So I am going to my first band audition this weekend!
 

It's a cover band they play pretty much everything from the 60's to the present. I have already been given a set list and half of the songs on there I crank up to and the other half I usually change the channel. So I have got to learn these songs that I am not very fond of... Any advice from you pros out there for psychologically dealing with a song you don't like but have to perform like you wrote it?

I find that so long as I like the people I am working with, and everybody learns their parts and plays their best, I am happy to play just about any song, or any kind of music. Sometimes, the process of studying the music makes me appreciate it where at first I didn't care for it. If you and the band nail the tune, and you have an appreciative audience cheering you on, I bet you forget that it's a song that you would "change the channel" on.

not a pro but it is part of being a pro and part of playing music. it comes down to if you want others to play what you like, you have to play what they like. AND, if you are going to play out, you have to play what your audience likes.
i have played with some of the best pro's in myrtle bch, including steve bailey(it was at church but i still got to play on stage with him). seems like every time i stopped in to see this one guy, he was always playing brown eyed girl. he hates it and sick to death of it but the audience loves it. i always give him a hard time about it.
got another friend that says if he has to play proud mary again he will kill himself. so he now plays jazz.
i have had to play songs that i really did not like and songs that were hard to make the guitar fit, but i did it, and i played them like i loved them. thank goodness songs were always changing.

I am auditioning for lead vocals, so I guess the only fear that I am really having is that I won't have the enthusiasm for the songs I dislike. I guess that is why they call it show business lol. I will try to do my best.

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If you join, you can work to change the material- but this takes time. If you really cant stand the material, dont join the band.

Thanks Lane!

It just seems all over the place imho, think about going from the Beatles, to REO Speed wagon, to bad finger to modern english to Judas Priest to alice in chains to the gin blossoms to sublime to marcy playground etc.... It just seems all over the place vocally...

Yep, that seems an odd mix. Working band?

Yeah, I believe they are. Been together several years I am told. oh, and I forgot Lit, Weezer, The Eagles, Lenny Kravitz , 3 doors down, candlebox, cheap trick and uncle kracker :D

I mean how do you go from You Got Another Thing Coming to Santeria?

Ha! Two singers.

Honestly there are about 10,000 songs that could work for a cover band these days but not every song fits the band and not every band fits the song. Play the ones you can do well and don't sweat the ones that don't really fit. We have about 200 that we can work up quickly for a particular gig and we will craft a set list based on who our audience will be. Biker club gigs are very different than family-friendly street fairs and festivals.

There are about 20 top requested songs that you just have to know cold if you want to get the tip jar filling. You know what they are and you can play them blindfolded with one hand behind your back. The trick is to make them your own and have some fun with them. Sadly, they are the reason most people come to see you play.

Freebird and Stairway to Heaven??? :D

God 200 songs, really? Impressive. My band has 3x10 song sets, and a rolling list of maybe another 20 on the bench. We never (rarely) play anything cold.

I saw Springsteen twice over the weekend. 18 piece band. Played 3.5 hours one night, 4 hours the next. No stops. And - about 50% of the material on night 2 was different to night one. Different set order, different material, complex arrangements, not a chart in site. One night two, I heard the brass section make a tiny mistake. I was relieved. It was just unbelievable, absolutely seamless, a musical tour de force.

I play the drums at our church and I don't like at least 90% of the music we play as it's "contemporary Christian music" and it all sounds like U2 to me, and that's not a good thing! I concentrate on doing my best, playing with excellent musicians and trying to remember that most of the people who worship with us really like this music. I'm a jazz, blues, classic rock kind of guy, so I make the best of it and appreciate the talent of the people I get to play with...

Well if you are gonna cover stairway these are some pretty big shoes to fill:
HEART - STAIRWAY TO HEAVEN in HD - The Kennedy Center Honors LED ZEPPELIN, 2012. - YouTube


Yeah Stu,
We keep 60 songs ready to go with a count-off and the others can be tightened-up with a rehearsal or two. We work a lot with lead sheets so everyone knows what key, what arrangement, what tempo, who sings lead and who solos when. Been playing a lot of 3 set nights lately which just seems so much easier.

I dips me lid. We could never do that. We play one/twice a month, and about half the stuff we could just walk in and play. But we have stuff in the list which just requires constant practice to keep on top off.


(God I hate that Kennedy Centre verson of Stairway...)

It's going to be a heck of a week, I have a lot of lyrics and timing that I will need to learn and then I will have to create the attitude/persona internally of the songs I don't care too much for in order to pull them off correctly. Thank God I know and like half of the songs and already have 98% of the lyrics memorized. Wish I knew what to expect when I get there. They might just bust out into one of the songs I may not of gotten to learn. Oh Well...

Man, can you imagine the feeling though, sitting up there in the balcony experiencing a masterpiece that you created being performed for you in such a manner. What a feeling that must have been...

Looked to me like they were wanting to be beamed back to the Enterprise....