I Have Been Back
Jun. 6th, 2025 10:26 am![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
ateolfHOLY SHIT! The Terminator live score went fucking great! I'm still just in a daze from it all (and lack of sleep too, of course!).
To start off, we had the soundcheck at noon. THAT didn't go so well! Lots of problems and stuff, but it was good to get those then and deal with them BEFORE the show. Not everyone could make it at noon but a good majority of the group did. So we had enough to check everything. The funny thing is it was the three people in group one that couldn't make it, so two full groups were present and one whole group was missing. But since we had set up the night before, we were ready and then it was just a case of waiting for Daniel to set up the sound and the mics. He let us know it would take two hours (which I understand, mic'ing nine scrap metal "instruments" isn't the most basic task!). Also I had missed a couple of things to bring so I had time to run back home (my laptop stand I forgot again, but also realized there's this mounting piece for the video camera stand and it's been so long since I've used it I didn't think about it, had to just search for that at home but luckily I found it with not too much trouble). Then we were able to sound check not too much later. I'll start with the things that went wrong. Jacques went to put on his headphones and the built-in cable was just completely severed (guess it got snagged on some of that metal!). So we were down a pair of headphones and then since someone had forgotten to bring a pair for the soundcheck, we were short a pair (actually, we were short a pair anyway before it broke but Jacques borrowed Daniel's pair). Then before getting started, there was something going weird with Reaper for me. If I tried to mute or unmute one channel, it did it for ALL of them! Couldn't figure it out, thought it was sticky keys but wasn't, restarted my computer and it still did it. Then I figured out I had accidentally done a ctrl-a and all channels were selected, I guess. Then we're doing the movie and I was thrown off with starting my timer from where they started the movie. I was off a little bit but dealing with it but decided I'd try to sync it back up at the end of a section, but then I did the arrow the wrong way and didn't realize I was on the wrong section and got even more out-of-sync. So I was frustrated dealing with that. And Kiefer didn't have headphones for this soundcheck at all so I'm hearing someone always be a little off on times and not stopping with everyone else (and I didn't realize at the time he didn't have headphones and that there was a good explanation). So we ran through a little of the movie and it felt a good bit messier than it has in our rehearsals. And there was probably something else that went wrong too! After that we took a break. I tried to take a short nap but for the same reason I couldn't go back to sleep when I woke up too early in the morning, I couldn't sleep then either.
Going back to get there at 5, Mary Beth was along with me and we also picked up Graham M. A couple of people brought extra headphones so we were all set and good! This time with everyone there we did the encore again and it was good. Then we did a shorter run-through of the movie and it was MUCH better! Then I was all feeling good about it again! (I came home with the tiredness hitting me and was feeling a bit dejected and worried we were headed for disaster! But that good soundcheck set me straight!) I had a little bit of running around. I had an idea of using both Kiefer's and my Tascam recorders (we have the exact same model) if they were able to use different sends for the percussion and the synth to run into each (so we'd have better control over mixing 'em later...a makeshift four-track). It took them a while because the board in the theater isn't the best for stuff that would be more normal in a strictly music venue, but he did figure it out! Also got the video camera set up upstairs by the board (Kiefer also set up a phone for video somewhere close to the stage I think). A little bit of running around plus I brought a change of clothes (I decided to wear a dress shirt and pants as I thought it looked kinda uniform-y). After a bunch of pre-running-around and a little bit of just hanging out in the green room (the theater's backstage green room, not to be confused with Crosstown's very nearby music venue the Green Room). In a conversation where two threads were merging together, one about the joy of different conjugations of "I'll be back" and another about Seinfeld...I got out a very funny (at the moment, at least) joke of "What's the deal with being back?" We had also practiced our entrance earlier, line formation to our instruments. The plan was to walk out all stonily, keeping up the cyborg shtick.
So then we play! There was a little delay starting the movie and we're all just sitting there in silence for a few seconds. And we're still in expressionless cyborg-mode so we're not relieving it from our end on the stage. And then it started! It went very very well! I was very happy with it as it was going along. It felt overall like the best run-through of all the run-throughs we've done (which is of course fucking ideal!). There were mistakes, but nothing major. During one section I completely missed unmuting the metronome but they still managed to play through it! At another point no one was able to hear me talking to them in the microphone (I used a microphone run into their headphones for instructions and stuff, mostly just signaling which song was about to be played and when to stop and also if they needed to get quiet). And I was told of this and I'm trying to figure it out but it was a time when there were a lot of changes happening fast so and I also just really wasn't sure what was going on so I'm trying to figure it out in the little gaps between changes. Anyway, at this point someone else is telling me they can't hear me and I feel like I probably had a small bit of snapping at them (visually with hand gestures), like...I KNOW AND I CAN'T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT YET JUST ROLL WITH IT FOR A MINUTE! In that I probably jerked my hand in a downward motion a little impatiently. Mostly frustrated with the technical situation (not the player, I know they wouldn't know I already knew!). But then it turned out to be the most obvious and simple and dumb thing. I ran the mic through the volume pedal even though I mostly ended up not even using it (just in case they were getting too much sound picked up into when it wasn't needed...but that didn't really happen but I kept it just in case) and it had gotten pushed down so when I realized it, easy fix. But it was a little frustrating. But they did great and rolled with these minor issues. Jacques knocked his "drum" over twice. It's this one odd round drum-shaped piece of metal and it fits almost perfectly on a snare stand...almost. And Jacques has a tendency to bang the fuck out of it when he plays! The stand fell over twice during the performance but he just picked it up and moved on. Graham has these two metal tubes that are hanging from some twine. I mentioned how the one broke in the last practice. I added new reinforcing strings to each one before the soundcheck. So double strung they should be good! But towards the end, on one of the pieces, both strings broke at the same time so it just fell off and he had to retie it and put it back up. But again, we all rolled with it! Overall it was a really good and satisfying performance! Everyone seemed to love it. During the credits, while we were still playing, a bunch of people did start to file out and leave, I imagine there was a good number of people there (most likely the majority) who were just there strictly for the movie. But I had the orchestra come to front and take their bow and we did our encore and it was well received by everyone who stayed. Got lots of compliments from everyone who talked to us. Oh yeah, and before we went on, I kept getting messages from people about the crazy line to get in and how completely packed the place was. At one point I had to go out to get some shirts to set aside for people from Denny (who was manning the merch booth) and yeah, I'd never seen that many people packed in the lobby...and at the time the theater was already getting pretty filled up. Afterwards, Courtney (who runs the film series there, so who has pretty much seen most all of the movie screenings) said she's never seen it that packed. It was pretty damn wild. I harbor no illusions that so many people were there for me...I mean, that's what happens when you attach yourself to a VERY popular movie franchise...I know the big draw was Arnold's caboose and flopper. But still. People seemed to take to the metal orchestra and I think it was very loud and powerful and imposing hearing that in person in the theater. Anyway, I really can't imagine it having gone better in a realistic way (sure I can imagine some of the issues and mistakes (I made a few in my playing too, but very minor) not being there, but some other minor ones would have shown up anyway). Oh damn. Yeah and on the stage it was the first time ALL of us played together AT THE SAME TIME! (We came very close on the last rehearsal...just one person missed it entirely and there were two others, one who could only come the first half and one the second half, who were both there but not at the same time.) But yeah, it's really a fucking thrill to finally get to hear it ALL being played together!
Okay, then after trying to talk to some people, you have to actually take all the stuff down and load it out of there! So did that, we brought the metal back to Graham's garage and then I took all my synths back home! At least the more times I load all this same stuff, the less it feels like a big deal each time. Got some sleep last night but once again woke up earlier than I should have. I got more sleep this time than yesterday, but still a little behind.
To start off, we had the soundcheck at noon. THAT didn't go so well! Lots of problems and stuff, but it was good to get those then and deal with them BEFORE the show. Not everyone could make it at noon but a good majority of the group did. So we had enough to check everything. The funny thing is it was the three people in group one that couldn't make it, so two full groups were present and one whole group was missing. But since we had set up the night before, we were ready and then it was just a case of waiting for Daniel to set up the sound and the mics. He let us know it would take two hours (which I understand, mic'ing nine scrap metal "instruments" isn't the most basic task!). Also I had missed a couple of things to bring so I had time to run back home (my laptop stand I forgot again, but also realized there's this mounting piece for the video camera stand and it's been so long since I've used it I didn't think about it, had to just search for that at home but luckily I found it with not too much trouble). Then we were able to sound check not too much later. I'll start with the things that went wrong. Jacques went to put on his headphones and the built-in cable was just completely severed (guess it got snagged on some of that metal!). So we were down a pair of headphones and then since someone had forgotten to bring a pair for the soundcheck, we were short a pair (actually, we were short a pair anyway before it broke but Jacques borrowed Daniel's pair). Then before getting started, there was something going weird with Reaper for me. If I tried to mute or unmute one channel, it did it for ALL of them! Couldn't figure it out, thought it was sticky keys but wasn't, restarted my computer and it still did it. Then I figured out I had accidentally done a ctrl-a and all channels were selected, I guess. Then we're doing the movie and I was thrown off with starting my timer from where they started the movie. I was off a little bit but dealing with it but decided I'd try to sync it back up at the end of a section, but then I did the arrow the wrong way and didn't realize I was on the wrong section and got even more out-of-sync. So I was frustrated dealing with that. And Kiefer didn't have headphones for this soundcheck at all so I'm hearing someone always be a little off on times and not stopping with everyone else (and I didn't realize at the time he didn't have headphones and that there was a good explanation). So we ran through a little of the movie and it felt a good bit messier than it has in our rehearsals. And there was probably something else that went wrong too! After that we took a break. I tried to take a short nap but for the same reason I couldn't go back to sleep when I woke up too early in the morning, I couldn't sleep then either.
Going back to get there at 5, Mary Beth was along with me and we also picked up Graham M. A couple of people brought extra headphones so we were all set and good! This time with everyone there we did the encore again and it was good. Then we did a shorter run-through of the movie and it was MUCH better! Then I was all feeling good about it again! (I came home with the tiredness hitting me and was feeling a bit dejected and worried we were headed for disaster! But that good soundcheck set me straight!) I had a little bit of running around. I had an idea of using both Kiefer's and my Tascam recorders (we have the exact same model) if they were able to use different sends for the percussion and the synth to run into each (so we'd have better control over mixing 'em later...a makeshift four-track). It took them a while because the board in the theater isn't the best for stuff that would be more normal in a strictly music venue, but he did figure it out! Also got the video camera set up upstairs by the board (Kiefer also set up a phone for video somewhere close to the stage I think). A little bit of running around plus I brought a change of clothes (I decided to wear a dress shirt and pants as I thought it looked kinda uniform-y). After a bunch of pre-running-around and a little bit of just hanging out in the green room (the theater's backstage green room, not to be confused with Crosstown's very nearby music venue the Green Room). In a conversation where two threads were merging together, one about the joy of different conjugations of "I'll be back" and another about Seinfeld...I got out a very funny (at the moment, at least) joke of "What's the deal with being back?" We had also practiced our entrance earlier, line formation to our instruments. The plan was to walk out all stonily, keeping up the cyborg shtick.
So then we play! There was a little delay starting the movie and we're all just sitting there in silence for a few seconds. And we're still in expressionless cyborg-mode so we're not relieving it from our end on the stage. And then it started! It went very very well! I was very happy with it as it was going along. It felt overall like the best run-through of all the run-throughs we've done (which is of course fucking ideal!). There were mistakes, but nothing major. During one section I completely missed unmuting the metronome but they still managed to play through it! At another point no one was able to hear me talking to them in the microphone (I used a microphone run into their headphones for instructions and stuff, mostly just signaling which song was about to be played and when to stop and also if they needed to get quiet). And I was told of this and I'm trying to figure it out but it was a time when there were a lot of changes happening fast so and I also just really wasn't sure what was going on so I'm trying to figure it out in the little gaps between changes. Anyway, at this point someone else is telling me they can't hear me and I feel like I probably had a small bit of snapping at them (visually with hand gestures), like...I KNOW AND I CAN'T DO ANYTHING ABOUT IT YET JUST ROLL WITH IT FOR A MINUTE! In that I probably jerked my hand in a downward motion a little impatiently. Mostly frustrated with the technical situation (not the player, I know they wouldn't know I already knew!). But then it turned out to be the most obvious and simple and dumb thing. I ran the mic through the volume pedal even though I mostly ended up not even using it (just in case they were getting too much sound picked up into when it wasn't needed...but that didn't really happen but I kept it just in case) and it had gotten pushed down so when I realized it, easy fix. But it was a little frustrating. But they did great and rolled with these minor issues. Jacques knocked his "drum" over twice. It's this one odd round drum-shaped piece of metal and it fits almost perfectly on a snare stand...almost. And Jacques has a tendency to bang the fuck out of it when he plays! The stand fell over twice during the performance but he just picked it up and moved on. Graham has these two metal tubes that are hanging from some twine. I mentioned how the one broke in the last practice. I added new reinforcing strings to each one before the soundcheck. So double strung they should be good! But towards the end, on one of the pieces, both strings broke at the same time so it just fell off and he had to retie it and put it back up. But again, we all rolled with it! Overall it was a really good and satisfying performance! Everyone seemed to love it. During the credits, while we were still playing, a bunch of people did start to file out and leave, I imagine there was a good number of people there (most likely the majority) who were just there strictly for the movie. But I had the orchestra come to front and take their bow and we did our encore and it was well received by everyone who stayed. Got lots of compliments from everyone who talked to us. Oh yeah, and before we went on, I kept getting messages from people about the crazy line to get in and how completely packed the place was. At one point I had to go out to get some shirts to set aside for people from Denny (who was manning the merch booth) and yeah, I'd never seen that many people packed in the lobby...and at the time the theater was already getting pretty filled up. Afterwards, Courtney (who runs the film series there, so who has pretty much seen most all of the movie screenings) said she's never seen it that packed. It was pretty damn wild. I harbor no illusions that so many people were there for me...I mean, that's what happens when you attach yourself to a VERY popular movie franchise...I know the big draw was Arnold's caboose and flopper. But still. People seemed to take to the metal orchestra and I think it was very loud and powerful and imposing hearing that in person in the theater. Anyway, I really can't imagine it having gone better in a realistic way (sure I can imagine some of the issues and mistakes (I made a few in my playing too, but very minor) not being there, but some other minor ones would have shown up anyway). Oh damn. Yeah and on the stage it was the first time ALL of us played together AT THE SAME TIME! (We came very close on the last rehearsal...just one person missed it entirely and there were two others, one who could only come the first half and one the second half, who were both there but not at the same time.) But yeah, it's really a fucking thrill to finally get to hear it ALL being played together!
Okay, then after trying to talk to some people, you have to actually take all the stuff down and load it out of there! So did that, we brought the metal back to Graham's garage and then I took all my synths back home! At least the more times I load all this same stuff, the less it feels like a big deal each time. Got some sleep last night but once again woke up earlier than I should have. I got more sleep this time than yesterday, but still a little behind.
