GTA- Gig Report (Jordan's Pub Orland Park) 11/6/09

My band's (GTA-Grand Theft Audio) first "official" gig was this past Friday night at a small bar in our area. Our drummer goes there frequently and asked the owner if we could play there, being its our first gig and all. The owner stopped having bands months ago because they weren't really drawing crowds anymore (which is happening everywhere) and were TOO LOUD, but since Mike has been talking us up for months now he finally said he would let us play. Friday night exceeded both the owner's and OUR expectations:

Before the gig, Mike did tell the other guitar player to leave his 1/2 stack at home because the owner would freak and probably stop us at the door before we even plugged in. So he left it at home and he played through the board which sounded great. When we got there to load in there were about 10-15 ppl there, regulars I would guess. We loaded in, set up, only needed 1 bank of lights and it was TIGHT for our 6 piece band.

Now this being our first gig and we as a band know A LOT of musicians in the area on top of our friends/family it was PACKED to capacity by the time we started (75 ppl). Two members of Ugoddawanna were there with their significant others (which was very cool) John's (bass) band mates from past bands that came out to support us, another band we are playing a gig with in Feb 2010 came out too see us, the parking lot was FULL and by the end of the long first set (24 songs) they ran out of my beer (Corona) and I had to switch over to another brand.

It was a REALLY great time for us for our first gig as a band, and we did get progressively louder as we went along. We just ROCKED THE PLACE and with everyone singing along the owner didn't care about the volume. All during the month of Oct we had been rehearsing twice a week. We did a (1 1/2 hour) set of 20 songs on 10/15 at another local bar near our rehearsal spot and we had to learn another 16 songs before our gig on 11/6 because we were playing from 9pm-12am. Some of the new songs were a little rough in the beginning of them but we got our groove by the middle. The owner said he wants us to book another show with us again soon and we picked up 2 more gigs since. One at another local bar (Bobby McGees - Chicago Ridge) which has a younger crowd (which is what we are trying to cater too) and another one on 12/19/09 at (Doug's Rockhouse in Aurora) with a local original metal band FHOD opening. We wont be playing Love Shack here :)

I have uploaded pics & video of Michael Jackson's "Beat It", Katy Perry's "I Kissed A Girl" & our closer (encore) Danzig's "Mother" which just brings the house down with Katy Kat singing it.

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MySpace http://www.myspace.com/tommygunzguitarplayer