…everything just sounds and feels… BAD?
I just got done with my weekly church gig this afternoon, and I have to admit that I was not in the least bit happy with my tone. It completely affected how I played; which felt choppy and contrived, not smooth and spontaneous.
I suppose we’re all bound to have those kinds of gigs, but I have to tell you, nothing puts me in a worse mood than having bad tone.
To be fair to my gear, my clean tone was fine, but my overdrive tone was absolutely muddy. It had no punch, and even with the volume up, I wasn’t cutting through the mix. Ewwwww…
Oh well, I’ll have to play around with my setup a bit…
Guitar Gear 
I’ve had that and worse. My band was playing a dance hall and I set up as I always did with my 20 watt Mesa to keep stage volume down, mic’d in the frint with my SM57 and after soundcheck I was moving my cables to get them out of the waywhen I looked up at my amp I could see the Mixer behind it and the singer was turning down the gain to my two mics (AFTER SOUND CHECK)
I went to get a beer so I didn’t explode.. I played bad from the first note of the first song. Afterwards, the other guys told me not to drink when we played cause I was really off that night, I smiled and nodded and we spoke of it later. We recorded the show so I showed them that I sucked from the start. So, I either play bad when I’m pissed or once I have half a beer.
Bad tone sucks and is very uninspiring but sabotage is downright mean…
I know exactly what you mean. I have been there to many sundays. When I am in that position I just look up and do the best that I can. The main thing is to just hang in there..
Take care
Tim
Yeah… It’s like hanging on for dear life… 🙂 Can’t get mad about it. You just have to grin and bear it and be thankful that you’re playing. 🙂