All's well that ends well !

Mukund

Senior Member
Hey everyone !

Yesterday our school had a fest and we had to perform for the closing ceremony (the school band). So our set list included - 1) We will rock you - Queen 2) What i've done- Linkin Park and our final song was Another Brick in the wall part 2 - Pink Floyd

Everything was going well,the crowd was clapping,jumping and enjoying the show,
but at the last song,things didn't seem to go the right way .At the time of the solo,all the instruments got cut off
including the vocals and only the drums were heard.(the area was small,so the drums were not mic'ed). Well i didn't know what to do so i kept playing the song and after like 10 seconds finished it with a roll. The crowd kept silent and we didn't know what to do ! Suddenly our bass guitarist shouted who wants a drum solo,all of a sudden the crowd got started and started shouting drum solo !!
I was very nervous but still i played a drum solo. I started with a simple groove,played some fancy fills,did a few stick tricks and then finished the solo with a long drum roll.The crowd roared with applause and seemed to have forgotten about the mess up. The mics suddenly started working again ,we thanked the crowd and left the stage with the crowd still applauding.

After the show finished many people came backstage and told me - ' We enjoyed the show and thanks to you, the show was saved ! '
I felt really happy ,thanked everyone and then we left.

Well that was some experience !

So,have you guys had any similar experiences?
 
You should have kicked the drums off the stage as a finale. You'll never have that chance again!
 
I had a somewhat similar situation except I swear this one was preplanned by the band. During one of our sets at a local youth centre, the band decided to go out and take a break. They then proceeded to tell the audience that the "drummer will entertain you with a solo while we go out for a breath of fresh air!"

Assholes.
 
I had a situation like that where we were having big problems getting something working (mic or amp?). I just fooled around and played some sweet fills. Everyone loved it, even the band was happy I saved their butts!

Sounds like you had as much fun as I did!
 
Funny story (well, I think so):

When I was working on sound at a large theatre a few years ago, we were running a Christmas show. Obviously it was in the midst of a British winter and whilst the thermometers rarely get low, it always feels a lot colder than it is - has to do with the humidity, which seems to be a particular problem around the back of a stage where the lights from a show cast shadows and there's an unenviable draft coming from outside.

Now, we had wired up the band pit in an odd way. There were surprisingly few electrical outlets and everything was running from just a few different sockets. We'd worked out the approximate power draw of the system we used in the band area. Four or five monitors, as well as electrical power to all of the instruments. Everything was running at just about capacity on the system we had implemented with a reasonable overhead if there were any problems.

One of the keyboard players decided to bring in a fan heater so that she could play her parts. It sounds reasonable enough a request but she didn't check with us running the sound.

Five minutes into a show with about two hundred children in attendance we got a total sound blackout. I got a message on my radio (that's how we had to communicate with the band due to a lack of returns on the snake) saying that all the power had suddenly gone down in the band area and that nothing was working. Call action stations and 'Plan B' was implemented. The actors stay in character and interact with the audience with a few jokes and generally entertaining the children (they were wearing roller skates, it helps).

Turns out that a fan heater draws around 2kW of power. 2kW. I'll say that again. 2kW.

Ever been at home and suddenly fired up a hairdryer, only to find that the lights dim slightly? Well, that had happened on a much larger scale and the power draw had blown a fuse on one of the main distribution points. Not a problem in itself but locating the blown fuse in the spaghetti loom of jury-rigged wiring we'd put down took fifteen minutes. It took a further few minutes to replace the fuse.

Fortunately, the actors were very good at what they were doing and no children got too bored. There was me, running around like crazy with the other main sound engineer, all dressed in black trying not to shout out loud to each other whilst we sorted the problem out and trying to stay discrete. Not easy when you have to rip out half a power distribution system to find a fault.

Needless to say, the fan heater was banned and we told the keyboard player to wear a scarf and gloves instead.

We re-started the show and it went off without a hitch eventually. Not my finest hour.
 
Uplifting tale, Mukund! You'll never forget that one.

I had a similar experience, although less fabulous than yours ... the power went off at a party a band was playing at and I was the only one left functioning. I was heavily into Osibisa at the time so I played some tribal rhythms I didn't get to use in the set. The partygoers were dancing and stomping along so much the host had to quieten things down because the desk we were on was apparently at risk of collapse.

Duncan, I imagine the keyboardist was wishing the earth would swallow her up. Ouch.
 
I just think she was unlucky. She didn't realise how much power fan heaters use and assumed that because it was fine at home, it would be fine at the show. She didn't get too much sympathy though, I hasten to add. That's not my style!

The problem is, most theatres I've been in have terrible wiring that's in severe need of an overhaul and mean that the engineers end up using a bodge like our's!
 
BFY:
I work in IT, and every single winter, I get emergency calls because some lady just had to plug a portable space heater in instead of wearing a damn sweater. Every year, management bans them, and every year, I still get the blame for lost productivity when someone plugs that crap into a standard 15 amp circuit which is already hosting computers and monitors.

I hate those things.
 
BFY:
I work in IT, and every single winter, I get emergency calls because some lady just had to plug a portable space heater in instead of wearing a damn sweater. Every year, management bans them, and every year, I still get the blame for lost productivity when someone plugs that crap into a standard 15 amp circuit which is already hosting computers and monitors.

I hate those things.

They are of the Devil himself. I'm glad it's not just me.

I stopped using them when I was five and my Lego aeroplane I had just built was accidentally placed in front of a fan heater and subsequently melted. I was very upset.
 
BFY:
I work in IT, and every single winter, I get emergency calls because some lady just had to plug a portable space heater in instead of wearing a damn sweater.

That's because, in a corporate environment, the male managers make sure that the aircon is set so that they will be comfortable in their suits. Unless the women in the office dress like men they tend to get cold.
 
That's because, in a corporate environment, the male managers make sure that the aircon is set so that they will be comfortable in their suits. Unless the women in the office dress like men they tend to get cold.

Yea, I agree. Hiring women when you can just hire a guy is really a silly move. You also avoid all the complaining and crying about "Waaah, he's doing the same job and makes more than me" or the classic "Waaah, I feel uncomfortable when the office manager innocently cups my butt with both hands".
 
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