Worst onstage disaster

Barry Gaskell · From: Cheshire, UK

My worst experience on stage in my playing career was during a show backing a well known English singer, who played his acoustic guitar so heavily he often broke a string. So I had put together two instrumentals to give him time to put a new string on. This particular night was no exception and sure enough he broke a string. Always the 4th string. He introduced me as usual and I kicked off with 'The Preacher'. A few bars in and two 'YES TWO' of my Sho-Bud pot metal knee levers broke........I battled on with more than usual bar movement to compensate. A few bars later strings 3 and 4 broke. I nearly melted in panic and only a fellow guitarist from another band ,who had seen it all from the wings , dashed on and finished the number on guitar. That sho-bud didn't last long and I retired it and bought an Emmons Le-Grande.
Come on guys, admit your worst nightmare on stage.
Barry

Ernie Pollock · From: Mt Savage, Md USA

I was backing an old fellow at the Bowling Green Fire Dept social hall back around 1978, I think, the old boy looked back at me and said Ernie, do you know 'time changes everything', I said sure do Carl, he stepped up to the mike, turned around at me and said 'C', then back to the mike, went to sing the first word, fell back, he had my friends new guitar on, and was heading for the drums as he went back, I reached out from my pack seat, grabbed the back of his head to let him down as easy as I could, he was dead before he hit the floor. The mans name was Carl Hillegas, from Cumberland Maryland. I often think of Carl as I grow older.

Ernie Pollock Crying or Very sad

http://www.hereintown.net/~shobud75/stock.htm

Damien Odell · From: Springwood, New South Wales, Australia

About a year ago I was doing a rushed setup for a gig, and I must have pressed a wrong button on my tuner.....
I ended up tuning all my strings on the steel a semi-tone flat. I should have picked it up when I was tuning and all my strings seemed sharp - but being in a rush I believed the tuner.....a mistake....
It wasn't until the first song started that I knew I was in big trouble. All the pedal and lever changes were out of whack cause of the string tension difference, and the distraction of having to hold the tone bar a fret up wasn't easy to get used to. Every time I did solo it was embarassing, because there was a very good steel player standing not far from the front hearing me play for the first time (he left after the first set before I had time to redeem myself)
I struggled on until the break between sets and I had time to re-set my tuner.
Not fun at all......

Jack Stoner · From: Kansas City, MO

I had one a couple of years ago at Silver Springs Park (Ocala, Fl). We opened for a Marty Martel "Opry Legends" show. The park required us to be there at 9 am for "sound checks" and we set up our equipment but never had a sound check until 10 minutes before we went on as the Nashville band and singers took up all the setup and rehersal time.

The steel was sitting on center stage and the outdoor (covered) stage sits facing south so the steel was in the sun for several hours and heated up the underneath rods which are aluminum. When I sat down, 10 minutes before show time, to check the tuning on the guitar - everything was out, including the raises and the lower pulls because of the heat. It was a frantic couple of minutes getting it back in tune before "show time".

I learned my lesson as we did the Opry Legends show the next year, too but I kept the steel out of the sun until showtime.

I had another issue the next year. John Hughey was there with the Nashville band so one of the singers we had for our show decided they would do "look at us" and were planning on having Hughey come out and stand by me and watch me when I did the break on the song - luckily when it came time they couldn't find Hughey.

Greg Simmons · From: where the buffalo (used to) roam AND the Mojave

As a youth, I was entered in the annual Kiwanis Music Festival "Age 12-and-under Plectrum Guitar" classification, as I recall playing a somewhat jazzy chord-melody thing.

I was the only entrant, performed my piece, was adjudicated and awarded...second place Shocked

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Ernest Cawby · From: Lake City, Florida, USA, R.I.P.

Time November 1949, on the stage at the Hayride in Shreveport, I got up from sitting down playing a National D 8, sharp corners when I stood to turn around who was right there but Zeke clements all 6'.6" of him the corner of that national went right thru the main body of that Martin, I thought I was dead, comming off stage he would not let me say I was sorry, He said it was both our faults I was looking back and so were you and we met. What a fine Gentleman he was.
Try that with some of todays gentlemen.

ernie

Michael Johnstone · From: Sylmar,Ca. USA

I have a half-dozen doozies but here's one: This was back in 1970 when I was still just a six-string player and I was in a sort of "blue-eyed soul" band as it used to be called. We were doing the Otis Redding classic "Try A Little Tenderness" where it opens with organ and vocals for a verse and then the drums come in lightly and it builds from there eventually into a powerful foot stomping coda of "Got-ta,Got-ta,Got-ta" You know how it goes. Well we were playing a dance in a college cafeteria in Va Beach and for a stage we were using a bunch of those 10' cafeteria tables that fold up in the middle for storage. We put about 4 of those together to form a stage and the drummer laid a rug across the middle to hold them all together - drums,amps,mic stands and everone was up there - a 6-pc band. The joint was packed - at the beginning of the 2nd set we started the tune and the drummer was in the bathroom. At the point where the drummer was about 15 seconds from his entrance into the tune he came bounding out of the bathroom and sprinted across the room. He jumped on a drum case and then up to the end of the middle table causing it to fold up - dumping his drum set in all directions taking the ampline with it and causing all band personel to leap for their lives off the front of the stage which in turn caused the centers of the remaining tables to go skyward as well,launching the mic stands and monitors into the audience. It was like a bomb went off beneath the stage. Luckily the B-3 was deemed too heavy to put on the "stage" and all it suffered were lacerations from the falling debris. The sight and cacaphony of all that was unbelievable and hilarious as you might guess and people were rolling on the floor in hysterical laughter. It took us the better part of an hour to set everything back up and get going again - without the tables this time. It wouldn't bother me so much now but at the time I was about 22 and was sure I was an up-and-coming rock star. If you've never been laughed at for 30 minutes by 500 people you were trying to impress,you don't know the depths of humiliation we endured.

Mike Perlowin · From: Los Angeles CA

I was playing for the late Jerry Eugene and the “gimmick” of the band if you can call it that, was that I played a different instrument on every tune. 6 string electric guitar, 6 string acoustic guitar, pedal steel, 3 neck stringmaster, mandolin, 12 string electric guitar, 5 string banjo (I suck at banjo) and Maybelle Carter style autoharp. It came to over 100 strings to keep in tune. So we decided that every member of the band was responsible for tuning one of my instruments as well as their own. The bass player was in charge of tuning my mandolin.

Every band member had a song on which he was featured. Mine was orange Blossom Special on the mandolin.

Well, we were playing at a really 1st class place, the best club we had ever played at, and it was opening night. We were all a little nervous about it, but we did allright till it was my turn to be featured. We started the song, and I started to play, and discovered that the bass player has accidentally tuned my D strings to C#.

There was no way to fake it. We had to stop playing and the bass player apologized over the mike while I retuned.
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Terry Farmer · From: Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA

One: due to faulty house wiring, I stepped up to the mike and ZAP!!!!! Shocked

........right on my butt into the drum set. Quite a ruckus! I always tested mikes with the back of a wet finger after that near death experience.
Two: An overzealous "fan" was upset that the evening had ended and let me know about it with a well placed uppercut to the chin. The ensuing melee was a blast, though. He saw the error of his ways and I had a cool "stitches story".

Ken Williams · From: Arkansas

I had only been playing for about a year so I was green. We were doing a fair showcase in order to try to get some fair bookings. David Houston as well as several other name acts were there. It was one of those kind of deals where you only get about 5 minutes to prepare. Peewee Rogers, David's steel player, told me that they were going to be around for the whole show. So, I asked him if I could just play his steel, since it was already set up. He said that would be okay. David and his band did their thing and we were to go on about an hour later.
Barely had time to sit down before we started our first song. It was a version of Faded Love in which the harmonica played a real lonesome intro by theirself, then I was to bring the band in with a strong steel intro. Well, the last note sounded on that harmonica and I started my intro, only to find that the steel was completely out of tune. I'm not talking about a string here and there. It sounded like someone had twisted every key a couple of turns one way or the other. It was so bad that my ex-wife noticed, and she was as tone deaf as they come.

I learned a lesson that day.

Ken

Terry Farmer · From: Albuquerque, New Mexico, USA

Then there was the shotgun incident............on second thought........nevermind! Shocked

Jim Eaton · From: Santa Susana, Ca

Playing at the "Bellwood Lounge" in Simi Valley in the early 80's with my band Savannah. I was there 45min's early as always even though it was "sit down" five nighter. I was thinking to myself that with that jukebox playing "Whisky River" so loud that I was really glad to have my Korg tuner. Just then a woman who was 3 sheet's in the wind drunk as a skunk came weaving across the dance floor from the buffet with a heaping pile of salad with lots of ranch dressing on a plate. She came right up to the edge of the stage, looked at me sitting behind my steel and yelled at me that "I hate that song!" and proceeded to dump the whole plate of salad all over my feet and pedals, rods, pedal bar. The managment ask her to leave and when she pulled out of the drive way, made a left turn over the raised median, ripping off the muffler and tail pipe of her car. She proceeded to gun it, and shot across the other two lanes, jumped the curb and knocked a hole in some guys block wall the size of her buick! When the cop's found out the whole story they wanted to know if I wanted to file assult charges! lol
JE:-)>

Bo Borland · From: South Jersey -

I was playing 6 string in a union wedding band. The bandstand was surrounded by a low fake brick wall. The bride asked the bandleader if her brother could sit in an play a song. I gave him my guitar and he stepped up to the mike. While he was rocking out, doing his solo, he sat back on the brick wall and fell over backwards, hit his head on the floor and knocked himself out.. he died later that night.
A few years later at a party, a couple pickers were telling war stories when I told this one... from across the room I hear the hostess say.. "That was my brother!"
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Bo Borland
Rittenberry SD10 , Derby D-10, Quilter TT12, Peavey Session 400 w/ JBL, NV112, Fender Blues Jr. , 1974 Dobro 60N squareneck, Rickenbacher NS lapsteel, 1973 Telecaster Thinline, 1979 blonde/black Frankenstrat
Currently picking with
Mason Dixon Band masondixonband.net

John Roche · From: England

I was doing a live TV gig called Pebble Mill at One in the UK back in the 80's, we were in our places ready for the cameras to roll ,about two mimutes to go when the Jack Socket on the steel snapped leaving me with no sound. I had to cut the Jack plug off and the wireing to the Jack Socket and with the aid of gas soldering iron borrowed from one of the staff on duty I got the wireing back together just in time to play the intro for the song. I had the best vibarto that day from shakeing with fear.

Jeff Agnew · From: Dallas, TX

I told this story on the forum many years ago, but here goes again...

When I was playing with the Navy Band we did many gigs for Ronald Reagan, who loved our music and would often specifically tell his protocol office to ask for us to perform at different occasions.

One night we were playing in a tent on the White House lawn for a Congressional barbecue in which Reagan would entertain members of Congress. We were sharing the stage with the Statler Brothers, who weren't carrying a steel player at the time. We could use their back line but I'd have to bring my steel. We were to go on first, tear down our gear, the President would say a few words, then the Statlers were to come on and finish out the evening.

Security at these gigs is always tight and the Secret Service kept coming up with new and infuriating hoops we had to jump through to play the gig. This particular night they decided I had to bring my steel on stage in its case, unpack it, play the show, then pack it back up on stage before carrying it off. Made no sense then and makes no sense today. The rest of the band could just carry their guitars and our drummer was able to use the Statler's kit. I protested loudly how stupid and time consuming this would be but the man had a gun so... "Yes, sir."

We played our show and everything went well. Reagan and family were eating dinner at a table at the foot of our stage. I saw someone had placed a copy of our latest album at their table. Good job, USN public affairs office.

We finish playing and the usual White House toadies are scurrying about hurrying us off stage. I turned my back to the crowd, rolled up the cords, packed the pedal, put my steel case on the seat, flipped the guitar over and was ripping it apart in record time. The rest of the band is long gone. White House staff pass by every few moments whispering "Get off the G*d*mn stage!"

I'm finally putting the guitar legs in the pouch when I notice some dude behind me who just stands there, in my personal space, waiting for me. This p*sses me off no end and, without turning around, I whisper "Hold your d*mn horses, pal!" He doesn't move. Finally I shut the case, fold up the seat and whip around to confront him with a surly, "WHAAAT?!?!?!"

It was the leader of the free world. Patiently standing there with our album in hand, who said, "Nancy and I were just wondering if you and the guys would sign this for us? And thanks for coming, we enjoyed your show."

Jeebus Cripes. I mumbled something incoherent in response and rushed off the stage to receive a tongue lashing from my CO for making the President wait while I packed up my steel.

John Carpenter · From: New York, USA

i cant compete with some of these, as i've never seen a president at a show i've played, but i do have a decent one.

about a year back i was playing at a local bar here in new york. see i had just purchased a new pair of pants. real nice slacks you know, and if i do say so myself, i was good and dressed up for the show.
anyhow, i had left my cigarettes on my amp, and as i jumped onto the stage to retrieve them, i heard (and felt) a good tear coming from directly below me. i took a look down and noticed that my pants had split, and not just a hole, these suckers were wide open from the button in the front to the belt in the back.
luckily, the show had not started yet, so the room was not yet full.
unluckily, the room is in the back of the bar, only way out is through the drinking crowd on the other end. and the place was packed

to make a long story short, i sure as well wasn't going to sit at my steel, legs spread from A pedal to volume pedal.
nope.
i hightailed it home, passing not only everyone in the bar, but everyone that happened to be walking in the 10 blocks from the bar to my house. (luckily i live that close)

i went home, threw on some sturdier pants, and was back at the bar no worse for wear in no time.

weeks later i returned the pants to the store where i bought em. the sales woman said to me "hopefully you weren't in front of a lot of people"

Barry Gaskell · From: Cheshire, UK

Hey guys.
My stage terrors pale into insignificance compared to some of yours.Being involved in disasters on stage is awful, but when you are watching things unfold for someone else it can be hilarious.
In the 70's we had done our set in a club in Liverpool, and were sidestage watching the next act just before the curtains opened. The band was then, a quite famous english band called the Hillsiders.They were standing in line behind the curtain vaguely listening to the compare who was introducing them.
There wasn't much space between the curtain and the front of the stage, and it was on here that the compare stood.
The singer behind the curtain wasn't sure where his mic stand was in front of the curtain as it was quite a wide stage and they were going to kick off the moment the curtains started to open. He was gingerly prodding the curtain trying to locate his mic stand and accidently pushed the compare off the stage.
In trying to save himself the compare grabbed a huge display of fruit that was being raffled and that too went over. Fruit and veg' eveywhere and the compare prone on the dance floor.
Mayhem ensued, and it didn't help that we were helpless with laughter at the side of the stage.
Barry

Ben Jones · From: Seattle, Washington, USA

jumped up on a bar table to do a guitar solo, spilled pitcher of beer all over table, slipped off table, fell to floor breaking my wrist.

Dave Van Allen · From: Souderton, PA , US , Earth

I was playing a little bar in DC back in the 70's.. the bass player had a fancy Ampeg bass with f-holes all the way through the body and a large scrolled headstock modelled to look like like an upright or viola.

We're playin' along and , well, he was the sort to get excited and jump around, and in this little bar there wasn't enough room for those kind of shenanigans...

long story short, he was dancin' about and swung around to his left- the scrolled headstock connected at escape velocity with my temple and I was out like a light.

when I was brought to some minutes later he was mortified, but also quite concerned my head hadn't done any damage to his beloved bass....
Razz

Charles Davidson · From: Phenix City Alabama, USA

Maybe not a disaster,but nerve wrackin just the same,Was playing a Hank Sr,birthday show in Mont.Ala.We were playing a set of Hank cover songs,I was strugging to play something similar to Don's licks on my C6th neck,The singer leaned over and said[Don Helms is sitting over there]I replyed,Why the hell did'nt you wait till the set was over to tell me that?At least got to visit with Don awhile,he was VERY nice

Carroll Hale · From: EastTexas, USA

Charles Davidson · From: Phenix City Alabama, USA

Carroll,Sounds like the same girl,I had my first and LAST date with,Went to pick her up and had to meet her father which was about 10 sheets in the wind,He warned me about a dozen times about what BETTER NOT HAPPEN to his little girl in the back seat of my 1947 chevy.

Susan Alcorn (deceased) · From: Baltimore, MD, USA

Well, like anyone who has been playing for any length of time, I've had my share of onstage disasters. The most memorable one for me was at a place called Henry's Hideout near Magnolia, Texas. Back when I was playing a lot of country gigs, I used to use distortion and overdrive for rock or blues songs and stand up for a solo to rock out, holding the steel guitar up with my knee and tilting it forward a bit. This did not, of course, help the sound, but people noticed it and would comment on how great it sounded (even the other musicians) though it would have sounded better had I remained sitting. And it was kind of fun to stand up once in awhile. So . . . I was standing up near the edge of the stage, and my steel somehow got away from me and fell four or five feel off the bandstand, strungs onto the dance floor. I just stood there as it fell -- it seemed to take forever falling, and I felt like I was going to die. surprisingly the guitar survived and I finished the night. Gotta hand it to those MSA's.

Jack Francis · From: Queen Creek, Arizona, USA

Jeff Newman told me a story of what happened to him when he first got to Nashville,,,,it's right up there with these stories,,, but,,,,,in fairness to him, I can't repeat it here. Some of you have heard it too I'm sure...so we can just sit and chuckle to ourselves. What a great sense of humor he had. Laughing

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Drew Howard · From: 48854

I forgot the dobro intro to "Let's Invite Them Over Again" in front a packed listening crowd at The Ark. Doh!
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