I reinforced a lesson I’d learnt after last Thursday’s Brick gig – always be prepared.

My main points are strings. If you go on with month old strings, no matter how often you tune during a gig, they’ll sound flat. I’ve also gigged with strings fresh out from the packet. This has a similar effect though, as the strings need to be a little warn to your guitar first :P

So I recommend re-stringing on the rehearsal before the gig.

A few more points too, always bring spares! A spare guitar or just strings, a spare power adapter if you’re using effects, or spare batteries if you’d prefer.

On Thursday I wanted to gig my new Tele (blog post to follow :)). I guess I saw the gig as quite a casual affair. This is such a bad mistake to make. You should always treat every gig as if it’s your last, if not for your own enjoyment. I didn’t take any spares, as you may have guessed!

Half-way through the set, during our song “Friend or Foe”, I went to smash into a pounding loud chorus. I’d hit the effect pedal, and I picked on the low D-string (we play drop-tuned). Nothing happened! The string had bust.

So I had to go through the rest of the set, playing one of my favorate songs “Seven Questions” sans D-string. Such a shame.

On the plus side I’ve always wanted to state to someone

Yeah, when I snap a string, I keep going because I can compensate

but the truth of the matter is, you can’t for a low-D string. I was always inspired from a performace Gary Moore did with Phil Lynnott. He bust his string and kept going strong. However, I’m not playing blues solos, I needed that extra string!

So lesson learnt (again!) – awlays be prepared! :)

Once we got there and met the promoter things started to calm down. It was a casual event and the atmosphere was chilled – very pleasent after a busy week at work. Our nerves soon calmed down.

We didn’t know what to expect. I knew it was our fisrt gig in a while and I wouldn’t want to experiment infront of a larger crowd but because of the bar upstairs it seemed empty before we got on. We were waiting for a crowd to build but didn’t see one.

After the first song that all changed. People want to see what goes down when they hear things. It’s quite inspiring when this happens :)

It felt good to get on that stage again. This is the set we played:

• Friend or foe
• Confused
• Romeo
• Seven questions
• Perfect cure

It was the first time I got to use my new kit live on stage. It’s amazing beyond words. I didn’t hit all the sweet spots with the setting but I’ve got a much better idea of what to do next time and that was my aim.

We were a bit jumpy at first but soon picked up amazing pace. All I could think of afterwards was how much we’re gonna rock next time :P

I’ll get some photos up when I can find them.