Hammond Music

Posts Tagged ‘rock bands’

If you are at a gig of a small, unknown band then take a look around the back as nine times out of ten you will see a small van that they use to hold all of their equipment. How important is the van to the group?

Dogs were thrown out in the early days of touring as the van became the best friend to many groups simply because they are cheap and easy to run. Many famous bands have a lot of money to spend on gigantic tour buses or they have the sponsorship by a company to actually have the bus during the tour. A lot of the smaller groups are not able to gain access to the big tour buses because sponsors are only interested in making a return from their investment.

What happens is the group get together and chip in money towards buying a van so they can use it for transportation use. Once again is can be very difficult to buy a van outright even if there are three or more people paying for it so more often than not bands will look into van lease because it works out cheaper.

The band then have any damages or accidents covered too so they do not have to take out any extra things they do not need like the band that took out pick up truck leasing just to cover them if the worst case scenario happened.

Although cheap van leasing is likely to be the best option for your band, it is also possible to get a van to run on vegetable oil which of course will save the band on fuel costs. You will need to take at least a trailer full of the oil with you as there are no refuel stations as yet where you can load up on the stuff.

After watching some bands old and new it is clear to see that some of them literally throw the money they earn away. Is this for effect for the fans, a crowd pleaser or literally because they earn so much money they can do what they want, when they want to.

Musical instruments really do not come cheap no matter which one you play and if you are seeking out the best of the best it is going to cost you a small fortune everytime you have to go out and buy a new one. However some bands choose to smash their things after every single set.. However when it comes to bands some choose to smash their gear after every single set they play. Kurt Cobain nearly always insisted on jumping headfirst into Dave Grohls drum kit or smashing his guitar onto the floor of the stage along with himself. They were in fact a very popular band, only breaking up after the death of Cobain. Well the drugs could have had an affect on his minds ability to think before acting but he seemed to be able to play the guitar and sing just as well so why not do this too?. What actually led him to enjoy this?? Well the drugs could have had an affect on his minds ability to think before acting but he seemed to be able to play the guitar and sing just as well.

So what was the issue? The Nirvana fans were just the same as any other rock fan at the time.. Not the fans who started listening to Nirvana when they became huge in the early 90s but the fans who has listened to them since the album Bleach and whose devotion made the success possible. Nirvana fans were just like any other rock fans at the time. The fact is that it doesnt happen as much as it used to and it is perhaps down to a fad where the fans loved to see the artists tearing apart the equipment they had used.

Of course if you are more into Disc Jockeying then perhaps smashing those expensive DJ speakers is not the best course of action to take, also make sure to have those DJ headphones on standby to ensure your safety.

The real truth behind it is that now bands will actually go up and approach MTV as well as Activision to be in the games Guitar Hero and Rock Band but there was a time in which they had to go around begging bands to allow them to use the songs in the games. This is more so for Guitar Hero when they were looking to release the first game as artists did not feel comfortable handing over master recordings to a company on the outside. Although some of the bands did actually allow for some covers to be done for the game. They had absolutely no idea that the game would become the success it did even with the cover versions. But then came the almost inevitable number two and bands started to let them use master recordings so by the time three was on its way out bands were approaching Activision? What had happened to make this happen??

Well the truth behind it is that because bands were appearing in a game that millions of gamers were now playing they were receiving more publicity and more record sales. However there are still a few bands out there that refuse to be in the game saying that playing the real thing is better and some are still not wanting to give up master recordings. Led Zeppelin are one of the biggest rock bands of all time and are the main band refusing to be in Rock Band or Guitar Hero as they are uneasy with handing over recordings to complete strangers. Of course they could always do what the Sex Pistols did and just rerecord it which is what happened when they found out the original tapes were missing.

Nothing can beat original, real guitars so why not pick up one of those electro acoustic guitars or perhaps even an ultra cool electric guitars and get learning in the right way.