I sit in with acoustic guitar player/singer occasionally. One day he called me about doing a "club" gig at a local bar. I accepted. I thought the job started a little late, but showed up around 10:30 to set up for an 11:30 start time. The place was deserted except for a couple of guys on a deck between two buildings (2 different clubs). One was the singer. The other was a security guy. I took my stuff in and started to set up on the deck. I asked the singer if he knew anything about the job and he said he didn't and it seemed as weird to me as it did to him. We finished setting up and sat around waiting. Around 11:15, 13 security guards came out of the still empty club on one side of us and had a meeting. As they were leaving to go back in the club, I asked one of them what was the deal? He said that around 12:00 midnight the club would be packed with 800 to 1200 guests. He wasn't lying. Most of them didn't speak English. Several of the security guards spoke Spanish.

Our job was to play for the overflow of people that came outside on the deck. They played loud Latin dance music (DJ) inside. Most of the time it bled out to our area.

The people were well dressed, friendly, and we got several tips playing the Americana stuff this singer did. I pretty much just "embellished" all night. Around 1:30 AM the large wooden deck that separated the two buildings split in half from one end to the other. Fortunately, it was only about 18 inches from the ground. No one was hurt. Security came out and moved all the people inside or to a lower deck area. We figured we could just get paid and split, since our now split deck was empty. We really didn't want to relocate to the other deck with our equipment. (Lazy)

We put the microphones away and were just about to take down the speakers when the head guy came up and said "You're contracted to play until 3:00"

We turned one speaker in the direction of the other deck and played instrumentals the rest of the night to an empty deck. We didn't bother hooking up the microphones again. I thing we played "Wipeout" twice (without a drummer).. They loved it. Some gigs are like being in the twilight zone. This was the weirdest one I've ever done.

It was I think in '95 or '96, and my metal band was performing at some hole in the wall. No stage, just lights pointed at the floor. I was the star lead guitarist. After we did a sound check, we waited for people to arrive. Only 5 people showed, so I got so disappointed I drank many shots of vodka and beer.

By the time we were ready to perform, I couldn't even stand, let alone play. They took me to the van, and did the gig without lead guitar. Afterward my bass player put my $200 in my pocket, and took me home. The height of professionalism, I'd say.

I was with my bandmates passing through Santa Barbara CA. headed to Orange County where we had a gig the next day. While walking around browsing stores and what not and enjoying the nice day we found ourselves in this huge store that had a little bit of everything including a lot of used items. I ran across an odd sized guitar case that was leaned up against the wall so I opened it to see what it contained. Turned out to be one of those latin style instruments with the courses of 3 strings together, can't think of the name at the moment, but I had never seen one in person and was kinda thrilled and excited to mess with it.

I was plinkin' away and about that time this kinda dumpy old Hispanic man came up and tried to take it from me. He couldn't speak English and though not getting especially angry or too physical he was obviously trying to get it from me. I'm like "Hey gramps, I saw it first". But he wouldn't let up. I finally gave him a pantomime of "Dude, back off". With that he walked away and I look at my buddies like what was that all about. A few minutes later the guy comes back with a younger man that could speak English. Turned out the old man was a street musician and that was his personal guitar. He was friends with the store owner and he would set it in that particular spot when ever he took a break.

I was so embarrassed. I told the young guy to explain what happened and that I was very sorry. He was actually pretty cool about it smiled and shook my hand.
But I got ribbed about that the whole weekend. My bandmates were all "You big bully stealing an old man's guitar".

I was playing lead guitar for a local Country band and at the end of the night we played a song called "Momma don't allow no playing round here." The premis was to do a verse and let each player solo. It was our way of recognizing each member of the band. This was extremely up tempo and in the key of E. Our rhythm player always counted down and started the song. The count started and for whatever reason on this night, our rhythm player started in the key of C We knew right away we were in trouble as the rest of us started in E A ghastly collection of noise began to fill the air. Being on the other side of the stage I could not see his fingers so I yelled to the bass player "what key is he in? He responded I think he's in "G" To which I thought he said Key of "D" I turned to the keyboard player and said he's in "D" To recap Rhythm player in "C" bass in "G" lead and keyboard in "D" and drummer in "what in the world is going on??"
As the drone of noise continued and as our lead singer who never let us know who would be the first to solo; proclaimed " and here's Frank on keyboards!! We all dropped out, to nothing but silence and the sound of Frank, completly lost (as was I) tinkering on the keys trying to salvage a lead and laughing hystericaly.
By the middle of the song we finally got on the same page and finished what, to this day was the worst rendition of a song I have ever been part of.
But what makes the story classic is that as we finished this last song, the crowd who obviously had been at the bar all night long began this fist-pumping- hootin'n holloring- standing ovation- calling for an encore chant. We looked at each other cracking up laughing and 35 years later we still laugh about that night.

I was playing a gig in a south jersey club and we were doing a happy hour gig. 3 to 7 kind of thing. The bassist in our band was a stone alcoholic. I mean this guy would do a shot of whiskey and follow it with a Yuengling. After doing the shot he would pour some of the beer into the shot glass to get any sediment left from the shot. So we play 2 sets at the happy hour and i see this guy making his rounds. He must have had at least 10 shots of whatever while on our 25 minute break. We are getting ready to start our last set and i see our bassist staggering back to the stage with one eye shut. He stumbles onto the stage and puts his bass on. We were opening the set with the remake of that Bob Seger song Turn the page. We were doing Metallica's version. So he is standing on stage blowing like a flag in the wind. He plucked one note of the song then started to fall backwards hitting the wall in the back of the stage. He crashed and just slid down the wall and laid on the floor with his bass in his hand. One of our sound crew picked him up and laid him down on one of my drum cases on wheels and wheeled him into the band room. We finished the set without a bassist. We later had to take him to the emergence room and we left him there. He got out the next day and where do you think the first place he went to. His local bar.

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Another night he was coming home from the bar loaded as usual. As he was driving he decided to change the station on the radio. At this point he ran into and hit 2 parked cars. So he leaves the scene and makes it home. While he was on his way home he sees the state police going to the scene that he just created. He thought he was home free. He pulls into his driveway and is getting ready to go in the house thinking he beat the accident. There was only one small thing he noticed when he was on his way into his house. He noticed that his front bumper was missing and the front bumper had his license plate on it. He just sat on the step and waited for the state police to come to his door which they did. LOL

We had a gig in an upscale hotel, and arrived an hour or so before the guests. There was an odor of sewage in the large banquet room, and the wall to wall carpet was wet and squishy. As we brought our equipment in, we realized there was something very wrong: the smell, the rug, and you could see wetness moving from the rug up the walls. There were some hotel employees with wet vacs moving around the room trying to get the problem under control as we set the equipment up.

By the time the guests were arriving the problem seemed to be taken care of, aside from the smell. We stood and watched as the cake was put on a small table for viewing, and the table collapsed, and the cake hit the floor. The employees just stared in disbelief and horror. We were trying not to laugh because it was so crazy. Then to top it off, once we started playing there was no pleasing the father of the bride, a constant barrage of demands and requests to turn down. Wedding from hell.