...So, Im in a band.....

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Ok, now that i have your attention... uh, yes I am in a cover band. I am painfully shy around people. ( seriously, they sometimes scare the crap outta me.) Does anyone out there have any suggestions on how to become more open and bold on stage? I love singing, but i have trouble being outgoing. Maybe i should ham it up more. I dont know.. any advice?

YES-I am doing the same thing, and I decided to do what Peter Gabriel did;
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=xtHClRu1 ... re=related
(if you want to see the "other" costumes do tell lol
(eg putting on face makeup or costumes)

Have a beer whilst setting up your gear. No more than one though.

I've spent a lot of years performing so I know what you mean. I think you need to be yourself. If hamming it up isn't your thing, you'll come across as ackward. Has someone told you that you need to change something? Maybe you're okay just the way you are.

Cocaine
.....
No I'm kidding, don't do that, haha.

If being on stage makes you shy, just paint your face like KISS, so nobody can see your true identity. Disguising myself always makes me feel more at ease, personally.

Why no more than one?
Get hammered!


Just kidding (sort of)


I have been in bands since I was 15, and I am now 33.
I was so overwhelmed ALL the time....in was an exercise in perpetual discomfort..I usually couldn't speak to anyone before or after I performed...I developed weird stomach problems...etc...being on the stage was awkward...I had no idea wheat to say to the audience...I was not your conventional front person at all.

I think I combat things now by keeping my hands busy..I play a musical instrument....that helps me feel less naked...I play the ukulele...which is really easy to learn, and a lot of cover songs have simple chords....Also, I wear a funny costume..I find that helps me out immensely....At one point, I vowed never to go on stage without a costume again....and it helps the image of the band...we are more interesting to look at.

My Aspie nature wants to answer in all seriousness: more than one will backfire and then I really have a reason to be nervous because then dexterity goes completely out the window!
Rule: one while setting up and into the first set. Second one in the second set. Water throughout because my mouth is dry.
This is why I don't play so well in church: I'm nervous, and it's in the morning, and it's church so...no beer. That makes me sound totally dependent on alcohol, which I am not- I use it, not abuse it.

What band are you covering? I believe I could give some advice (respectfully) if I knew the type of music

do what I would do, get hammered before the concert pass out and miss the concert, problem solved

Hmm...I'm in a band too! and I had to beatbox in front of a lot of people last week!...

I was terrified before that, but when I got on stage I just imagined there was no one there and never looked at the audience and it worked out fine...if I did see them I would have pissed myself

So...what I recommend is...avoid any eye contact...it may sound as if I'm telling you to be distant, but when nothing else works...it's the best thing

Mike Stipe used a loudhailer/megaphone to cover his face when REM released orange crush to the UK charts in the late 80s . That was because Top of the Pops back then was mimed, they had no idea until they turned up. So he didn't feel he could mime confidently in sync., the rest is history:
[youtube]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2BvXBwtrs_k[/youtube]

Good point- the "fake eye contact" wherein one looks out over the audience without really focusing. If the lights are on stage and the audience is in darkness, this is much easier.

Last edited by riverotter on 08 Apr 2009, 10:38 am, edited 1 time in total.

i reccomend heroin...... jk jk!
no dust get totally wasted and then you just dont care anymore, and if you drink enough you wont remember the entire event the next morning.
also, watch "bullet in a bible" (green day) it is a great example of what to do, if images help more than words for yah also, great music for doing a cover album on! (try St. Jimmy & homecomeing)

Apparently Stevie Nicks of Fleetwood Mac had the same problem, according to this New York Times article:

“I needed a uniform,” she recalled, one that would counteract the stage fright she encountered in the mid-’70s, when she first began touring with Fleetwood Mac. At the time, her brief to Margi Kent, who still designs much of her wardrobe, was to create “something urchinlike out of ‘Great Expectations’ or ‘A Tale of Two Cities,’ ” a chiffonlike, raggedy skirt that would still look beautiful with black velvet platform boots.

“We came up with the outfit: a Jantzen leotard, a little chiffon wrap blouse, a couple of little short jackets, two skirts and boots,” Ms. Nicks said as she reminisced in her suite at the Waldorf Towers last week. “That gave us our edge.”

And an effective disguise. “I’ll be very, very sexy under 18 pounds of chiffon and lace and velvet,” Ms. Nicks promised herself as a teenager. “And nobody will know who I really am.”

Roy Orbison wore his famous dark glasses to hide his stage fright.

i think just experience helps. i've been playing solo and acoustic (apparently one of the scariest things a musician can do, not that i'd know) at open mic shows for nearly 3 years, i certainly wasn't that great when i started. i just got more used to it the more i played at these open mic shows. all i can say is you'll never be completely ready for your first one. i'm really shy and people phobic too... onstage and off, i'm like two different people.