So I'm guest-mixing in a small club, and the changeover has begun, and it's our turn. I go to plug in the bass channel, and a huge boom goes through the system. I'm thinking, "That's weird; I muted the channel – it couldn't be a phantom power pop…" I go back to the desk, and the first six channels are lit up. Just to see what happens, I push up the snare channel, and sure enough, "Bagunk Bagunk" is the sound that is made as the fader passes through unity…
Upon further inspection, I notice an overturned bar tray and an empty beer glass on the floor. I put two and two together and realize the console is now full of beer. I have about five seconds to figure out what the hell I'm going to do when an angel appears. It's one of my colleagues from the sound company I work at, and he's like, "What's wrong?" I explain, and he's like, "I'll be right back."
Our shop is only five minutes away, and he's back in 10, which is about the amount of time it takes us to finish off the change over. We had the same console, so I matched them up, did a quick, re-patch and voila, we didn't even lose any time. In fact, the changeover took half the time as the band before us! Pretty sweet.
-Derek Stevens
