88MVP

I just want to thank everybody for the advice on here. The show was about two weeks ago now and by all accounts it went really well. Turnout of about 5-600 people (wayyy more than I've ever played in front of before). I felt like I was personally a little bit sloppy with all of the nerves, but all of the comments after the set were complimentary, so maybe it wasn't as bad as I thought. One thing that I wasn't fully ready for was how different playing in a large room sounds. The amps weren't mic'd so there were no monitors and I could not hear our other guitarist on the other side of the stage at all. As far as I was concerned I was just playing with our drummer by myself and hoping that we were all in time together. Our other guitarist accidentally yanked his lead out of his pedal board momentarily - fortunately it was a part of the song where we were both playing the same thing so I don't think too many people even noticed. Lesson learned for next time. All in all it was a blast - we're cutting a demo soon and trying to get more gigs.

Haha, no worries about noodling. We've got the set list planned out in groups of 2-3 songs back to back with no real pause in playing. Raising the amps up off the ground is another thing I hadn't thought about (playing for a larger group of people is entirely new to me). Should i attempt to angle it upwards with one of those amp stands or is just getting it a few feet higher off the ground good enough?

That follow the leader exercise is a really good idea, we haven't done anything like that before. Levels are something i'm definitely concerned with for this show - the vocal mics will be through a PA but we're going to just be cranking the amps for the guitars and bass. Pete, your idea to have someone out in front is a really good idea...Hopefully we'll get the mix right from the start, but if not we can make adjustments early on based on what the guy out front is indicating. Cheers

So my first semi-serious band has its first gig coming up in a couple weeks and I wanted to get an idea of what sort of things you guys do with your gigging instruments. So far I've ordered strap locks and a pickholder that stores extras on the back of the headstock. I'm considering blocking the trem cavity (hardly ever use it) and buying locking tuners to reduce tuning issues. Any other suggestions for things to do to get the guitar ready or just general advice on live performance would be most appreciated.