In article ,
SSJVCmag wrote:

One or two at a time? Probably not. There's ALWAYS a loose cannon or two
that has to get attention. You shrug it off and they NEVEr truly follow up
the threat, they give up or walk and are never heard from. I've had people
threaten to call police and such, and you politely explain how you;ve done
your venue homework and are within local ordinances and such but the crawl
down your throat anyway and you stay polite and agree with them that indeed
they CAN call authotities and probably SHOULD if they need to.
They never really do. They;ve gotten their 10 minutes of your attention and
belittling.
But a regular STRING of these, focussed and clear headed, can and will get
the attention of folks.
If it can get to the artist as well that;s better, sometimes (more often
that you;d think) they don;t KNOW what's hitting the audience.
Story about Julio Iglasias and a less-than-optimal monitor engineer...
US sound company on the tour got a phone call from Spain, as directed by mr
Iglasias, saying "we're sending this guy HOME... TODAY... I expect (NAME OF
KNOWN TOP_DRAWER MON ENG) on a plane here TODAY or we're kllling this legacy
long-term relationship, Hiring Clair Bros TODAY"
It got their attention.
It got fixed.

One Person with All The Power can do this.
It WILL take a LOT MORE people with LITTLE power to match it but the WEAPON
is the same... The POCKETBOOK.


When the service sucks, do you tip?
When the food sucks, do you eat anyway and pay?

ONE customer won;t get the chef or cook changed.
A string of them and a reputation issue WILL.

Can you,
at the venue, while the concert is going on, actually find someone who
will refund your money if you tell them that you don't want to stay
because you don't like the sound?


There's ALWAYS someone In charge.


Occasionally, they'll give refunds if you complain that it's too loud,
but I would expect they usual response would be "The sound engineer has
been with the band for 25 years and knows what they should sound like.
It's perfect. If you don't like what the band sounds like you shouldn't
have come. Now get back in there and enjoy it like everyone else."

When this happens at the local movie house.. (bad sound, bad picture)
I keep pushing.
AND MOST IMPORTANTLY, like ANY such approach, you don;t START this battle
unless you indeed are ready to walk...
And you walk whether or not you get your money back... But you walk LOUDLY,
preferably where lots of folks can watch.
And you don;t actually WALK untill you have gotten,
on paper
in writing
in front of each person,
the names and contacts for the following,
starting with the FOH sound engineer:

TOUR STAFF
TOUR TECH MANAGER

ARTIST TOUR REP
ARTIST MANAGEMENT

VENUE LOCAL CREW MANAGER
VENUE HOUSE MANAGEMENT

LOCAL BOOKING AGENCY

With addreses and/or phone numbers
(and the one thing that WILL be available there, no matter what they say,
will be PHONE NUMBERS... They don;t leave home without those)

And then you indeed WRITE LETTERS
(emails too if you want but LETTERS FIRST)
Explaining
WHAT you didin't like
HOW you were treated
What you will tell your friends.
In polite, stern and believable language.

THIS gets results.
LACK of this is what keeps the level of performance LOW.



I'll have some of what he's smoking.