cymbals, invest in some decent microphones. There are plenty of good mics that are (relatively) cheap, including Shure SM57s and SM58s, which are industry standard instrument and vocal mics respectively.
I think one reason many people don't think of the PA as part of their identity, as something to take pride in, is the free rider problem---if bandmate A invests in a really good PA, then bandmates B, C, and D will potentially get the benefits of the good PA without sharing the costs. Well, yes, that may be true, although hopefully PA enthusiasm will infect the whole band. (It could happen.) And, if you have bandmates who refuse to invest in making the band better, that may be indicative of a bigger issue that you might want to keep an eye on. But even in a worst-case scenario, consider that, whatever satisfaction you may get out of being a tough guy who nobody takes advantage of, NOTHING good comes from following that path. You're a tough guy whose band sounds bad playing through a shitty PA. Whereas if you embrace the idea of taking pride in your PA, yes, maybe it costs more out of pocket, but, (a) your band sounds good, and (b) you have a great PA! Which you can take with you if (when) your current band of freeloaders implodes.
There are other ways to deal with the freeloader issue, but that's part of a bigger issue, so it will be the subject of a separate post shortly. In the mean time, take a look at your current PA. Are you proud of it? Can you say honestly that it's presenting your band in the best light? If not, try making that your gear focus for a while. I assure you, it will pay greater dividends than getting that third guitar!
But unfortunately that pride rarely extends beyond each individual player's little corner of the stage. That's a shame because by far the most important gear when it comes to a band's relationship to its audience is the PA, but many, many bands barely get by with an absolute minimum amount of lower-tier PA gear, although the players individually may have really top-shelf instruments and amps.
The thing is, even if you're getting a great guitar tone, you're coming to the plate with two strikes against you if the overall sound of the band is muffled or distorted, or vocals are unintelligible, or the band can't hear themselves on stage. Almost nobody will leave the show thinking, "Well, I couldn't really hear the vocals or the kick drum, but the lead guitarist had great tone!" And you know who the few people who will think that are, don't you? Other musicians, and it is pretty much impossible to become successful as a band if that's all you appeal to.
So I highly recommend---indeed, I challenge everyone to try to do this---expanding that feeling of "pride in your gear" to include your PA. Make THAT a part of your identity as a musician. Assuming you've got an at least adequate instrument/rig, before you spend that next thousand dollars getting a new (or another) guitar, drop some money into a pair of decent powered speakers---there are lots of nice ones that will work either as mains or can be tilted back or laid on their sides and used as monitor wedges. You will always be able to find a use for them! And don't get something cheap. Go with mid-level or higher from a good brand.
Or, before you get a new amp or cymbals, invest in some decent microphones. There are plenty of good mics that are (relatively) cheap, including Shure SM57s and SM58s, which are industry standard instrument and vocal mics respectively.
I think one reason many people don't think of the PA as part of their identity, as something to take pride in, is the free rider problem---if bandmate A invests in a really good PA, then bandmates B, C, and D will potentially get the benefits of the good PA without sharing the costs. Well, yes, that may be true, although hopefully PA enthusiasm will infect the whole band. (It could happen.) And, if you have bandmates who refuse to invest in making the band better, that may be indicative of a bigger issue that you might want to keep an eye on. But even in a worst-case scenario, consider that, whatever satisfaction you may get out of being a tough guy who nobody takes advantage of, NOTHING good comes from following that path. You're a tough guy whose band sounds bad playing through a shitty PA. Whereas if you embrace the idea of taking pride in your PA, yes, maybe it costs more out of pocket, but, (a) your band sounds good, and (b) you have a great PA! Which you can take with you if (when) your current band of freeloaders implodes.
There are other ways to deal with the freeloader issue, but that's part of a bigger issue, so it will be the subject of a separate post shortly. In the mean time, take a look at your current PA. Are you proud of it? Can you say honestly that it's presenting your band in the best light? If not, try making that your gear focus for a while. I assure you, it will pay greater dividends than getting that third guitar!
Sunday, October 14, 2012
Seeing Beyond the Set-Up
I was reading Guitar Player magazine recently and noticed again something I have noticed there before that bothers me. Every issue contains reviews of gear, including guitars. The reviewers talk about the distinctive points of various instruments, their pros and cons and good and bad qualities. And often, in the course of the review, will be a comment on how well the guitar played out of the box, or a note that it needed thing X adjusted.
This is at best unnecessary information, and at worst downright misleading, and here's why:
On any guitar, especially electric guitars, there are a number of parameters that can be adjusted to make the guitar play its best. Dialing in these variables is known as "setting up" a guitar, and the resultant condition is called the "set-up" of the guitar. Generally when a guitar is set up well it will play easily all the way up and down the neck, without buzzing frets or choked notes. Among the factors that go into a set-up are string height (adjusted by raising or lowering the bridge, and also sometimes by the depth of the slots in the nut), neck relief (how much the neck bends under string pressure, which can be adjusted in most guitars by loosening or tightening a "truss rod" in the neck), intonation (adjustable on many guitars by how the bridge saddles are positioned), and, on electrics, pickup height. There are other adjustments that can be made on a guitar with a vibrato bridge. Not all guitars have all of these adjustments available, but most electrics do.
Most guitars don't arrive from the factory with the perfect set-up, for a couple reasons. First, set-ups are subjective, so many manufacturers error on the side of high action because it's easier and more forgiving of heavy-handed play. And, a set-up can change due to things like heat and humidity, or just getting bumped around a lot, so the set-up when a guitar arrives at its final destination may well be different than what it had when it left the factory. This is also another reason that the factory may not want to dial things in too closely before shipment.
There was a time when (in theory) the retailer would tweak the set-up of new instruments when they arrived, before putting them out on the sales floor, and some still do. But "big box" retailers tend to do less of that, and with so many instruments being sold on-line now, it is quite possible that nobody will have touched a new guitar between the factory and the ultimate owner, although it can get shipped back and forth across the country (or the world) a few times in the interim.
So, nobody should EXPECT a new guitar to play that great when they pick it up. Of course, some do, and it's always great when you find one. But it's important to be able to look beyond the set-up when evaluating a guitar. So when Guitar Player (and they are not the only culprit; just the one I saw most recently) suggests in a review that it matters that a guitar played great out of the box, or that it's a bad thing that it needed a truss rod adjustment when it arrived, they are doing their readers a disservice.
To be a really savvy guitar shopper, it's important to learn to see beyond the set-up of a guitar you're trying out. Think about: how does it feel ergonomically? (Not the actual action; the other stuff like how does it hang on your shoulder, how does the carve of the neck feel under your hand, etc.) How does it sound? Assuming it CAN be adjusted, how it plays can be dialed in later, if everything else is good. I suspect most reputable dealers would either set it up for you as part of the purchase or allow a purchase contingent on it being set-up-able.
There are plenty of red flags to look for with a new guitar, and some may not reveal themselves until the guitar is set up, such as low or high frets. But if you assume any new guitar is going to need a set-up, and look beyond those issues in initial evaluation, you are less likely to lose out on a great guitar that just needed a truss-rod adjustment.
This is at best unnecessary information, and at worst downright misleading, and here's why:
On any guitar, especially electric guitars, there are a number of parameters that can be adjusted to make the guitar play its best. Dialing in these variables is known as "setting up" a guitar, and the resultant condition is called the "set-up" of the guitar. Generally when a guitar is set up well it will play easily all the way up and down the neck, without buzzing frets or choked notes. Among the factors that go into a set-up are string height (adjusted by raising or lowering the bridge, and also sometimes by the depth of the slots in the nut), neck relief (how much the neck bends under string pressure, which can be adjusted in most guitars by loosening or tightening a "truss rod" in the neck), intonation (adjustable on many guitars by how the bridge saddles are positioned), and, on electrics, pickup height. There are other adjustments that can be made on a guitar with a vibrato bridge. Not all guitars have all of these adjustments available, but most electrics do.
Most guitars don't arrive from the factory with the perfect set-up, for a couple reasons. First, set-ups are subjective, so many manufacturers error on the side of high action because it's easier and more forgiving of heavy-handed play. And, a set-up can change due to things like heat and humidity, or just getting bumped around a lot, so the set-up when a guitar arrives at its final destination may well be different than what it had when it left the factory. This is also another reason that the factory may not want to dial things in too closely before shipment.
There was a time when (in theory) the retailer would tweak the set-up of new instruments when they arrived, before putting them out on the sales floor, and some still do. But "big box" retailers tend to do less of that, and with so many instruments being sold on-line now, it is quite possible that nobody will have touched a new guitar between the factory and the ultimate owner, although it can get shipped back and forth across the country (or the world) a few times in the interim.
So, nobody should EXPECT a new guitar to play that great when they pick it up. Of course, some do, and it's always great when you find one. But it's important to be able to look beyond the set-up when evaluating a guitar. So when Guitar Player (and they are not the only culprit; just the one I saw most recently) suggests in a review that it matters that a guitar played great out of the box, or that it's a bad thing that it needed a truss rod adjustment when it arrived, they are doing their readers a disservice.
To be a really savvy guitar shopper, it's important to learn to see beyond the set-up of a guitar you're trying out. Think about: how does it feel ergonomically? (Not the actual action; the other stuff like how does it hang on your shoulder, how does the carve of the neck feel under your hand, etc.) How does it sound? Assuming it CAN be adjusted, how it plays can be dialed in later, if everything else is good. I suspect most reputable dealers would either set it up for you as part of the purchase or allow a purchase contingent on it being set-up-able.
There are plenty of red flags to look for with a new guitar, and some may not reveal themselves until the guitar is set up, such as low or high frets. But if you assume any new guitar is going to need a set-up, and look beyond those issues in initial evaluation, you are less likely to lose out on a great guitar that just needed a truss-rod adjustment.
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