Been trying for ages to get into a covers band. I'm happy to play either second guitar (it never did Ronnie Wood any harm, nor anyone in the Foo Fighters) or simple bass (yes I know I'm not a proper bassist, but if it gets me the gig...)
I seem to have landed myself a gig as a second guitarist in an acoustic country rock thing. (I say seem to because we've only had the one get together and everyone seems happy thus far.)
The trouble is the guy who's leading it wants to pick all the songs. That's not an issue, someone has to take charge to avoid chaos.
But the songs he's chosen are really dull. They're big hits, but fuck me, I got bored listening to them once, never mind the severalty times I'd need to in order to learn them. Really stodgy west coast stuff. Not even the exciting west coast stuff.*
So to my question - do I suck it up in order to be 'in' something and then transfer when I've got some half decent gigging experience or say "Nah, not for me" now and keep looking?
*This is entirely just my opinion - everyone is free to disagree with me, I get that, but it is just my opinion and no offence is intended to any fans.
If you must have sex with a frog, wear a condom. If you want the frog to have fun, rib it.
Comments
What's the point? You won't be doing the band or the songs justice, you'll be wasting their time as you'll be looking to jump ship as soon as a more suitable band comes along and more important than anything, you won't be enjoying yourself. If the band get wind of that you'll probably be fired anyway.
Sometimes songs you don't really like are still rewarding to play. Actually learning songs you really like can ruin them for you so getting to choose isn't always the best. It may be that as the band progresses some songs don't work out well or don't work live and you need to change the set around anyway but you've got to start somewhere.
I'd see how it goes, sounds better than going back to square one. At a future point you can politely leave if it's not working out, you aren't marrying them.
If you want a band that fits your image of how it should look and sound the likely reality is that you've got to do everything in making it work, the rest will be along for the ride. If you don't want to do that then you'll invariably have to make some compromises.
It gets you out and should pay, so that helps with networking and improving your playing and just having fun being on stage. I've done plenty of gigs where it really isn't my kind of music but the gig was still fun - either because I like the band members or audience. It's a lot easier finding bands when you can talk about what you have done rather than just what you want to do.
IF you like them and the pay is ok then I'd do it - but keep your eyes out for other options as well.
The challenge with boring songs is to make them sound interesting.
Adam Neely said it but I'm not sure if he was simply quoting someone else.
I think it comes down to how much energy you're willing to invest. If you want to do the bare minimum of learning the chord charts and turning up then it's possibly not going to be much fun.
The excitement of just being in a band will make up for most things. Once you've got a bit more experience and contacts then you can be more selective.
The other thing is that though the songs might be bland and obvious never underestimate the extent to which audiences hate anything that isn't very famous and obvious.
You have to decide if you would rather play Mustang Sally to a crowd of dancing people or an obscure song that means a lot to you to a mostly empty room of bored looking people.
The gigging experience will be worth more than the fact the material is uninspiring.
Because it's not about playing the songs, it's about performing them.
You can learn to play the songs in your proverbial bedroom but you can only get the feel of performing them on stage.
And the experience you gain will make you much more likely to get into another working band.
Get the experience -- it's invaluable.
And I'm not trying to be snotty about any of this, as I do know it's impossible to join a band that only plays stuff I like. I'm not that daft.
it's just not my bag, really. But I take the point - if I've got the in, then at least do something and then move on. This isn't my first ever band (it's the third, really), but I've not been in anything for two years now, so it's about time I managed to get something going.
So yes, thanks for that, I'll get on and see if there's anything interesting I can do with the songs the guy wants us to play.
Besides, even among that genre, there's still the opportunity to do some stuff that can be reasonably uplifting.
Oh, and thankfully Mustang Bloody Sally is not an issue.
The other dilemma, for us anyway, is being a genre band rather than a general covers band ( I've not googled it but surely somewhere there is a band called The General Covers Band) and the OP's new band will have that. There's a country rock audience that will lap up Take it to the Limit and there's a pub audience that will find it very dull; at what point do you go 'f**k it let's do Mustang Sally and get people dancing' or stay true to what the band does.
Ah well, we'll see.
The other week I was playing "Jean Genie" -- like I have every f*cking week for the last seven years. My indifference to this song is well documented. In fact in Bowie's autobiography he personally apologises to me, Oli, for ever having written it.
But while our singer was out front loving every line of his favourite song, the bass player and I were playing peek-a-boo behind the columns of the venue. Which entertained both us and the audience.
Performance. It is fun