You are true blue musician, a lover of all things sound related, and a consummate professional. Naturally, you’re going to want to destroy your guitar or instrument as part of your live show.
Smashing your instruments goes back to, at the very least, the sixties, although it’s more often thought of as a punk thing. Of course, most punk bands back in the day had the musicianship of a pack of rabid hyenas, so smashing their guitar made little to no difference in the quality of their sound. [Cheap Guitar To Smash]
Truth be told, if you do it right, smashing your instruments can be the violent crescendo to an awesome show, and leave your fans thinking that it was the coolest thing ever, especially if your fans are testosterone tainted teenage boy or owners of demolition companies. But like anything, smashing your instruments is something that you shouldn’t head into willy nilly.
Bait and Switch Guitars
The biggest problem facing most would be instrument annihilators is the fact that instruments actually cost money, something that musicians, on a whole, do not actually possess. If you smash your good instruments and aren’t making a bunch of money, you may find your band rapidly devolving into a barbershop quartet.
Fortunately you can have your guitar and smash it, too. What you need to do is buy some old, busted instruments that cost next to nothing or, in some cases, actually nothing, and then swap them out for your good instruments before the end of the show. This way you get the joy of destruction without the pain of regret.
Pick an Instruments You Can Destroy
This is important. If you are a piano player, you might have to give up your dream, because unless you can pick up a piano and hurl it or you carry a fire ax, you’re going to find it hard to smash.
Likewise, electric guitars tend to be shockingly durable, so if you have the upper body strength of a starved gerbil, you’re going to find it hard to destroy your instruments in a meaningful way. Make sure that the instrument you choose to destroy is one you actually can destroy. [Smash this guitar]
Be Aware of Where You Are
Once you’ve gotten to the point where you actually can destroy your instruments, you need to be aware of where you are. If you bring your guitar down like a lumberjack splitting wood, you’ll want to make sure that your bass player’s head isn’t in the way.
Yes, technically, drummers and bass players are instruments, but the police will probably take a dim view of you destroying them. You also want to try to avoid smashing your instrument into things that could potentially kill you, such as electric plugs, pyrotechnics or security members. There’s no point in destroying your instrument if you die before you can appreciate it.
If you follow these simple guidelines, you can be wrecking beautifully crafted instruments in no time flat and showering the rest of your band with splinters, and isn’t that what music is really all about?
Great article.