Bag It Up
I spent most of the day Saturday installing new locks on the house - not that the old locks were bad per se, but my lovely wife bought some electronic deadbolts with the spiffy new keypads. See, now I can’t lock myself out of the house anymore (twice since we moved in). It was okay when security was around to let me into my apartment, but the locksmith is more expensive and a little farther away now.
These locks run on 9-volt batteries, so I did what most enterprising young musicians would do when faced with a need for the little square givers of electronic life. I raided the gig bag. By the way, it’s a sure sign of domesticity when your gig bag becomes your primary tool kit. It isn’t that I’m overpacking the gig bag, though. That bag could be a savior at a show when your gear (or soomebody else’s) breaks down. It’s a good thing I checked, too - the batteries in the bag were dead, and I ended up having to run to the hardware store anyway. Better then than at the show, even if I did have to extract my car from the snow to do so.
Anyway, if any of the readers of the bass book are checking this out, here’s what’s in the gig bag at any time:
- Multitool, like a Leatherman® or something
- Screwdriver, ’cause I hate the screwdrivers on the multitools
- Extra set of strings
- Polish cloth for bass body and neck
- Polish cloth for strings
- All necessary cables for gig
- Backup cables for the necessary cables
- The 9-volt batteries I had to replace
- Spare tuner
- Bass DI (in case the amp goes or they need a PA feed
- Spare fuses for amp
- Electrical tape
- Sharpies (Silver and Black
- Business Cards
- Flashlight
- Kazoo (once used for a solo and kept around just in case since then)
A good gig bag will help you out of a lot of jams, and it’s handy around the house when domesticity ensues. Just make sure to test the batteries and make sure everything gets returned.