Preparing For Your First Gig

Preparing For Your First Gig

Sections:

1. Rehearsals
2. Promotion
3. Equipment
4. Set list
5. Warm Up
6. Safety
7. Recording
8. On Stage
9. Other Thoughts

So your band *insert awesome band name here* has there first gig.  Whether it’s in a tiny pub venue, a stadium or anything in between you’ll want to make sure your well prepared and feeling as confident as possible before stepping on stage.

Let me briefly elaborate on my background.  I did my first gig to 200 people when I was 14.  Since then I've been gigging on average at least once a week with all sorts of bands in all sorts of places.  I wouldn’t say I'm an expert at gig preparation but the following information is just to be a guideline for those who want it or need it.  Take from it what you will and ignore or interpret the parts you feel necessary.

Rehearsal

Before you consider booking your first gig you need to know your ready.  Having one strong song and then another five mediocre or unperfected songs is no good.  For your first show and every show following it you want people to listen to every song and think WOW.  You should be able to walk into a practice room and play your set comfortably and confidently.

Needing lyrics on stage is not ideal but also not a total loss.  If deadly necessary Just gaffer tape them to the floor if required but try to use them just for cues otherwise you will never engage with the crowd.

For more information on rehearsals see this article

Promotion

You will want to make sure people turn up to your show.  Ideally people that have never heard of you before will arrive so you can start building your fan base.  How do you ensure this I hear you ask? 

Obviously the promoter/event organiser of the gig should do a large piece of this for you.  Usually they will put up posters in relevant locations and hand out flyers.  You should try to request some of these to hand out yourself so that you can target a much larger collective of people.

If the promoter/event organiser hasn’t already done so you should set up a Facebook event group.  Invite all your friends and try and get them to invite all of theres.  The more people you ask the more likely hood there is of them saying yes!  As well as this there is a lot of online sites that advertise peoples gigs,  a quick google search should yield plenty of results.

Some local newspapers may be interested in your show and you could always ask them to publish a press release with or without a picture. 

My final and most obvious recommendation is to ‘annoy’ your friends.  I don’t recommend spamming people but posting on your friends Facebook Timelines and texting people advertising the show wouldn’t be so bad, and again ask them to ask there friends and so on and so on. 

After all a Gig with no crowd just becomes a glorified band practice

Equipment

This is such a huge area to cover so I'm going to split it up into sections of instruments so you can skip as needed.  I’ve only listed the 3 most common band instruments but feel free to ask if you play other instruments and require help! 

Before arriving at the gig you need to know what gear you actually need.  This will be different for every band in every venue.  

PA and microphones will usually be provided but the quality and hygiene of this is sometimes questionable.

Between yourself and the other you should try find gear that you can share. Drum shells, Guitar cabs, Bass rig are the usual shared items.

Drums

Find out if the venue has a drum kit or if another band is supplying a drum kit.  In most small to medium venues its not for every band to take there own kit as this would make change over times too long and sometimes the storage back stage just cant accommodate.  

If a band is willing to share drum kit is likely you will still have to provide your own breakables/stealables.  These include Cymbals, Snare Drum, Sticks, pedal(s) and if possible or requires Stands as well. Sometimes you will only need Cymbals, Sticks, and Snare Drum but its better to take more than you need.

Make sure your kit is tuned as best it can be if you are required to take your full kit.  A spare set of skins in a bag will never go a miss but hopefully they wont be needed! 

Also make sure you have plenty of sticks that your comfortable using.

In my bag I keep a few things as a precaution:

• • Drum Key (I have multiple drum keys across different bags incase)
• • Sex Wax (The stick grip wax, nothing naughty)
• • A set of Allen Keys
• • Pliers
• • A set of Screw Drivers
• • Gaffa tape and Electric insulation Tape (NECESSITY!)
• • Spare Cymbal washer and felts and wing nuts

Guitars

You should know what sounds you need and how to produce them on your own amps.  Ideally take your amps with you.  If you use a head and cab set up then see if you can share a cab to avoid taking unnecessary bulky items. 

If you use effect pedals consider investing in a pedal board so that you can lift them on and off stage in one movement.  Keeping them cabled in the order you want on that board will also quicken the process up as you will only require the input cable and output cable to be plugged in each show. 

On those pedals if you need to change settings in between songs consider sticking tape as arrows on controls so your not spending too much time in between songs getting the right sound. 

Do you own multiple guitars? Consider taking two incase a string snaps on stage.  This is also handy if you have songs in different tunings, you could tune a second guitar to a different tuning in preparation.

In your bag you should carry:

• • Spare Strings (A string winder speeds up string changes)
• • Spare Plectrums (Lots of them,  You’d be surprise how fast they vanish)
• • Spare cables 
• • A Tuner (consider a tuning pedal)
• • A set of allen keys
• • A set of screw Drivers
• • Gaffa tape and Electric insulation Tape (NECESSITY!)

Vocals

Most venues will provide a microphone but remember these have been used by many other artists and riddled with there spit.  Now you may not care about this but then again you might

I would recommend buying yourself a microphone that’s suited to your voice that only you will use.  An investment that will always come in handy. 

Also consider keeping a long XLR taped to your microphone if you’re the kind of singer that likes to dance around or swing there microphone anywhere it can be fired.

In your bag you should carry:

• • Spare Cables
• • Throat sweets
• • Gaffa tape and Electric insulation Tape (NECESSITY!)

Set List

This is totally different for every band and a lot of shows.  Il give a very general overview but really just play around over a few practices until your feel you’ve got it right.

Don’t play all your best songs a the start of the show.  If you do this people will be bored by the end.

This doesn’t mean play you worst song at the start.  People will remember how your set starts more than anything and theres always doors they can walk out of.

Scatter your set list so you don’t run out of your best songs before the end and aren't playing to many similar sounding songs after each other.

Warming Up

For any show I'm about to play I make sure I'm warmed up,  I use to do a lot of athletics and I treat my shows in a similar way.  As a drummer I feel I move a lot of my body quite vigorously on stage and like to know I can avoid injury if possible.  

All band members should stretch

Drummers should do some rudiments and finger warm ups on a practice pad

Guitarist should play some scaled and stretch there fingers

Vocalists should warm the voice up slowly in a way that wont tire them out.

Safety

Following on from warming up comes the dreaded health and safety.  

Don’t worry about this the venue should have the major aspects covered( if you do see something that could cause harm make sure you express your concern to an appropriate member of staff)

Make sure amps are sturdy and not going to fall over.

Singers DON’T CLIMB ON SPEAKERS,  It may look great and make you feel on top of the world but even speakers that are safety chained can fall or at least be damaged.

On stage there are a lot of hazards.   You can minimise your risks by being cautious of where cables are and taping them down where possible. Don’t put your clothes over the top of a light or your amplifier as these get extremely hot.  

Keep hydrated, the last thing you want is to pass out on stage or loose your voice half way through.  Buy bottled water or get some from the venue and keep drinking it! 

Recording

Some venues offer this for an added cost but it is not so hard to do it yourself.  Even a very low quality recording can come in handy to analyse your stage presence, your set list, and how the crowd took to you. 

Try get a video camera set up on a tripod and microphone at the back of the room.

On Stage

its up to you! So il keep this short 

Just remember:

• • Keep the audience keen 
• • Tell people your website and where to find music
• • HAVE FUN

The rest really is up to you,  put on a great show! 

Other Thoughts

• • Stay professional
• • Enjoy the other bands
• • Thank everyone involved especially if your shared equipment

All of the above are not set in stone,  there just for you to think about.  I hope I've helped.   

Im sure I've missed off things and included irrelevant things. This is just how I would approach it.   If you want more information then feel free to contact me and ask!  Il help you as best I can!

And if theres any other articles you want me to right also request them!

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