How old is too old...

[jgcable]

Now... don't give me any of that "you are as old as you feel" crap because I feel great. I'm 44 but pretty well preserved.

How old is too old for playing metal covers live?

Where is the point when you can no longer connect with the crowd and it seems that all the kids that are there aren't connecting with you + they all look slightly older or younger than your own kids?

Is it time to give up when your friends all leave the gig around midnight because they have to get up early or because they can't leave their kids alone that long or they don't get hammered (which pisses the bar owner off) or they generally just aren't rowdy due to the fact that they are all pushing 50?

Here is how I feel doing live metal covers.
When I am doing the songs I love (80's metal), I feel old. Why?? Because the songs I am doing are older than most of the people watching.
When I do the newer metal songs, I feel old. Why?? Because I feel the crowd is thinking "look at those old guys playing songs written by 20 year olds). Also, I can't relate AT ALL to the lyrics of todays metal. I can't sing about girlfriends or growing up or stuff like that.

I also REALLY feel the affects of a gig before/during/after and the day after. If the gig is on Saturday night I am pretty much wrecked for Sunday (and I don't even drink). Its the super late night and all the lugging equipment around that blows me away the day after.
Back in the old days we had roadies. They loved carrying gear and their payment was groupies. They got paid well! Nowadays, its impossible to get my very best friends to help carry gear. My friends all have bad backs it seems!

Doing all originals with my band AFTERMATH is a little different because the fans that come see us all love the songs. They sing along with all of them. They accept that we are an older original prog/metal band.

I think I am coming to a crossroads in my musical life and at the moment I am not digging what is happening. Maybe my days of being in an 80's metal cover band are over.
I think that is why I have been into playing the blues so much lately. It seems that the older you are and the more beat up your equipment is the better the crowd likes you.
What do you older JCF'rs think?

[MBreinin]

I think it is time for a new musical direction, ONLY if you really feel out of touch with the metal covers. You have paid your dues, you have gathered some life experience....it is time for the BLUES, my man.

Mike

[donf]

I say, do what you like. I'm a 70's/blues fan but play in an 80's rock/bubblegum-like band. Am I thrilled.................not really, but I have good friends in the band, the crowd accepts us and I generally have good time. I'm also 46 soon to be 47.

[jackson1]

How old is too old for playing metal covers live?

The problem is non-existent when old guys play for an old crowd. That's my view.

I just saw Thin Lizzy yesterday and they rocked! And the crowd was as old as the band, between 40-50+. And Lizzy loved it.

I know Lizzy don't play covers but the same applies. If the band's age macth the crowd all is good.

Your post is complex, i just addressed one area.

[rjohnstone]

You're never too old.

[chrisgUK]

Your age should never hold you back from doing something you love. But if your age is stopping you from enjoying playing those gigs then maybe it is time for a change in direction. If its more the fact you feel weird playing infront of youngsters then find a different venue or you like was mentioned above. Find a musical style which will attract the type of crowd you are comfortable playing to.

[SEEGERMANY]

John, what you're feeling is perfectly natural. You might enjoy playing metal, but you can't really relate to it anymore. Like you said, you're not an angry, pissed off, sexually frustrated, pizza faced kid. You've grown up, matured, have a family, and a successful job.

Sure, I like to listen to metal from time to time while at home or driving to work, but I'm damn sure not going to a metal club where the guy next to me has a bone through his nose. I've graduated to the Monday night blues jam or the 60's-70's "cover gig" on Saturday night. You know the kind, where you get up there and play a relaxed set, then break with your friends, ask a friend on stage to jam a bit, then break again. All the while, remembering life has been good and that you're still having fun!

By the way, how's the aquarium doing?

Mr G

[jgcable]

I say, do what you like. I'm a 70's/blues fan but play in an 80's rock/bubblegum-like band. Am I thrilled.................not really, but I have good friends in the band, the crowd accepts us and I generally have good time. I'm also 46 soon to be 47.

The problem I had with that last few gigs was that our older crowd accepted us from 10:00pm to around 11:50pm, but they all left around midnight (the clubs are open until 2:00am). They also don't pound down drinks. Most of them are responsible adults who are married with children and they don't make it a habit of driving under the influence. That really pisses the club owners off. They come out to support the band (I have at least 18-20 people coming to see me everytime I play not counting the other guys friends) but they feel they supported me enough staying for a few hours and having a few drinks. Club owners around here are looking for drinkers and stayers.
I can't tell you how many times lately I have heard a club owner say that the bar take was light or that many of the people left early (around midnight). I tell them that my friends would tear up clubs until the house lights came on but that was 20 years ago. Now they have to chase their kids around or go to work.... or both.

[jgcable]

John, what you're feeling is perfectly natural. You might enjoy playing metal, but you can't really relate to it anymore. Like you said, you're not an angry, pissed off, sexually frustrated, pizza faced kid. You've grown up, matured, have a family, and a successful job.

Sure, I like to listen to metal from time to time while at home or driving to work, but I'm damn sure not going to a metal club where the guy next to me has a bone through his nose. I've graduated to the Monday night blues jam or the 60's-70's "cover gig" on Saturday night. You know the kind, where you get up there and play a relaxed set, then break with your friends, ask a friend on stage to jam a bit, then break again. All the while, remembering life has been good and that you're still having fun!

By the way, how's the aquarium doing?

Mr G

Hey Mark... 1st of all, the aquarium is doing great. One of my striped convicts has nasty white blotches (they almost look like whiteheads) on him but I am treating the tank. He might make it. All my other fish are doing great. I have 3 generations of striped and pink convicts now. They are breeding machines. I have a separate 20 gallon tank for the babies. They stay in their until they are big enough to hang with the big guys in the big tank.
I agree with everything you said. Thats exactly how I feel. Exactly.
For instance... I love listening to Disturbed but I feel embarassed if I get "caught" listening to it. Especially if I am singing along. Heck.. I have a shirt that older than the guys in Disturbed.
I think I need to graduate too. That is exactly the type of gig I could relate to.

[lerxstcat]

I graduated FROM blues TO rock and metal when I was around 17. If you want to switch that's cool, but musically it's really a regression. If it makes you more comfortable as far as the crowd goes, that's great though.

I am 48 and don't really play out anymore, but I am given lots of respect by some of the local young metalheads. Yeah I feel my age around them, but prefer that to going to the retirement home that I see blues clubs as. It's all in what you want to do though, but I personally would give up playing altogether before playing something I don't really get into.

If you dig the blues, then it's a good move for you; I just don't get into them generally. I can appreciate SRV and guys like him, on their more energetic stuff, but the slow one-note wank stuff puts me to sleep. If I want to hear someone ccry about losing his baby I'll listen to Zeppelin or Dokken!

[VulfgangPfuck]

John,

I feel the exact same way you do bro. But I have friends playing hardcore/metalcore that are pushing their mid/late-30's and don't feel so bad (I'm 35).
I'm no longer playing covers...and never will again. I'm all about writing now, and I am writing in the vein of what's going on in the metalcore scene...the whole Gothenburg sound...blast beats....etc...

That's something I love....and I get pure joy out of writing, arranging and recording it.

My opinion on your dilemma is to go with the flow. If you feel you're connecting, then stick with it, if not...follow a different path. It's all about what makes you happy.

[MBreinin]

[QUOTE=lerxstcat]I graduated FROM blues TO rock and metal when I was around 17. If you want to switch that's cool, but musically it's really a regression. [QUOTE]

Really, you think it is a musical regression? Based on what, exactly? Many people can play blues, very few can play it well and bring something original to it. I think it may be more difficult to play something that is "limited", like blues, to something that is wide open, like metal. The Blues is really raw, there is no place to hide....unless you are going to do it with a Recto wide open...but that ain't Blues.

JG, you are allowed to use your Soldano though.

Mike

[quakana]

I think you just go with what you feel. Sometimes it's hard to say goodbye to a certain thing or period in your life. I think it's natural. I mean I rode a Harley for 14 years and when I sold my last one I knew I wanted to but still kept thinking I was letting go of a part of my life and I was, but you just evolve into the next period just fine. I think if you don't change it up every once in a while you get stale and just dont grow as a person. Remember you can always change back. Anyway....that's my 2 cents

[pro-fusion]

Is it only people in our age range (40ish) that are coming to your '80s shows, jgcable? Your original post seemed to indicate that you were also getting younger folks at the shows and that part of the problem was your own self-consciousness. As to the problem with the clubowners, it's hard to know what to do about that. I can't imagine that they could reasonably expect many 23 year-olds at a gig devoted to music made when those folks were toddlers.

I can totally relate to your problem with self-consciousness, though, even just as an audience member. I was at an Arch Enemy show awhile back where I had to be one of the 3 or 4 oldest people in the place, and I'm only 38! I was like "who let all these damn kids in here???" That was definitely a "get off my lawn" moment...

Here's the flipside, though, and maybe the way you should think about it. The social life of most of my friends my age seems to consist entirely of standing around somebody's back patio drinking a beer and yacking about their lawnmower, kitchen remodeling project, or their kid's soccer team. Would you rather be doing that or be out there onstage carrying the metal flag!! There's nothing wrong with playing a blues gig too (I was doing that when I was 20 years-old), but you don't have to give up the '80s gig unless you just don't enjoy it anymore. And there's nothing wrong with getting sick of a long-running gig, either.

Wow, I'm just full of fuckin' advice, eh?

[lerxstcat]

[quote=MBreinin][quote=lerxstcat]I graduated FROM blues TO rock and metal when I was around 17. If you want to switch that's cool, but musically it's really a regression.

Really, you think it is a musical regression? Based on what, exactly? Many people can play blues, very few can play it well and bring something original to it. I think it may be more difficult to play something that is "limited", like blues, to something that is wide open, like metal. The Blues is really raw, there is no place to hide....unless you are going to do it with a Recto wide open...but that ain't Blues.

JG, you are allowed to use your Soldano though.

Mike

I can play blues quite well, thanks, but it is as boring as hell to me. If you dig it that's great, but to me, musically, it's like going back to grade school after completing college. There's zero challenge to me in playing the blues, I can do it without thinking and get an awesome audience response. So to me playing the blues is prostitution - but ONLY because I don't get into it, but listeners do. Does that make sense? I am a rock and metal player by love. I have played other stuff for money but felt somewhat whorish doing it.

Now I can enjoy playing blues when I'm drunk, because then I can't think and can only play feel anyway. But since being diagnosed with diabetes, I just don't enjoy drinking much anymore. I know I'll have a 2-day hangover and my system will be toxic.