Neverkid – PRESHOW RITUALS

In this Preshow Rituals segment, the electro pop artist, Neverkid, reveals what she does before taking the stage. You can check out the story, after the break.

My routine before a show rarely stays the same but I have a few things that I always do – like changing my outfit at the last minute and styling my hair for ages before taking it out again and just putting it up in a ponytail! I used to not get too nervous before gigs when I was in my band, so we’d all just have a beer together and get up onstage but now that I’m a solo musician and my songs and performance style are completely new – my preparation and mindset are a bit more thought out and technology-centric.

For my last show, I cleared out all the furniture in my living room to make space for my setup and rehearsed my set for two days straight, making tweaks to the mix and assigning different parameters to my sampler (like filters and reverb) for various instruments. For a new set, this process actually takes about a week or so of tweaking as I often find problems with the mix, go back to my mixing computer to fix them, re-save the audio and midi files and transfer them back across to my laptop. On the day of the gig, I make sure I’ve got plenty of time to pack up my gear (three stands, two keyboards, a laptop, a sampler, an audio interface, and all my cables) and order a large ride-share car to get to the venue (and feel like a King climbing up into the front seat if its a van).

During soundcheck I’ll usually make some last-minute tweaks to the mix on my laptop (for example, if the bass is too loud or soft out of their PA system) and once done, I always turn off my laptop until I’m about to start my set. Twenty minutes before playing, I have precisely half a schooner of beer (usually an IPA). The taste of beer relaxes me and makes me feel like I’m in a social setting, so when I get up on stage, it’s like I’m hosting a party. I like to chat with the attendees before playing and prioritize watching the band playing before me. As I’m about to get up onstage, I completely clear my head, fire up my laptop and get excited to play my best show yet.

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