What Makes Us Want to Gig? Thoughts Before Belladrum

It's Tuesday and you know what that means.

For something that was agreed some time ago, in just a few days, we'll be heading to our last Lucid Liars gig for a little while - we're at the Seedlings Stage at Belladrum Tartan Hearts Festival (Saturday at 2.45 with a killer set for all the sickos).

Unsurprisingly for those that know me, the last 6 years in Lucid Liars I've had a love/hate relationship with gigging and putting on shows (I even wrote a song called 'Eyes on You' from our second album regarding it).

Currently, at least in my mentality, the best gigs are those gigs where you've built the show from the ground up with a purpose in mind. I've never been fond of gigging for the sake of it, that isn't for me. I enjoy having a purpose and something to promote. Whether that's a new show (Hard Times Live), new album, a new single, or even just helping out a friend's band. We're at the point where I'm really just looking forward to shows that scratch my itch of seeking a new challenge.

Knowledge of when to setup a a show and what that purpose is tends to drive strategy for us. We end up fielding a lot of offers, and a lot of the time, between Robbo and I, we come to the conclusion of "We could have more control and do what we want if we just put this on ourselves". Usually that involves working with Robbo on a plan, seeking venue hire, sourcing equipment if needed, and agreeing lineups.

The handful of gigs we've done so far this year have been built with this mentality. I guess it puts the onus on us to promote that gig effectively and reach the people we want to reach. Our new setup of doing the live sound ourselves has really scratched that itch for me.

I've always said to the guys that since we started with Lucid Liars, I've wanted to keep the setlists moving forward. There's always a new song, or a rearrangement, to keep things interesting for us. We do this because we love music and putting shows on is exciting for us, we do it for the love of the game.

Of course we've had our mainstays. 'Better Days' and 'All My Time' were a huge part of our sets for what seemed like an age. However, I couldn't fathom playing 30 shows a year with the same collection of songs, it's just not in my makeup. Recently I was asked about whether Lucid Liars was going to transition to a recording project, at least this was asked in a jovial fashion, but it's got me thinking.

Despite our gigging schedule, aren't we basically a recording project already? A recording project that does a handful of gigs a year? We've released 3 full length albums and we're currently sitting on around 5 fully recorded songs we're looking to release in some capacity - in the same year we released 'Hard Times'. It kind of puts it in perspective.

I wanted to see if this mentality was shared by other bands in our locality, and reached out to Josh from Familiar Enemies (lovingly saved in my phone as 'Familiar Enemies Guy') who offered his own perspective on being in an Inverness based indie rock band.

Josh - "I won’t pretend that I am the most experienced when it comes to gigging and playing shows, honestly my time here with FE in Scotland has give me more knowledge than all my years back in the states. Of course I played shows here and there but nothing ever on the same scale. I think it truly comes down to the support system I have now, I am not a confident person but I have people that push me forward and that makes it all the easier. And I feel like we have a good rapport with the venues we’ve played in, no nonsense we get up do our part and work with the sound guy and keep it as professional as possible. Its all about treating others how I want to be treated. Ultimately I remind myself every day that I’m not the greatest guitarist, singer, or songwriter but I am the best at being me. I love meeting the other bands and try to support where I can and when I can. All of this so far has been more than I ever thought Id have musically and thats truly something special."

Now this perspective has allowed me some food for thought. Maybe we're just in different parts of our journey, and respecting each others journey is a big part of it as we're all moving in different directions at different points. Hearing Josh talk about the differences between the States and the UK independent music scene has been interesting. Josh is out there with Familiar Enemies doing it for the love of the game, much like us.

Even now, looking back over our time together as a band, I see Lucid Liars as having 3 distinct eras (so far). We have the early days (Happy to Be Here.), we have the maturing days (The Best is Yet to Come) and now we have Old Man Lucid Liars (Hard Times onwards). Where does this leave us next year? I keep making mention to the guys that I need time between gigs and shows to understand how to improve, make the show more meaningful and worthwhile.

So where does that leave us after what will surely be a great day at Belladrum? Hopefully we'll be further energised and looking for that next challenge. Watch this space.