Ever have to fire someone in your band?

[phishlips]

I was going to give you all the whole story that I'm currently facing but I was getting bored just writing it and figured it be even less fun to read so....  I've come, well actually I think the whole band has come to the conclusion that we have to let someone go.  It's a shame because he's such a great player but in the bigger picture he is really holding us up.  I'm really not looking forward to most likely ending at least my friendship with him and possibly the other guys will too, but I just don't think its going to be a happy departure, or even an understood departure.  Well, I am really soaking in this tub of guilt and uneasiness so I guess I'm just looking to hear some similar stories and how things played out for those of us that have gone through this before.  Like I said, its a shame.  5 years together, but he's holding us up, I can't wait any longer on him.

Sorry for such a downer of a thread.

[picture_of_nectar]

Tough deal man.

I'm curious if he is such a "great" player, how is he holding you up? In what respect is he holding the band back? What instrument?

Have you all spoken with him about the issues? He's unwilling to comply? Or can't?

I am petty inexperienced when it comes to bands, but I do know with any group or team effort an open line of communication is crucial. You gotta be able to be real with eachother.

Think about all the time you have invested with this dude. Is it gunna benefit the band that much to ditch him, and is he that easily replaceable.

I think these are some of the questions you and your bandmates need to work through. And if the time comes to drop the axe, at least be able to thoughtfully and respectfully express your ideas to him so he understands. His feeling may be hurt but if you all are respectfully he will get over it.

Relationships are tough. Don't wreck a friendship over music, imho.
My two cents.   

[phishlips]

Hey Picture,...whelp he's our drummer.  He's more of a "pro" than I am (meaning he does this more for a living than I do), but he and I originally started this band after another band that both of us were in broke up.  I was always under the impression that this band would take off to at least close to making a living standards mostly because he was at the time one the few people I knew who were playing full time.  I guess I just figured he was gonna be willing to put in the time.  Although he does have a beautiful studio that he works out of, we never get to do anything in it...not even practice very much.  I am the youngest in the band 33, the drummer's 38, bass is 47, and keys are 53.  They are all great players, to be honest I wonder how I ended up with them.  Now even though we started this band together its always been considered that its my band, although I don't want it to be just "my" band, I much rather it be "our" band.  It's taking me a long time to find these guys that play well together but more importantly get along together really well.  Back to the real issue, our drummer who does this full time has to split his time between a few different bands to fill his schedule.  One band in particular is much bigger and busier than we are and he basically left us all summer long to tour with this band.  No problem, I totally understand and don't mind holding your spot for when you get back.  Well...we've basically come up with a plan and direction as to where we wanna go with this band while he's been gone.  Great!  I'm feeling like I've finally broken the "my" band label and now I play in a band with three other guys who are all working towards the same goals.  Drummer comes back from tour and we have a nice band meeting with him and let him know what we're thinking, he's totally on board.  Great!  Lets get to work!  Our goals would include playing out from once a week to twice a week, getting further from where we currently play, and practice once a week, every week, and record new demo/presskit/etc.  I'm rambling (sorry), to make a long story shorter we all schedule practice from week to week around what works for our drummer.  Our drummer has a nasty habit of waiting until the day of practice and something seems to without fail, come up every time.  I think we all feel as though we've been patient and understanding of his situation, and obligations and what have yous, but we can't wait any longer.  Don't get me wrong, I want the guy in the band, but I don't wanna play the same songs for the rest of my life though.  I know he's aware of the situation and it doesn't seem to phase him much.  The pace we're moving at is just too slow.  These guys are seriously good players, we should be able to pound out 3-5 new covers a week without a problem, not 1-3 new covers a month and be playing them like shit the first two times at shows because we don't practice.  I hate to lose a friend outta this too, but he's a pretty stubborn, head strong guy that is not gonna take this well, and see that he is holding us up.  Sorry for such a long read.  I really appreciate your thoughts though.

[ShockedAndPersuaded]

I agree with PON about the communication.  The best thing to do would be to lay the cards out on the table and discuss it as a complete group.  The hardest part about this is going to be doing it without making him feel ganged up on. If you are all friends like you say you are then a civil conversation shouldn't be out of reach.  Good luck man.   

[Happyorange27]

The drummer should understand that he hasn't committed to your band solely like the rest of you have.  You can't expect much of him when he spreads himself thin.  He still has the other band once you let him go.  Maybe this is a chance for him to shit or get off the pot.  Anyway proceed with care as well.  Best wishes man.

[fluffhead4020]

About a year ago I experienced the same situation and had to remove someone from my band. He was the weakest link in the chain, and it was bound to happen. Long story short he ended up robbing my house and stole my guitar, which I did get back.. However we are just high school kids and things get blown put of proportion at our age and maturity level. Thought I would share my experience, and I wish you best of luck. And keep your doors locked too.

[phishlips]

First of all, thanks guys for taking a moment to put some thought into my problem.  I think there is no question that we've had good communication between every band member including the drummer.  Right now we are gonna let the bass player have a quiet, non-confrontational sit down with him and make sure he understands where all of our heads are with this situation.  This isn't a group of high school buddies that grew up together playing music, this is four adults that wouldn't even know each other if we didn't share the same interests in music, preforming and making a few bucks too.  I don't think the up coming talk between our drummer and bass player are going to suddenly fix everything, but I guess we need to let it run its course and let our drummer come to his own conclusion that this is not working for the band and hopefully do the right thing within a reasonable amount of time.  Anyway, thanks again for the comments and I'll keep ya posted as to what goes down.

On the up side, we do have a lot of drummers looking to get involved with our band.  So if the sh*t does hit the fan, we won't be canceling any shows.

[picture_of_nectar]

I'd find a new drummer first. Good drummers are a dime in a dozen which is why your guy prolly is able to play in 3 bands.

I hear you though it can be really frustrating when different members have different levels of commitment to practice.

[ColForbin]

I had to let a drummer go who was holding us back as well, and it's not fun.  It never is, he didn't talk to me for 4 years or so but we have recently had a reconciliation.  My point is, you need to do what is right for your music, no matter the stakes.  Holding onto hope that someday this will all change isn't a great position to be in, but I would hold out hope that everything will turn out for the best.  All the advice you have received before this post is also very good, honesty is always the best policy and hopefully will be respected and appreciated by the drummer.

Good luck.

[Rusty the Scoob]

I'm going to take the contrary approach here and side with your drummer.   To quote AI - "Practice?  We're talkin' bout Practice?"

Pros don't get together to practice cover tunes, and they don't play covers like shit because they didn't all practice together.  You all need to learn your individual part and know and trust each other well enough to put it together on stage.  Just book the gigs you want to book, and have the other drummers fill in as needed. 

[phishlips]

Hey Rusty, while I appreciate your input I just couldn't disagree more.  In a perfect world maybe everyone just learns their individual parts of songs and ya get together and nail it the first time through every time, but it just doesn't work that way.  Especially in the jam band world of a zillion different recordings and versions of the same song, "oh, thats not at all like the version I was listening too."  The last thing I'd wanna do on here is pick a fight but, its foolish to think that a band of any sort, cover or original doesn't have to practice.  Not to mention,...its just a reasonable request. 

Its all in an effort to make the band better anyhow, is that wrong?

[Walker done done]

Hey Rusty, while I appreciate your input I just couldn't disagree more.  In a perfect world maybe everyone just learns their individual parts of songs and ya get together and nail it the first time through every time, but it just doesn't work that way.  Especially in the jam band world of a zillion different recordings and versions of the same song, "oh, thats not at all like the version I was listening too."  The last thing I'd wanna do on here is pick a fight but, its foolish to think that a band of any sort, cover or original doesn't have to practice.  Not to mention,...its just a reasonable request. 

Its all in an effort to make the band better anyhow, is that wrong?

Well, in Rusty's defense, I can vouch for the fact that not only is it possible, it happens quite regularly.  If you don't believe it, it's only because you haven't experienced it.  It's a different mind-set completely, yes, but very possible if that's where you want to be.  I can vouch for it because Rusty and I actually put together a side project, having only practiced twice with the 4 band members, and once with 3 band members (even though that one wasn't even a practice, more like a discussion of parts of the songs) and we pulled off a very successful Phish cover project last summer. 

I think what he's saying is when you consider yourself a professional musician, it's more of how you carry yourself (i.e. rather than assimilating "professional" with "full-time") - you can come ready to play and expect other too as well.  Rusty was a professional musician = he (and the rest of us) came to practice knowing our parts, ready to go, so when we would start playing there really wasn't much in the way of us doing what we were supposed to do. 

Now, obviously this works much more easily in a cover band than an original project.  In fact I'd find it impossible to do in an original project...how would the other players even know what to play?

[Rusty the Scoob]

   Yeah, man... and we didn't shy away from the tough tunes, either.   I'd love to see how we'd sound with a few gigs under our belt.  I was really bummed that we didn't get to do it this summer.  

You don't realize it's possible until you do it.  I'm not anything special as a musician, but I was lucky to find myself thrown into a full-time band at age 22 - these guys really did make their living at it, and so did I for a while - and we would have at most a practice or two upon lineup changes.  I've had a disdain for excessive band practices ever since.  

This is a JGB side project a friend and I threw together with two practices, and this is our 2nd gig. http://www.archive.org/details/DLG2010-10-16.Beatniks.Worcester  (Ben - this is Keir.  He shreds!  You are my favorite two guys to play with outside of Fennario, of course.)

My regular band is a GD tribute that last practiced in March or so.  Can't even remember when we practiced before that.  Our drummer's been in Australia for 3 months, finally coming home this weekend, and I can't wait!  Toby's like one of my limbs on stage... we practially share a brain.  We've played 3-4 great gigs a month without him and have yet to practice with any of the various fill-in drummers we've used.  http://www.archive.org/details/Fennario  

In all three cases we do discuss things via facebook and e-mail - which era of the song to learn, chord changes that we missed at the last show, etc.   Fennario will often have a quick discussion about changes or transitions during soundcheck if we're debuting a tune or really stumbled on one last time.

My point is that it absolutely can be done, and it's done all the time, even by regular joe-schmoe musician like me.   Everybody just has to show up ready with a capital R.  I expect everyone to nail at least 90% of a tune the first time.

[phishlips]

Ok fellas,  because I feel as though I'm being made out to be quite "green," here's my response.  I've been playing in working bands for the last 12 years or so, I plenty familiar with getting on stage not knowing what we're gonna be playing and not even knowing the other musicians on the stage.  I think anyone who's been playing out for any length of time has been in these types of situations, no big deal.  And wonderful music has been made in these situations, no doubt.  Great!

My frustration with this situation that has mostly been resolved since my original post I'm happy to report is this.  Over the last 5 years that this band has been together we've gone through a few bass players and finally seem to have found "the guy."  Wonderful!  And over these last 5 years we've had maybe, and I do mean maybe 5 practices.  Now, my feeling is this, I've finally got all the members working well together and happy, now lets get to work.  This band is my baby, and my baby hasn't grown the way I'd hoped it would.  We are all very competent players, we just need to work out our "show" a bit more to get to the next level of success.  I'm trying to get the band to be working more and to do that we need to adjust a few things like our setlist, our sound system, and our overall show.  We are located in Northern NJ.  Now to be a steady working band around here you need to wrap your brain around playing places like NYC, Jersey Shore, ski resorts in the Pocono's, some college towns within driving distance and anywhere else they're willing to pay.  Sure, up here in Northern NJ where we're locals they love us playing Bathtub Gin, and One More Saturday Nite, and all kinds of other jammy stuff we on this board all love to play.  We do great round here.  However, people in NYC and round the Jersey Shore couldn't give a shit less about a band like Phish or the Dead, unless its Phish or the Dead themselves.  It just doesn't go over as well in places like that.  Chicks can't dance as easily to it, whatever the reason, it just doesn't work.  So we need to adjust our set a little, not "selling out," but playing more groovy motown and things that make any generation dance.  These are the places where you can get weeknight gigs and not be praying that all your friends are gonna show up or the club owner is gonna be pissed and not have ya back, no places like NYC have a crowd that'll go out on weeknights and you don't have to personally invite each one of em.  Or continue to play the same stuff once to twice a week and be the hometown hero band.  Getting back to my band, we need to put some work into just what we're doing and where we'd like to go.  In other words, practice and band meetings.  Don't get me wrong, we still can have fun at these practices and meetings.  Smoke one, drink one, tell some jokes, whatever, but let's come away with something accomplished at the end of the night.  Maybe after a year of solid weekly practices we won't have too anymore, fine.  Until then though, we need to do some work and everyone needs to be on board or it just doesn't happen.

I'm tired of constantly playing shows that are limited to songs that we've played too many times and 3 out of 4 people worked out the "new" song that we all talked about but we're not gonna play it tonight because the 4th member didn't work it out and doesn't feel totally comfortable with it.  I understand what your saying about a band doesn't need to practice to make good or even great music, I'm well aware and have been part of it many times. 

Now checking out your show on archive, sounds great.  Assuming that it was recorded on something small and convenient to record a show with to get an idea of what it sounded like, something always gets lost in translation and I'm sure live it was a riping night of great tunes, most of which I also know off the top of my head and could've played right along with you fellas, great.  To be honest though, the vocals are all over the place on most songs, a lot of the songs get off to a slow start and kinda wander...all of which could be fixed with a few practices.  I'm not saying I'm a great or even good singer, its hard.  But I'd rather practice and get as close to great as possible for my range.  And be honest on this one, this show is within 10 miles of where you live, at a bar that you hangout at and you know over 50% of the people there that night....be honest.  Not that there's anything thats wrong with that, thats where I'm at most of the time and I'm looking to get away from.  Sure your friends all tell you that it was a phenomenal night of music, but strangers are a little less forgiving and they don't care that you didn't practice at all and look what you pulled off.  To them it probably sounded like a decent band that needs to practice a little more and would be great.

There are NO great nationally touring bands out there that don't practice at all and never have.

I realize I'm coming off as a dick here and I apologize for that but I'm just trying to sum up what track I'm on and where I'd like to be going.  Usually nothing great just happens with no effort involved, and right now my band needs to put some work in to get something great out of it.  Call it "practice" or "work" or whatever you'd like, but its going to require 4 committed guys all working for the same goal, and thats what I'm talking about.

Discuss...

[Walker done done]

Hmmm....well, minus that 4th paragraph, I hear ya totally and was sorta on that same track you're on/trying to get on and I think I lost the path somewhere along the way.  I'd like to write more but I gotta head to bed...up too late as is....heading out @ 8:30 tomorrow morning to drive to Boston > fly to AC for Halloween.  After tonight's show, I can't wait.  They smoked it tonight, I streamed the show (up until right....now) and they tore....it....up.  Loved the Zep teases/jams throughout the night.  Wonder what the album will be???  We shall see, we shall see....