- My Own Trip
- Balling in a Bathrobe
- Eyes Wide Shut
- Glitter
- Sumthin Boutcha
- I Forgive you for Party Rocking
- Falling For You
- Ascii Trip
- Tripping on Bills
- Percbuddy Fever
- Dream Alive
So much rapid development has taken place since this show, which is why this article is being published so long after the day the performance took place.
Over spring break I had my first proper gig at a small venue called "Healer." It was a really perfect space to perform in. The inside of the building is covered in art. When you enter the building, a carpeted path leads you through a small hallway. On either side of the walkway are small doorways into immersive art installations by a variety of different artists. At the end of the hall the space merges into a larger room with a stage and PA system on the right side of the room.
Setup went smoothly. After I had some issues with the length of HDMI cables at the smaller open mic, I made it a point to come prepared with cables and adapters while not bringing a redundant amount of equipment. It ended up working out perfectly. The venue ended up having a lot of cables for me to use, but the ones I brought worked great and it was a good look for the venue owners. Even though I brought my own, I ended up using an in-house projector that the venue had set up, and I was projecting 2d images that were queued with Ableton and HeavyM2. My setup this time was considerably more complicated with the addition of a vocal pedal. Before the show, I programmed the pedal to load presets in the order of my set-list, so auto tune and delay would fit the corresponding song being played. Despite this added piece of gear, it didn't get in the way because it was easy to use the footswitches while I was performing.
The performance went well considering it was my first real gig. The first song only played out of the monitors because of something on the mixing side. A few seconds into the 2nd song, the sound guy came up and adjusted some cables on stage, he told me that the audio wasn't playing properly. I couldn't hear him very well, but after about 30 seconds the problem was fixed. This was the biggest issue from the set and it wasn't even really a problem for more than a minute. Other than that, there were a few moments where I messed up vocals or came in early, but I made quick recoveries and remained visibly unfazed. This was because prior to the show, my father gave me a really good piece of advice. He told me that nobody notices a mistake until you notice it. When an artists makes a face, stops the song, or gets visibly frustrated, that is what tends to tell the audience a mistake was made. At the end of the show, I attempted to cover the blink-182 song, "I Miss You." I originally planned to cover the song to pad out the set time, but I didn't end up needing the extra time as my set already ran up to 40 minutes. During the first verse, I messed up and ended the show. Despite an intense flare up of anxiety I was able to play it off and come out of my set gracefully.
During this performance, I learned the best ways to traverse my setup
during live performance, I learned how to play off mistakes, and I got a
good idea of how well my system functions in a high pressure
environment. I got really positive feedback all around from the attendees. A lot of people came up to me afterwards to talk about it which was super encouraging and rewarding. In conclusion, it was a huge success. I'm happy with how it went and it was a great learning experience that helped prepare me for my capstone presentation. I've been asked to return to the venue for another show this June with a few other electronic acts.
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