Secret Romance Gig Diary: Gig 9, A Season Of Secrets, Corporation Mainstage, Sheffield

Entry 7

Happy New Year!

Wow, my first post of 2013, I have just realised this.

2012 was a crazy, important year for me, for many reasons, but most relevant to this blog, my gigging life. My first proper gigs were played in 2012, and we were lucky to get so many good ones.

We ended the year with Gig 8, which was again at Corporation small-stage. I decided not to write about it because although we played well and the crowd were good, it was pretty much "same old, same old" for me. It might sound like I'm ungrateful for it, but it was nothing new. Same set, same stage.

We supported The Famous Class, who put on an excellent show. They really know how to play!

2013

So, the year ended, and a new one started. (In case you weren't aware). Since about November/December we had a gig already planned for the new year, but I never actually believed it would happen. Many times I've been told "Oh we'll be playing with these, on this stage!" And if it was too good to be true, I didn't believe it, and it didn't happen.

So what gig had been planned? We were to support A Season Of Secrets, one of Sheffield's most well-known bands of the current music scene, on the Corporation mainstage. on the 12th January.

The mainstage is a stage that some of my favourite bands have played, such as Anthrax, Sepultura, Atreyu, Lamb Of God, Marillion, Mastodon, Stone Sour and Testament. I even found a picture on the Corporation website of Troy Sanders, bassist and vocalist for Mastodon, playing on the spot I was playing. Exciting times!

So, of course, we did actually get this gig, and we had two practices to prepare for it. We knew we had to step up our game, and be brilliant. To play on such a stage, alongside other great bands, we had to be on top form.

In practice, we finalised our new song What A Night, and Kriss introduced a new song to us that he named Lachrymose. At a first listen, it just sounded like a song with 3 chords. However, when we put it together, with acoustic settings on guitars, slow drums, and alternating vocals between Kriss and Andy, leading up to a loud, "meaningful" solo, and then finishing with a loud, distorted chorus, it became one of our best songs yet. It's certainly my favourite to play.

We only had a 20 minute slot for this gig, and we were first on, so some sacrifices had to be made. Our set usually lasts 25-30 minutes, and as we wanted the two new songs in, in the end we had to leave out 3 songs. I Can See You, all covers, and Vanity. In the end, our set lasted about 22 minutes, so all was well.

Gig Day

Today I had work, which finished at 3, so it meant, again, that I didn't have long to get ready for the gig. I had a new Children of Bodom vest that I was looking forward to wearing, so I already knew what to wear. Luckily, my guitars didn't need completely restringing, so in the end I was fine, and only 10 minutes late.

We had to be there fairly late this time, so it was all good. Soundcheck times were properly given to us beforehand, (it was a 20 minute sound check, which is fantastic. This gave us time to get used to the stage (though we found it hard to get our heads around how big, and excellent it was,) and get a good sound.

Though the sound was overall good, it very much depended on where you were standing, on stage and in the crowd. For example, if I stood in the middle of the stage when soloing, I couldn't hear myself too well. However, if I stood where my Wah-pedal was placed, on the right side of the stage, I could hear myself perfectly.

I arrived at Corporation, however, it was like a totally different venue. Different entrance, different stage. I put my gear down with the rest of my bands and went with Andy to the backstage dressing rooms. Originally, I thought it was O2 Academy that supplied free beer. However, it turns out it was the promoters SB Squared that did this, and as it was a gig they put together, we had free beer here too. So, I helped myself to one to settle my nerves a bit. My fingers were cold due to the cold weather outside, and so I was growing a bit nervous that they wouldn't be able to move as fast as usual when I got on stage.

It was time to soundcheck, and what I loved was how the stage had two side-doors to enter the stage from. It just felt cool opening a door that led straight on to the stage. I set my equipment up, and we individually soundchecked. I decided to play Dave Mustaine's solo from Holy Wars: The Punishment Due to soundcheck, to warm my fingers up, and of course to show off. It was really loud and pierced through the whole room. It felt good. To soundcheck together, we played through our song Just a Boy, and then Teenage Kicks. For some reason, we love to soundcheck to Teenage Kicks, it seems to be a good decider on the overall sound.

It was 6:15, 15 minutes before the doors opened, and we were finished sound checking. We were due to play from 18:40-19:00. We headed to the dressing rooms, and sat down, worked out ticket money, and drank a bit more. My body felt nervous, but my mind was extremely excited.

6:34- we each looked at each other, and decided it was time to head to the stage. We walked together, looking ahead, through the corridor, and walked up the stairs to the stage door. We opened it and walked to our instruments.

Due to the high amount of lighting, and also the smoke machine, we couldn't see the crowd. In fact, when I finally looked through it carefully, I noticed there was hardly anyone there. I was therefore reluctant to start, because I wanted more people to arrive first. However, when I plugged in and we began playing Holy Oath, everyone gathered together, and by about the third song, there were at least 150 people there, our biggest audience yet.

I was very energetic that night, and was very determined to give my best performance yet. I moved a lot, and played well. At the end of the third song, Just A Boy, I moved to the middle, (to Kriss' left instead of his right, in between him and Andy,) and continued to solo after the song finished (this is typical of me now, my band expect it, and as do our regular attendees,) while Adam Elliot switched his guitar. I played fast, and showed off in the 20 seconds I had. I finished, and there was a nice response from the crowd, which by this point was really big. I quickly switched my guitar and we started the heavier half of our set.

We played our new song, What A Night, and it wasn't perfect, probably quite far from it, but it was new, and fun, and energetic, so it doesn't matter. We have a really catchy breakdown section to it, which was fairly messed up unfortunately due to the drums stopping too early, and the rest of us having to quickly respond by playing the breakdown early. But still, it went well, and no one else other than us probably noticed there was anything wrong with it.

We played Last Stand, our usual set-ender, and the stage being so big, Kriss was able to comfortably switch places with me to let me stand at the microphone for the heavy breakdown-riff, in which me and Andy sing/scream: "You'll never take me alive, you won't take me alive," a few times. It felt great stood at a microphone with my guitar, if only my voice was capable of lead-vocal duties. (Though, I am practicing vocals a lot lately, so watch this space, maybe? I doubt it, but hope so!)

We then quickly switched guitars again, (the first time we have ever switched guitars more than once. We usually keep our Standard-Tuning songs on the first half of the set, and then switch for the last half of the songs which are in Drop-D tuning. However, Kriss suggested we ended the set with the slow, new Lachrymose. At first I disagreed, but as it's such a powerful song, with a large build up to a beautiful solo, and loud chorus at the end in which Kriss sings really high pitched, which makes it even more powerful, I agreed to the idea.)

Due to forgetting my switch pedal, which would've enabled me to easily switch from clean to distortion when I needed, I had to ask my roadie Callum Longden, (He joined us at our last gig, and is great company, so I'm grateful he can come with us to all our gigs as Road Crew,) to switch sounds for me. It must have been quite a lot of pressure for him to come on stage and switch sounds at the right time for me, having no previous experience of the song, but he did so brilliantly, so he saved the song in effect!

We began the song, to which the crowd started to sway from side to side without us getting them to. The intro I put to the song, (which I decided to also play in the verses,) is often regarded to as very similar to Metallica's "The Day That Never Comes" intro. I can see why people think this, but it isn't the same, so I still use it, because it sounds great.

The build up to the solo worked fantastically, and I went to the middle of the stage to play it. After the loud solo, there are no drums. It is a quiet verse, with just single-strummed chords, before a nice drum/guitar build up to a loud, distorted, powerful chorus, and then an outro which consisted of a faster solo to end the song, and thus end the set.

There was a loud response from the crowd, as we thanked them and quickly packed our things away.

We got many positive reviews that night, including a few girls from my college stating "I was told you were good, but I didn't know you were that good!" And "Lose the nailpolish!"

It was the first gig where people complimented the whole band to me, instead of them just complimenting me to me.

My friends stated that I should have told the crowd to move, and circle-pit, because the energy was there, but we didn't provoke it. My band told me previously to stop doing this, so I didn't at this gig, and slightly regret listening to them in a way!

Afterwards, I went and watched the other bands play.

Fall Of Empires
These were an excellent band. Their bassist was fantastic, tapping, slapping, the lot. They had, (like every other band except us that night,) screaming vocals, which went well with the Dubstep backing track they had over their set.

Dead Harts
These were the "biggest" band of the evening, with about 16,000 likes on Facebook. They didn't arrive at the venue until five minutes before their set, so I didn't get to see how they were in person. They were really heavy, and the crowd got really into them, including me. (I jumped into a circle pit, and within a minute was kicked somewhere I shouldn't be kicked, and then immediately after, stumbling into the elbow of someone, which winded me. I slowly walked out, unable to breathe, but pretending I could, and smiling my way out, walking like an idiot. Lovely!) They put on a great show.

A Season Of Secrets
These were pretty good. Everyone in Sheffield, (teenagers mainly), know these. It's funny, because their lead singer, Sam Gibson, went to my Secondary School, and seemed all trendy, and he sang in the school band that wasn't mine. Therefore, I was surprised when he did screaming-vocals all night with no singing-vocals. Their guitarists were pretty good, they had a new lead guitarist called Ben Jones. Not many solos, but overall the sound quality was good. The crowd loved them, and they finished, and the night was over.

Many people that night called me the "best guitarist of the evening", because I was not just "showy-offy," but also made each solo matter, and didn't just show off. It feels great to be regarded that, and I'm not sure if it's even true, or if it matters, as every guitarist there had their own styles etc. But still, I feel proud that all my practicing is paying off!

I want to thank SB Squared for putting us on to this gig, to the other bands who did a great job playing, to the audience who were good to us, and mainly to my band - we played awesomely. It's set our expectations really high for future gigs, which might be a bad thing, but this was our best experience yet, our best gig. I loved it, and can't wait to play that stage again.

What a night.

Thanks for reading!

Adam 'ARK' Walton