Open Mic

I just read through the local newspaper, and much to my surprise (and pleasure, I might add), I saw that a local pub is going to start having Open Mic sessions the first Thursday evening each month! It's not a lot, but it's the first time since I started playing guitar, that any pub in my town even has live-music playing. I'm thinking that going to one of those Open Mic sessions is going to be a great way to get out there, show others what I can do, possibly find a band or some folks to start one with, and generally help motivate me to become a better guitarist and musician. This is like a perfect opportunity for me, but I'm not sure about the general rules about Open Mic sessions, as I've never even seen one.

I know that, as they wrote in the newspaper, all genres and styles are allowed, from Jazz, Swing and Blues to Hard Rock, Glam Metal and Death Metal, but that's all I know about this opportunity.

My biggest concern is: Do you normally have to bring your own guitar to Open Mics? The pub says they'll arrange for two Guitar Amps, a Bass Amp, a PA system and a Drum-kit to be available for those Open Mics, so I'd suspect that people have to bring their own Guitars, Pedals and Cables, but I'm not sure if this is how it normally is at Open Mic sessions?

Sounds like fun!!! Usually open mics are just that - a microphone. Those are more of a singer/songwriter thing. This sounds like they are setting up for pickup bands.

Do they have a "house band" that you could just sit in with an play guitar?

If they are providing amps, you would just show up with your guitar, and maybe some pedals. Your first time out I would skip the pedals. You don't want to turn it into a big deal getting setup.

Let us know how it goes...that sounds awesome!!

Definitely bring your guitar! Most open-mics provide everything else; microphones, cables, PA, etc. You could bring your pedals too, but I agree with Rich - skip the pedals the first time out, then you'll see how it all works, and go from there.

Good luck with it!
Mike

The plan they've got for it is to have a new, upcoming, unsigned band playing for 30-45 minutes, before the stage becomes open to everyone else. After that, anyone who wants can just go on and jam with others. I sadly don't know any local musicians, who could be interested in jamming together there, but I'm sure someone will go up there and play the other instruments. I'll probably just sit in for a while the first time, just to get a feel for how it works, after that, I might throw myself up there (should probably bring some friends for support...), and see how things go.

It seems that leaving my pedals at home would be a good idea (until I have a band that can take up that coveted "headline"-slot at the beginning). I can only hope for the best. Until the first time I get the chance to jam there, I'll have to brush up on my scales a bit. Maybe learn to identify all the notes of the Major, Minor and Dorian Modes to begin with, since Major and Minor are generally used a lot and I've read the Dorian Mode gets used a lot in 80's-style Rock.

Definitely go for it! Open mic's are a good opportunity for new bands/solo players who don't have a lot of experience to get out and play in public.

I've played a number of open mics in Glasgow and you get a good mix of serious players, which means you have good networking opportunities, and people who just do it for fun.

Originally Posted by: Stephen QuinnDefinitely go for it!

I intend to. I don't know how it'll go once I get the chance to play for complete strangers, with complete strangers no less, but then, if I knew, there wouldn't be any point in going :)

With a bit of luck, I might just happen to find a few serious band members this way, so it'll be worth a shot, once I get past this other gig I'm preparing for. By then I don't have to worry about a work project either, so I can focus completely on this opportunity. I hope they're gonna increase the frequency a bit if it becomes a success.

Okay, so it's probably more of an Open Jam than an Open Mic, but since I'm still new to that kind of things, I think it's easy to think it's the same...

One question I just thought of: How does it usually work? After you go up on-stage and plug in, and there are others up there with you, do you just play a couple of songs everyone on-stage knows, or do you just stand or walk around up there and jam away until someone gets tired of jamming and leaves and you'll have to jam on without them? Or do you play both songs and random improvised jams?

I don't know how things are over in Denmark, but the "Open Mike" nights around here usually mean that people show up and perform, one after the other. "Open Jams" are a very different thing... the few I've seen quite honestly are just blues nights. There is usually a host band, and you can go up and join in... supposedly. In reality the band just ends up playing the night. But that's just my very limited experience with "jam nights".

Open mike nights, again, there may be a host band. But this is quite different. Individuals or complete bands will have a turn and go up and perform a rehearsed piece. Its not unusual for the host band to back up an individual... an acoustic guitar player may ask them if they know a song, and if they do, they may all play together, or maybe just the drummer and bass player. Most of the time though, the people perform rehearsed songs without backup if they are solo performers, or just their own band members if they are band.

I'd be cautious about how entertaining you'll be trying to "jam" something with complete strangers in front of a live audience... think how rough 1st time rehearsals can be. Better to come prepared to perform a rehearsed piece. If nothing else, you could call or go down to the pub and ask what the format of the evening is meant to be.

I didn't realize how fortunate I was to live where there are a LOT of open mic venues. It seems a lot of bars are doing mic nights in place of hired bands for the obvious fiscal advantage.

Every venue seems to have it's own interpretation of what "open mic/jam night" means. At some a garage-type band plays all night and it's rare to see anyone else join them (lots and lots of blues). At some you'll see start-up bands show up and test their stuff on a live audience- in between the regulars. At the really good ones there's someone in charge making sure anyone that would like to play - will play. They will ask you what you would like to do. If there's someone else there with same song or similar ambition they will put you in with them. Either way they will work you in. These are very enjoyable to watch and generally well attended. The novice gets the same applause as the career musician.

I've never seen an open mic venue that didn't have it's clique.The same people who show up every week, have gotten real comfortable there, and pretty much control and dominate. To me that's a pretty intimidating scenario .... I just want to have fun - not try to win the approval of the "home team".

I don't mean to put you off the opportunity Kasperow - definitely go. If all you do is meet some like-minded people it will be time well invested. What I do is leave my guitar in the trunk of my car and just listen and scope on the vibe - if I feel I (more often "we" because I always go with a guitar buddy) would fit in (or, more accurately, are good enough) then I/we can go get the guitars.

Good luck, I'll be anxious to hear "how they do it in Denmark"










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Slipin: So I should just rehearse a few songs so I can play them as tight as possible? Is there usually any rule regarding originals vs. covers in this situation? I don't know for sure if the opening band that night is going to act as "house band" that people can go up and play with. I'll have to check out the place before actually participating in the jam night, just so I learn how things work there :)

Fretsmith: You're lucky to have several venues that offer this opportunity near you. Where I live, there's only one actual venue, and a handful pubs and bars, and they aren't the best places to play. At all. The venue is oversaturated with Blues and Jazz (it was built specifically to give these genres a place to be played after all), and the pubs usually just have a television showing either a soccer match or VH1, because live music is too expensive. The only way to actually get permission to play at those pubs and bars is to either play for free, or make sure people buy lots of drinks., and in most cases still play for free.

This is the first time that a pubin my town outright invites people to come play. They probably do it for the increased draw it gives when a pub does have live music, but I have a feeling some musicians are still going to show up, just to get a chance to play. I'm definitely going to bring my guitar and leave it in the back of the car. That way, I can see how it works, and if it looks fun, I can go out, grab my guitar (and get some fresh air), and go back in to take the stage when the chance comes. I'm not quite sure how long they allow each person to be up there, but there's only two ways to find out. Call them, or better yet, go there on the night :) I'll have to see if anyone I know can come, just to have a kind of support group so I won't be playing for only complete strangers, even if I'm playing with strangers.

In any case, it's gonna be a new experience for me. If I can manage to get a few people I know (friends and family) to come along, great. If not, I'll have to go alone and have someone else film my timeslot on the stage :) I'm still going to wait until April before I go and actually play, so I don't have as much to worry about away from the guitar (and I'll have a lot more practice/rehearsal time starting in April and May).

The situation here on the east coast of the US is the same as Slipin describes.

I would say you should have some covers rehearsed that will go over well with the crowd there. You may need to go a couple of nights to just scope things out to see what goes over well with the crowd. If you play something the crowd doesn't know, they are likely to lose interest. Same thing if it's a rhythm-n-blues type crowd and you play GnR. You want to try to engage the crowd. You are there to entertain them, not yourself.

Take it from me, it's a lot of fun to play music that you may not normally listen too. I'm going over my part for Gladys Kight's version of "heard it through the grapevine" and it is a blast to play, even though it's not a song I would play in my car on the way to work.

Good luck with it!!!

Originally Posted by: maggiorThe situation here on the east coast of the US is the same as Slipin describes.

I would say you should have some covers rehearsed that will go over well with the crowd there. You may need to go a couple of nights to just scope things out to see what goes over well with the crowd. If you play something the crowd doesn't know, they are likely to lose interest. Same thing if it's a rhythm-n-blues type crowd and you play GnR. You want to try to engage the crowd. You are there to entertain them, not yourself.

Take it from me, it's a lot of fun to play music that you may not normally listen too. I'm going over my part for Gladys Kight's version of "heard it through the grapevine" and it is a blast to play, even though it's not a song I would play in my car on the way to work.

Good luck with it!!!

Thanks :)

You bring up a very good point that I tend to either overlook or ignore when picking out songs to learn. I usually just pick songs that I love that I want to learn, but I should try learning a bunch of songs I normally don't listen to. That pretty much covers anything within the Grunge-subgenre, as well as a few older Rock Bands. I really should be more open about my song-selection, so it doesn't end up being 50% GnR and 50% Aerosmith...

To be fair, though, I've been spending a fair bit of spare-time this month with Rocksmith 2014, and I'm pretty close to nailing both "My Generation" by The Who (whom I don't listen to very much, if at all. I only actually knew the CSI-themes...), "Paint It Black" by the Rolling Stones and the Lead Guitar-parts of "We Are The Champions" by Queen. The original "Knocking On Heaven's Door", by Bob Dylan was pretty easy to nail too, since I already knew the GnR-version. Same chords, just without Power Chords in the Chorus, and none of Slash's solos (obviously...), and it is tuned to Standard Tuning, not Half-Step Down like the GnR-version is. "My Generation" and "Paint It Black" are actually some pretty good songs, yet they're sort of easy to play.

I should probably also pack a handful of Blues-classics into my repertoire, just to have a bit more variation. You never know what kind of audience you'll be playing for, if they're into Blues or into Heavy Metal or anything in between (and it's always fun to play the Blues).

We all do the same thing - we learn to play songs we are interested in learning. Once you move from that to being part of a band and performing to entertain, your personal preferences of music become much less important. To do that, you need to find like minded musicians and a venue to play in that likes the same music. It's hard enough to put a band together without those limitations! :-).

I've known people who were in multiple bands so they could play music they perferred.

It sounds like Rocksmith is helping you out. "We are the Champions" is a song I should learn. The guitar work in that song is pretty cool.

Yeah. I know what you mean. I'm having lots of trouble finding people to play with who like the same bands as me, but maybe if I were to actually be less restrictive on myself, I might have a lot more luck finding people to jam with. The only real places where I draw the line are extreme Metal and Cover-only, and I'm not really a huge fan of Jazz or newer Punk either. Other than that, I can go with playing several styles of music, although 80's Hair Metal and 70's/80's Rock are the styles that I would prefer to play. I won't deny that there are a few good newer artists, with some pretty cool songs, though. And of course, bands like Queen, the Rolling Stones, Led Zeppelin, The Who, and so on also have a ton of great songs that could be fun to learn.

Yeah, you have to draw the line someplace. My abilities limit me too. As cool as it would be to play in a jazz or jazz fusion band, my chops are certainly not up to it.

Sounds like you've got a plan and the right attitude.

You know, right after posting that other comment, I looked at a Danish website for finding like-minded musicians, and there was a post by a drummer and a singer, who were looking for some people to start a band. Granted, they wrote that they are mostly into Pop and Soft Rock, but I still sent them a message. If it turns into something serious, I'll get a chance to play some music with others, even though it's probably not going to be the Hard Rock I love. But hey, even one of the best guitarists in Denmark (at least in my opinion) plays with pop-bands when they need a guitarist to go on tour, and he seriously manages to make it sound great even though he normally plays Hendrix-style Rock in his own band. And really, playing in a Pop-Rock band won't be all that different from the music I love. 80's Hair Metal has a lot of nick-names, one of them being "Pop-Metal", and both Deep Purple, Aerosmith and Queen have made a few great songs that have a Pop-like sound to them. So it's not going to be only bad, if I end up joining that band. And in about half an hour, I'll find out if that other guitar-student at my music-school is up for playing together at that upcoming event too.

On the bright side, that other guitarist is up for playing together at the music-school-event-thing. On the not-so-bright side, neither of us are allowed to have any control over any aspect of the whole thing... At all. I'm thinking once we're past this event, that it might be in my best interest to just stop taking lessons there, since it sometimes feels more like a hindrance than a help.

Now, I don't have any problems with playing an improvised Blues Jam, although playing an actual song would be preferable, in my opinion, but it kinda removes the "improvised" part when we'll be rehearsing what we're going to be playing. And that's before I even start talking about the tone, we've been told to use. It sounds nothing like Blues, or at least not like the Blues I've heard. I mean, come on... It's supposed to be a Blues Jam, right? Then why is the Gain dialed to 0? Blues needs a little Gain to sound right.

Another thing that bugs me mindlessly is being told only to use the A Minor Pentatonic Scale, and only the box-pattern starting at the 5th fret on the E-string. That's quite a restriction, I'd say. I tried improvising some stuff using the Dorian, Minor, Major and Phrygian scales at different points today, and I got told that I should stop hitting notes outside the Pentatonic Scale. Why should I stick to one pattern of the Minor Pentatonic Scale, when I know a few other scales that could also sound good? Or heck, when I know the Minor Pentatonic Scale by Intervals, and not just the basic box-pattern?

At least I get to use my own guitar, strap and picks. Right now, I'm seriously starting to second-guess whether signing up for that event was the right call...

Sorry for complaining about it, but it does frustrate me a lot, having thousands of restrictions placed upon me, regarding a simple Blues Jam... I really don't like to do stuff when I have absolutely no control over anything other than whether my pick hits the strings it's supposed to or not...

Well, in between rehearsing my pre-planned improvisation-parts for the music school show thing, practicing stuff I'd be happy to play, and jamming along to records (just to see how screwed up my timing is), I've managed to learn a few licks in some solos by just hearing the songs a lot of times and trying to replicate the melody. I also managed to get some stuff going yesterday, after finally getting a new phone (one with a mic that doesn't make it sound like I'm trying to drown someone or cut through diamond with a buzzsaw, to make it even better).

I managed to get a quick recording of the Rhythm parts for a new song that sort of just popped up, but I'll have to do a re-take tomorrow, because of a stupid text message that caused the phone to ring, which then got on the recording... Annoying, but that's life. I hope to have the opportunity to record it all over tomorrow, import it into the recording software that came with my amp, program some bass and drum tracks (as much as I'm opposed to computer-produced music, it's the only feasible solution until I find a band. It's cheaper than buying a bass, a drumkit, a crapload of mics and then learning to play those instruments...), and mess around with some Lead Guitar stuff over it. And hopefully have it done by the end of the week... Maybe I should try asking for help from the one person that supports me 100% and happens to have an iMac that can run my recording software better than my laptop... Ask if she wants to help me record, produce and mix some music (probably not for free, though)

If my plan works this time, it should also give me something to showcase to other musicians when I find some people to start a band up. Granted, this thing is in the slower end of what I play. I do also have a few faster songs, but they aren't being recorded until I find if this works.

Funny enough, this is the only original that I use my ES-345 on... And it's the only one where I play in Standard Tuning, rather than a half-step down. Well, that can be changed. I just need to start playing around with it a bit more (it helps that I got it a dedicated strap, so I now have one for each of my 3 Epiphones. Sitting down with an electric just isn't as fun).

In any case, at least I'm progressing with my own goals :)

Good for you!!! It sounds like it's becoming a positive experience despite some of the misgivings you expressed last week. It's hard sometimes to have to work within restrictions, but sometimes doing that ultimately makes you a better player. There is something to be said for doing more with less, whether it's less speed, less notes, less scale shapes, etc. It helps you break patterns that you have formed and naturally repeat.

Once you get a recording together, I'd love to hear it!! I'm sure others would too. It's inspiring and motivating to hear how others are progressing.

Originally Posted by: maggiorOnce you get a recording together, I'd love to hear it!! I'm sure others would too. It's inspiring and motivating to hear how others are progressing.

If it works out without too many problems, and I actually manage to get a recording done, I'll probably do as many recordings as I can. I've got a few songs that I just need Bass, Drums and Lyrics for, and if I can program the Bass and Drums, I can get some help with the lyrics. My sister has already offered to help with that, if I want it. I won't be writing lyrics during the recording session, though. That's just a waste of time.

If it works out, and I get some recording done, at long last, I'm going to share it here first, so I can get feedback from other musicians first, before throwing it on YouTube and sharing it with friends and family. Should also be easier to find others to play with (either start a band or go with a solo project so I get to play music I love), since most of the new musicians I've jammed with don't want to try writing. They just want to play completed songs.