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Re: Set-Up



Hi there,

I used to suffer with this too. There was a time when my live
performance rig required 4 trips to the car. Now it requires just 1.

I got a very large rolling suitcase from one of the Mexican markets in
San Francisco's Mission district. I keep my gear is wrapped in towels
to save on space. The most fragile gear is in boxes with bubble wrap.
They are stacked in order of breakability/replaceability.

The dealbreaker for me is that I needed something I could carry on
public transportation. That was a big element of me switching primary
instruments, too. The only downside is that it still takes me 20
minutes to set it all up. I've looked into pedalboards. What I really
need is an enormous pedalboard that packs up into a rolling case that
also has room for floor pedals. (The pedalboard would be a table.)

Things I've learned for airplane travel:
1) It's much, much cheaper to have two full-size suitcases than it is
to have one full-size suitcase that is over weight. (On my last tour,
the overweight bag was $110, where an extra check-in bag would've been
$35.)
2) Get a small rolling suitcase for carry-on, and put the most
valuable or hard-to-replace items in there. Checked baggage tends to
go through a lot of abuse. Last I knew, carry-on baggage did not have
a weight limit.
3) If your check-in or carry-on contains a very suspicious-looking
instrument, it's a good idea to paste newspaper articles or
descriptions of it on the outside of the case.

My solution for performing with a large variety of gear? Don't. At my
venue I've seen many shows where people bring a large variety of
instruments. They tend to get so distracted in making sure they use
everything that the performance becomes more of a demonstration than a
concert. Do you really need a smoke machine?

-- 
Matt Davignon
mattdavignon@gmail.com
www.ribosomemusic.com
Podcast! http://ribosomematt.podomatic.com
Rigs! http://www.youtube.com/user/ribosomematt