Karaoke Forums

Hey guys; I was wondering, some of you veterans, what's the silliest reason you've ever been given for losing a weekly gig?

My company recently picked up a show at a relatively new sports bar. They wanted a Friday night DJ -- someone to get the girls on the dance floor. I was happy to oblige, but it got weird quick. The manager that I was dealing with was pretty obstinate about dance music; he wanted me to play music that the twentysomethings would dance to, but insisted that I don't play stuff by black artists, because "we don't want the wrong element in here." I played ball -- I'm not proud, but my regular Friday night gig burned down, and I need that night to bring in some extra income while they're rebuilding -- and, predictably, the younger crowd filtered out.

Then, one particularly dead night, people started asking about karaoke. The owner -- not the manager -- asked me if I was prepared for karaoke. I always have karaoke equipment on me, so when he gave me the go-ahead, I set it up, and we did karaoke for the last hour and a half. It was a rousing success; everyone in the bar participated, and a few of the younger people called their friends, who came out and sang and danced. The bartenders were, astonishingly, in great moods -- they'd been surly before, but now that they had a packed bar and full tip jars, they were in great spirits. Loads of people asked me: would we be doing karaoke next Friday? I said I didn't know, but I'd try to talk the owners into it, since it was such a success.

The owner went home, and I asked the manager if I should expect to be doing karaoke next week; I made sure he knew I'm prepared to do either, but I'd like to do a more singer-friendly setup if we were gonna be doing karaoke. He responded angrily, "No. That was f---ing terrible. Never, EVER do that s--t again."

I shrugged it off, thinking he was just annoyed by karaoke; it just seems to me that if the owner and the manager are telling me different things, I'm going to defer to the owner's call every time. Oh well -- we'd see what happened next week.

But next week never arrived. Two days later, my boss called me, kind of upset that we'd lost a gig. He asked me what happened last week -- I told him. He said that the manager had called him and informed him that the bar would no longer require our services, because I couldn't bring people in (false) and I "just decided to change it to a karaoke night without asking anybody." (Also false.) Fortunately, my boss knows me -- I'm his most reliable worker, and he knows I don't ruffle any feathers -- and had suspected that this guy was full of crap before I confirmed it. After that, he was okay with losing their business.

So I ask again: what's the most ridiculous reason you've ever been given for a canceled gig?

In these type situations (owner/manager/asst manager all in the room making decisions), I always make sure I let them all know who is making the call beforehand. "Hey Sam, Tony just told me to do Karaoke...thought you should know in case he didn't mention it to you". Sounds like the owner said nothing to the manager.

Funny he didn't run down and tell you to stop during the 90 minutes you were at it! If he wanted you to stop, he could have told you so after the first 5 minutes.

I think I would aggressively hit up neighboring bars, if it went over that well. Sounds like there is a need.

Funny you should mention it, Bazza -- that's precisely what I did! The owner was sitting at the bar most of the night, generally watching and enjoying the spectacle; when he told me to do karaoke, I told him that the other Mike had asked me to do some karaoke. He seemed surly about it, but didn't really respond. It was only after it had happened that he was pissed.

I guess it could have been about the bad singing, but that kind of comes with the territory. In any event, there's definitely a need in this area -- if it weren't so far away, I'd beat the bushes a little more!

Well, then in that case they are idiots. They should have recognized a golden opportunity when handed to them, but it sounds like the managers karaoke prejudice gets in the way of making money. Their loss.

Does the owner know what the manager said to you? Seems like he would be upset with him.

_________________
KingBing Entertainment C'mon Up! I have a song for you!!! [font=MS Sans Serif][/font]

I will chime in on this subject with 2 different stories..

First story. I inherited a gig from a friend who is also my mentor. It was a very small bar, only holds about 35 people, and is located in a very small town of about 600 people (mostly LDS of course, it is Utah ya know). The first few weeks were awesome as it could be,, each night pretty well packed the house with the maximum amount of patrons. The very last week I was there, happened to be the opening of deer hunt weekend,, and this particular area is HUGE into hunting. So needless to say, most EVERYONE is on the mountain at deer camps on that weekend. So, that last night, we only had 5 people in the bar, total. Me, my wife, the bartender, the owner, and ONE customer only. Now, with that type of crowd, I can't do much of anything. However,, I got the bartender, the wife AND the ONE customer to sing some songs... The owner is a retired California Highway patrolman, who retired to Utah and bought the bar. The guy is a total creep, he assaulted his girlfriend regularly, drank extremely heavily, and accosted several women customers over the time he owned the bar.. a total jacka$$,,, the WORST type of owner EVER.. After that deer hunt weekend, he just told me to pack my sh!t and get out,, it was MY fault there is nobody in the bar.. so I did. And just left him to destroy the oldest running bar in Utah, and he closed the doors within 2 years. This bar had been in business since 1906, and closed its doors because of this dirt bag in 2007. Sad day for sure.

Second story,, and quite the opposite to the first story.
I was hired by the Eagles club in a pretty good populated area to host karaoke. The way these "no-for-profit" national clubs work is,, they elect a committee to oversee local operations. The Eagles have 7 committee member, and the president is the deciding vote in case of a tie. Each committee member is over a specific area of operations,,, I really don't know how it's broken down tho.. OK,, the committee member that is in charge of finding entertainment was actually a karaoke host himself,, and so was his uncle.. But he felt that would be a conflict to hire himself or his uncle, so he went outside to look for a karaoke host. I started hosting on every other Friday nights, splitting the time with another karaoke host. My nights were packed!!! In fact, the shortest rotation I had was 34 singers, and usually drew in about 150-200 people to the club. The other host drew about half of what I did. The Eagles Club has a great kitchen and dining area, which also was the stage area,, very nicely set up for karaoke or whatever type of entertainment they wanted. My last night there was no exception,,, we had 36 singers that night and about a crowd of 200. It happened to be the Friday before Christmas that year, and they expected it to be slow, which it wasn't. The show was very successful, and had lots of happy people at the end of the night. The head waitress came up to me and told me personally that she had NEVER gotten so much in tips before since she has worked there,,, and she has been there 7 years. Also, of the 7 members of the committee, 5 of them were in attendance at that last show, including the president and the entertainment director. Of the 5 members that were there,, 3 of them sang,, yep, you guessed it,, including the president. And they ALL were laughing, dancing and having a great time. A couple days later, the entertainment director called me and told me that the committee voted to NOT do karaoke anymore,, it was TOO BUSY,, they just can't handle that much business.. I find that very odd,, they don't WANT to be successful, i guess they don't like money, or actually being able to donate to charities,, which is what those "not-for-profit" clubs are saying they do..

2 totally opposite reasons for me losing shows...some people just aren't meant to be bar owners/managers... DOH!!!

I would find the closest bar near and take all their business away. That is bunch of bullcrap.

Agreed. It happens a little more than I'd like to admit; I have several places that hire me strictly for DJ gigs, but a stubborn manager refuses karaoke based on a simple karaoke prejudice. I approached one such manager one time -- not being overly pushy, just mentioning that some regular patrons seemed interested in it and it usually draws a good crowd -- and he looked disgusted. "I hate karaoke. There's always someone that sings that stupid Carrie Underwood song, and they're never good, and... ugh. I just don't wanna deal with that." And it's kind of like, hey, I hate that song too, but patrons who wanna sing it put money in my pocket and yours... oh well.

I would think so, too, but apparently my boss spoke to a different owner. (The place was co-owned by two guys, and then they had the racist, offputting manager that cost me a gig.) The other owner was friends with the manager, and wasn't there that night, so it appears that two of the three people in charge of running the place were against my return. I mean, I don't want to go into a place where I'm not wanted or appreciated; I'll do it for a quick buck, but regardless, I'd have to deal with a manager who had it out for me if I were to return. It's a moot point anyway, since the place has since closed their doors. I know what you're thinking: how could an establishment of such fine repute and keen business acumen ever fail? Sometimes the universe works in strange ways.

Funny side note: the very first night I went there, I got a call from my boss at 4:30 PM saying we had an emergency gig at 10:00 that night. I rallied, did the gig, and the head bartender tried to short me on payment, saying that I didn't bring anybody in. (This jackhole seriously asked me, "don't you have any friends?") My company specializes in karaoke, so it's gonna be hard for me to amass a crew to come out to listen to me play vaguely upbeat music, and besides I had approximately three hours to work with. I put it on Facebook and STILL was responsible for half of the bar patrons that night, due to one of my regular singers who lived nearby rallying a few of her friends to come out. If they wanted a Delaware celebrity to attract flocks of adoring fans, they should've looked up George Thorogood.

Many years ago, and less mellowed, I stopped the owner's alcoholic and drunk brother from molesting some female singers- and I did so in a predudicial and less than considerate manner . I would do it again in a heartbeat, by the way.

The dumb part was that the owner KNEW his brother was an alcoholic and nasty drunk, yet allowed him to drink in HIS bar! Can't get much dumber.

_________________
"No Contests, No Divas, Just A Good Time!"

" Disc based and loving it..."

Yet, he works there every night. Doesn't HE have any friends?

Man, that would've been a great retort.