Back in the late 1970s, I was doing semi-permanent house sound at a club in Cleveland, OH. They were pretty eclectic in what they presented, with a few days a month being dedicated to punk. With all the bands that were boiling out of nearby Akron, we got a lot that went on to national level. Well, one night we were headlining the Dead Boys.
They actually showed up on time for the sound check, and I had just gotten the system up and running, and was playing a cassette to EQ the house. They listened as I set up, and then one of the guys came over to the FOH and said, "This rig is way too clean, can you do something about that?"
After laughing in his face, I had to ask, "Are you serious?"
He replied, "Yeah, we usually play through shitty rigs, so that is ‘our sound.'"
Well, after spending a lot of time and money making a good sound system, I was not about to abuse it to satisfy them. I looked at him and said, "Well, I'll make my rig sound bad if you go up and kick holes in all your stage amp speakers, so we are on an even basis."
Needless to say, they didn't, and the show went on well, the audience was raving about how good they sounded, and the band then hired me to do other local gigs when I was available. They never asked for "shitty sound" again.
-From FOH's Unused "Nightmare" Archives, circa 2005…
