Easter Performance

Today we had our Easter gig which consisted of us performing 3 original songs. I felt that considering our position, we had just wrote finished all of our songs the week before and not practised them enough times, we had a good performance and it went rather well. I think that in terms of our stage technique and what we did when we were on the stage we did well. We didn't interact with the audience but that's something we could look at possibly doing in our next bands to help us improve on our performance technique. I had to improvise for our last song which ended up being an instrumental, Beth didn't have enough time to write lyrics to the song so it ended up having no vocals. I now realise that we should have focussed more on the work instead of stalling working on our songs. Absence was an excuse we used to do nothing in the pod sessions but we later realised as it got closer to this Easter gig that even if we were missing band members we could still get a substantial amount of work done.

The audience reacted well to our first song, Fallout, which we felt was our strongest song but I did feel that in certain areas of the song that it was out of time. We should have practised with a metronome which Amy suggested, this would have helped us keep in time with one another. At the start of the bridge, the part we called "Phil Collins" because of the drums, you can see me go over to Harry and say something. I was mentioning how we forgot part of the chorus and it didn't go to plan. Because these were new originals the crowd didn't know any different and probably thought it was part of the song, they'd never heard the song until we played. But we knew we had made a mistake. It could have been down to stage nerves because we did feel quite comfortable with playing it, we practised it a lot. Its quite hard stopping stage nerves but I find that if I talk to people before I go on stage then it helps me. I rarely get nervous when I'm actually on stage.

Our second song which was called Funky Fruit didn't actually have any vocals, Beth didn't have enough time to write any vocals so it became an instrumental. This song would have been a lot better if it would have had vocals but I don't think it was too bad. There were quite a few mistakes due to a lack of us practising the song in the pods but considering how much we practised it, probably about 3 times if that, I think that it went well.

The last song we performed, Caged, had a few mistakes like at the end. It seemed like we didn't know when we were ending the song, I was off. We didn't practise or outline what the ending was. To prevent a mistake or problem like this in the future I think it would be best to go over sections in the song to make sure everyone is comfortable with each part and then go over the song in one with all the parts, from start to finish.

Overall it was good, I'd give it a 7/10. I felt that our songwriting ability could have been showcased in a better way if we would have communicated better with each other but we were able to create interesting melodies which felt unique.

The band that consisted of Jordan, Tom, Charlotte, Brook and Jack were most likely my favourite band that I saw perform in the Easter gig. Their original songs sounded really good, I was impressed with their songwriting ability. I was expecting good songs from them but I was a little surprised at how good they were. The second original song that they performed I felt was the best that they wrote. It had interesting time signatures which changed and very nice melodies. It really showed off their rather high level of musicianship.

The only thing that I would say that let them down was their stage presence. Their was a lack of movement. Brook was moving around but the others weren't. To be fair to Jordan he was unable to due to his leg which was in recovery. To help them improve on their stage performance they could stand up whilst practising in pods. I think most bands don't actually stand up and get comfortable with their songs. It's also good to possibly think what you'll be doing on stage for each song. You have to take into account what type of song you'll be performing, whether its fast or slow, mellow or rocky.

Overall I'd give their performance a 9/10, they were probably the best band. They managed to showcase their abilities.