rogue_drummer
Gold Member
Does anyone else get burn out, or have gotten burn out? How did you handle it?
I'm at the point where my frustration level is sky high. Enough almost to to say the hell with it and sell the drums. I don't need the bs and aggrivation from the past 6 months or so. For something that's supposed to be fun and I get warm fuzzy's from...it ain't happnin' now. Here's the latest incident.
This actually happened yesterday. How would you have handled this situation?
Same church gig...I get there bright and early at 8 am. I'm lucky if I have my socks on at that hour, if you know what I mean.
I take my usual place - in the drum booth - and begin putting my cymbals on the stands. I need to add here I bring my own cymbals because the church's set is, um, not quite as good as my "Pie - Stee" set.
We begin rehearsal and the first 2 songs go well. Since we have a number of groups come in and use the large room and sound equipment, we are continually having to adjust the Aviom mixers every rehearsal and service. So I'm adusting my mixer during a break between songs. Let me set this up properly: the guitar players are noodling around practicing various licks, the bass player arrived late and is playing and adjusting his mixer, some in the choir are talkng loudly and joking around - enough to be picked up in the mics. The piano player is talkng to someone.
So a normal, prudent person would assume it's okay to "test" the drums by playing less than 5 seconds to make sure the volume level is set right in his mixer, right? I have 2 overhead mics, one mic on the snare, one on the ride tom, and one on the floor, and one on the bass. I want to make sure I hear what I'm playing. I needed to tweek it, so to speak.
I play maybe all of 3 or 4 seconds, then stop playing and sit there waiting for the next song to start. I wait and I wait...not stiking a drum.
Minutes later, one of the sound techs walks up to my booth, opens the door and very rudely and in a very cocky-ass voice asks me:
"Would you NOT play the drums while Beth (the leader) is talking - we can't hear her."
I reply I'm simply testing to ensure my sound level is ok so I can hear the drums.
He then replies even cockier "Oh UNDERSTAND what you're doing...." He then shuts the door and walks back to the audio booth.
I'm sitting there speechless and totally shocked by his tone and cockiness.
So now to be an onery pissed off sumbitch - which I am at this point - I take the butt end of my stick, raise it above my head and strike the rim of the snare as hard as I can. Honestly, it felt great to relieve some of that built up anger. Not sure if anyone else saw it or not. I know the techs damn well heard it since all 4 of them looked in my direction.
Yet still, the choir was screwing around, guitar players were noodling around, and the bass was practicing his bass line - all before the next song.
So I ignore the guy and play around on the drums. I even open the booth door wide open. In part because I'm hot and in part because I want to be an ass and challenge him. "Come on, say something. Anybody."
Funny, but nobody from audio said anything else to me in rehearsal after that. Good thing because I'm not totally sure what I would have said. Good? Bad? Ugly?
So does this guy have an atttude about drums, or is just me being too damned sensitive? I did see him talk to his audio boss and the worship leader after rehearsal, but nobody yet has said anythin to me about it. The audio boss who is a great guy did sorta look at me as though he knew what was going on, but as yet he's not said anything.
I've chewed on this since it happend yesterday.
I'm at the point where my frustration level is sky high. Enough almost to to say the hell with it and sell the drums. I don't need the bs and aggrivation from the past 6 months or so. For something that's supposed to be fun and I get warm fuzzy's from...it ain't happnin' now. Here's the latest incident.
This actually happened yesterday. How would you have handled this situation?
Same church gig...I get there bright and early at 8 am. I'm lucky if I have my socks on at that hour, if you know what I mean.
I take my usual place - in the drum booth - and begin putting my cymbals on the stands. I need to add here I bring my own cymbals because the church's set is, um, not quite as good as my "Pie - Stee" set.
We begin rehearsal and the first 2 songs go well. Since we have a number of groups come in and use the large room and sound equipment, we are continually having to adjust the Aviom mixers every rehearsal and service. So I'm adusting my mixer during a break between songs. Let me set this up properly: the guitar players are noodling around practicing various licks, the bass player arrived late and is playing and adjusting his mixer, some in the choir are talkng loudly and joking around - enough to be picked up in the mics. The piano player is talkng to someone.
So a normal, prudent person would assume it's okay to "test" the drums by playing less than 5 seconds to make sure the volume level is set right in his mixer, right? I have 2 overhead mics, one mic on the snare, one on the ride tom, and one on the floor, and one on the bass. I want to make sure I hear what I'm playing. I needed to tweek it, so to speak.
I play maybe all of 3 or 4 seconds, then stop playing and sit there waiting for the next song to start. I wait and I wait...not stiking a drum.
Minutes later, one of the sound techs walks up to my booth, opens the door and very rudely and in a very cocky-ass voice asks me:
"Would you NOT play the drums while Beth (the leader) is talking - we can't hear her."
I reply I'm simply testing to ensure my sound level is ok so I can hear the drums.
He then replies even cockier "Oh UNDERSTAND what you're doing...." He then shuts the door and walks back to the audio booth.
I'm sitting there speechless and totally shocked by his tone and cockiness.
So now to be an onery pissed off sumbitch - which I am at this point - I take the butt end of my stick, raise it above my head and strike the rim of the snare as hard as I can. Honestly, it felt great to relieve some of that built up anger. Not sure if anyone else saw it or not. I know the techs damn well heard it since all 4 of them looked in my direction.
Yet still, the choir was screwing around, guitar players were noodling around, and the bass was practicing his bass line - all before the next song.
So I ignore the guy and play around on the drums. I even open the booth door wide open. In part because I'm hot and in part because I want to be an ass and challenge him. "Come on, say something. Anybody."
Funny, but nobody from audio said anything else to me in rehearsal after that. Good thing because I'm not totally sure what I would have said. Good? Bad? Ugly?
So does this guy have an atttude about drums, or is just me being too damned sensitive? I did see him talk to his audio boss and the worship leader after rehearsal, but nobody yet has said anythin to me about it. The audio boss who is a great guy did sorta look at me as though he knew what was going on, but as yet he's not said anything.
I've chewed on this since it happend yesterday.