Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Awesome story Darren. That reminded me of my 1st apartment. There were three feet of concrete on either side, but noise traveled a lot from upstairs and downstairs. I was upstairs and never very loud. One day, after living there for two or three years, the downstairs neighbors started playing some loud obnoxious music early on a Sunday morning while I was sleeping. I'm normally not the retaliatory type, but I got out the 70's Crumar bass pedals, my 3 foot tall TOA 4-channel mixer amp, and my '92 4003FL FG. I plugged in the bass and bass pedals a la Genesis, turned the TOA way up, and faced the speaker directly onto the floor and gave them a 15-second dose of E major they'll never forget! Another true story. Great minds think alike after all!!!!

Maybe I'm curmudgeonly beyond my years, but when I'm at home the last thing I want to hear is my neighbour's music. Conversely I don't expect them to want to hear my music either, so when I play I'm careful about the volume. To me its a respect issue - I respect their right to enjoy their homes and expect the same in return.

86kubicki wrote:Maybe I'm curmudgeonly beyond my years, but when I'm at home the last thing I want to hear is my neighbour's music. Conversely I don't expect them to want to hear my music either, so when I play I'm careful about the volume. To me its a respect issue - I respect their right to enjoy their homes and expect the same in return.

+1, Steve!

Jason, I had a similar situation in 1984, when in the Navy in Virginia. My upstairs neighbor would come home every night and turn on loud R&B music, often well past midnight. I usually had to get up around 4 AM, so this was a problem. One night I finally went up and knocked on his door - His response was, "I pay my rent, I play my music".

Well, I have a saying too, which is "Sometimes easier to demonstrate than discuss". It just so happens that I had a 100w Ampeg VT-22 that I couldn't even play in an apartment because it was too loud even with the volume knob slightly unseated.
I plugged it in, plugged in my ES-335, put the volume on 10, fed the cable under the door and left the room - even with the door closed, the amp was feeding back I unleashed a 20 second version of "Cat Scratch Fever", put the guitar & amp away and went back to bed. Dust was falling from the ceiling... I never heard his music again!

Like I said, sometimes easier to demonstrate than discuss. He must have got the point. In most cases, though, I try to be tolerant, as I'm sure that people have been subjected to my music and playing at times. This was just an extreme example.

(What I really HATE is when people insist on hanging wind chimes everywhere!)

just_bassics wrote: (What I really HATE is when people insist on hanging wind chimes everywhere!)

You eventually get used to them, Jim. I did...after many years.

basjac wrote:Well I got my first non-compliance letter. Apparently my neighbors don't like music or I really suck. I have ten days to comply. It's not like were playing at midnight. It's more around 11 am to 2 or 4. Oh well, I guess it's time to move because I can't forsee a future without playing. BTW we have lived here 12 years. I thought about just going down to the courtyard and rattle everybody at once. But that seems a little antagonistic.

Do you live in a Co-Op type place where they have "rules"? Why would you have to move because someone complained?

11am- 2 in the afternoon doesnt seem like disturbing the peace to me.

I lived in Appartments for 36 years of my life in NYC.
when I was 15-18 I had my 250 watt Fender Bottom with 2 15's and a Fender Tube head, talk about loud! no one ever complained but then again I was probably playing loud when I was cutting school to practice.

Besdies my Parents wouldnt have appriciated the loud rock and roll when they were home, they were more Tommy Drocey and Eddie Arnold kinda people...lol

When My Wife and I were expecting our first child we moved to a 2 bedroom place and the neighbors didnt like me playing. I played low out of respect for others but these people complained if you walked to the kitchen at 8 PM!
so one day I placed the amp speakers down on the floor and gave them a taste of what it could be like. They never complained again.

I now live in the country with no one near me for 300 yards. the only complaints I get is from the people IN the house!

Too bad!



in 3 years when My Son goes to college I will turn his room into a sound proof studio.....

Local laws vary. I looked up the law in Tustin when I was having problems with neighbors' loud music ... IIRC, in Tustin the rules are split into specific time windows, with daytime being more tolerant than late night, but generally one can't have it loud enough to be heard outside the apartment. Note too that 'noise' in this case includes all sources, be it musical instruments, pets, machinery ...

I did do the 'revenge' thing on occasion, usually plugging one of my basses into the Dual Showman Reverb or the Sentura II (both having 2x15" JBL cabinets) ... one or two songs and the other music usually went down in level.

BTW, if I practice at night (after 10 p.m.), I do it unplugged.

Our local noise ordinance (25 miles outside Vegas) is such that if you can be heard 75 feet away from your noise source, you're too loud. 24 hours a day. Period.


And I like it.

jps wrote:

vin*tone wrote:This kinda thing is even killing off band venues in Melbourne (Australia).
Apartments are going up around venues- then the new residents start complaining.

Same thing happened to Riverside International racing track. It was there long before all the development and then people complained about the noise and crowds. What were they thinking?

The land was worth more developed into residential and commercial properties, that's what they were thinking. Times change, populations grow and move and expecting everyone to say "Oh, yeah, that dragstrip/racetrack/factory that 50 years ago was out in the middle of nowhere isn't in the middle of nowhere any more but that's OK it doesn't have to move out to the middle of nowhere it's cool" is unrealistic.

By the way, the same thing will eventually happen to RIC.

Yep, it's happened for some time now. When I joined CIBA-Geigy in 1987, one of the first things I did was help in the relocation of the Cranston, Rhode Island site. It was originally built in a more rural/industrial area, but homes/apartments gradually encroached until people were living on the other side of the property's fences. Because one of the chemical reactions performed at the plant produced nitrobenzene as a by-product (for anyone having used gun barrel cleaner solutions, that's the smell in them - at least, the older formulations), people were constantly complaining about the smell(s), enough that the company decided that enough was enough and they moved out of the facility (and relocated to McIntosh, Alabama, where I was).

I don't think that the same will happen to RIC because the area is already built up, and very seldom does industrial land get rezoned back to residential here in California.