Tricked into big band performance at a tamale festival Dec 12 2024

and somehow still walks away without food.

It’s true, missed the set list, missed stage lights, missed wack-a-doodle count-ins, missed the “dress nice” memo, and told it’s a rehearsal/gig/payrent type of rehearsal.

By, “missed” i mean neglected or wasn’t informed.

”It’s a rehearsal?”

It’s a rehearsal, because nobody gets paid.
It’s the gym, because no one‘s paid.
It’s not a gig just because there are people watching. It means it’s a high pressure rehearsal/practice session. Pfff… my fucking job is experiment and take risks knowing the consequences are different. This is a quality assurance session and at the end people should be asked for critiques… under the assumption that this group of people encompass a business.

Seriously though the drummer would probably be better if it was a paid gig. What does that say about me? If I’m not experimenting or learning something, this situation might be a waste of my time. Is my video gonna be good?

To make matters worse, I didn’t see a single tamale. One would think tamales would have been everywhere. I wasn’t offered any, I didn’t see any, food trucks had none.

Scroll way down to skip a text-wall and see video footage of a song. (Remember: im just the bass player who believes in fair compensation.)

Event Observation

It’s basically a street fair or really large block party. Stage set up music and entertainment and lots of food trucks and tent vendors. Sounds cool if you’re not one of the local restaurants/businesses. I look on the map and there’s maybe 15 to 25 different Mexican food restaurants within a 3 mile radius. There are at least 15 within walking distance of the rehearsal venue. There are a lot of places to eat around here outside of the event. The vent is comprised mostly of food vendors. So, if the local vendors aren’t out there, competing with the vagabonds, they’re probably losing business on this day.
Hopefully, I’m wrong. Hopefully customers are extremely abundant, and hopefully it spills over to the regular local businesses.

The churro truck line was giant. I couldn’t see past it. Maybe I went down the wrong street for tamales.

Parking

I took the best street for parking.

Streets were blocked and we (musicians) were told we might need to take a shuttle. Parking far away was out of the question. No way with bass, cables, and amplifier!

A sneaky little alley brought me to my usual parking space. It was marked as reserved, but I took it anyway and loaded equipment real close to the venue. I was prepared to leave the parking spot, but it was the last hour or two of the event. I’ll stay and maybe offer it to another musician in route.

This band doesn’t know how lucky they are. I would have bailed if the $20 lot was my only option. The guitar player did. No guitar, and no keyboard and can you imagine how the “gig” would’ve sounded with only drums and horns? Today it’s just me and the drummer from those recent videos. So, me. That’s the rhythm section. Me. What if I chose not to show up? They lucky I’m interested, healthy, and my car is functional. It’s a good thing I left early and prepared the night before.

No tamales for the musician/entertainment.

Suddenly, I’m on stage.

I cropped myself out of someone’s picture. Someone in the band likes to take pictures. I hate it enough to hate steeling it, but I’m simultaneously grateful. 😵‍💫

Just me and the drummer are on stage.
I’m in the middle of the stage.
The singer and soloists are all out front on the floor near the audience. Here they are…

They look good, so why put me and drums on stage? (A “real bass player” would have an instrument thats too tall. The top of an acoustic bass would be super jazzy all over the ceiling tiles.)
They look cool, but why not put trumpets up there with us. Feels like it probably looks awkward to the audience.

I think all of them are trying to avoid getting stuck next to the commonly unprofessional and characteristically expensively loud drummers.

I think the only thing I would do different is put the drums on the other side of the stage, put the bass player on the floor in front of the drums and have the trumpets sit down on stage. Everything else would move back towards the stage. If that doesn’t work, I would consider switching places with the drummer and the bass player. Bass player stage right and the dark Drummer on the floor right side. Whatever… the stairs might be in the way… whatever. I’m not a whale.

I’ll be sight reading all this music. I have not seen any of the songs before. Maybe one. No lights on my music stand.
Smells less like mold on the stage today.

It’s like assessing a battle field.

“RHYTHM IS THY KING!”

“DIE THE KING!”

“DIE FOR RHYTHM!”

“RHYTHM OR DIE!”

It’s like Rambo getting gear prepared. The necessity to predict and practice monkey-wrench and unorthodox dynamics that emerging in the musical environment should not be part of what it takes to play an instrument/create beautiful music for people.

Ranting again… Christmas battles… let’s look at pictures of the venue.

Glam

Here’s my view of the audience.

Here I am telling the drummer to count and beware of rhythmic trickery.

This is my video camera’s table top view.

Yeah, there was a table on stage. It was next to the Christmas tree box and some other junk. It was like a storage area… the stage… storage… performance… people looking.
🤷‍♂️
I was surprised there were no tamales in sight? After reading what I wrote, I’m not surprised.

Video

Here’s a video and this is what we sound like in this day. It’s that simple. Own it. All I do is play the bass. My job is to play the bass correctly.

I only play bass. I’m not the director and I’m definitely not the drummer. I play bass and I give them rhythmic and tonal foundation. It’s not my job to train other musicians. My job is to make bass sound good. My job is to make this song sound pleasant with my bass.

It’s not my job to shelter musicians that haven’t honored the rest of us by preparing themselves. Fellow musicians who lack confidence because they lack preparation is not my fault. Fellow musicians who don’t record themselves and analyze their tendencies are not my problem.

🥷

“Friendly Fire Ambush!?!”

Battlefield characteristics persist. In the video above, our director clicks one rhythm and then suddenly sings one rhythm separately to get the band started.

”On your mark, get set, go!”

Cute, but that’s not how it goes. It’s not a race. Count ins are supposed to be in tempo unless there’s some type of emergency. Upper echelon musicians and directors operate that way. They get paid well. This situation is low-key and we want time. Count “1,2,3,4” in tempo, and in the way the song should sound. Like as if the lyrics were those numbers and their musical subdivision.

❤️‍🔥

Simulations Smell Like Desperation

I’m not required to perpetuate any simulations. If my social media resembles a real person, good. Fuck all the fake. Real people making mistakes, placing their bets in the wrong companions, struggling and whatever else equals musical reality. Not only is the illusion of perfection unattainable, it’s also a self defeating phenomenon. If drummers don’t know how to count or lock-in with other players, it’s their problem. What’s the worst that can happen? My video of a shitty Drummer scares away a shitty Drummer? What, I’m supposed to be afraid that someone who likes shitty drummers won’t hire me? 😂

You got an artsy type rant post I should read? Tage me in it. I like creativity drama. No, I hate art drama/convolution. 😵‍💫

Thanks for reading.

Thanks for the support.

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