Had a Guitarist try out today..... oh boy....

Lickety Britches

Senior Member
So I play guitar and drums and I feel like I'm pretty competent in both areas. For a while we were trying to find a drummer because I wrote a lot of the guitar parts and so it was just kind of assumed I'd be the guitar player. But we have NOT been able to find a drummer. So I said "well lets try to find a guitarist and I'll play drums if we find one". So we tried this guy out today.

First of all, I sent him 2 songs to learn and his response was "yeah cool I could definitely write something over that". And I was like "These are already existing parts that we need you to learn for now." he mentioned doing solos and I told we were not interested in someone who wants to slap guitar solos on everything. and he said that was cool, so no harm no foul.

He shows up late and doesn't apologize or anything, not that it was a huge deal or anything, but it would normally be common courtesy just throw out a "sorry Im late guys" and it wouldn't have been a big deal.

I have my Vox AC30 already set up for him to use, and he says "oh I'll use my own". kind of dumb, but its cool, people like their own gear, but it was only dumb because he brought in some hartke solid state head with a crate cab and it sounded awful. Also, he clearly did not take care of his gear.

Then we get to the playing. We sent him 2 songs to learn. I have the tracks from where we recorded, so I just sent him drums and lead for him. the whole first song was ridiculous. He was so far off it was distracting everyone else. He was essentially writing his own part over the songs, which I specifically told him not to do.

We got done playing the 1st song and the bass player says "You wanna try running over that one again" and I just said "lets just move on to the next song". We get to the first chorus and I just stopped everything because he basically started soloing over stuff and I was like "Look man... I dont want to waste your time or ours, but you clearly did not come prepared, you didnt learn the parts, you seem like you barely even listened to the songs, this is just really not going to work out"

I just had to vent a little bit. I cannot understand what goes through these people's heads. His "solo work" was unbelievably terrible and as a musician who takes music very seriously, I dont understand how you can do something like that and think it sounds good. Now at the same time, we are not divas looking for a puppet, we would love someone who can give their input, but you dont come to a band tryout and tell them you rewrote the parts. We just wanted to find someone who we really got along with, could play the parts, and be respectful, so it was just kind of offensive when he literally even said "I mean the song is super simple I could write better parts over that anyway". It just blew my mind how someone can be that rude and immature. rant over. thanks for listening.

any fun try out stories?
 
I have a bizarre tryout story. I was answering an ad to be the guitarist for a cover band. They gave me 3 songs to audition with, and I nailed them. The drummer, who placed the ad, said, "Well, it looks like we got our guitarist!" The bass player seemed unimpressed. For the next 2 rehearsals, same thing--10 songs per rehearsal, I nail them all with backing vocals, the drummer is ecstatic, but the bass player doesn't say a word and just shows looks of discontentment. In telephone conversations with the drummer, he assures me that the bass player is just "odd" in social situations. It turns out that the bass player didn't like me because I was 23...didn't matter that I could nail the parts. He didn't like younger guys being in the band. The "looks" started to make sense, and I found out after getting an apologetic boot from the drummer, that the bass player was calling the shots. I'm still frustrated about that to this day. At least you had the decent idea to come right out and talk to the guitarist during the audition...
 
My tryout story is a bit different. It was me trying out for a band prior to the one I'm in now. Original material band. I get sent some songs, & get them down just fine prior to the audition. I turn up on time, set up, & we run through the songs I was sent. I kept everything absolutely simple - no farting about whatsoever. Anyhow, after each song, the singer kept asking me to play faster, even though I was playing at exactly the tempo of the recorded songs. He then starts requesting totally different beats to their own originals. I oblige, even though his suggestions were crap. This singer was obviously the band leader, but kinda on steroids. The other band members were almost silent through the audition. It was obvious to me that he wanted total control. "Fine, if your paying me, but you're not" was going through my mind. Anyhow, I asked if he'd mind me putting my own stuff to one song that I quite liked. He reluctantly said OK. We went through the track. It was obvious to everyone but the singer that it sounded much better (less busy/frantic), with more purpose & power, but he was having non of it.

I cut the "audition" short, said openly that I didn't think I was a good fit for the band, & left. In the following weeks, I received phone calls from both the guitarist & bass player, saying they really wanted me in the band. I told them the reason for my decision, & they "understood". The singer called me too, & I gave him my reasons, although he didn't see what the issue was.

Glad I didn't get caught up in that :)
 
Glad I didn't get caught up in that :)

Wisdom in action there.....

I have to many to count....the moody songwriter who dosen't know theory...the drug/alchohol scenes...the unmotivated....the unequiped...the unskilled(superior to the others in this list)...any combination of these...list goes on and on.
 
My tryout story is a bit different. It was me trying out for a band prior to the one I'm in now. Original material band. I get sent some songs, & get them down just fine prior to the audition.


At least you got sent the material.
In one of my 1st auditions ever, I tried out for a band who did 'originals' none of it online or even a myspace etc . they were very un-planned communicators, called me only one day before the audition to when/where to show up, but gave me NO material to listen to before hand. Not one note. I show up. They rehearsed in a tiny one room shack, dirt floor, leaky. Rats could have lived in the bass drum. To save space all microphone stands were inverted and nailed to the ceiling lol!! At least they had imagination. The drum kit had hihats that would not open, floor tom heads covered with 5 bumper stickers, but worst, all the cymbals in/on one tall stand, kind of a tree of just all cymbals up to the ceiling. How do I play that? Well I play that by just using my un-opening hats.

OK I'm not a snob, we'll give it a go. I am thinking we'll do some standard covers, but they launch right into their originals, 8 in a row, like I am supposed to have heard them all already, allover the radio. They start each one saying. "this one goes like this"....WTF, I try to play along. It was awful of course, they looking dumbfounded at me as to why I don't know parts or cannot play the right fill. I should have just got up and told them their expectations were ridiculous. But I persevered. Dumb.

I've been through a few since then and I agree with you, when things are not going well its best to stand up, pipe up and say whats on your mind, and even leave if need be.
 
...They rehearsed in a tiny one room shack, dirt floor, leaky. Rats could have lived in the bass drum. To save space all microphone stands were inverted and nailed to the ceiling lol!! At least they had imagination. The drum kit had hihats that would not open, floor tom heads covered with 5 bumper stickers, but worst, all the cymbals in/on one tall stand, kind of a tree of just all cymbals up to the ceiling. How do I play that? Well I play that by just using my un-opening hats.

Oh man, that’s weirdly sad yet funny at the same time.
 
...his suggestions were crap... "Fine, if your paying me, but you're not" was going through my mind.

Makes all the difference, don’t it?

If you pay me, I’ll play what you want. If you’re not paying me, you have to, at a bare minimum, listen to my ideas.
 
Oh man, that’s weirdly sad yet funny at the same time.

it was funny, after i left, i initially felt "well I screwed up that one", but then thinking about what had just happened for a few seconds longer ...I thought "whew, yippee, dodged a bullet".
 
I got called for an "audition" many moons ago by a guitar player who got my name from the local music store. He threw some songs at me over the phone and set a date. I show up and he and his bass player are set up in a one car garage with a heavily taped cheesey drum kit set between two speaker cabinets on crates, so when I sat at the drums I literally had two speakers facing inward to me at angles three feet from my head. It was so loud I was flogging the drum set like Thor and still could barely hear the snare or cymbals. Thing was I really liked the music they played and the guys were fairly nice. So at the end of the night the bass player hands me a tape (yeah...it was that long ago) and says "hey man learn these for the next time we get together". I was pumped.

I got a call about a week later from the bass player.

"Hey...Jim (the guitar player) says you can't drum loud enough...guess we can't use you".

Sweet...
 
I posted this audition story two years ago long story short:

I audition for a very well known regional act in my area. The guitarist / leader tells me "we have a set of drums for you to play" So i bring some cymbals and my snare. They give my six songs to learn on cd and i was prepared. I arrive at the audition to discover the drumset they were providing was literally a "toy" drumset, complete with concrete block to keep the bass drum from moving. I played my heart out and nailed the audition even on the crappy drums. Turns out my audition was simply a "going through the motions" as i later found out the drummer had already been selected the day before. Total waste of time!
 
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