I’ll never be a ‘proper’ rock star

kossofffan

Reading the post regarding which guitars Mr Page played on his albums Led me to think just how did the likes of Page, Hendrix, Slash, Gallagher, Green, Clapton etc even manage to play live when at times they were properly drunk or stoned beyond belief?
I can’t play properly after one tin of Guinness!
Let’s hear your tales of inebriated live gigs & how did you pull it off?

Kittyfrisk

I think that given your FB name & avatar, you really should have included Paul Kossoff in your list 

rossi

I down two double jacks and  coke ,with ice of course ,before I go on for my pub jam session bit singing and playing .Works a treat .My mate does the driving .Sadly having COPD its gonna be a while before it happens again for me  again .The Government ,common sense and my missus  have locked me down hard.

DrBob

I always found playing gigs to be analogous to playing pool in as much as the 1-2 pints “window” takes the edges off just enough without impairing your game but much beyond that it all goes to hell 

DLM

I cannae play after a half or even a strong coffee. Even at home it's no fun unless I'm sober.

Paging Mr. StellaArtoisCaster himself, @Danny1969

Teach us, Master!

Adey

It's the Mitchell and Webb "just under two pints" rule that you have to obey.

pintspiller

I hadn't played a gig for fifteen years when a cover band I was in did a benefit for a rehearsal room.

I broke a two pint rule I set for myself a long time ago and played loads of wrong notes in the wrong places. There's YouTube footage of me sweating buckets and nervously rubbing my face. Luckily there was three guitarists in the band and nobody in the audience.

Blueingreen

Kittyfrisk said:

I think that given your FB name & avatar, you really should have included Paul Kossoff in your list 

Indeed.  The one time I saw Free he was too stoned to function, hardly played a note.

kossofffan

Couldn’t bring myself to mention my idol as it’s such sad history ☹️

But please share your memories of funny moments on stage!

Sassafras

Alcohol is the only drug that fucks up my timing and rhythm.
Acid might but I've never tried gigging while tripping.

Corporeal_bodies

In the 2000's every gig I did I was pissed and or stoned, for me, I actually got used to it, didn't play better, didn't play worse, kind of became the norm (don't recommend it by the way, totally T total now since the family came along). We recorded all the gigs so I know my playing was spot on. However there was the time when I puked and shit myself on the last song once but thats another story.

Lesgrandepotato

Corporeal_bodies said:

However there was the time when I puked and shit myself on the last song once but thats another story.

I don’t think you can leave that hanging ( so to speak ) 

Funkfingers

I blame flat screen televisions. They don’t give the satisfying smash of a glass cathode ray tube. 

roberty

Page earnt his reputation as a studio player by performing off his tits with his guitar around his knees ;-p

Wonky

Played and sang many gigs on drugs, but never alcohol or any other downers for that matter.  Actually knowing which you can play on and which enhance you is the real trick.  Speed, yes, Coke, yes, E's nope etc....  The actual thought of any of that stuff just give me shivers down my spine in a bad way these days.
I do like a little drink whilst I'm recording now.  All above board and legal as they say. Not too much either or it stops play.

Danny1969

DLM said:

I cannae play after a half or even a strong coffee. Even at home it's no fun unless I'm sober.

Paging Mr. StellaArtoisCaster himself, @Danny1969

Teach us, Master!

Ha Ha ..... well all I can say is practice practice practice ...... I've been drinking and playing for so long now that the drink doesn't really affect my playing within reason. I can 6 or 7 pints and be fine guitar wise. However I do a lot more vocals these days and my tuning suffers after about 4 or 5 pints .... I listen back to stuff people put on facebook and occasionally  think ooh that's a bit flat !
Spirits are out for me though when gigging .... wine is OK but I wouldn't touch spirits. With beer you feel the effect linearly with time, with spirits you can be fine one minute and completely wankered the next ... at least I can be. 

The bass player in my main band is a beer monster, did 13 pints at one gig - The Colonial Bar, Horndean in 2004 ish ... he's a big fella mind!

Corporeal_bodies

 Well basically, a heavy night before at a friends bbq, thought I was just hungover, so I proceeded to beer up ands normal, you know hair of the dog and all that, started the set and felt progressively worse throughout, got the message from the body I really needed to shit, but u know I was in the middle of a set, climaxed in the middle of the last song, projectile puke on stage down myself and guitar lol and the shit forced it way out at the same time. Stumbled off stage and proceeded to hurl my guts up and shit for the next hour. Didn't appreciate that visit to brown Town. Turned out I had food poisoning from the BBq the night before as 2 of my m8s back home had the same thing.

prowla

kossofffan said:

Reading the post regarding which guitars Mr Page played on his albums Led me to think just how did the likes of Page, Hendrix, Slash, Gallagher, Green, Clapton etc even manage to play live when at times they were properly drunk or stoned beyond belief?
I can’t play properly after one tin of Guinness!
Let’s hear your tales of inebriated live gigs & how did you pull it off?

I watched a video of Clapton playing on the OGWT a couple of weeks ago (Guitar heroes at the BBC?) and I remember thinking "I bet he thinks this is great"...

Lestratcaster

Always used to have 1 drink (usually a JD and coke) before I hit the stage, as a ritual just to settle myself before I play. But since the years rolled on I didn't feel I needed to do it anymore. Never really made a difference to my playing.
Also I would never eat less than 2 hours before stage time. 

hollywoodrox

Danny1969 said:

DLM said:

I cannae play after a half or even a strong coffee. Even at home it's no fun unless I'm sober.

Paging Mr. StellaArtoisCaster himself, @Danny1969

Teach us, Master!

Ha Ha ..... well all I can say is practice practice practice ...... I've been drinking and playing for so long now that the drink doesn't really affect my playing within reason. I can 6 or 7 pints and be fine guitar wise. However I do a lot more vocals these days and my tuning suffers after about 4 or 5 pints .... I listen back to stuff people put on facebook and occasionally  think ooh that's a bit flat !
Spirits are out for me though when gigging .... wine is OK but I wouldn't touch spirits. With beer you feel the effect linearly with time, with spirits you can be fine one minute and completely wankered the next ... at least I can be. 

The bass player in my main band is a beer monster, did 13 pints at one gig - The Colonial Bar, Horndean in 2004 ish ... he's a big fella mind!

Can you post a pic of your Stella strat , I always like to see it 

LuttiS

I have a two pint rule, one before and one during. I've learnt that from experience of falling off stages, falling off PA's, general falling over, over people, over things and over myself, completing gigs being held up, or on the floor and more fuckups than should be made. 

Saying that, in my last band the drummer was a horrific drinker... It really did destroy his life and he had to move back to Poland.. but he was a very natural drummer and he was drunk all gigs.. two gigs were rarely the same (even with the same setlist) but it was mostly fun. The singer and bassist was also always stoned. 

One time the drummer was so fucked that we literally played one drum beat for the entire gig.. didn't even stop between songs. I mean, it was a good beat and we adapted everything on the fly so it worked out ok

We made a core setlist at that point, a reduced set that could be played no matter what condition we were in. We played those songs in practice so many times that it was habit and no thinking required. Fun fact, played them perfectly while coughing up blood with fun undiagnosed (until doctors later) illness! 

So, practice is the key