Well, I made it through the gig. I am still alive. Just to be safe, send bacon rolls anyway - better safe than sorry.
My own post match analysis is interesting :
1. Gain structure. OK, I cocked it up. I had lots of headroom still on the PA, but forgot about that and pushed the mixer. I could hear some crackles and distortion and I'm not sure if I was overloading a channel or two, overloading the mix bus or whether the PA was objecting.
2. DCA groups. Usually with this band, I tend to set a rough level then switch to a bank of DCA faders to ride things up and down. The frontman is fairly dynamic, the lead guitarist has madly quiet lead patches and the keyboard player has absurd level changes so I'm kept on my toes. Sadly, I was so caught up in it, I didn't take a second to switch to working via the DCAs which would have put everything I needed onto a single page. Silly boy
3. Outdoor enclosed stages and a hard hitting drummer are struggle. I only had the kick in the PA - bringing up the snare or the o/heads made no difference in sound without going to very high levels. Sounded fine, so I was cool
4. OTOH, we moved people about as we had stage space and so fixed feedback issues with positioning and mic angles. That was nice to do for a change. Band happy with on stage sound. Which was nice
5. Lots of compliments about the sound overall. Which is very nice. A lot from other musicians which is doubly good.
6. It was hard work though! And chilly in the open air - I need to stick a pair of gloves that still work touchscreens into my kit bag. I should have realised that the Met Office wouldn't get it right...
7. Oooooowwwwww!! On top of the physical effort of loading kit, rigging, mixing, de-rigging and loading again, I'm currently nursing an injured knee. By the time I stopped at a ratburger van on the way home, my leg couldn't actually support my weight. A good night's sleep has helped quite a lot, but I'll be taking it easy today.
So all in all good. People happy. Band paid. New owners of venue met and befriended. Punters all merry. (Uber making a small fortune taking people from a country pub back to towns)
I should do this again sometime - oh - I am in a couple of weeks... better get fitter!
