Waiting for the end
Just three more shows and this tour will finally come to an end. The next show in Minneapolis has been moved to a smaller venue. It seems that they have in house lighting and sound. We could fit the lighting system we are touring with in there, but the venue will charge the promoter a huge fee to take it out. So I am stuck using a bunch of par cans. Whatever, it's stupid all the way around.
The people putting on this tour have wasted so much money do to mistakes they have made.
There is also some petty jealousy and talking behind people's back. It's pathetic, like a bunch of teenagers and their little clicks.
So next week I go home for about a week and get to recharge my batteries before I head back out. I will be spending the month of September lighting the guys from Finger Eleven. It's a club tour, but at least it is a real band. They will also be doing a tour in Canada in October which I may not be doing because of work visa issues, mainly the cost. This hopefully will change.
They are suppose to come back into the states in November for more shows. So the rest of the year should be busy for me.
Labels: Concert, Lighting, Rock The Bells, Touring
The saga continues
It's mid afternoon here in San Francisco. The weather is wonderful, we couldn't have asked for a nicer day. The show is in full swing and I have nothing to do. It's a fairly early show today with most of the acts playing before it gets dark.
I am waiting till sometime around Cypress Hill's show to venture out and run lights.
We are down near AT&T park, which of course is home to the Giants baseball team. McCovey cove is right by the venue. I took a picture of the stadium very early this morning along with the stage.
The wind is blowing quite a bit right now and the rig is swinging about more than we would like. There are no backdrops up at this point.
Still a bit tired from yesterdays cross country flight.
I had a bit of an incident with my bag. It seems I was 2 pounds over and they wanted to charge me $50. Now I understand the reason for the weight. It becomes a fuel cost thing. My argument is if I am only checking one bag and you are allowed two, then I am no where near the weight limit.
I asked to speak to a supervisor and she agreed with me and since I fly that airline so much she didn't charge me.
I mentioned this the other day that the show in Sacramento for tomorrow is cancelled so we are off to Reno late tonight. I need to keep my gambling to a minimum.
Labels: Rock The Bells, Touring
Well that was quick
The break is over. Three days goes by really fast. Just like Monday I will spend most of tomorrow on planes flying coast to coast. It's back to Los Angeles and we all get back on the buses to continue the tour. Our next show is in San Francisco and the last date with Rage. Hopefully the crowd will be a little better behaved than they were last weekend in San Bernardino.
The Sacramento show on Sunday has been cancelled due to poor ticket sales. This gives us another day off which we will spend in Reno. There goes my per diem for this week.
It also looks like they are changing the venue in Minneapolis on the 25th. It was suppose to be at the Metrodome in the parking lot. I guess it will now be at the Myth. This is a smaller venue but we should be able to get most of the lighting system in there. This is probably a good thing since I suspect tickets numbers were not high enough to hold it outside at a large venue.
Just a couple weeks on this tour and it's on to another in September. I won't mention the band quite yet since I am still finalizing things with them. Let's just say I have been on tour with them in the past.
Also one thing I want to mention. The mining accident in Utah has caught my attention. I seems that nine more were hurt trying to rescue the six that have been trapped. That industry needs to start looking closer into the work conditions that these folks must deal with. This particular mine has had so many violations in the past yet they were allowed to remain open. Things to need to change.
Labels: Lighting, Rock The Bells, Touring, Travel
ZZZZZZ.....what.....zzzz.....where am I
Spent yesterday flying from LA to the east coast for a short break. All of this on 6 hours sleep over the last couple of days. I departed at 6 am west coast time. The first flight was fine since I was in first class, I sleep most of it. Now what was bad was the 4 hour lay over in Washington DC. I was so exhausted that I nearly passed out waiting to get some food. I finally got home around 7:30 last night. I had nothing to eat in the house so after a quick trip to the store and some food I finally got a good nights sleep.
The tour continues to be an adventure. San Bernardino was a mass of people. Rumor is it was over 40,000. The thing I know was it was chaos. During Cypress Hill the idiots on the lawn decided to set fires, which included burning plastic bottles. I don't think these people realize they are toxic. Well after I finished the Wu-Tang set I turned it over to the Rage Against The Machine LD and got the hell out of there. Headed backstage to find the catering was closing down. Great no dinner for me. So it was off to the bus to see what was there. Thank god for peanut butter.
Now I just wanted a shower and sleep. Which after waiting an hour and a half I got.
The next day we had a regular day with our production in San Diego. My day went well but the audio guys had all kinds of problems. We had a smooth load out and it took only an hour and half. After showers, at 2 am we headed to LA to catch flights. This is why I had so little sleep, two hours I think.
So here I am at home for a couple days off. Had a chance to catch up on mail and pay the bills. I went out looking at televisions too. I had planned to buy a new LCD flat screen HD later this year, but found a nice one for a good deal, so now it sits in my living room.
I also needed to get new piece of luggage since my current bag has a zipper going on it. I hit the outlet mall and the Samsonite store and picked up one of the $400 ones for half price. Hopefully this one will last longer than six years.
Anyway I head back out on Friday to LA to rejoin everyone. We will drive up to San Francisco for the last of the shows with Rage. There is talk the Sacramento show the next will be cancelled because of poor tickets sales. Oh well that means another day off, I get paid either way.
Labels: Airlines, Rock The Bells, Touring
Week One Recap...sort of
It's been exactly seven days since I stepped out of the door of my house. Arrived in Providence late at night and took a cab along with a couple of the other guys to Mansfield, MA.
After 4 hours of sleep we went to the venue and began to load in the production. Well it turns out the lighting was not properly prepped. Which in turn caused us to spend several hours just getting things to work. This held up the rest of the stage being set up and effected some of the sound checks.
Mind you the first show was not until the next day. However, the extra day was for production rehearsals and such.
The show went fine for the most part. We did have some issues with Wu Tang and the opening of their show which hopefully have been solved.
The shows in NYC were a bit different since Rage Against the Machine are closing the show. We are using their sound and lights which makes my day easier, plus the rig is larger. The place was hot, rainy and the crowds were huge. If you do a search on You Tube there are clips all over.
We are now in Atlanta for a couple of days off. We are also looking at where we are from a production standpoint. Part of the crew out here are very green and it shows.
So many hours so far and so little sleep, I am spending my time recharging a bit.
Labels: Lighting, Rock The Bells, Touring, Tours
The days approaching
Just a few days until we begin the tour. This one is similar to the Smokin Grooves tours that I have done in the past. A multi-artist tour with a bunch of hip-hop acts. The difference this time is that we are using a smaller production.
I will be using a lighting system, which we will be carrying on the tour. There was talk of using local lighting at one point. I'm glad this was not the case. The audio guys will be using the same consoles and montiors but the PA will be from local sound companies. So there will only be two semi-trucks on this one instead of 4 or 5 which we had on the Grooves. The trucks are loading today and will be leaving from California later today.
There are also going to be two production buses.
If you know anything about this upcoming tour, you know that Rage Against the Machine will be headlining four of the shows. We will being using the production they are using which means my lighting rig will stay in the truck. Our day will be a bit easier on those shows.
We are going to need it since we are loading in at 6am the regular days of the tour with doors at 2pm. It is going to make for a very long day. The other good thing is we only have a couple of shows back to back. There will actually be quite a few days off. There goes a bunch of the per diem again.
The production crew will all be flying in on Tuesday evening. Some of us have worked together in the past and some have not. So it will be the first time meeting and getting to know each other. It's interesting how people who don't know each other learn to work and live together in a very short period of time. I can't think of any other industry that this occurs, except for maybe pro athletes.
Labels: Concert, Rock The Bells, Touring, Tours
