[Glice]

It was bloody ridiculous. If it was Paganini, I could understand it, but I'm perfectly capable of play the odd wobbly jig half-cut. Bastards, the lot of them.

[Count Mecha]

When I was a sophmore in highschool (a little over seven years ago I guess) Me and my friends who I had known since seventh grade decided to start a band. In youthful naivety we thought we would blow everyone away. We hated all the other bands and with our superior musical taste and our combined powers (to from voltron/captain planet) how could we suck?

At first it was me and two guitar players, I was going to play drums. I'd only been playing a little over a year and obviously wasn't very good yet. One of the guitar players had been playing for several years at that point and had lessons and everything, he was the only good one in our bunch. Even though he played very generic metal riffs and solos whatever. He was really into Ozzy and AC/DC around then. And then there was the rhythm guitarist and if anyone had to be called it he was our frontman, though he wouldn't sing. He was really into ska punk at that age and was really into Lagwagon and uh, Less Than Jake.

The problems almost started immediately when we would have disscussions about the band during lunch at school. The first topic that lasted for a while was what the band should sound like. It kind of makes me woner how real bands decided what they were going to sound like because in my real band, we don't discuss anything and our music just kind of happened.

Anyway, Rhythm guitarist was the most vocal about it and thought we should be a punk band. I was fine with it (would've been fine with almost anything really, I was just happy to be in a band), but metal guitarist wasn't having it. He hated punk rock with a passion because he felt it was too simple and easy to play, and would always do air guitar power chords in jest and complain about how lame those punk bands were. I would try to comprimise and suggest we just be a rock band. But Rhythm guitarist didn't like this and mistook it as I was implying we be a 'classic rock' band, emulating the sounds of The Who or whatever. "Why would you want to do that?" he'd say "Why would you want to do stuff some guys did 30 years ago?" and I'd always have to explain what I meant. Earliest on I tried to option for indie rock like Sonic Youth, Dinosaur Jr., Built to Spill or whatever. But everyone thought I was saying 'India Rock' and thought I was talking about middle eastern jams or whatever.

We never agreed on a sound much like the rest of the bands tenure of not agreeing on anything. After we had been around a couple of months and had practiced maybe twice. One of the more popular bands around the high school was doing this show at the local ampitheatre and wanted us to play. I immediately said yes even though we didn't have any material. But Rhythm guitarist was completely against it on the grounds that we weren't ready yet. What it really ended up being is that he just doesn't like to play in public, call it stage fright I guess.

The next issue with the band is what we were going to play. I can't remember Metal guitarist's stance, but Rhythm Guitarist had absolutely zero interest in writing any original material at that point. He wanted us to start out with a bunch of covers so that we would get in sync well with eachother. I thought it was a stupid idea and Metal Guitarist (who didn't really care at all about anything) didn't care either way. So the system they set up was each of us were going to pick two covers totalling up to six for us to do. Rhythm Guitarist's picks were AFI's 'Last Caress' (not the Misfits mind you), and Blink 182's 'Dammit'. Metal guitarist picked Crazy Train and nothing else. And I had to go through like twelve songs because they kept shooting down my picks. I tried to pitch Television's Friction and Ween's Cold and Wet, and Rhythm Guitarist shot both of them down violently. I amazed I got him to agree to Mildred Pierce since he hated (still hates) Sonic Youth. He might've done it out of pity since he shut down all of my other suggestions, never did get another song out there.

We mostly ended up playing Pierce at practices and Dammit/Last Caress only occasionally. We did Crazy Train once and it was so hard.

After that first while Rhythm Guitarist got a girlfriend who was a guitar player and wanted to be in the band. Neither Rhythm or Metal guitarist would switch to bass so she agreed to play bass even though she didn't really like it. Also, she wouldn't sing either. The three of us agreed that the band was pretty unfocused before and that mayber her addition would reorient us. If anything it made it worse.

She continued the two cover thing we had to do by adding some Rise Against song, and Metallica's For Whom The Bell Tolls. Bell Tolls ended up being the main song we did. I began to feel bad for the bass player because her 15 watt amp or whatever wasn't loud at all and the drums would overpower it with ease. So they asked me to play quieter, which I tried. The drums caused other problems too. Rhythm guitarist had never been around them before I guess and the snare drum was too loud for him I guess and he would blink everytime I hit it. This one practice he brought these earmuffs, you know the kind lumberjacks wear when cutting down trees. He wore those for about five minutes and then complained that he couldn't hear anything.

Speaking of practices they were severely unproductive. Almost every practice went in the vein of play for about ten minutes after arguing for twenty over which song we should play first. And then take an hour long break and watch Darkside of Oz or something.

At this point the band became pretty close to being a power couple thing between Rhythm Guitarist and his girlfriend the Bass Player. Rhythm Guitarist was controlling already but it was getting worse when he was working off his girlfriends vibes. Before then we never had a band name, just nothing came to mind. And then after Bass Player had been in the band a while, she and Rhythm Guitarist had all of these potential names for the band. And they were all horrible, and frankly kind of gay coming from him. The only two I remember out of several were Queen Arthur and Padpon (a combination of tampon and pad). Metal Guitarist and I severely hated Padpon, and he really hated Queen Arthur as well, I didn't care for it either, but if I had to call it something it would be that. I had made some counter name suggestions, the only one I can recall was The Angry Seaturtles. Rhythm Guitarist loved it, Bass Player hated it, so it went out.

The band dissolved about two or three years after inception when they FINALLY agreed to write original songs when the cover approach obviously wasn't working. I was super pumped that we were going to attempt originality. But it ended up being the worst practice (and the one that ended the band) when we went into my room and no one did anything. Rhythm Guitarist and Bass Player just rolled around on my bed, Metal Guitarist did scales in the corner and I couldn't do anything about it. I would've written the songs myself, but I'd only been playing guitar for a little while at that point and could barely make chords. Everyone once in a while someone would chime in in jest 'alright, so let's get writing.' and then silence. It's really pathetic to think about.

So yeah, probably the most indecisive band ever, can barely call it a band. But we played and spoke of it as such. I still hang out with all of those people. But yeah, I really hated being in that band. Sorry this was so long.

[SuchFriendsAreDangerous]

Originally Posted by SuchFriendsAreDangerous

I was in a blues band where apparently everybody hated me. two faced bastards we played good music for like a year before they finally gave me the boot. no hard feelings though, but I surely didn't get it. bands are like girlfriends, you have to play the game right. further, you have to be careful not to let your old lady know about your potential flings and mistresses... it tends to hurt feelings (helped to instigate my removal)

I thought this thread sounded familiar, I was bout to post this same thread

Originally Posted by Glice

I was in a shit folk band who actually got shitter after I left. I was kicked out for drinking too much and being awesome.

Originally Posted by EVOLghost

Psh people be hatin' when they can't hang and party as much as you.

thats essentially what happened to me, sans the drinking. My state presence had become to dominating, we were initially a diverse group where everyone got to sing two songs in a set, but as we progressed me and my friend Mau began to dominate, and my bluesman persona began to get a little to authentic for them.

[DeadDiscoDildo]

I've only had one serious band and so far I love it.

We've been together for 3 years now and are growing steadily and I can be a control freak sometimes but I think they like my choices and respect my vision. They havent quit, and they are both conistant, powerful players who come up with their own brilliant stuff but also listen to my crtiticisms.

It's preeeetty good, for now.

Only thing is I do all the booking and business shit, they just show up, leanr the songs, tell some friends to come out, and play.

[GeneticKiss]

Originally Posted by val-holla-ing

i have a love/hate relationship with my band. on one hand, when we're focused, we're amazing, and blow minds, but more often than not, we're kinda "off." our...their gear, which isn't really that great, is always falling apart (i try and take care of/repair my shit), we barely ever get more than 2 days of practice in (our frontman lives 8 hours away now) and can be really inconsistent live, our record was recorded in less than 24 hours and it shows at times, we can't settle on a drummer for ANYTHING, and at times it feels like the sounds i create for the songs are too subdued to give way to the songwriting, instead of playing an integral part in the songwriting.

that said, i really love my bandmates and love playing with them. when a gig is good, it's amazing. when we have time to flesh out songs the way we want to, in the studio, it's amazing. when the gear doesn't cut out and leave us high and dry, it's amazing.

i think we could take over the world if we had some sense of stability in regards to the band. it'll probably come with time, though (especially since our frontdude is sober now).

Except for that last part (our singer is on antidepressants), that sounds SO much like my band.

[automatic bzooty]

Originally Posted by pbradley

Not really. The bands I've been in were never serious endeavors and were short-lived.

this this this

[ni'k]

99% of people get into bands with the same part of their personality that also makes them a dick.

99% of people think that being a dick is the way to make good music, because its all this male punk ego fantasy trip.

that's why they fail imo.

it's always the humble people whose artistic ideas are not hindered by a completely inaccurate view of themselves and their abilities that are able to actually produce and work hard, and thus make good music. they might stereotypically turn into the opposite after some measure of success, but then they start to suck.

i think it comes down to the fact that you have to have a real love of music to be good, because if it becomes about any superfluous crap you're never gonna make a great album.

[Jeremy]

Nice post Count Mecha, I enjoyed reading it quite a bit.

My theory is that every band member has to have similar tastes in music to make the band work (So for example emo influenced drummer doesn't always argue with folk singer/guitarist). Additionally, I think most bands work best when they either have a designated leader who has majority of the say and writes most of the songs (A Black Francis or Stephen Malkmus) or where it's band members each writing their own songs (Mission of Burma, Dinosaur Jr, Husker Du, etc). Just my opinion, anyway.

Not really a long existence, but I jammed with a few friends a couple times and while fun, it was a total mess. It was last year.... It was myself, twin brother, and a guy we had known since middle school (About four years) on guitars..... One of our friend's friends on bass, and dork they knew from school on drums. Their drummer was a laughing stock, the kind of guy who tries to hang out with you even though he's really uncool. Drummer was awful, got tired easily, and could barely do 4/4 without fucking up. Bass player was great, though.

My twin brother is a great guitarist, but wants to do too many solos. He wants to be the star of the show, have everybody in the audience looking at him, that sort of guitarist. Our friend too is a great guitarist, but wanted his guitar to be the loudest, to the point where I could barely hear my guitar. So we thought of a few riffs to jam upon, yet even though myself and my brother tried to arrange some stuff, it never turned into anything other jams with the riffs while all of us taking turns playing solos. Like Count Mecha, I tried to get some indie rock thrown in but it was always either "Loud riff" or "Quiet riff then turn on distortion". It was fun to jam, but that was it, just guys jamming out and having fun, nothing serious.

~Jeremy~

[ni'k]

yeah i was always the kid who tried to hang out with you even tho he was uncool and you weren't. until one day i formed a different band, and we took off for the stars.

[ni'k]

but after that i had to get with the fresh new stylez and sounds of the 90's, so i went solo.

[pbradley]

I think the most fun I had in a quasi-band was one between my friend and I and a rotation of his other friends which was called "Bloody Fishknuckle and the Tumor Heads." It was pretty much a side to his other band CRAK. I played bass and he did casio keyboard and weird vocals.

A more traditional outfit was Dying Barnyard Animals in the sense that we had guitar, drums, bass, etc. We couldn't really agree on a style so we mostly made ridiculously exaggerated covers, like "My Generation" where the singer strutters so much that he constantly falls behind the song.

And now I just write stuff alone like this.

EDIT: but these were good times, so obvious irrelevant to everything forever

[Count Mecha]

Originally Posted by Jeremy

My theory is that every band member has to have similar tastes in music to make the band work (So for example emo influenced drummer doesn't always argue with folk singer/guitarist). Additionally, I think most bands work best when they either have a designated leader who has majority of the say and writes most of the songs (A Black Francis or Stephen Malkmus) or where it's band members each writing their own songs (Mission of Burma, Dinosaur Jr, Husker Du, etc). Just my opinion, anyway.

I certainly think all of those things are true. In Queen Arthur, yeah sure all three of us liked some of the same music, like say Velvet Underground, or the Who. But in terms of the music we wanted to play, none of us had the same direction in mind. In my real band Moonwatcher, the band is basically me and another guy. And our tastes are fairly different, I'm engaged by more esoteric (to most anyway) stuff like Boredoms or Sun City Girls. And he's really into older stuff like Roy Orbison and The Eagles. But it's also very easy for us to find a common ground. So that helps a whole lot.

I think both of those theories are very valid. In my case, the band works to where the members just write their own songs work them into the framework of the band.

Originally Posted by Jeremy

My twin brother is a great guitarist, but wants to do too many solos. He wants to be the star of the show, have everybody in the audience looking at him, that sort of guitarist. Our friend too is a great guitarist, but wanted his guitar to be the loudest, to the point where I could barely hear my guitar.

Oh boy do I know both of these kinds of guy. We have an essentially part-time member in the band and he plays guitar. He doesn't really know how to play any sort of rhythm but damn does he love to solo. I had Speech class with him in college and he'd always be reading guitar books on scales and stuff. He's good and all, but it's all he does and he does it way too much. And he always makes sure his guitar is the loudest if we play live, or even in practice. It wouldn't even bother me that much if it didn't take the energy out of the songs. But whatever, I wish he would just sing, I like it when he does that.

[Derek]

There is also the argument that having band members be influenced by different things allows for diversity in the long run. Honestly though that's never really worked for me unless there's a member who's not bothered about what he plays.

[Jeremy]

Something funny, last night after posting a friend (bassist) on Facebook asked if I wanted to jam with him, a mutual friend, and the old guitarist I had jammed with.

What's awkward about it is my twin brother used to play with them, so it's essentially swapping one Shaw for another Shaw.

I'm going to noise that shit up....

~Jeremy~

[SuperCreep]

a few in high school, most notably one that took their influences from coheed and cambria and the mars volta. i purposely sucked my way out of that one. blech.

[FreshChops]

the idea of a "band" is always intimidating to me. To me, collaborating means compromising.... at least at this point in my life.

It doesn't help that I have played with dozens of musicians, and have yet to sync up with anyone I share the same taste with. Enjoy playing with all types of musicians and enjoy good company. Of the few that I've played well together with, they tend to be the most flaky or live over an hour away.... it's always something. To be honest (and humble) musicians are the most dependable of folks.