Does anyone else cringe when this crazy mic drop thing at the end of a speech pops it's ugly head up. The disregard for a working entertainer's valuable and expensive mics and equipment just makes my skin crawl. What dumbell ever started this. If this ever happens to me i can almost say I would go crazy. People see this on TV and think it is alright.
I don't think it happens when its someones personal property but in a situation of a theatre or backline company who can absorb the cost of a mic. Probably a $100 SM58. I think it was Chris Rock who first did it at the end of a show and even with that it was a damn funny show. What really gets me is recently guys trashing keyboards. Over on the Keyboard Corner forum there was a long discussion about a keyboard player throwing over a vintage Vox Continental and it was BORROWED !!! Owner wrote no real damage was done and he forgave him. Better man then me. Recently on Saturday Night Live the player in the band first stood on and then threw over a Hammond B3. Some one posted it was an A100 in a beat up B case that belonged to the player. Still made the guy look like a total a**. I go back to the days of the WHO trashing their instruments and its always made me mad. How many players (me included back then) would of loved to be able to get their hands on such gear. The only story I like is Jerry Lee setting fire to a Baby Grand at a college show. He asked for an old beat up upright but they gave him the Baby Grand. Scene was featured in the movie "Great Balls of Fire" He did write out a check for it after the show. I'll give him a pass, just because.
Bill, I have a better Jerry Lee story. In 1961 I was playing a place in Lexington that hosted traveling groups...Jerry Lee, The McCoys, B.J. Thomas, etc....people on the way up or on the way down. Most played Saturday in Chicago and the following Friday in Atlanta. Lexington was the low budget stop-off. The group got a bed, food, LOTS of booze and committed to having the name player and a performance which was a loose association of house guys and band members.
At 15, I tried to hold things together on these Wednesday night "free for alls".
I was the only sober person. I taught players their parts and played whatever was left....bass, guitar, B-3, piano; even sometimes mandolin, banjo, etc.).
Lewis set the house piano on fire, using a can of lighter fluid. The piano was old, and easily extinguished with a large rag...in fact, I think the whole thing was planned.
What wasn't planned was a lady who was slid between her partners legs and part of fashionable dance. She howled like a banshee! She was on a part of the floor where she picked up massive slivers...I'm talking about 1/4"x 10" pieces of flooring in her ASS!! The EMT's were called and she was hauled away to the hospital.
Move forward about 20 years. I was at a really unique Italian restaurant in a Cave that had gone uncovered for many years. this place was HOT! The snooty little wife of the owner was, you guessed it.....SPLINTER GIRL!
She passed away from Alzheimer's a while ago. But every time I hear Jerry Lewis' name I laugh my ass off.
Bill, I have a better Jerry Lee story. In 1961 I was playing a place in Lexington that hosted traveling groups...Jerry Lee, The McCoys, B.J. Thomas, etc....people on the way up or on the way down. Most played Saturday in Chicago and the following Friday in Atlanta. Lexington was the low budget stop-off. The group got a bed, food, LOTS of booze and committed to having the name player and a performance which was a loose association of house guys and band members.
At 15, I tried to hold things together on these Wednesday night "free for alls".
I was the only sober person. I taught players their parts and played whatever was left....bass, guitar, B-3, piano; even sometimes mandolin, banjo, etc.).
Lewis set the house piano on fire, using a can of lighter fluid. The piano was old, and easily extinguished with a large rag...in fact, I think the whole thing was planned.
What wasn't planned was a lady who was slid between her partners legs and part of fashionable dance. She howled like a banshee! She was on a part of the floor where she picked up massive slivers...I'm talking about 1/4"x 10" pieces of flooring in her ASS!! The EMT's were called and she was hauled away to the hospital.
Move forward about 20 years. I was at a really unique Italian restaurant in a Cave that had gone uncovered for many years. this place was HOT! The snooty little wife of the owner was, you guessed it.....SPLINTER GIRL!
She passed away from Alzheimer's a while ago. But every time I hear Jerry Lewis' name I laugh my ass off.
Russ (OUCH) Lay
Great story Russ, if you ever decide to write a book with your lifes storie(s) i will be the first one to buy it...
Yes, Bill, I played with all the traveling bands...B. J. Thomas, Lewis, The McCoys (Hang on Sloopy) and many others at this little club. I put it all together. At 15, I drove the bus, because no-one else was straight enough to do it. I had a license from Mississippi, where the age was 14.
All these guys traveled with a 6 channel Vocal Master, a tape Echoplex, a 6 wheel truck with a cover and a station wagon for the players. The truck was generally a Ford 350 with 150,000 miles on it.
R.
P.S. Jimmy Swaggert, Lewis' cousin was on several trips and played piano better than him (sober, I guess).
WAY back, my band opened a show at the Legion in Nowata, OK, for Jerry Lee. It was sponsored by a radio station in Tulsa and we played a lot for their blowouts. The place was packed, maybe a thousand people in a place designed for 500. Jerry Lee got halfway through the first song, stopped the band and proceeded to first break a leg off the stool then beat the piano to pieces with it, all the time cussing it for being out of tune. The crowd boo-ed him as he left the stage, giving them the finger. They called us back up and we did three more hours and nobody left or demanded their money back. Heck, where else were they going to go in Nowata Oklahoma on a Saturday night? By the time we finished I'm sure Jerry was half way to Mississippi! No, we didn't get his money, but they did pay us quite a bit extra for saving the show!
I knew Jerry Lee was off the wall and that's one of the reasons I like him but that story is over the top. I think he would sound better on a out of tune honky tonk sounding piano. Imagine the stories his band could tell ? I'd buy that book too.
The very first time I saw a rocker slam his guitar on the stage floor and break it into a zillion pieces, I thought to myself "What an Ahole!" If you're not good enough to entertain a crowd with your musical skills, you really don't belong on stage. But what the Hell do I know?
I hate the destruction of musical instruments. There are so many players who would love to have them. The worst case I have heard of recently was Tarantino making the movie "The Hateful Eight". The Martin guitar museum loaned him a 145 year old Martin acoustic guitar that was priceless. There was a scene where Kurt Russel smashes the guitar so Martin also gave him copies of the guitar to smash. Tarantino being the jerk he is didn't call cut before the smashing to have the guitar changed for one of the copies and allowed Russell to simply smash the priceless antique. It was reported that Tarantino smirked as it happened. What an a****** He allowed it to happen for the shock value and publicity. I will never watch one of his movies. Martin now refuse to loan their museum guitars to Hollywood sets now.
I totally agree with the stupidity of "trashing" musical instruments and mics on purpose.
Jerry Lee Lewis. One evening about 50 years ago, the scene was a restaurant with upstairs bar in Hot Springs, Arkansas. As I recall, racing season was in full swing and Jerry Lee Lewis was performing at a nightly gig at the bar upstairs. My wife and I were entering the foyer of the place and had just followed our friends to the escalator. About halfway, shots rang out from upstairs and Jerry Lee came running down the stainless steel sides of the escalator at full tilt, quickly followed by a hail of gunfire from a jealous husband. Naturally, we ducked and dodged as best we could and it was amazing that nobody in the place was hit or injured in the pandemonium.
That sure gave us plenty to remember and be grateful for whenever someone would bring up that event.
I read that on his Russian tour, Billy Joel flipped his Yamaha Piano over at the end of the show, (it broke) and offered to leave it for them as a souvenir. They told him to take his trash home. I think it's hanging from the ceiling of the Hard Rock Cafe in NY now. There's nothing cool about trashing gear. Nothing makes me more crazy than spoiled, entitled, show biz folks, using the platform of entertainment to showcase their own personal agendas, or insecurities that have nothing to do with show biz. This is MY craft. MY art, and I resent anyone diminishing it's validity.
I've had my personal mics and guitars abused intentionally many times. Recently, it's drunks at a country club grabbing my mic (sometimes when I'm using it), making their stupid announcement and then tossing it.
I went in last week, and a drunken member had pried open my case and was beating on an acoustic Parker guitar. Since it costs $75,000.00 to join, with dues of about $25,000.00, they think they'll just replace the damaged goods, not realizing that it is the personal attachment that makes a lot of difference. I now have a sign that tells people not to touch any equipment.
That won't stop it (these folks thing they're invincible)but may help.
Russ
P.S. I told the moron last week that if it happened again, I'd give him a guitatrectomy.
Many times establishments have told me I could leave my equipment in the back room---"It will be Safe".
I never leave it behind. I always take my equipment with me, where I know it will be safe.
Well meaning individuals offer to help carry my equipment. I let them carry the mic stands, music stands etc. The expensive stuff is always handle by only me.
I learned my lesson 30 years ago about leaving gear on the job. It was the American Legion in Havre de Grace, Maryland, where I played every Friday night and was scheduled for a crab feat party the following day. I came in to see a pitcher of beer sitting atop the keyboard on the cloth cover. I picked up the pitcher and threw it in the trash can next to the bar and gave a look to the barmaid that would have dropped most folks in their tracks. I never again left gear on the job.
Russ, you need an inexpensive cattle fence zapper surrounding your gear - 50,000-volts really gets someone's attention. Seriously, I would not perform at a place where folks with that mentality congregate. Sounds as if the only thing they care about is themselves, and the world is filled with individuals of that caliber. There are lots and lots of nicer places to perform.
Years ago with the band in NY were playing monthly dances for a particular group ... one night one of the members comes up to us and says he has a friend who wants to sing ... the guy comes on stage and intros himself as "Lightning Larry" - I still don't know why - then he grabbed our most expensive mic and did a couple of 'Little Richard' songs and during the last one, swung the mic around by the wire, letting more wire out with each revolution ... one of the guys grabbed it just before it was going to slam into the floor ... the following week we went out ant bought the cheapest mic we could find for any future 'guest singers' ... BTW way - "Lightning Larry" only struck us ONCE !!! ...
Wrestlers are COOL! I've known a bunch, from Randy Savage (Poffo, actually), to lots of others. What entertainers! Savage, his dad, Angelo and brother, Leaping Lanny operated out of Lexington thru the early 80's. Ronnie Garvin was the toughest little SOB of the group!
Gary, meddlers are everywhere. In 60 years, someone played with the "toys" on the bandstand at every job I've had.It's my fault I don't remove everything, but on a house job, I get lazy, I guess.
So Lady GaGa does the 'mic drop' and the media goes crazy, calling it "epic" ??? ... 'twitter' goes crazy with comments ... I'm OLD, because I just don't get it ...
I really didn't like the preformance all that much. Maybe I just am tired of all the overproduced shows out there these days. I will say I think she was actually singing although I'm sure the backround music was canned. And it did have a lot of energy but aren't we tired of the fake crowds put around the preformer to do fake reactions to the preformance. The Olymics did it so much better. As for the mic drop, ehhh, don't care.
In my opinion, I think the lady can sing. Some people are turned off by all the hype that surrounds her, but that doesn't mean that she's not talented. As far as 'overproduction', hey, it's the Superbowl. How else are you gonna' justify those multi-thousand dollar ticket prices and gazillion dollar ads?
I never said she couldn't sing - she sings quite well. However, the sexual innuendos associated with her on stage performances tend to be over the top, IMO, which really doesn't do her any justice. You really don't need to show lots of flesh and gyrate when you have great vocal qualities. When she was alive, I would have much rather seen and heard Whitney Houston perform on stage. Same held true with Karen Carpenter. Maybe I'm gettin' old. Hell, I am old!
I wasn't a fan either, but I was impressed with the show. Her energy and talent. She sang, danced and played instruments...............and no political rants.
She must be doing something right.
Lady Gaga's Sales Surge Over 1,000% in Wake of Super Bowl Halftime Show according to Nielson music.
Based on initial sales reports collected for Sunday, the diva sold about 150,000 digital albums and songs in the U.S. on Feb. 5 -- an increase of a little more than 1,000 percent compared to the previous day, when she sold around 15,000 digital albums and songs.
Also impressive: On Super Bowl Sunday alone, Gaga sold more songs and albums digitally than she did in the entire week ending Feb. 2 -- across both physical and digital formats. In the week ending Feb. 2, Gaga sold 30,000 albums and songs, of which 26,000 were digital.
In total on Sunday, Gaga sold over 125,000 song downloads -- up about 960 percent compared to the previous day (a little more than 10,000 sold). Her biggest-selling song on Feb. 5 was "Million Reasons," which sold more than 45,000 downloads -- up nearly 900 percent compared to the previous day (about 5,000)
Watching Lady GaGa at half time (for all of 8 minutes before I had to switch channels) reminds me of that saying....."people listen with their eyes!" I couldn't find even a hint of "melody" in what she was singing. If you take your eyes off the screen and just listen, all you hear is "noise!" To save my sanity, I recorded the whole game just so I could cut out the half-time antics.
Yes.......she is extremely talented, plays piano, sings well (trained!), dances, talks well. But what's the point of it all if there's no substance to the songs she sings? The music was designed simply to compliment the dancing, and not at all meant to be Grammy winner tunes.
BTW......I read that she didn't get paid for the show. That all the production costs were covered but......no salary!
I think one of the things we - 'WE being those born in the 1940s - 1950s, and maybe even later - have to come to grips with is the fact that today's music and musical performances are not created for US, the same as the music WE grew up with was not created for our parents and grandparents ... the targeted audience is that late 20s to perhaps 50 year old demographic that is going to spend money buying the artists songs either on 'hard copy' or by D/L from the I'net ... now some might say that audience doesn't have the money these days but based on her recording sales after her performance, I would have to say that would be incorrect, and she accomplished what she wanted ... Unfortunately, the days of some talented singer with a microphone, standing in front of an audience and just 'singing' are gone ... I can think of only one - Adele - who performs in a scaled down setting, although with a LARGE orchestra ... Lady GaGA came on the scene wearing outrageous costumes, etc. and that got her the popularity she needed ... underneath it all was REAL talent, as recognized by Tony Bennett, and IMHO their duets are GREAT ...
I guess it's safe to say you weren't one of the 160 million people who watched her do her show........As Gary would say "It's all about being an entertainer"
Safely said, Jerry. Actually, I DO admire her for what she's done to improve herself, and nurture and exploit her talents. I've read a bit about her......she's worked hard at her profession and now she's on the payoff end.
I think you missed my point, though, about the music itself. I don't knock the show that she put on. I knock the music they give her to do (or she picks herself). Nothing memorable. No brilliant formula songs like ABBA used to come up with almost every time.
I worked appx 15 years as a pro DJ (in addition to playing live). My most requested songs were evergreens....Sinatra, 70's disco hits, 60's standard, Springsteen, Billy Joel, Motown, etc....very, very rarely did I ever get contemporary music requests from adults, unless it was for their kids.
I never forgot what I read many years ago. A song will not be remembered as genuine music unless you can "hum the melody" of it. Think about that.......I do often.
I'm not complaining about the show.......I thought it was a brilliant production. Just NOT for ME.
And.....I almost forgot....another experience from my DJ days. A middle-aged women approached me (around 2005) and asked for a recent song. I knew the song, and by any standards it was just plain awful. I was curious. I asked what she liked about the song. The answer was: she didn't particularly like the song.....she just wanted to "feel young"....another way of saying she "didn't want to feel" old.
I venture to say there just might be 160 million people out there who feel the same way!
I never forgot what I read many years ago. A song will not be remembered as genuine music unless you can "hum the melody" of it. Think about that.......I do often.
Mark !
Thank you very much for this saying........ It is so true ........
For me, they could have picked FAR better performers for BOTH anthems today ... and, again, for ME, the endings of both games were just as bad ... but that's just ME ...
For me, they could have picked FAR better performers for BOTH anthems today ... and, again, for ME, the endings of both games were just as bad ... but that's just ME ...
I'm with you Tony. first thought was why Jimmy Buffet ?? Wrote some songs about geting drunk, got rich, and now puts his name on mega developments. He can't sing, never could. 3000 houses being built off 95 here and people thinking because it has his name on it they're gonig to live in a community with a non-stop party going on. Its 5 miles from 95 and 25 miles from the Beaches of Hilton Head, kind of a nothing location. Good Luck with that.