Worst stage disasters?

Last night I had the most ridiculous stage disaster I've ever experienced as a drummer.

In the past I've dealt with a lot of stuff going wrong on stage. I've had the typical cymbal stand collapse, broken drumsticks during solos, bands that get off sync with clicks and backtracks, power outages stopping performances, broken drum heads, even snare wire ties snapping on stage. Last night still took the prize.

We had a great show opening for Aaron Watson, and played to probably 600 or 700 people who were actually pretty engaged. The whole set was going really smooth until our second to last song. About 4 measures into playing, my bass drum beater came loose and flew off of the pedal. After a brief moment of panic I managed to start using my left hand to imitate the bass drum by playing my floor tom, and moved my right hand to the ride to get it out of the way. It worked, but it wasn't pretty. My left hand was doing both the bass drum and snare work and the song was fairly uptempo. My bassist was the first to notice what was going on and started laughing hysterically. My lead guitarist realized somewhere around the first chorus and almost died laughing. The sound guy caught on and managed to get the bass drum beater back on the pedal while I was playing, but that was only a couple measures from the end of the song. My bassist and guitarist said I pulled the whole thing off pretty well, and our front man apparently had no idea anything was even wrong until we all talked about it later. While I'm glad it wasn't obvious to everyone it was still probably the most stressful 3 or 4 minuets I've ever had playing live. I will be triple checking the tightness on the beater every show for the rest of my life before playing. At least it was something fun to laugh about.

Does anyone else have any good musical stage disasters?

Great story, even greater recovery!
Last gig the guitarists amp or pedal board died during the last song. Nothing, no sound at all. We wrapped up the last 1 minute of Stevie Wonder's Superstition with only bass, drums and vocals.

Then there's the 'cape story' around here.

I was running late to a gig one time. Got there and was setting up. I started to relax knowing that everything was going to be fine.

Then I realized I forgot my hi hat cymbals.

Sorry, not a drum related stage disaster, but a great story about BB King that few people have likely ever heard.

I have a friend who was a member of a family band that played Vegas in the 70's. Some members of BB King's band caught their set and invited the entire family to hear BB and his band play later that night.
Only my friend accepted the invitation and they let him sit back stage.

Shortly into BB King's solo his guitar amp on stage--unbeknownst to him--caught on fire. The crowd started cheering. Feeding off the crowd's energy BB's solo intensified. The harder he played the flames
would shoot out farther from the amp and the crowd would in turn cheer louder and of course BB would play even harder. The flames were really projecting out of the amp. You get the picture. Finally the
stage manager showed up with a fire extinguisher.

My buddy said it was one of the best memories of his musical career.

Two childhood disasters.

Sixth grade concert band. Had to use my own snare and it was missing the arm for the snare strainer. I had to use my drum stick. Naturally the snare fell off the stand and rolled across the gym floor!

Eighth grade orchestra, playing cymbals clicks marching style. My blow dried bangs lifter with every cymbal click. The whole place was reacting and I did not know why. My yearbook included many signatures with good luck with your cymbals!

Back in the 60s, playing at a little country church way out in the sticks. During the sermon, our old Kustom PA head starts picking up some rock and roll station. We almost killed ourselves cutting it off before the church congregation killed us. Later, when it was our turn to play, they loved us. Turns out is was a Pentecostal church with dancing in the aisles and whooping and stomping. Almost scared me to death at first, then it was lots of fun.

Another time during a high school symphonic band state competition. We were playing a piece with a whip. Well, our whip stick wasn't loud enough, so one of the other drummers made a pair out of some 1X4s, screen door handles, and a hinge. Worked great!....all through practice... During the actual competition, every time he'd slap it together, pieces of wood would fly past our heads. We all got tickled and were about to explode to keep from laughing out loud. The band director saw us trying to stifle the laughter and kept getting madder and madder. That made it that much worse for us! By the time we finally got through the piece, those 1X4s were down to about 4" long.

I had DEA raid a dive bar in full SWAT garb while my band was playing. Was a bit nerve racking as I was a teenager at the time.

Managed to get almost two-bars of "Bad Boys / COPS theme" in before getting shut down.

I remember getting together with band mates after a PD vs. FD bar fight and learning to play the main COPS groove. We played it at low volume whenever the police had to intervene in a venue (wrestle some drunks out the door). It lightens the atmosphere, and keeps the audience focused on you rather than the cops, allowing them to get their jobs done. The singer was responsible for directives like "Give em some room" and "Clear a path".

Anyone else do this?

Collapsing drum stool, rolled off the back of the stage through the Velvet Curtain just like a Magic act. The band just kept playing .. got to love that.

That happened to me once too but very luckily it was on the last note of the song so no harm done. That must have been a few minutes of absolute hell for you!

The wing nut on the stool finally caved in, funnily i don't recall any anxiousness about it. I did play out the last set in an Armchair though ..not recommended.

-The keyboard of my church was invited to play ONE song in a town 45 km away. Not that much, but It was just for a song.
-He asked me for help with the drums and a couple of guys with guitar an bass.
-The day came and we drove to that town. The venue was just an school auditorioum for about 100 people.
-There were a lot of artirst doing his thing and then "NEXT!"
-So, we unload the van and surprise surpirese, I didn't load the hardware.
-160 km/h back to my church.
-160 km/h back to the auditorium.
-Right on time to set the drums, play the song and then pick up everything and leave.

Good times

Forgot my bass drum on Sunday afternoon.

Gig was in a winery out of town. Realised just before I arrived. Huge crowd, sunny afternoon. Set up everything else, left a big gap. Even tried playing my snare case, but it would stay upright.

My wife drove my bass drum to me - she arrived 15 minutes after the gig began. Set started with a few acoustic songs. Placed the drum in the gap and started playing within a minute of her car arriving...

Wife was a tiny bit sarcastic that evening...

Worst one for me was about 12 years ago, I was playing this little sweat box in Stafford on one of those rare hot days in England or summertime as it's known in certain circles wearing just a pair of white shorts. It was like that scene in Ace Ventura when he gets stuck in the Rhino!

I was counting in a song and my nose started bleeding, too late to turn back I played the full song with my nose bleeding running into the sweat on my body and then down to my white shorts. Not a good look

The funniest I've seen was a uni gig where a string quartet was using wireless mics that just happened to be on the same frequency as the karaoke in the uni bar so the concert hall was treated to some tone deaf sports student belting out 'I Know Him So Well'

Not my worst, but had a funny thing happen at a gig last month. I was playing outdoors at a venue right on a lake on a hot summer night. The only light was coming from the stage lights, and about half-way into the gig, a swarm of big, red beetles started in on us. We had them landing on us and our gear, covering our clothes.

The guitar player wearing a white shirt got it worst, and he was the most squeamish about the bugs. He was flicking them out of the frets on his guitar.

I don't like bugs landing on me much either, and these things were big and dumb. I could feel them crawling into my shoes and on my face and I couldn't stop playing to do anything about it.

Crazy night. When I took the drums out of the cases for my next gig a few days later, I was still finding dead ones all over. Even inside my chart book.

Numerous train wrecks, drunken audience members trying to get on stage, finishing songs with one stick, playing whole gigs with absolutely no applause, playing gigs to an an audience of four people, throwing up into a bucket between songs etc - but three nights especially spring to mind...

- Many years ago, playing in a club in England, I put my snare drum AND bass drum through during the same song! At the time I had little money and no spares, and had to tape up the damage and get through the gig as best I could. Nightmare.

- More recently, like a scene from a comedy movie, a saxophone player who had over-indulged in various substances, collapsed spectacularly into my drums, mid-song. I somehow managed to keep playing amid strewn equipment and the prostrate musician. The sax player completed the gig being held up on stage in front of his mic by two friends of the band. The show must go on!

- And my most uncomfortable night: Many years ago, I virtually froze in terror on stage as the two girlfriends I was dating at the same time both turned up at the gig unbeknown to each other. Messy - and a life lesson learned!

8Mile said:

Not my worst, but had a funny thing happen at a gig last month. I was playing outdoors at a venue right on a lake on a hot summer night. The only light was coming from the stage lights, and about half-way into the gig, a swarm of big, red beetles started in on us. We had them landing on us and our gear, covering our clothes.

The guitar player wearing a white shirt got it worst, and he was the most squeamish about the bugs. He was flicking them out of the frets on his guitar.

I don't like bugs landing on me much either, and these things were big and dumb. I could feel them crawling into my shoes and on my face and I couldn't stop playing to do anything about it.

Crazy night. When I took the drums out of the cases for my next gig a few days later, I was still finding dead ones all over. Even inside my chart book.

Click to expand...

Ladies and Gentlemen....The Beetles!

IDK Lar that sounds pretty bad to me, like God was behind it or something. I think you pissed God off. God is kinda partial to the insect swarms when he is displeased

Supermac, can you go into detail about what went down that night between you and your 2 gfs?

supermac said:

And my most uncomfortable night: Many years ago, I virtually froze in terror on stage as the two girlfriends I was dating at the same time both turned up at the gig unbeknown to each other. Messy - and a life lesson learned!

Click to expand...

Wow, thats uncomfortable.
Messy? How? They both caught one another's eye? Threw beer or tore strips off you?

I've had the beater fly off or almost all the way off a few times. Sometimes band mates help set up and they don't get tightened down, sometimes I forget, sometimes I just needed a little more pressure.

That's part of the reason I play a double, if something happens to my main, I can at least play something basic on the slave and fix the problem when the song is over.

I once forgot to bring with me the floortom legs. Big ugh! Luckily I got my wife on phone and she drove all the way to the studio, then to the concerthall through all that horrible traffic and brought them just in time. Would have been weird to play a rock concert with only a 12" tom.

Played a really tiny yet tall stage and was forced to sit literally on the very edge of the stage. Gaffer was supposed to hold the throne's feet to the ground to ensure there were no disasters, but mid set, forgetting where I was I thought that I could use a little more leg-room, so with the adrenaline pumping, I picked up the throne, dropped it off stage and tumbled down after it and got stuck between the wall and this big industrial looking box with tons of switches and backlit buttons on it.

Then there was another time where my brain decided to crap out on me and I completely forgot how a song went, so I decided to wing it and fix it up later. I was playing in this technical death metal band at the time, so I was lost and I didn't know what to do, so we stopped, I asked for some more guitars in my wedges to hear the riff and catch on, but it didn't sound familiar to me at all, so i winged it again. We stopped and skipped the song altogether. All of this was captured on film and is on youtube somewhere. I still cringe thinking about that.