Got Live If You Want It/Action, Jackson!

[Thatbastarddon]

Excellent @Jethro Rocker !!!

 

[Brian Krashpad]

Gig Report: Amber & the Antidotes at Cypress & Grove Brewery, 5/29/26​

Played with the cover band last night. I got talked into this band by my friend Lisa, an octogenarian lap steel player I've played with in a couple other bands (one was an Irish acoustic band, in which she played harp). She's a pretty amazing person. She went to a Crash Pad (my main band, that plays punk rock and roll originals) show this Spring, and someone asked her if she was my mom. So now sometimes I call her "Mom," haha.

Our first show doing two sets. But the lead singer talked between songs so much that we only got through 4/5 of the 25 songs we had ready, haha. It went really well, friends from another local band provided the PA and mixed for us, so that was one less thing for us to have to deal with on our own. Here's the two sets as planned, our last song was actually the Stones' Wild Horses:

Set 1
EXES & OHs
ANGEL FROM MONTGOMERY capo 1
BLUE BAYOU capo 9
DREAMING
THE STORY capo 2
WHAT’S UP capo 1
VOICES CARRY
WHITE RABBIT
POOR POOR PITIFUL ME capo 4
DON’T GET ME WRONG
ANGEL OF THE MORNING capo 1
I’M THE ONLY ONE
YOU’RE NO GOOD
IF IT MAKES YOU HAPPY
Set 2
CLOSER TO FINE capo 2
BABY CAN I HOLD YOU
HOLD ON HOLD ON capo 1
ONLY THE LONELY capo 1
ROOM AT THE TOP
WILD HORSES
BRASS IN POCKET
LINGER
DRUNKEN ANGEL capo 1
GIMME ONE REASON
BECAUSE THE NIGHT

During the first set I played my Epiphone Les Paul Deluxe, except for one song that has a capo way up on the 9th fret (I switched to my Jagmaster, pre-capo'd, for that'un). The Deluxe did great! Held tune despite putting capo on and off, or moved to different frets, several times. And I loves me some mini's. Here's the guitar in question (taken a few years back), sorry about the size of these images:

Here's the Jagmaster, a beater Squier I bought for $125 (w/gigbag) at a pawn. It's a shortscale, and actually one of my faves:

Rig was my Fender Super Champ XD (15W 1x10 hybrid) as master, into a slaved Marshall Lead 20 (20W 1x10 SS), both speakers on (the SC XD has a line out that doesn't turn off the onboard speaker). Although it was a pretty big room, to keep things simpler I just used stage volume, not mic'd. A shot of the "best of both worlds" mini-stack, from a prior gig with a different band:

For the second set, I switched to my Gibson Les Paul Classic. Just for funsies. It always plays and sounds great, and last night was no exception:

Here's a couple shots of the actual show:

Finally, a snippet viddy of the end of a song, that Mrs. Krashpad recorded. The crowd was fecking great, you can hear the start of their reaction at the end of the song:

☆ Video Snippet! CLICK to PLAY☆

Good times. I'm way over my head tryna play covers, but I like jumping in deep water. I'm way too lazy to get any better on my own, haha.

xo,

Krash

 

[Don O]

We’ve got 3 gigs lined up over the next 2 months. Two birthday parties and a block party. This will be our 3rd year at the block party. One of the BD parties is on the edge of the next lake over to the west. We went over to scope it out today after practice. Nice setup and view. We’ll be playing 2 sets starting at 6 PM on July 18th, sun at our backs. They expect about 150 people.

 

[Jethro Rocker]

We have a gig here at a bar June 20. Been awhile since we played in this city with 4 members living elsewhere. Small stage, gotta choose wisely.

 

[Brian Krashpad]

We have a gig here at a bar June 20. Been awhile since we played in this city with 4 members living elsewhere. Small stage, gotta choose wisely.

Pics?

 

[Jethro Rocker]

Pics?

I posted a bunch elsewhere but this is a good thread to do it. Will do

 

[Don O]

We did the block party gig tonight. No wife’s, so no photographers. Here’s us setting up.

 

[Jethro Rocker]

We did the block party gig tonight. No wife’s, so no photographers. Here’s us setting up.

View attachment 111203

View attachment 111204

View attachment 111205

Jeez that looks fun!

 

[Jethro Rocker]

What a fun show! Enjoyed ourselves immensely thus the audience does.
Love that Iceman.

 

[Brian Krashpad]

Belated Gig Report: Sunday Funday Band Trifecta June 28​

So on the above-referenced date the undersigned played in all three of my bands on the same day. For me, that's like a feckin world tour.

At 11:00 the side cover band had its regularly-scheduled Sunday midday practice.

Since the show was a matinee, my fellow bandmate Lisa (she's the one with the lapsteel above) and I wore what we were going to wear for the gig, and went straight from the rehearsal over to the club. And yes that's a Motley Crue laminate I'm wearing. Because 1) it's blue, and 2) it's totally absurd, and the other side band that Lisa and I are in is heavily absurdist.

Anyhow, the show is an ongoing last-Sunday-of-the-month series called "Hardback For A Day," named after the beloved currently otherwise defunct Hardback Cafe, our local punk rock mecca that lasted from the beginning of the '90s into the mid-Aughts. in three different locations around town. The Hardback owner/founder, Alan Bushnell, runs these shows as well. They're held at the flagship local gay bar University Club, which also dates from the '90s. A predecessor series, alike in everything but name, called Occupy Pancakes, had begun in a residential backyard, but was sometimes rained out (particularly in summer), and the UC kindly allowed them to move to their club instead. Since the UC would presumably have been closed on Sunday afternoons anyhow, it's a win-win, as day drinking is encouraged among the Hardback crowd. Not that they need any encouragement.

As you can see, Crash Pad got top billing, though the absurdist side band Bill Perry Orchestra actually played last. Probably because the BPO hadn't played in a couple years (Bill has had some health probs, and my other 2 bands have been taking priority of late), so there was some novelty there. Crash Pad played the penultimate spot, which is actually better, frankly, as the crowd tends to thin over the course of the afternoon and with so many acts.

Crash Pad's set was our first gig after my recent throat surgery (I had a nodule on a false vocal cord removed, which was caused by "overuse"), and frankly came probably a couple weeks earlier than it should have on that account, as the radiation therapy I endured 16 years ago has made that area slow to heal. But I croaked along as best I could, and subsequently seem none the worse for wear. On the upside my unmic'd 50W 2x12 Ampeg Reverberocket R212R sounded feckin' glorious. However, I should've put it up on the riser nearer the drummer, who could not hear it as a result of my lack of forethought. Lesson learned. Guitar was my 100th Anniversary LP Studio with stock '57 Classic and Classic +. My most recent guitar acquisition and already in my top tier. Love it. Even though I'm not really a blueburst guy, the looks are growing on me as well.

The BPO's closing set was fine, after we got through the abso trainwreck of an opening song. Bill just could not find where to come in vocally throughout the entire song. So he'd start a half-line off, step on solo spaces, etc. He's actually a painter/artist who dabbles in music rather than a traditional musician of any sort, so we are used to this happening on the regular, and covered the best we could. The upside of the BPO is that the songs are so weird to begin with, I'm not sure anybody but us knew this was happening. Rig was my Dano Hodad into my li'l Fender Super Champ XD (15W hybrid 1x10).

Didn't get any decent photos of BPO, but a well-meaning audience member (who should know better) took one of his photos and "AI'd" it:

Note how the "smart" computer changed my guitar's headstock to Fender.

Anyhow, as always sorry about the giant size of some photos; any questions gladly answered.

xo,

Krash

 

[Brian Krashpad]

ANOTHER Gig Report from Krash, wtf?

So, Thursday we played an early (7-9) two-set show at the local flagship gay bar, University Club (our lead singer is gay). This is the same club that has the monthly Sunday punk rock matinee that I've played with my other bands (and regularly attend as patron), so it's becoming a second home of sorts, haha. The club had some sort of internal kerfuffle a few days before the show, posting on their fb page that one of their DJs (and more importantly, their live soundman) would no longer be employed by or associated with the club, because they valued their customers safety. So, although cryptically stated, I'm guessing this guy was involved in some sort of predatory behavior in his past, and it just came to light. Since we were using the house PA, I feared this might tank the whole thing, but the venue found a different guy, who, like the person I was expecting, had a lot of sound reinforcement experience with live bands in addition to being a DJ. So the show must go on!

That said, the sound guy was having to figure out what gear was there and how to cobble it all together as we were loading in and setting up. Fortunately our singer brought her mic and stand, and I had several in the Rockmobile (2.0), or we would've been fecked, because I don't think the venue had any of that. At any rate we got it sussed and had a working PA by showtime. I brought my Røde M1 mic, which I specifically bought because I have a low growly voice, and the Røde's low end starts up at 80 Hz instead of 50 (for an SM58, and its high end is also shifted up, to 18 kHz (vs. 15 for a Shure). But in addition to that, I specifically told the soundguy to cut the bass on my mic, because this is a dance club predominately, not a live music venue, and whatever their speakers are skewed to produce massive bass. I'm guessing he either ignored me or, whatever it was he did do, it wasn't enough. More on that in a tick.

At any rate, rather than just having a tip jar like a straight band, this gig featured the debut of our Cashisaurus Rex, yet to be specifically named. One feeds the dosh in through her stomach or mouth or something, and it comes out her butt into a bucket. I love this band.

Here's the backline (minus a tiny 1x8 used by our lapsteelist, which surprisingly was loud enough); my amps are a Fender Super Champ XD (15W hybrid 1x10) mastering a slave Marshall Lead 20 (20W SS 1x10), bass rig a Gallien-Krueger 1x12 (wattage unknown to me), all amps unmic'd and balanced by ear:

Here's my rack. Main was the Gibson Les Paul Special, the unused backups my Firebird Zero and Squier Jagmaster, banjo on one song (Elle King's "America's Sweetheart"):

In general, the sets went well. As we've expanded from one set to two (three at our gig next month) we've added a few songs where our singer can sit out entirely, or just do backing, with the guys singing. Our drummer sings T. Rex's Jeepster. Bassist sings "All Along the Watchtower," our version of which is neither Dylan nor Jimi. But there are 2 spaces for solos in the song itself, plus an outro. It was a high point for me because I didn't spectacularly feck it up despite all that soloing, and afterward the bassist came over and whispered that he thought it was awesome, haha.

Low points for me were the song I sing, Tom Petty's Room At The Top, because of the aforementioned PA problems. It's a real breathy deep vocal (the way I sing it, especially after throat surgery), and the PA kept bassing out, with the result that I had to sing way off mic to avoid that. Fortunately our lead singer sings backing on it, which hopefully distracted the crowd from the PA problem. But I sure coulda popped the soundguy, because I warned him about the potential for that very thing happening, before we ever played a damn note. The other, more general low point was the aforementioned America's Sweetheart, which has a bunch of weird stops and starts, and was pretty trainwrecky in that regard. Despite those 2 songs, we had a lot of fun and the rest of the sets went well.

Here's some shots:

Good times. Sorry if the photos are giant.

xo,

Krash

 

[Jethro Rocker]

Nice!
As long as you are having fun!

 

[Brian Krashpad]

Nice!
As long as you are having fun!

Definitely that.

 

[Don O]

Had a great time at the private event gig last evening.

Setup and some early arrivers.





Live shots and video from an iPhone.