Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

"Pure grain alcohol and rain water, Mandrake..."

Or you could do what Mike McDonald does right before singing: gargle a vanilla mikshake...

Brian: I'll buy a Fisherman's Friend a beer once in awhile, but that's as far as I'll go...

(Wouldn't want you to lose faith in the peanut gallery...)

wayang wrote:
Or you could do what Mike McDonald does right before singing: gargle a vanilla mikshake...

Phlegmatic, DPW.

winston wrote:When my throat was constricting or acting up I used to suck on a Fisherman's Friend lozenge between sets, especially if I had any respiratory ailment. They are very effective.

Has the young lady in this ad paid a visit yet?

winston wrote:When my throat was constricting or acting up I used to suck on a Fisherman's Friend lozenge between sets, especially if I had any respiratory ailment. They are very effective.

According to Wikipedia they were developed by a young pharmacist named James Lofthouse in 1865 to relieve various respiratory problems suffered by fishermen working in the extreme conditions of the Icelandic deep-sea fishing grounds.

A good supply of cool water is always helpful too.

I await the older than dirt jokes from the peanut gallery.................

+1000
FYI, those Fishermans friends are found in the Pharmacy section, not up at the register with the candy. These little guys really do the job for a cough, and can soothe a barbed wire throat. Good luck finding a better one, and don't expect them to taste like candy.

JakeK wrote:I don't smoke anything, and I don't drink alcohol. ...

Jake, you're not old enough to drink .................. legally that is.

Fisherman's Friend or Riccola.
Or, better yet, 2 fingers of Th' Auld Quare, aka Bushmill's. I usually have a pint of Guinness nearby too.
The more Guinness, the better I sing.
The more you drink, the better I sound.
Really.

Either lots of Coke or Gatorade. Nothing else seems to do the trick (including just water), so I stick with what does not psychologically screw me up.

If you want to take care of your voice, water should be it. Staying hydrated is key. My vocal professor in college went down a list of all the bad stuff for your voice: caffeine, alcohol, anything sugary, acidic, etc., and he was right. But, I realize it's not a very rock star move to be waiting to go on for your set and only drinking water. But, I'm a bass player who doesn't have to do backing vocals, so I indulge with the best of them!

As a bass player all I do is drink beer & keep my mouth shut.........usually

A wise move. Nobody wants the bassist to show them how to play their guitar correctly.

Water, Fisherman's Friends (the odd Riccola)and that's about it.... True story:

Back in the early 80's, I was the bassist in a 7-pce Disco revival showband that was doing a pretty good business on the Wet Coast of Canada... Most nights, our evenings went like this- Move in- one beer. Set up and soundcheck- one beer. Dinner before the show- one beer. Back to the venue dressing room- One beer, normally carried onstage for the first 45 min set. First break- one beer. Back on stage- water. Second break- one beer (anyone keeping score here?). Back on stage- water. Third break- one beer, and because this is the last set, carry another onstage for the final set. Breakdown at the end of the night- last beer until we all hit the latenight bar. One of our female vocalists was somewhat more health concious and had her first beer after sound check and her second after the last set, but the other 6 of us pretty much followed this pattern for nearly two years.

We taped our sets for reference, mostly to check on mistakes -if any. Then one night, I heard the first set followed immediately by the last set (which, if you're keeping score was played during the 5th beer since dinner, which was actually the 8th beer of the evening). Well.... after the finger-pointing and yelling died down, we all agreed that it was a darn good thing that the crowds were out-drinking the band for the most part, or we'd have been out of work- a lot! That night I became a sober musician, limiting myself to one beer- AFTER the lights go out..

Oddly, my music started sounding better almost right away, esp later in the evenings.

FWIW

Nice story, and not unlike a few of my own. Welcome to the forum.