great mistakes #4

For a couple of years I attended church at St Matts Manly. For those of you who don’t know the area, its located in a major tourist area, which is also largely residential.
I was on sound one night and had turned up for sound check as usual at about 4 in the afternoon– full band plus 3 or 4 singers.
Well, I managed to get our sound check shut down by the police that afternoon. I was a confused for a little while as to why all the neighbours were complaining about the noise being unbearably loud, but heaps of people had complained, so here were the police.
I wasn’t mixing especially loud – I don’t think church should be overly loud, and it was only sound check. I even had front of house turned off when the police arrived, so it was definitely not loud. But the secret was all in the bell tower. St Matts is one of those really old churches with a bell tower, and our bell tower was special because it had speakers in it. Somehow I’d managed to turn on the bell tower speakers and therefore was broadcasting our sound check to the whole of Manly! The neighbours had good reason to complain. It must have sounded awful.

My day at the circus.

Sometimes it feels like I work in a circus.
I started late today. Had to go to City Recital Hall to record "discovery" with the Sydney Simphonia. The conductor talks through the music for the audience. I always enjoy these gigs. Tonight they did Elgar's nimrod and other variations on the theme of whatever it is.

I get to work and I go to the store room to grab a little portable mixer, and the batteries are all flat. i tip them out to put new ones in. i get battery acid on my hand. I put the batteries in the bin. I put new battieries in and no go. So i take the thing to Tom and demand he fix it. then i realise i haven't booked the car and it's already out and Tom laughs at me. i demand that he find me another one. he says no. Punishment for not forward planning. I say i wasn't rostered any time to forward plan. he says to quit while I'm ahead. then Tim walks past and i ask him to find me a car. He syas it's not in his job description, can't tom do it. Tom's punishing me. Tom rings 702 and organises me a car. I complain about getting battery acid on my fingers. Tom says "WHATTTT did the batteries leak???!!!! They're not meant to leak. Get me the batteries."
Me - no, they are in the bin.
Tom - i need the batteries, they're not supposed to leak.
I go get the bin.
Tom says not to put them on his desk, he needs them in something.
I say - here have the bin, they are in the bin. That's something.
Tom nearly hits me but can't because he'd lose his job.
He gets some paper towels and i fish the batteries out of the bin and get more battery acid on my fingers. And the batteries also have bits of food on them now.

Anyway I get back from the gig and i have instructions to leave the car keys on the reception desk at 702, but I can't get into 702 after hours so i have to go down to security to ask them to let me into 702.
them - you are supposed to leave the keys in the box down at the staging office
me - no, the 702 people want me to leave them at their reception desk
them - the policy is to leave them in the box at the staging office
me - but the the 702 people told me this afternoon to leave them at reception
them - (a bit more like what has already been said.)
((And a few more times back and forth))
me - but no one will know where the keys are if i leave them in that box. they want them on the reception desk
them - this is all new to me
me - PLEEEAASE believe me - i really need need to leave them on the reception desk. please can you let me in??!!!! (pleading)

Finally the security guy walks with me up to 702 and i leave the keys on the reception desk.

The end.

Hard Quorum

Episode 3 has gone up.

http://hardquorum.mypodcast.com/index.html

Oktoberfest

I’m in a band right. We are called the Gonks. In our own minds we are rock stars. In everyone else’s we are just a cult band. We were introduced once as everyone’s 2nd favourite band. I play bass.
Last Friday night we played at an Oktoberfest party put on by a couple of guys from my church.
The set list was

1. Listen To The Music
2. Eagle Rock
3. 634 5789
4. Cajun Moon
5. I Got You (I Feel Good)
6. Black Magic Woman
7. Moondance
8. Midnight Hour
9. I Shot The Sherriff
10. Take Me To The River
11. Living For The City
12. Superstition
13. All Right Now
14. Sultans Of Swing
15. Crossroads

The food consisted of lamb, beef and pork on the spit – tasted amazing, homemade German sausages – tasted amazing, sauerkraut – tasted amazing, salad – tasted amazing, and German beer in huge bottles. One beer was the equivalent of 2 normal size ones. Dave our lead guitarist had to sing everything because our 2 lead singers were both unavailable. So we had a restricted set list, but Dave was great.

We were playing a hall that had the tiniest stage I have ever seen. There were 5 of us in the band and only 3 of us could fit on the stage. It was like playing in a box. And the sound bouncing around in there was crazy. I couldn't hear what i was playing because of all the reflections and the drums were so loud even though Greg was playing quietly.

Stevie Wonder in Sydney

Last night I saw Stevie Wonder live at the Acer Arena in Sydney. To put it simply he is an absolute genius. He has written so many huge songs which have appealed across platforms in the pop world and also into the jazz world. His voice was as good as it has ever been - amazing, and effortless.
He really played to muso fans last night too which was great - he didn't just play a pop concert. He started off playing Miles Davis "All Blues" on the harmonica. Not a predictable way to start and absolutely brilliant. He also played some other jazz numbers through the night - Spain, and Giant Steps, and then all the funk classics, plus the crowd pleaser pop tunes. But even they are brilliant works of art.
There were 15 people on stage - 2 percussionists, drummer, 2 keyboardists, 2 guitarists, bass, 4 bvs, horns, and Stevie. Huge.
OK now here is my gripe. Why in this day and age can no one install a sound system in a large venue that sounds good? We pay all this money for concerts that sound like crap. There was no clarity in the bass at all. The whole night it was just a huge rumble, so all those funk tunes which are so reliant on the bass line were just mush. And I don't believe it was the fault of the engineer. I think those venues are just rubbish. Like Sydney Entertainment Centre. Everything sounds awfull. Surely the artists would like to think that they sound good out the front. And as a bass player I know that bass players like to be heard - especially when they are playing really complicated lines. All you hear is the sub and no clarity. Drives me nuts. And it really detracts from the enjoyment of the concert.
Anyway Stevie is awesome.

Great Mistakes #3

Thinking back to my time at the casino again, I started laughing when I thought about some of the crazy jobs I had to mix. One of the classiest acts was the Manhunt and Queen of Clubs competition. Totally himbo and bimbo stuff.

The manhunt involved guys showing off their bods and this included a modelling spot - The first guy up for the night was prancing around like he really thought he was so amazing. Except for the bit when he completely misjudged the edge of the catwalk and fell off the stage into the front row of the audience. Woops. Hee hee.

Actually, talking about people falling off stage Humphrey Bear made an appearance at the Johnny Young Talent school end of year concert and yep, poor humphrey fell off the stage that night. There were a lot of very worried 4 year olds who thought humphrey was dead. But don't be silly it wasn't the REAL Humphrey - it was just a guy in a bear suit pretending to be Humphrey.

I seem to also remember a particular Swedish magician falling off the stage during a rehearsal in Sweden. No one knew what to do. Do we just pretend it hasn't happened? Or do we all rush to help? The place was silent while we all waited to see if he'd get up or just lie there... Only a bruised ego.

Then in the girly night club competetion, each girl had to present herself in an original way. This one girl went for the Barbie theme. Yep, it really was a night of intellectual performances. She had the Barbie song playing - "I'm a barbie girl, in my Barbie woooorrlld..." And she came on stage riding in a pink Barbie car. We had completely lost it in the audio booth. Oh yeah i nearly forgot to mention the bubble machine. Awesome. All of my life mistakes just fade into complete insignificance.

Hard Quorum

Around Easter time in 2006 I agreed to help a couple of friends out recording a podcast. The proposal was to record a series of 6 podcasts and post them once we have recorded all 6. Around easter time this year we recorded the final episode. It took 2 years to record 6 podcasts! Althought the first episode has only just gone up because it took so long for matt to do the editing. I was involved because of being a sound type person and I had some equipment, so Matt and Joe offered payment in the form of a 6 pack. Sounded like a good deal to me.
So they rock up to my place that first Sunday afternoon, with a 6 pack of Easter buns. Not quite what I expected, but the precedent had been set. The next time after they finally arrived, a bit late because they had forgotten I’d moved house and turned up at my old place, we managed 2 episodes. Payment was a 6 pack of wild turkeys. Things were getting better.
Next time I was presented with a 6 pack of eggs.
The final time, Joe insisted we start early, because he had things to do. We waited an hour for him to show up. The 2 final episodes were done!!!! Payment? 6 pack of fruit juice poppers. Awesome.
Anyway the person giggling in the background is me. We weren’t trying to be too professional about it. I also join in the singing now and then. Aaah my moment of fame has finally arrived. For some reason they call me the producer. I didn't really do anything of the sort. I recorded it and giggled. Oh and I made the theme music. Although you cant really hear the genius of it because they faded it under the taking.
What’s it about? I’m not sure. Oh yeah, discussions about Christian issues. Of a kind. Lots of questions asked, no answers given. When Matt asked me what I thought about the first episode, I think I said something like "could’ve been funnier" .
Hard Qorum - things could be better. Here it is -
http://channels.ourmedia.org/hard-quorum#

Great Mistakes #2

Well it’s one thing to bring the curtain down on a multimillion dollar production, but to take our National broadcaster off air? Uuuhh yep – done it. Although it wasn’t really my fault, just one of those freak things.
We were having server upgrades one Saturday morning and I was on shift. We couldn’t do any live programs because all our computers were off line. So everything was precorded to be played off CD and I had the important job of sitting in the studio playing CD’s of the hours’ blocks of content, excluding the news. So at the top of every hour I had 5 minutes to change CDs and get them cued while the news was on and then at 5 past the hour, my studio was on air.
Now our CD players had a bit of a trick to them – the CD drawers weren’t mechanical closing types – you had to push them shut. But if you pushed too hard the CD sometimes jumped out of its carriage and got stuck, but if you didn’t push hard enough the door wouldn’t close. So there was a fine art to closing the CD drawer.
So 10 am, I went to change the CD and low and behold, although being extremely careful, I just shoved it that little bit too hard. The CD had jumped out and was now stuck up in the back of the CD player, unable to be played. Here’s where the panic starts. I’ve got less than 5 minutes to fix the problem or we’ll go off air. I tried and tried to get the drawer open but it was jammed. I ring up tech services in the building.
ME - “Can you please send someone up to RN studio 242 to get a CD player open in the next 2 minutes. This is an on air emergency – we’ll go off air if we don’t fix this before 5 past.”
THEM – “What’s your name?”
ME – “mi……. – can you please send someone one up now?”
THEM – “what’s your surname?”
ME – “Go……….”
THEM – “how do you spell that?”
ME – “just get someone @#%$% up here now!!!!!!!!!”
Needless to say, they didn’t get to me before 5 past and we went off air. Eventually they arrived and got the thing open and into another CD player and we were back on air.
A couple of years later when we had another server upgrade, I warned the engineer about what happened to me. I said they should have back up CDs in case the CD player jammed. They didn’t take my advice. We went off air again that morning…

calm radio announcer

Well I like to pride myself on how calm I am in the studio. The whole world can be falling down around me, and I keep it together. Not sure how I'd go if the studio was burning down around me.
Check this video.
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=v_KOK0wLmdA