It’s just what you’ve all been waiting for! The new WHY? Shoppe is open for business. Please head over HERE to check it out and see our newest products along with all your old favorites.

-WHY?

Where have the Golden Tickets been you ask?? We don’t want ya’ll to think we been slackin’. Over here at WHY? Inc. things have gotten a little hectic. The boys spent a month and a half recording new WHY? songs in Texas, Yoni, Josiah & Liz spent another few weeks recording vocals back home and then Yoni was off to Atlanta mixing with Graham Marsh! We’ve got a small window of free time (well, not exactly free) to hold a quick two-fer Golden Ticket contest. What does it all mean? Here’s the scoop:

“POT SONG”
-”Uh, Allah, sir? A secret sin: I mate!”
-’Godless- even I was so, to toss a wine vessel. Do get a minister, Cesar.’
-”I shall! A hug?”
-’No! Stop!’

Doug is Palindrome King (what, you didn’t know?). Fifteen years ago today Doug wrote his first palindrome on the back of an empty crisp packet while vacationing in Europe with the McDiarmid clan. Over the years he’s honed this rare and fragile gift. Today we honor his tremendous skill with words and back-words with a 72 hour (EST from when this is posted via Facebook) palindrome contest. There are 2 tickets and 2 winners. The winning palindromes will become the lyrics to each of the Golden Ticket mini songs. We will review the submissions and notify the winners via email.

RULES:
1) You must write an ORIGINAL palindrome. It cannot be copied, written by your friends, or your mom.
2) You must use YOUR NAME in this palindrome. It can be your first, last or nickname (if your real name is not palindrome-able). If you can use your first AND last name this will be considered highly advantageous.
3) Your palindrome can be anywhere between 10 and 100 words.
4) Only 1 entry per person.
5) Email your submission to admin@whywithaquestionmark.com – be sure to put your FULL NAME as the subject heading (not “golden ticket entry”, not “hey here’s my palindrome”, etc.).

For those of you bidding who may not be familiar with our Golden Ticket project:

Every month since December 2010 we have given out Golden Tickets to lucky fans who ordered from our shoppe, we’ve held contests in which they create and submit something they’ve made, or through Ebay charity auctions. The Golden Ticket is a unique theme song written/recorded by WHY? for that fan and posted on our website and facebook. If you win this auction you will be lucky fan #7! Yoni Wolf will webstalk you for song content with which to base his lyrics. Josiah will produce the music and we will send it to the interweb the following month. When we reach #12 we will have a full record!

In the event you win here’s what we need you to do:

1) Be sure to pay for your auction IMMEDIATELY upon winning it! If there is a good reason you need time then you must notify Liz and work something out. If you do not pay within 24 hours you will forfeit the auction and we will start it all over.
2) You must friend Yoni Wolf on Facebook so he has access to your info for lyrical content!
3) Take a nice HORIZONTAL image of yourself (500×700 pixels minimum) against a simple (blank) background and please don’t use a flash.
4) Email Liz your image here: admin@whywithaquestionmark.com
5) Enjoy your new status once we post that shit up on the interweb.
6) We will email you an MP3 of your song once we announce it.

Thanks so much and may the best fan win!!!!!!!

GOLDEN TICKET #6

“Your Filmed Theme On the Silver Screen!!”

You will have 24 hours (05/01 10:30 pm EST – 05/02 10:30 pm EST) to create a 2 1/2 minute (or less) silent video for your potential theme song! Yoni will score the winning video with your theme song based on the visual content and your personal info. Be as creative as you can and have fun!!!

Rules:

1: You must friend request Yoni Wolf on Facebook so he can web-stalk you for additional song content!! Do not include your personal info in your entry email.

2: The accompanying audio will be YOUR theme song (written by us) so the video should represent YOU.  Film yourself, your friends, your dog, your favorite environment or things that best represent your personality and edit it however you see fit.

3: The movie MUST be silent!

4: Only one entry per person!

5: Your entry should be a link to a LOW RESOLUTION version of your video on YouTube, Vimeo or a video sharing site of your choice.  Email the link to Liz: admin@whywithaquestionmark.com within the 24 hour period to qualify. Maximum resolution should be 100 megabytes for entries (though be prepared with a hi resolution version in the event of your victory). Title your video as your first & last name so we can keep track of it easily.

6: In the event that you win, you will need to supply us with a top quality version of your video (via www.sendspace.com) to be showcased on our website & posted on Facebook.

7: GOOD LUCK and may the best fan win!

In other news… Golden Ticket #5 is wrapping up and will be ready to drop in the next few days along with the winning photograph!! All of the participants’ awesome images will be featured in a gallery shortly after the announcement.

We’ll start with one of my favorite things in the world, mixing live sound.

LIVE SOUND
Mixing live is such a rush. Every day presents an engineer with new situations, problems to solve, and fun to be had! Front of house (herein referred to as FOH) mixing is the most important part of a show. Nothing is worse than bad sound.

I like to be a very ‘hands on’ engineer. My fortes lie in live effects. I really like to do tap tempo delays, manually controlled reverbs, and other effects live.

FOH
- If it’s too loud for the engineer, it’s killing the audience. Remember, you’re mixing for them, not for you.
- Don’t be afraid to tell the band to turn down their amps. If you’re fighting with stage volume it can make the entire room unbalanced.
- Be nice to the band you’re working for. They’re signing your checks after all.
- Mix with your ears, not with your eyes. Too many new engineers look at all the lights to make sure everything is doing what it’s ‘supposed’ to do. It doesn’t matter if it looks wrong, it’s what it sounds like that’s important.
- The less microphone stands, the better. Claws and amp grabbers will make everyone’s life easier. I always clamp my ‘overheads’ as ‘underheads’. It takes the harshness and attack out of the cymbals and looks very nice on stage.
- 2 mics on individual instruments can be your friend. In & out kick mics, top & bottom snare, bass DI and mic. This allows you to get two different tones and be able to blend them together. This will prevent a lot of equalization that you would normally have to do. For snare, it also give you more room to work with when applying reverb.
- Garbage in, garbage out. It’s a lot easier to make a good band sound bad than it is to make a bad band sound good.
- Sometimes, in a big room, it’s not a bad idea to engage a high pass on the kick drum around 40-50Hz.

MONITORS
- Never take your eyes off of the band. Watch them like a hawk.
- Be nice to the band and listen to them. It can get a bit hectic on stage at times, but always keep your cool. A bad monitor engineer (not necessarily bad monitors) can ruin a show.
- Ring out your monitors every day with whatever vocal mics you are using for that particular show. Nothing is worse than feedback.
- Be very gradual with your adjustments, one jump too big in a level can induce feedback.
- Develop hand signals. Band members asking for things over their microphones can totally kill the vibe of a show.
- Learn your frequencies (or buy a handheld RTA).
- Never pull out more than 5 frequencies (aside from the super low ones that you don’t need anyway).

TOUR MANAGING
- Your job is to make the band’s life easier. With a good TM, a band shouldn’t have to worry about much except for showing up on time and playing the shows.
- Day sheets will lessen the amount of stress and inevitable headache you get every day.
- Advance, advance, advance! Ask the band everything they will need to know each day and find out that information far ahead of time.
- Know when to work, and know when to party. If you don’t cut loose every now and then, you’ll go crazy. However, you will need to be on top of your game and ready to take charge at any given moment.
- Realize that you’re going to have to be an asshole at times.
- Don’t ever question a band’s request, just do it.
- Figure out how to get drugs (or anything) in every town. Most bands have their vices, and your job is to provide them (this is something you can advance as well).
- Don’t expect the band to do anything for themselves. You should always be the first one to take care of anything, or at least offer to take care of any issues.
- A good TM is the first one up and the last one to sleep.
- Always keep the band’s money on you. Never leave it in the van or at the venue (the hotel is ok, or if you’re on a bus leave it in the safe).
- Deposit your money in the bank as often as possible.
- Master Tour (or other TM software) can make your life easy. Technology is on your side with TMing.
- Budget an extra hour for all drives.
- Keep your bus/van well cleaned and maintained.

It takes a certain kind of person to be able to handle touring. It can be a dark, lonely time, or it can be the one of the most fun and invigorating experiences! When touring a lot, one has to realize that they will never develop deep seated relationships with people via close proximity. You have to figure out a way that works for you. Personally, I have tons and tons of great acquaintances, but very, very few close friends (WHY? being 3 out of the 6 of them). I feel very lucky to even have that many! One of the best things to come out of my career as a Tour Manager and Live Sound Engineer is my relationship with the WHY? band. They’ve seen me at my best, and also at my worst. They’ve been there for me when I’ve been in some of the darkest places of my life, and that is something I will never forget or ever be able to repay.

When choosing this career, one has to be able to realize that it’s going to be a very long adventure with no foreseeable end. Most of these things are what I’ve learned after lots and lots of trial and error.

Sacrifice and Compromise
Those are the two things that happen once you leave for tour. If you’re used to getting your way all the time, forget about touring. It’s not going to happen. You have to mold yourself to the same schedules of everyone else you’re traveling with. Realize that you’re giving up a lot of things that you might cherish in order to live your dream.

Exercise!
You will spend hours upon hours in a van or bus on tour. Exercise is one of the most important things to keep your body and mind healthy. You’re going to be eating at restaurants for almost every meal and undoubtedly eating copious amounts of bad (aka fried) food. Staying healthy is one of the most important things on tour. Once one person gets sick, everybody else will get sick.

Explore
I can’t tell you how many awesome places I’ve been to that I’ve only seen the highway, the venue, and the closest restaurant with vegetarian fare. I started to regret it, and decided that I really need to experience the places I visit.

Don’t Buy (or Bring) a Bunch of Junk
You won’t have room for it. If you do, it’ll probably get broken. Don’t bring anything on tour, you couldn’t live without or replace. Things break, get lost, stolen, and left behind.

Stay Clean
Shower every day. If possible, twice! You’re going to be in very close proximity with a bunch of people. Nobody wants to have to sit next to the smelly one.

Take Pictures
Again, I regret that I don’t have pictures of a lot of the really incredible things that I’ve seen over the course of my fledgling (6 year) career.

Bus/Van Maintenance
If you’re touring in a van, make sure to take care of it! It’s your home on wheels. Keep it clean, keep the oil changed. Nothing will ruin a day more than a broken down van, or some rotten food floating around. If you’re in a bus, make sure that your driver is on point. Nothing is worse than a bad driver who doesn’t take care of their bus.

Don’t Take Anything Personal
Towards the end, and sometimes middle, of every tour. People start to get cranky. They’re exhausted, malnourished, and homesick. You have to be able to forgive and move forward in order to keep a good working (and personal) relationship with them.

Bring Appropriate Clothing
If you’re doing festivals in England, don’t forget your wellies! Always bring a heavy coat, an extra pair of shoes, and more than one pair of pants.

Here are a few of my personal bus rules.

BUS RULES
Rule #1: No #2 on the bus.
Rule #2: See Rule #1
Rule #3: Sleep with your feet forward. One tap on the brakes while you’re asleep, and you’re head first into the wall.
Rule #4: LOCK THE LUGGAGE BAY EVERY TIME. NO EXCEPTIONS.
Rule #5: Clean out the fridge once food goes bad. Don’t wait on someone else to do it.
Rule #6: No bags or backpacks in the seats. Someone has to sit there.
Rule #7: Bus Call mean the door is shutting and the bus is taking off with or without you. Don’t be late.
Rule #8: Be nice to your driver. They can make the tour fantastic, or terrible.
Rule #9: Designate a ‘junk bunk’. If there’s not room for one, keep all of your junk in your own bunk.
Rule #10: Label your food/drinks. Anything without a name on it is fair game for all.
Rule #11: Don’t drink the water from the bathroom sink in the bus. Brush your teeth with bottled water.

Also, be prepared to be doing a lot of this:

Anyway that’s it for now, I’ll write another guide to Live Sound or a guide to Tour Managing in the next few days. Hope you like it!