Your most embarrassing moment

  • Thread starter Thread starter castlerock
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one night on stage we were doing touch me. during the intro right where it comes to a stop and morrison starts singing, come on, come on, ...... I had jumped into the air so as to land just on 1 of the stop, and came right down on my guitar cord that was pluged into an Ampeg V4 stack. I ripped the wire out of the plug, the plug stayed in the amp and the connections had bent so they were shorted. Instead of Silence for the vocals there was just a huge loud short buzz for the singer. Everything kinda stopped for about a quarter of a second as I turned and slammed the off switch. Good think it wasn't a fender with the switches in the back. The band took off and I went fishing for a cord.
 
Too many to recall or admit - but 2 guitar related ones that stand out:

1. At the count of 4 the band starts the 3rd song on our set list (well everyone but me -I started the 4th song) - wrong song, wrong key, wrong riff, etc. There were about 3,000 in the audiience - not a subtle situation.

2. I and the bass player got our guitar cables tangled while crossing the stage (in mid song). He was hooked directly into his amp, which was on top of a stack of 2 cabs. I don't know why the cable did not simply pull out - but instead, his cable pulled down the amp, which pulled down the top cab with a huge crash as they landed on the stage. It was a dive bar with only a dozen people in the audiance - but we sure felt like fools.
 
Wow, these are some awesome stories guys. Kind of makes mine sound juvenile....

Let's just say that myself (guitar) and the other guitar player might have had a bad drinking problem... Our band would usually have a decent time, either headlining or right before the headliner, so we would sit at the bar and get plastered. Usually, there were no problems. It always seemed that we played "tighter" when he and I were drinking. (Probably 'cause we were so wasted that we didn't give a shit, but hey, it's all good.) WELL, this one night, instead of only drinking beer, we just used the beers to chase the shots of Jack. During this one song that really got us all hyped (we played upbeat alternative) I got up on the drum riser and did one of those "rock star, kick your feet up behind you" kind of jumps... When I landed I tripped over my own feet and, in an effort to save my SG from any possible damage, landed pretty much on my face. I jumped up as fast as I could, but my nose and mouth were bleeding, and the people in the front were on the floor laughing.

And one more...
I was in a country band bad in high school and we had regular weekend gigs at this biker bar that was close to our practice room. Our singer had a false tooth, on one of those wire things that clips into your mouth. During one of the songs that thing went flying out into the audience, and as we kept up the song, he proceeded to drop his acoustic and literally get down on his hands and knees to search for the thing. We ended the song without the acoustic or vocals, again, with everyone laughing.
 
well, this one isnt really my fault, but i was once playing with a band for a small crowd, probably around 50-100, and we were doing a few covers. we had just started crazy train, when the guitarist[ i was playing bass for this one, which i dont do usually do, but i digress] steps on his cord and pulls it out, even though i had told him to to put the cord through his strap. It falls to the floor before it was time to play, and he doesn't notice. I motion to him, the drummer motions to him, and he's not looking. Well, we get to the part where the guitar comes in, he starts playing, and suprise, no sound comes out. He looks to me with a very confused expression. I try to show him with a nod what the problem is several times, but he doesnt take the hint. In the end I'm yelling at him, and he can barely hear me. Eventually he finds the cord and plugs it in.

Long story short, we broke a record with the longest bass-n-drum crazy train intro ever. I'd guess about four and a half minutes of it.
 
This one was, like others, neither the band's fault nor mine. Nevertheless, it was excrutiatingly embarassing. I played in a punk rock band in high school, and the last show we did was at the tailgate party before our homecoming game. The athletic director comes and tells us we have ten minutes left before we have to shut down for the game, and so we figure three two-minute songs, with banter, would be about 7 minutes. That gives us 3 to spare. So we play.

Turns out the athletic director was wrong. Attendance at the game was roughly 14,000, and the crowd all stood for a moment of silence for two students that were drunk-driver victims the year before. Well, a moment of *near* silence. I hope they at least enjoyed the end of the set...
 
Speaking of "China Grove"...

The song starts off with the guitar rift of course. It also restarts the song after the solo and chorus break. One night I did this over the top, zealous, "look at me" guitar solo. There was a room full of sorority girls that had shown up from the local college and the band was feeling its oats. After playing the solo I remember thinking "I'm am so bad" (ego for I thought I was incredible) and jumped into the chorus before the break. The whole place is bouncing to the beat and the song stops. I go to start the main riff of the song and.......no sound. I had pulled out my 15 foot cable and the whole room is looking at me waiting for the rift. My band mates are looking at me nodding their heads indicating "come on, start the rift!". I look back at the rhythm player and nod my head emphatically, look at his hands with "you need to start the riff " in my eyes. He stares back at me with a puzzled look like "huh?" I do a 3 way nod this time tilting my head down to wards the cable on the floor and pointing my eyes toward the amp trying to indicate "You really need to start this" followed by a nod towards his guitar.

By this time the music has stopped way beyond the alloted normal time for the guitar to come in. I look out across a sea of beautiful babes who are looking at me irritated because they are still moving to the beat but there is no sound from the band. It was like a slow motion moment, the look in all those confused faces, the sound of their feet still moving to the beat, the numerous Farrah Fawcett hairdoos swinging through the air as heads with quizzical looks turned toward the stage. (That dates the story)

Finally the rhythm players light bulb goes off and he starts the rift...
....on the wrong fret. He's never done that part of the song and is looking at me pissed. First because he was forced to do a part he is not use to and second because now all the beautiful babes are looking at him like "you'r e late, and you suck".

During the ensuing scramble of human emotions that are trying to figure out "what the hell just happened there?" I got to my amp, 15 feet away, and plugged in the cord. At this point I went for broke, did an Ed Van Halen string tapping thing, very loud to distract the puzzled crowd. The guitar player re-adjusts to the right key and the song gets to the station but not necessarily on time or even possibly the right track.

What a way to leave an impression with a crowd as this was the last song of the night. Needless to say, the band went home without making any new female friends that night.
 
legionserial said:
I tend to have a fair few embarrasing moments. Like all those times I pick up a guitar and play it.
Click to expand...

hahahahaha
 
My most embarrasing moment at a gig was at my first ever gig. Our singer didn't turn up and we had been promised 2 or 3 songs before the main band went up at a local blue light disco. I put my hand up to sing, just so we could get out there. Anyhoo, we didn't really know any full songs, and about 15 seconds into Holidays In the Sun, the real band came running onto the stage unplugging us. They didn't even say anything, just turned the amps off and unplugged us and we all slinked off. We spent the rest of the night engaged in our true forte...smashing bottles against a brick wall on the side of the road.
 
Besides just playing badly usually the band I was in (the Naked Igwanaz) were playing a 21st party. Some oldies heckled us to play something slow so I came up with the ideas of a 12 bar blues waltz - kind of worked except while we were discussing what key etc every one tuned up but using 2 different tuners - one of which was running out of power & not registering right so the two guitars were in one key & the bass and sax in another - the guitarists didn't notice!!!!
Another week at a pub in Sydney I forgot my cable & no one had a spare - I ran around the city untl I found another gig & bought a 2nd hand spare from another player.
 
Probably have to say some gigs in Fremont where my sound was pretty fucked. Not one particular incident but rather a few merged together into one sonic nightmare.
 
Giant outdoor weekend long multi-band gig, my band was there with artists like paul rodgers.... when I was touring with a band and played a huge guitar solo on a different axe for one tune with great stage tone through the amp, wailing away, only to find out afterwards that that amp wasn't miked up live. it was a huge outdoor show, nobody heard a note of my playing in that tune, but I looked even stupider running around the stage and totally wailing LoL

now I have learned to discuss ideas with that with the live sound guy before assuming that every amp on stage is miked up and ready to be used.

Cheers,
Don
 
Easy one. I played a slide guitar piece in DADF#AD, then forgot to retune for the next song in DADGAD. :confused:
 
Standing 2 feet from Jimi Hendrix, playing his white Strat, playing the opening chord to "Foxey Lady" - and playing it wrong !!

So dumb, on so many levels.

Replacing Joe Walsh on guitar during a James Gang rehearsal.

So dumb, on so many levels.

That's just two of a hundred different stories.
 
mine ist quite as bad as some of the other ones, but it's still pretty funny. one time before a show i pulled off one of those magical feats where you are so wasted that you don't even know you're wasted. our first song was a blues improv jam. we usually start off this way, and its fun to just jam onstage, but that's when i'm sober. so anyways i manage to get the rythm part right but then for the solo i started playing in the wrong key about 2 beats ahead of the band and i didnt even notice because i was so wasted. so i was like hopping around and shit and acting all macho but sounding like crap. we pretty much got booed off the stage after that (although at the time i didn't really understand why) and when i watched the video later i laughed my ass off. still embarrassing tho
 
Once at a friends big outdoor party he figured he would pull a prank on me and sneak up behind me and pull my shorts down while I was playing with the band on stage. It was a hot day and little did he know I was wearing swimming trunks with nothing on underneath. There I was hanging out in all my glory and I didn't stop playing to pull em up and he had to sneak back and pull em up. I really wasn't that embarrassed though. :eek:
 
Did a big outdoor show in Chicago. Our bus had just parked backstage. The singer and I saunter off the bus as two chicks walk by. Ogling them as any guys would, I noticed how genuinely repulsive one of them was, and we joked out loud, at least loud enough for them to hear. Of course, we got dagger-stares from both of them.

Our set went well, and we slipped around to the front of the stage to mingle with some would-be fans. The next band takes the stage and begins their intro vamp. The poor girl we had verbally brutilized backstage takes center mic, and we here the announcer say, "Ladies and gentleman, please put your hands together for Nashville's newest sensation, PAM TILLIS."


I will never do that again.
I will never do that again.
I will never do that again.
I will never do that again.
I will never do that again.
I will never do that again.
I will never do that again.
I will never do that again.
...
...
...
...
I will never do that again.

Pam, will you ever forgive me?
 
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