Thatās great, much of your story echoes what Iāve experienced since joining a music club, doing gigs with others and getting involved in various jams and festivals. Itās a great community out there.
1 Like
Donāt have time to write a book - too much guitar to play 
Cheers Gordon - Yes, very much looking forward to see what 2026 holds!
Hey Michael, at risk of sounding a bit āzenā weāre all on the same journey, and we are all learningv - thatās the fun part.
Thanks Richard - make sure you spend time using triads to make music - better to be able to make music with one or two shapes than know them all but not be sure what to do with them!
Thanks Ian - Iāve never been so busy!
Hi Nancy - youāll get a much better response if you ask this question in the main forum, but personally I just use the phone on my camera most of the time. Most of the recordings on me on this site are done that way. I find it quick and easy.
Thanks Paul for sharing your experiences this year. Lots of invaluable advice in your post. Iām not sure that at 78 I will be using that advice personally, but hey, ānever say neverā. I hope you do enjoy more of the same in 2026.
1 Like
Hi John - Indeed, donāt count it out! Clapton, Keith, Macca, Dylan and Neil Young are still going strong after 80 ā¦
2 Likes
Paul, that was a very nice and additionally very useful post to read for me!
I saved it to my notes.
I am about to restructure my guitar path and you gave me another nudge to finally look up the local resources to play with others.
Just a few days ago I talked to a busker and he named me a place with an open mic where people from all levels show up.
My year was quite mixed but I plan to make my next one much better - thank you for the inspiration!
2 Likes
This is a really nice write-up. Iām glad the EQ trick has helped.
Iām interested in your approach to hearing protection. I remember you telling the #BBP group that the band was pretty loud.
Cheers,
Keith
1 Like
Thatās awesome Dominique - I hope you have a good time - get chatting to the folk there (after they have played!) you might find a whole heap of other things going on near you.
Hmmm. Yes we are loud - for these gigs we donāt put the guitars through front of house, so I go from the QC to a super clean 120w Orange amp and a 2x12 Cab behind me. The other guitarist does similar. I have measured the stage volume well over 100dB.
I bought ear plugs, but if Iām honest, Iām not using them as much as I should. They take some getting used to - I know itās the right thing to do
3 Likes
Good call, Keith!
My wife plays the violin in an orchestra and depending on where she sits - sometimes close to the brass - she says it can be really loud so she also got earlplugs which she doesnāt use! 
Normally sheās not close to the Brass and most of the time, theyāre not THAT loud I think.
100dB - oh, thatās something! To be honest, itās over my enjoyment zone. At times, with live music I would otherwise love, that can take away from it (just for me very personally)
Maybe you should give that hearing protection another chance again, Paul? I mean, your ears are a precious thing, above all if youāre just starting to have the guitar time of your life!
My wife definitely noticed that her ears got worse over those years of playing in an orchestra, unfortunately! Being five years younger than me, she sometimes canāt hear high frequencies when I can.
2 Likes
We have the same problem, especially in small rehersal rooms. Basically, acoustic drums are forcing guitars and bass to be loud and voice is impossible to cut through - you end up with incredible noise, but you canāt actually hear yourself or others properly. Setting proper levels and band monitoring is really a science - I feel only on our perofrmance we had good levels, after an experienced guy set us up.
Since then, we started using mesh cimbals and quieter drum sticks in small rooms and that helped, but it is not ideal for drummer. I think the proper way to solve this problem is to have in ear monitoring, preferably with own band mixer and individual controls. Then you have a splitter to send one set of outputs from instuments to FOH, and the same (second) set of outputs to your band mixer which is connected to IEM system and sends individual mixes to each band member. That must be absolutely awesome, but expensive for amateurs.
1 Like
We have to mic up the drums or the dummer canāt hear his kick over the guitars 
To be honest, we could probably play more quietly but itās a different sensation for both the band and the audience to play loud.
We do at least have a very experienced sound guy in the band who does sound for a lot of other bands.
Yes using IEMs and sending everything through FOH would probably be best, but as you say itās complicated and expensive.
1 Like
As someone who has done sound for a few local bands, I would echo all of this.
Basically, if you have an acoustic drum kit, that will always be the biggest challenge in small gigs as it sets the base level for everything else. Iāve helped with pub gig where people have complained about the drums being too loud and thereās literally nothing I can do about it other than ask the drummer to calm down a bit (which only usually lasts a few songs).
Yes, mesh cymbals and sticks can help with that.
Other than drums, the other major issues tend to be monitoring and feedback, which tend to work against each other: the guitar player asks for their monitoring level to be turned up in the wedge, which then causes more feedback.
There are things you can do about some of this: modern digital mixers have the ability to āring out the monitorsā and if you do this at the start of every gig, you can practically eliminate feedback. You can do this on older analogue desks as well, but it tends to be a lot harder. Ideally do this with as few people in the room as possible (because it sounds horrible).
Obviously an IEM setup solves this issue but, as well as being an investment, some musicians really donāt like them. Basically there are two types:
- āItās RockānāRoll man, itās supposed to be loudā
- āI care about my hearing and donāt want to be deaf/have tinnitus in 5-10 years timeā
If your band is all in the latter camp, then itās worth exploring.
Expensive, possibly, but not necessarily complicated. A modern digital mixer with IEM setup can be really easy. In fact, when one of the local bands I used to work with went this way, they reckoned it saved them almost an hourās worth of setup and tear-down.
The setup we had was my Behringer XR18 connected on the stage, acting as a stage box (a lot easier than running a snake to FoH) with a cat5 cable running to my FoH where I had a small router and a laptop hardwired in.
The XR18 has wifi, but it generally doesnāt work well when the unit is buried backstage in a pile of cables and next to the drum kit, etc. So I ran physical network cables to a router and my FoH Linux laptop where I controlled the mix. If I had continued doing this then I probably would have got a Behringer X-Touch, but the X-Air controller on the laptop works very well.
I also ran a private wifi hotspot from the router so I could walk around the venue with an Android tablet and make changes.
For the IEMs, the band started to use the Behringer P16s which, basically, daisy-chain using a cat5 cable from the Ultranet port on the XR18. Each band member had their own P16 (e.g. on a mic-stand mount) with locally connected IEMs and set their own monitor mix.
The setup (XR18 and P16s, without IEMs) cost around Ā£1,100 for a 5-piece band.
In this case, the drummer had been using an electronic kit for years anyway, and used to set his own mix and just give me a feed. With an acoustic kit, itās going to be tricky still, and you may need a wedge monitor with a mix for the drummer.
Cheers,
Keith
2 Likes
Sounds like a great set up Keith! I think ācomplicatedā is relative, and this is certainly a good bit more complex than our current set up where mics, keys, bass and drums go into an old analog mixer which sends to three separate monitors and FoH. Guitars normally go into amps unless we are playing somewhere where we need to be a bit more sensible on the volume front and then everything is going through the mixer (which is only 8 channels so that becomes a challenge) and on to FoH.
Cost is certainly an issue - but some of us are making the case for IEMs, so Iām hopefully something will āgiveā in 2026!
Yes, indeed.
To compare, the old setup was all of the stage equipment connected via a 12-channel snake to an analogue desk which fed the PA and the monitor wedges. Originally we had an A&H 12 channel mixer.
That got upgraded to a Soundcraft MPMi20 20-Channel Mixer when the A&H died.
The guitar amps were, originally, micāed up via the snake into a channel on the mixer. We also had micās on the drums, usually just kick and snare. Then 2 x keys (piano and synth) vox and BVs. This from 2016:
This setup evolved over time, especially as we got the bigger mixing desk and started using more channels (3x vox, 3 x keys, another mic or two on the drums).
For almost all the gigs they played, we had to provide both PA and lights. If you are lucky enough to have a venue where they provide this, then the setup will be far easier.
For the old setup, once the amps, drumkit, PA, etc. had been set up, we had to lay out the snake and connect each channel to the desk (it came on a large reel, rather like this one):
Then it was setting up the mics for the amps (later, we used DI boxes which was slightly less setup work but far easier for mixing), and the drums, setting up the monitor wedges (often a challenge for space), and connecting everything up to the snake at the stage end.
Then it was soundcheck, trying to get both audience and monitor volumes right. And, as you said, when the room fills with bodies, that all changes anyway.
When they moved to the digital IEM setup, there were no amps. They just brought in their modellers (Helix, etc.) and we plugged the output into the XR18, and ran a daisy-chain from the XR-18 to their P16s, and a cat5 to the desk. Done! It reduced the amount of kit that needed to be carried in and set up by about 30%, and the amount of cabling by around 60%.
(This was an earlier gig before they moved fully to IEMs, we still had amps at this stage)
The sound check was also easier: recall a scene on the XR18 and tweak to get the FoH levels right. No need to worry about getting monitor levels right; the band did that themselves. When the audience came in, a few tweaks to get the room sounding right (and I could walk the room to see what it sounded like at the back).
Cheers,
Keith
2 Likes
You make a very compelling argument Keith! Iām in no doubt that it will provide a better outcome. Inertia and economics are the remaining hurdles Hopefully weāll overcome those next year.
Thanks a lot, Keith! This is incredibly useful information, I appreciate it! 
I had in mind wireless system, that is why it was expensive. I had no idea about P16.
If I got it correctly, each band member has one unit and we all can independently set our own mixes? Where are P16s positioned on stage usually? There will be 5 cables (daisy chain) for units to connect to mixer + 5 earphone cables for each band member. How practical is this? Can people move on stage?
great post and congratulations!!
1 Like
Yes, wireless IEMs are fairly expensive.
The P16 is, as you said, individual units with a cable to each. So you might have:
Xr18 to Lead Singerās P16
Lead Singerās P16 to Bass Playerās P16
Bass Playerās P16 to Drummerās P16
Drummerās P16 to Guitar playerās P16
and so onā¦
The P16 is a pretty small unit and can sit on top of the keys players synth/piano, next to the drummer, or on the singerās mic clamp.
Then, of course, you need a wired cable from the P16 to the IEMs. That could, potentially be a wireless one if you can find an individual wireless solution. If you want to use one of the multi-channel IEM units, then you would, of course, need to run the audio cable out from the P16 to the transmitter. This would be a bit of extra cabling compared to locally wired IEMs, but probably not much, unless you are playing massive stages.
You could use this selectively (e.g. for the guitar player) so they can move around the stage (if they prefer to be able to do this, and have the space). Itās unlikely you would need this for the drummer or keyboard player, unless they use a Keytar.
Cheers,
Keith
3 Likes
Thanks a lot, Keith!
I know Paul has taken this to a new space but guess this question is relevant to how animated the band is, thinking the likes of Angus and Bruce D legging it all over the stage etc. I know when Iāve used my wired IEMs for our OMs here (and not reflective of gigging) I certainly feel tethered to the Xenyx(s) even with an additional 3 m extn cable. The radio IEM aint cheap for sure !!
2 Likes
Iām already tethered with a guitar cable and Iām too old to be jumping off speaker stacks, so I wonāt object to wired IEMs personally
6 Likes