Things I should have remembered about Open Mic Nights.

So in  my last blog I promised a blog including what my ipod comes up with on shuffle. I have 3053 songs on my ipod, this is going to be interesting. This blog will be about other things also, but I will let you know how this goes. It will be interesting. First song: Lily of the Valley- Queen. Not bad.

So you may have guessed form the title of this blog is that I have recently had some sort of interaction with an Open Mic Night. (Oceans - Evanescence. Judge me if you will, it's really not bad).

On Monday night we went to an Open Mic at Cherry Bar in the city. And here are the things I should really have already known, but neglected to remember this time.

1. There will always be someone playing who plays for way too long, and is generally bad/weird.

This is typical at every open mic, as anyone can play, therefore everyone who can play 'ten guitars' gets up and does their version of Wonderwall. This time, there was a slight variation. This guy I'm talking about looked like a blond version of Robert Smith from The Cure. (All My Love- Led Zeppelin. Getting better). He sang like the singer from Placebo, and played songs (I'm guessing they were originals) reminiscent of The Rasmus. He wasn't bad, but after about 6 songs, we all got a little bored. He played Disarm by the Smashing Pumpkins as his closer, which was rather good and suited his girlish voice. He had a large tall badass looking guy playing the bongo alongside him. That was the funny part.

2. There will always be someone who treats it like their own show.

This has happened at several open mics I've been to. The first one where this occurred was when I was still in high school and my band plus some other musical cats from the year above decided to rock out at Oliver's in Clyde, about 10 minutes drive from my hometown in New Zealand. The guy running it got pissed at us because we brought a drumkit, and played 'too loud'. Typical old-man-who-lives-in-a-bus-with-a-hippie-wife syndrome. He played some country noodling. It was ok.

Cherry Bar was no exception. (Higher Ground- The Red Hot Chili Peppers). There was a girl who came with her whole band (who brought their own gear - wise men), minions and grandmother. She was down from Sydney apparantly, and decided this was the perfect opportunity for a gig without any organisation. Smart girl. She was pretty good, think Pink with an ACDC type band behind her (with a drummer who looked like Mick Mars from Motley Crue). Unfortunately she kept saying how nice it was for everyone to come see her, and got her 'minions' to hand out 'albums' to everybody. This album consisted of a burnt CD with the artist's name sharpied onto it (mine was scratched to hell) in a white CD sleeve with a sticker on it. I had expected more of an effort from a girl who acted so professional in every other aspect. She played for a good 30 minutes. Everyone left after she played, and we were next. Awkward.

This is us at Cherry. Ashleigh Dunn took this pic, she rocks all of the socks.

3. The gear will ALWAYS be shit.

This is something I learned years and years ago, but failed to remember whilst going to Cherry. As always, open mics are generally free, so it's not like anyone's going to go out of their way to provide a good kit or guitar amp. The bass amp was alright. The kick pedal provided broke halfway through our second song, so we had to stop. I didn't bring a drum key, so had to ask into the microphone for one. Awkward. Lesson learned. A drum key is now residing on my key chain. Silly Rachel. We played averagely, as we couldn't hear Drew (I think the amp was broken), and the place was pretty much empty. (Stairway to Heaven - Led Zeppelin). The floor tom sounded very silly also. But thats ok, it's an Open Mic night. Expectations should never be high.

So all in all, 'twas an average gig. Think Honeybone, circa 2009. Like, just after we formed. I blame the awkward situation and the gear. It was one of those cases where all you could hear was your own voice and it's very unsettling. What's good about this is that now I am reminded is that an Open Mic gig for an actual band (not solo singer songwriter types) is never going to go well. Lesson learned. We weren't terrible, we weren't amazing. (Shihad - Ignite). No one remembers the average bands. So I'm hoping no one will remember us, and we have a second chance for a first impression at the Gig on Tuesday.

Kudos to our good mate Ash for coming to watch us, even though she was hungover. She's a champ. Chur bro xxx

Oh and the practice on Saturday last week at The Wick was in-fucking-credible. I played a REAL drumkit. I could HEAR Peter's bass. We played for FIVE hours. It totally rocked. (Stop - Shihad)

Drew being totes badass at practice.

So not too many embarrassing songs came up this time. Next time I will try harder. I do have Nickelback on my Ipod, and Kidrock. Lets hope they come up so you can all have a laugh.

xxx