ANd will you be buying purple spandex soon?
LOL! They auditioned a bunch of talented dudes...with great equipment...dudes with Les Paul and SG Customs (several 3 pickup models of each) just leaned up against the wall where anyone could knock them over.
I had the least amount of gear of anyone. I took my heavily modded Gibson SG and the Schecter C1 Hellraiser as a backup, one of my DSL40C's, two Easy-Lock cables I've had since 1984 (a 25 and a 35 footer) and my Korg pitchblack tuner. That's it.
Observations:
The dudes are my age - late 40's early 50's. Very, very precise and educated musicians.
Floor monitors!!!! Yes!!!
The bandleader has a Gibson Black Beauty and a Phil Collen model Ibanez Destroyer. His "rehearsal rig" is a vintage Marshall Major and its unbelievable how loud it is...but really good tone.
The singer effortlessly nails Klaus Meine....and he nails the intro vocal to "immigrant song" with absolute precision. He plays a Jackson USA model and a Korg keyboard, switching back and forth between them all night long. He is also running the lights, smoke and the big screen monitor (behind the band) which switches between camera views and runs video clips simultaneously. He also plays an acoustic in a horizontal stand and his Jackson can also be used as a synth interface.
The bass player...wow....the dude is good. Fender P Bass through a huge Aguilera stack. When i performed "run to the hills" during my audition, he put his foot on the monitor and "sprayed" the onlookers ala Steve Harris.
The drummer is very solid. I was off to his right. I could feel the percussive blast from every hit. Double bass...phenomenal.
Each audition is a mini performance with smoke and lights and a video in the background. It starts off dark with smoke, lasers shooting upwards and an ominous keyboard part accomanied by space program radio traffic.
Our first song was "Rock you like a Hurricane" and I played the opening riffs. The edge was unreal...I had made some last minute adjustments to my DSL40C in the warm up room...rolled the bass off some (final settings were bass 4, treble 6, resonance 8, presence 5, gain 7, reverb full-on) in hopes I could compete with the bandleader's Marshall Major...and it worked.
My opening salvo to "Rock you like a Hurricane" came off sounding really very Angus-ish, but I remained totally faithful to the original arrangement.
This was followed up by "big city nights," Summer of '69," "Rock and Roll Band," "Another thing comin," and finished up with "Run to the hills" at the original tempo....Rock!!! LOL!!!
All in all, I had a great time. The band is a really friendly group of guys. Lots of talented dudes showed up, that's for certain.
I got one dude to shoot a pic with my phone. I'm on the far left. Look close and you can see the Black Beauty center stage.
I will keep you guys posted...
