Drummers who wait until they're on stage to get their kit together...

[Uladyne]

WTF?

We've all been here for hours, you couldn't at least put your stands up and put the cymbals on them while the other bands were playing? What about the floor tom legs?

If they start taking the kit apart piece by piece on stage when they're done I'm gonna lose my mind.

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

lol. Yeah every single shitty semi pro band on the planet.

 

[Chryst Krispies]

I toured with a band that insisted on breaking down the kit onstage after their set.

WHAT THE FUCK IS WRONG WITH YOU.
Take the shit off THEN break it down!

 

[TheWinterSnow]

Every decent band that I have seen starts putting their shit together as soon as they get to the venue, most will unload out in the parking lot and set their shit up and then move it backstage and wait until its time for them to set up. Hell even drummers with rack setups throw all their cymbals and toms on it and then have two people walk it out to the riser.

That band were just a bunch of unprofessional beginners, can't dock em too hard BUT, if they were in my area, the FOH engineer would have been giving the hell, yelling at them and running up on stage and setting up for them, which is never too pretty.

 

[Last_Confession]

yeah ive always had bands get everything set ready on side of the stage or itll take time from their set and ill cut them when they were supposed to finish

 

[Ermz]

Arg, more reminders of why I left live sound.

 

[Harry Hughes]

Hardly the only sin drummers commit either

 

[TheWinterSnow]

Hardly the only sin drummers commit either

Amen!

 

[Russtopher]

That's bunk. It's a dickhead move, period. EVERY club, no matter how small, has SOME room to get your kit put together. I waited until I got onstage to start putting my drums together, once. ONCE. The ass-reaming I got from the sound guy and the booker was enough to make sure my 17 year old ass learned a lesson.

Also, I've played a 4 piece kit for a good 10 years now, so it's a hell of a lot easier to get everything set up, and moved quickly onstage. Hell, there have been times where I've been set up AND mic'd up while the bass player is still trying to figure out how which end of his cable goes to his bass, and which end goes to the amp

 

[Trevoire520]

God don't even get me started. This goes along with:

Guitarists who leave their pedalboard onstage after soundcheck.
Keyboard players who leave their keyboards onstage after soundcheck. Not even moved to the side out of the way.
The band who HAVE to use their own drumkit and refuse to let anyone else use it. Of course their neither on first or last, so you've got 2 changeovers of kit in the middle of the gig.
Guitarists/Bassists who leave their wireless units plugged in for the whole night.
Drummers who turn up and ask "do you have a drum mat?" No. I'm not the drummer, you are. Bring your own shit goddammit!
Drummers who don't bring cymbal stands.
Drummers who don't bring hi hat clutch's.
Drummers who don't bring felts.
Guitarists/bassists who leave their guitar/bass onstage behind an amp all night.
Bassists who insist on 3 people carrying their ampeg 8x10" cab down several flights of stairs. Despite the fact that there's an identical model of cab in a 4x10 version already set up on stage. And the bass is coming through the PA anyway. And it's not exactly a big venue that requires a 8x10" cab.

 

[El_Gato]

I take my own drumkit, (or parts) and set it up before in the backstage (position, heights, etc). Then I only have to put it together on the stage (5 minutes)

 

[updog]

Guitarists who leave their pedalboard onstage after soundcheck.

Sorry but I don't get it. Wouldn't it be more of a hassle to unplug them and take them off the stage than leave them on stage, ready to be used? Is the pedalboard really that much on the way?

I'm not attacking you or anything, I honestly don't know.

The band who HAVE to use their own drumkit and refuse to let anyone else use it.

This I understand, but with cymbals excluded. If one of the other drummers cracked one of your cymbals, no one will confess, and no one will probably even notice it happening.

 

[slashvanyoung]

It's a bit rude towards the other bands to clutter everything up on stage.

I've got nothing against people leaving their heads or maybe racks on stage if there's plenty room, but I can't count the occasions when I had to unplug and move aside other people's gear.

 

[Trevoire520]

Sorry but I don't get it. Wouldn't it be more of a hassle to unplug them and take them off the stage than leave them on stage, ready to be used? Is the pedalboard really that much on the way?

I'm not attacking you or anything, I honestly don't know.

If there's a massive stage then yeah it's no problem to leave your stuff. But when you've got a relatively small stage, and a 3/4 band lineup, each with 2 guitarists, and everyone leaves all their shit lying about. You're relatively small stage can quickly become a tiny one.

 

[Trevoire520]

This I understand, but with cymbals excluded. If one of the other drummers cracked one of your cymbals, no one will confess, and no one will probably even notice it happening.

Yeah, everyone using their own breakables (cymbals, snare and kick pedal) is a given.

Which reminds me of another thing:

Drummers that don't bring their own snare/cymbals/kick pedal!

It's bad enough when it's their first gig. But when it's a band who have already played a few gigs, and then when you quiz them it turns out they had the same problem last time, and haven't learned from getting told then. That fucks me off.

 

[bryan_kilco]

Guitarists and bassists who set up oddly.

Instead of having the bass amp in between drums and one guitar amp, they'll have it off to the side. Cant stand it. Or when I have my amp set up sort of behind/even with the drummer so he can actually hear me (stage without monitors) and I look over and the other 2 guys are like way out in front and all oddly angled. Then I mention "maybe you could move your amps back a bit so we are like a wall of sound and not staggered all about" and they hear me but dont seem to care at all.

 

[arv_foh]

I rip people new assholes for shit like this

 

[MartijnPaauwe]

All of this is way too recognisable haha, when i was in my band we played a lot with different bands. I've drawn the conclusion that the most unprofessional bands with the least amount of experience most of the time have the largest mouth (arrogant attitude) towards other bands or FOH guys/gals. (but if you are a FOH engineer and you're yelling during a soundcheck that the triggers are giving feedback, then you can be called stupid, which i did, true experience)

I always, and i mean always brought my own snare/cymbals/hardware/pedals/chair and set it backstage up with cymbals on and the stands on the right heigt for me so it was just a matter of placing the stands at the right place. (But then FOH people already hated me enough because i'm lefthanded, and 95% of the drumming community is not, i always made the deadline though)

Another little experience, we played as supporting-band for a pretty famous-ish death metal band in the Benelux community which i'm not gonna name. Guys were totally professional and most of the guys were super-chill to hang out with. Drummer kept most of the time for himself, when it was their turn to set-up the gear for the show, the drummer did not bring his drum-chair, asked if he could borrow mine. I said fine but under no circumstance whatsoever was he allowed to change the height of my chair, the guy called me a douche-bag because of that. I almost thought of taking the chair back and let him figure out how to play their show, but i'm way too nice for that

 

[Loren Littlejohn]

The reason I said "semi pro" is because pros have roadies and drum techs set it up and all the semi pro bands have to setup around their shit.

 

[Dalinkwent48@aim.com]

I just dealt with a band thursday night that waited last minute to set the drums up. Oh, and AFTER soundcheck the drummer decided he wanted to move his set more upstage, which repositioned the mics, which lead to another soundcheck, and he couldn't understand why we had to re-check it. I forgot to mention- He had no front head on his kick drum either!Im not saying he had the head with a huge hole, no head at all, whatsoever, motherfucker accidently the whole thing!@#$$%%%$&&$#^