Anyway, I never thought of Beatallica as rock stars!

They're not. They have a good attitude, and I wish them all the best.
I wanted to see that show, but I had to work the next day.

Not enjoying Beatallica is like not enjoying a Neil Diamond impersonator.

Pasha the Pom wrote:I fear that some of the worst non-headliner rock-star excesses have been committed by a band I was in with another poster here. (Hey, buddy! Remeber that show with Pinetop 7 and the Jicks?)

If by "non-headliner rock star excesses" you mean blowing the motherfuckers off the stage, I suppose I owe an apology to just about every band I ever opened for. Just ask the Necros...

Not enjoying Beatallica is like not enjoying a Neil Diamond impersonator.[/quote]

Speaking of that, there is a Neil Diamond impersonator based out of Charleston, WV where I am from. He doesn't have a band, he just sings along with a tape. He does the hits 2 or 3 times during a set.

BUT he is a black man who sounds exactly like Neil. He calls himself the Black Diamond. I have to admit that the first time I saw it, it was amusing. He wears sparkley shirts and will come out into the audience, get you to dance with him and sing to you.

It's pretty obvious that everyone who sees him takes it as camp but last I heard he's trying to make a career out of this. Supposedly he was on the Kimmel show last year. When he played at the place I worked, he brought his manager and some other dude and they ordered steaks and drank top shelf liquor all night. This was part of the payment for the night. I didn't even want to ask how much he was getting paid.

did someone say Stars Of The Lid? No?

I was in a band that opened a four band bill with the Buzzcocks headlining. We were the 'locals' on the bill. We would sell our t-shirts for ten bucks which we thought was a reasonable price (they cost us maybe $6 to make). The Buzzcocks tour manager told us that we would have to charge the same amount for our shirts that the Buzzcocks were selling theirs for ($18!) if we wanted to sell them at all. As if someone was going to buy a shirt based solely on price ("Jeez, I am a HUGE Buzzcocks fan, but this band's shirt is 8 bucks cheaper. Guess I'll buy that one instead!") We chose not to sell them inside and then announced the whole thing on stage and offered to sell shirts out of our van afterwards. The manager went ape shit and started screaming that we would never play the venue again. Of course, this was our local club and the promoter was a friend so his threats were ignored.

scannest wrote:The Buzzcocks tour manager told us that we would have to charge the same amount for our shirts that the Buzzcocks were selling theirs for ($18!) if we wanted to sell them at all.

I think this price matching thing is pretty common with bigger bands. The same thing happened to my band when we opened for Sebadoh. The show was at The Vic in Chicago, which is a pretty big venue, and they wouldn't even let us sell our own merchadise. We had to hand it off to someone who worked for the venue to sell it.

However, Sebadoh were nice enough to lend us a snare drum when ours broke . . .

If you don't think that anything might happen to your equipment if you loaned it out, I have three words for you: G.G. Allen.
There's nothing like a mic that smells like colon.

The worst rockstar bullshit i have run into in my years of playing was when my old band opened for Idlewild. First of all they were miffed that the venues maz cap was 250 (dudes... noone in Canada gives a fuck agbout you). The entire night untill they went on stage they sat in their bus like fucking rockstars. The entire night they didnt say a word to us... no thanks for playing... NOTHING. Granted their roadies were nothing short of amazing they told us that we were the best local band that had opened for them on the tour so far and chatted us up real good like. Now i dont care how big a band is but it would be nice to thank the openers for playing... fuck the only reason anyone showed up to that show was because they had a local opener with a good draw ( not to toot my own horn)... At the indie record store i work at we have yet to ever sell a single Idlewild disc.

I've suffered thru a lot of this shit, but the most recent would be with a Chicago band called Dream End. they were playing at this miserable shithole in olympia, and we got a last minute call to come down and play. being nice guys we agree to drive 60 miles, play for free, tell all our friends and loan these dudes our bass amp...and i think our bass player bought a record from them. they proceeded to make snide comments amongst themselves during our entire set. Typical Chicago Jackasses.
-chris

OK, I got a good one. You know that guy John Hiatt? He is that middle of the road, XRT-loved, weak-assed bar rock singer songwriter, yes? Just awful. Anyway, he played a Jam booked show at Lounge Ax many years ago. For his show he had the production company bring in a HUGE soundboard because the regular one we had and used 364 days a year for 8 years with an average of three bands a night just didn't seem to be able to do the job for him. SO the brought in this freaking HUGE board (we had to remove our board to make room, mind you) that was about four extra feet wide, therefore when it was installed in the soundperson's booth it over-hung into where the audience stood thus making it even harder for the sold-out yuppie crowd to enjoy the terrible show. Dumb. Better that this, he had a HUGE anvil rolling case for his WARDROBE!!! It was so huge in fact that we had to remove a door and door jam just to get the damn thing down the stairs to the dressing room. I KID YOU NOT! HIS WARDROBE!!! I think he ended up pulling a suit out of it. SERIOUSLY! Couldn't they just leave the freaking rolling case on the bus and bring his suit down on a hanger?! WTF!!?

I understand he is used to playing larger venues but come on! This was a special small show. So why not let it BE a special small show? It's like when Aerosmith says they recorded their record in a hotel room, then you see footage of these huge hotel rooms with a truckload of gear and thirty guitars all on guitar stands and a truck of additional gear linked in the parkinglot right outside the window... Come on! If you are going to do that, why not just use a proper studio guys?! Stupid people make me angry.