mcbike
Silver Member
I played a wedding gig last saturday, hopefully my last. The couple are big fans of my band and they come to see us at least once a month. They definatley know what we do and what we don't do. We had a meeting with them a few months before the wedding and told them basically what we can and can't do and what to expect and warned them the everybody wants to have a rock band play their wedding but as soon as grandma is there they want us to tone it down and we don't really have that much toned down material. They insisted that we were perfect for their wedding and we agreed to learn two songs for the father/bride and mother/groom dance.
They didn't get us the songs they chose until a week before the wedding and we told them we couldn't learn them that fast so they agreed to let us just play it off an ipod.
The wedding was at the Petroleum Club of Houston which is the top floor of the Exxon building dowtown, you really have to know somebody to even get in there. The room actually sounded really good despite being all glass on 3 walls but there was a big high ceiling and heavy carpet and drapes. We loaded in at 2pm and did a nice soundcheck before the wedding.
They didn't have an m.c. or a dj so it turned out they needed us to m.c. the event which ended up not being that bad of a deal. I played some rat pack off my ipod during the cocktail hour and our singer mc'd the event.
We went into our first song which we started off with our lightest slowest 6/8 ballad and right off the bat the bride gave us the "tone it down" hand signal and the caterer came over and told us to turn it down. Everything was downhill from there. I was playing as quiet as I could totally choked up on the sticks and it was a workout trying to play that quiet. We ran out of ballads like 3 songs in and we had to try to rewrite songs on the fly to make them slower and softer. All in all I actually had a good time with the challenge and I was proud of myself for making it work despite the situation. The rest of the guys in my band were hating every moment of it though and it made it hard.
Everybody kept coming up to us with really stupid requests especially this one guy that insisted on us playing "We are Family". There are not any "sisters" in our band dude, not happening. This one old guy came up and demanded that we play a lindy hop. The other guys in my band had no clue what he was talking about but luckily I know all those dance tunes from my jazz band days but we didn't have any songs anywhere close to lindy hop. I told the guys to play jailhouse rock (which we have never done before) and the singer said he didn't know the words so I took on singing responsibilites (I am a terrible singer). We did the song and I faked the lyrics. I think the whole third verse I just kept singing "jailhouse rock" over and over again. We packed the dance floor for that song though so It went by okay I just hope they dont put that video on their wedding dvd.
The most annoying thing about the gig was during dinner they had this mariachi band come in and play with trumpets blaring. The joke was funny for about 2 songs and then it just got annoying. They were really bad too. Everybody was out of tune/time but for whatever reason they got away with it because they had sombreros on.
In the end they treated us really well, fed us, paid us well, and the groom tipped each of us $50, but I hope this is my last wedding gig. I now know why wedding bands charge double or triple what regular bar bands charge. I don't think any sum of money could make me want to do again. There is so much expectations for everything to be perfect from the wedding planner, father of the bride, caterer, bride. I wouldn't go to a wedding without knowing all those wedding songs. The best part about it is now when people ask us if we do weddings we can just say NO.
They didn't get us the songs they chose until a week before the wedding and we told them we couldn't learn them that fast so they agreed to let us just play it off an ipod.
The wedding was at the Petroleum Club of Houston which is the top floor of the Exxon building dowtown, you really have to know somebody to even get in there. The room actually sounded really good despite being all glass on 3 walls but there was a big high ceiling and heavy carpet and drapes. We loaded in at 2pm and did a nice soundcheck before the wedding.
They didn't have an m.c. or a dj so it turned out they needed us to m.c. the event which ended up not being that bad of a deal. I played some rat pack off my ipod during the cocktail hour and our singer mc'd the event.
We went into our first song which we started off with our lightest slowest 6/8 ballad and right off the bat the bride gave us the "tone it down" hand signal and the caterer came over and told us to turn it down. Everything was downhill from there. I was playing as quiet as I could totally choked up on the sticks and it was a workout trying to play that quiet. We ran out of ballads like 3 songs in and we had to try to rewrite songs on the fly to make them slower and softer. All in all I actually had a good time with the challenge and I was proud of myself for making it work despite the situation. The rest of the guys in my band were hating every moment of it though and it made it hard.
Everybody kept coming up to us with really stupid requests especially this one guy that insisted on us playing "We are Family". There are not any "sisters" in our band dude, not happening. This one old guy came up and demanded that we play a lindy hop. The other guys in my band had no clue what he was talking about but luckily I know all those dance tunes from my jazz band days but we didn't have any songs anywhere close to lindy hop. I told the guys to play jailhouse rock (which we have never done before) and the singer said he didn't know the words so I took on singing responsibilites (I am a terrible singer). We did the song and I faked the lyrics. I think the whole third verse I just kept singing "jailhouse rock" over and over again. We packed the dance floor for that song though so It went by okay I just hope they dont put that video on their wedding dvd.
The most annoying thing about the gig was during dinner they had this mariachi band come in and play with trumpets blaring. The joke was funny for about 2 songs and then it just got annoying. They were really bad too. Everybody was out of tune/time but for whatever reason they got away with it because they had sombreros on.
In the end they treated us really well, fed us, paid us well, and the groom tipped each of us $50, but I hope this is my last wedding gig. I now know why wedding bands charge double or triple what regular bar bands charge. I don't think any sum of money could make me want to do again. There is so much expectations for everything to be perfect from the wedding planner, father of the bride, caterer, bride. I wouldn't go to a wedding without knowing all those wedding songs. The best part about it is now when people ask us if we do weddings we can just say NO.