Like most of us I am sure, I always dress "for the gig" ... For NH/AL gigs it is always a shirt and tie, upscale restaurants depending on the season it is jacket, shirt, tie, or a real dressy sport, and always with a nice pair of slacks, outdoor gigs depending on the weather and venue it could be a colorful 'Hawaiian' style shirt and slacks or shorts ... and we all know how Gary dresses for his gigs ... but yesterday I was talking with the sax player from the band in NY and we were discussing how many musicians 'dress' today ... with the band, it was ALWAYS the latest style tux and shirt, bow ties, patent leather shoes, pocket square, etc. ... today 'wedding bands' often wear dark shirts with a tie, sometimes with a jacket, and nice slacks ... The aforementioned sax player, the guitar player from the NY band and I had gone to see the 'easy listening' jazz group "Spyro Gyra" at a jazz club in Boston ... most of the band members were wearing jeans ... one of my friends commented that he remembered when the musicians dressed better than the audience ...

The rule of thumb used to be 'one up'. If guests dressed in shorts and super casual, musicians were casual; guests - casual, you - business casual; guests - business casual, you - business suit and tie; guests dressed to the 9's - you tux ...

society's dress code has gone in the toilet....look at these kids the way they are dressed for school?.....or even at weddings today I see people with sneakers,and construction booths no suits,tux etc,...it's a free for all out there so sad...the dress codes of yesterday is a thing of the past. Times have changed not necessarily for the better..

not to mention the Tatoos now if you want to get them it your business but you got to look very hard to find a girl with out them esp the demo 25 to 35 years full arms it just a different time .

Well, not that I'm fully retired and sailing during much of the time, I no longer have a need for more than 20 satin shirts and a dozen embroidered, silk vests. All of the shirts are size Large with matching ties and all the vests are size Large as well. I also have a pair of patten leather shoes size 12 that have only been worn a few times, two black tuxedos size 44L and one tux with a white jacket, same size. I'm open to any reasonable offers. Nigel, you would look great in these outfits. And, Donny, since you've lost all that weight again, they would fit you as well.



All the best,

Gary

Tatoos is a thing of this generation, its best to learn and live with them...

But someone with tatoos can also still dress for the ocasion, and i think thats the miracle word, dress for the ocasion.. if you have a gig at a swimingpool catering to mid 20's and youger requires totally different clothing (as well as music choice) as playing on grannies golden marriage in a luxury restaurant...





Even ladies with full arm tatoos can look classy

As many of you know, I play most of the time at the same place. When I first started playing there, in late 80's, I wore a tux every night, and so did the other guys who worked there, and so did the waiters. Even the bus boys dressed nice. A coat and tie was required for gentlemen to be served. We even kept some there for those that forgot theirs. It had been that way for 30 years at the time.
Now the waiters wear black pants, white shirt and a black vest. They still look nice, but no tux. Someo the customers still dress up; most don't. You can wear shorts and a tee shirt as long as your credit card isn't maxed out.
I wear slacks and a sport coat, no tie. I usually wear a hat. Nobody else who has entertained there in the past 7 or 8 years has dressed even close to that nice. Most guys wear jeans. One "band" wore tee shirts that had a picture of a tux on the front. A couple of the girls that have been there occasionally dress o.k., but certainly not evening gowns as they used to wear.
Times have changed. I'm sorry they have. I still drag out a tux on N.Y.'s Eve, just to make a statement.

It all depends where I play. If it is a wedding ,of course I wear something nice. If it is a bar , a T-shirt works too. At the who really cares? And what is wrong with tattos? It is like not hiring someone because it is a girl.
I have no tattos on me. None, nor I will ever have any. But I couldn't care less if someone I play has any. It is how they play and are they ok people to work with.

I will be playing a wedding of a young couple in a couple of weeks ... not a big affair - about 100 ppl or so - the bride and groom have heard me play before, in fact they were recently at a 4 hour dinner/dance I played so they now what music they will be getting ... I will wear a black suit with a black dress shirt and a solid silver grey silk tie ... I'm willing to bet that other than the bridal party I will be one of the best dressed people there ...

This is why I only play at nudest camps.

Bachus, if I rolled over in bed and saw a gal with those tats on her arms I would run screaming from the place and leap into my van, hoping it was just some kind of nightmare that I will soon awake from. For the life of me, I've never been able to understand why a beautiful, young girl would do that to her body - it just does not make sense. Maybe I'm just an old fart and my mind still resides in the past.

Gary

I just had the words to my favorite country song tattooed to my d***......"It ain't no Big Thing, But It's Growing"....all 7 verses.

In 18 point type, italics!

Russ (true BSer) Lay

Mine APPEARS to say MITY but under certain conditions spells out Massachusetts Institute Of Technology.

chas

Man, this thread took a turn didn't it ??? ...

Played a wedding yesterday. Keyboard for the ceremony in a park in Bluffton SC and then DJ on the deck of a restaurant in Hilton Head (Both the Bride and Groom work there)
I wore Black pants and shirt and a burgundy tie with a keyboard on it. When people started arriving for the ceremony I knew I wasn't in NJ anymore. Some were dressed appropriate but some had jeans and sweatshirts on. Sorry but thats a bit too casual for me, even in the laid back South.
Post above said it, "be one step above" but who knows theses days.

The very last wedding I did was a Barefoot Wedding, which took place aboard a 50-foot houseboat's sundeck. With few exceptions, everyone dressed appropriately, however, the musician was the best dressed guy on the boat. The groom wore shorts, which on a boat I guess was appropriate for the occasion, and the weather conditions, with temperatures nearing 90 degrees in the shade and 80-percent humidity. Thank goodness I had my fan, because there wasn't a breeze stirring.



During the reception, the temperatures rose to the mid 90s and I changed to shorts and sandals, but retained the shirt. It was just too hot for long sleeved pants. No air conditioning on a boat's sun deck.



Great topic,

Gary

Absolutely, you can never put the genie back in the bottle!

So, now.......why do the rest of you members think people feel it necessary to defile themselves with a tatoo? I've asked a dozen people already and didn't get one single answer that made any sense. I'm starting to think it's a "follow the leader" or a "monkey see, monkey do" thing!


I've got to say........I was walking down Broadway in NY where the ritzy hotels are. I noted this absolutely gorgeous lady decked out in evening dress, high-heel shoes encompassing a pair of perfectly shaped legs, diamonds and pearls on her neck and arms and her glimmering black hair in a full Victorian hair style. Absolute class. The kind you see in the pictorials on the society pages.

She was stepping out of a limousine as I was drooling saliva all over my shoes. Until.........she turned away from the car and what did she have on her back? A full blown picture of an eagle going from shoulder to shoulder and down to her waist (she made sure she had a "low-cut" evening gown to show it off).

In a way, this is all good, for me anyway. Playing events all my life, I couldn't concentrate most of the time, because of the beautiful women in the audience, all made up and all decked to the nines to impress both the men and the rest of the ladies there. I even remember the time I was driving my new sports car and I turned to look at a woman waiting for the bus. Well, it only took a split second for me to plow into the back of the taxicab that stopped short in front of me.

Women looked so feminine years ago, and my head was like a doorknob that turned with every lady that walked by, all the while trying to control my testosterone level and keep it in the safety zone! Now I don't have to waste the time with a first look even 'cause there's nothing to look at anymore.

How is it good? The less time I spend looking at women, the more time I have to practice music!

MARK

Mark, are you over 40 years old? It takes that long for your big brain to kick in. before that,you follow that little "monster" around, and that can be HELL!

Ever notice that most good music, literature, art, etc. comes after 40?

BIG Brain Vs. LITTLE BRAIN!.

Damn, I miss that little fellow (LOL).


Russ(now, much more creative)Lay

I "defiled" myself with two tattoos...

Here's one. The only difference being that my wolf is brown.

There's nothing wrong with having a tattoo or tattoos. There's plenty of stuff that I won't like about those that think they ought to set the rules of what I'm supposed to do with my body.