Sick happens

Wow. What. A. Month. March is always busy for us, but this year we got our gigging ON. Saturday night we played our 10th show in 24 days! We played 1 private event, and the other 9 events were public shows in 8 different venues, in 8 different cities. Luckily, we love what we do, so it's a privilege to have so many folks who like what we do.

The shows ran the gamut from an early evening 45-minute showcase with other bands on the bill to a late-night 4-hour show with just us. Some were more challenging than others due to sound issues, timing, convenience of getting equipment to the stage site, etc. But the real challenge was for me (Suzy) about half-way through a tour of shows we did during Spring Break week. I got sick.

I didn't puke on stage or anything (I'm talking to you, Justin Bieber).

But my body was definitely going through something and wanted me to be there for it - not traveling around playing shows. One of my friends, who is also in a band, asked me what you do in that situation. So, I figured, "That calls for a blog!"

The first thing is that you never want to cancel a show if you can possibly avoid it. It may seem perfectly reasonable to you to say, "My insides have become molten glass. I cannot play a 3-hour show today." But a venue booker hears, "I am letting you down today. I'm going to go out with my friends tonight and laugh and laugh about how I screwed you." And then they never hire you again.

It may be unfair, but it's true. Some of the gigs we've landed over the years have been because a band cancelled due to illness of someone in the band. And then we never saw that band and that venue again. So, if it's at all possible, power through.

That's what I did. I ate chicken soup, sipped on green tea, and I got on stage and pretended I wasn't scared half to death when I felt my stomach grumble. And everything went just fine. Thangod.

Thanks, Stephen. It was close, but I made it.

Johnny has done it as well. He severely sprained his ankle one time and could barely walk. If you've seen our show, you know what a problem that would be for him on stage. But he didn't cancel our next show. He perched himself on a stool and bounced as much as possible from there.

We've played through someone's voice being completely gone, someone being depressed, someone being mad, all of us being attacked by allergies, and everyone being exhausted. Just do it.

If you can't power through, though - it's just really not an option to leave your bed - then tell your band as soon as possible, and encourage them to play without you. Seriously. We've had to do that several times. In most cases, someone in the band can fill in on vocals if need be, and you can make reasonably pretty sounds with some instrument pieces missing. If you need to, call in a pinch hitter (a "special guest") to sit in with you. It won't be your normal perfectly rehearsed show, but the venue had its band for the night and you got paid. Everybody is satisfied.

If there's just no way to soldier on, let the venue know ASAP. If you can recommend a friend's band that you know is free and might like the last-minute gig, give a name and a number so the venue doesn't have to scramble - or see if you can arrange for them to fill in for you and then ask the venue if that's okay.

Do what you can to make it as easy on the venue as possible, and hope they're understanding. And if they're not, don't take it personally. Sometimes sick happens.