NWB - Community Blog

Hey there I use ear plugs as our drummers bleedin loud.

Benefits - I can hear after the gig
The ear plugs i have are not intrusive or hurt my ears

Try www.audiorelief.co.uk around £8.00 I think or theres others that are silly prices.

Damn right i do, but I'm a bass player. It was after 1 gig in Warrington where the guitarists were so loud my ears were ringing like mad after the gig. The drummer had always worn the disposable "Rhubarb and Custard" ones and let me have some until I got a set of Alpine Safe Pro's. Also have some Elacin ER 20-S.
Both are very popular with muso's that i know and the Alpine's have 3 different filters to provide the degree of attenuation you need.
At the end of the day if your ears go, your musical career probably goes with it.

Was talking about ear plugs to the Bass players wifey the other night,we were sat right next to ST and behind Aiden, bugger me it was loud!

How you guys play all the time without ear plugs is beyond me.

never have yet, like to hear whats going on, perhaps getting the band to turn down a little may help, we have allways used a sound engineer so only rely on back line for stage use only, if every1 sets levels up just above the drums it aint that loud, never had ringing ears after a gig so far. or maybe the damage is allredy done and I cant hear fekk all!!!!!

Another SHOUT for Elacin ER 20's.

Feel sorry for you guy's stood in front of the drums as you get the full on frequency 'hit' from the cymbals.
Earplugs also cut out what you can't hear (fundamentals) which can be just as damaging..

Never felt the need to wear them yet.....until the whittles charity gig that was...Drums were fully miked up...but the backline wasn't! so it had to be LOUD....TOO LOUD.

Elacin ER 20s for me too. I don't wear them all the time, but perhaps I should.

@ MES, www.amazon.co.uk/.../ref=dp_image_z_0

They're the very ones.

@ Vankwish.
They don't block the sound out, just attenuate the harmful frequencies. I find you can hear what is going on better with ear plugs than without.

I use a bike earplug in my left ear just to enable me to hear my vocals. We use monitors but vocals not always audible over the backline, we are however in the process of sorting in ear monitors so will let you know how we get on with em

yes, I always wear earplugs... I just get the cheap foam ones.. cheap but typically they attenuate over 30db.. most musicians don't like em because they cut the high frequencies more than the low, but that's fine by me

I never go to watch a band without earplugs, and I never rehearse or gig without em... want to preserve what's left of my hearing

I don't find singing with em a problem.. but it does take getting used to

Yep, ER20s, about a fiver from Amazon. I don't always use them with Delirium as drums are backline are a sensible level. Always need them for Angel Of Sin though as the drummer can only play one way!
Jon

had tinnitus for 2 years now. luckily its never effected my sleeping and i cant hear it until im in bed or in a quiet room.

yeah ear plus are the way forward, ive forgotten what silence sounds like. its weird to think i'll never hear 'nothing' again. and every now and then a really loud high pitch comes into my ears for 5 seconds or so - i heard the radiohead guitarist had the same problem, he went almost deaf for a while and different frequencies came back to him at different times.

recently its been a lot better, but i should wear plugs all the time for gigs/practices. i got the ones above, with changable bits in them. didnt wear them for saturdays gig, we were louder than normal and my ears are foggy today. like they've got water in them.

Pardon could you repeat that please?

i went to a hearing centre for some earplugs that are made from a mould taken from the ear, supposed to be the best you can get and don't deaden some frequencies like other, cheeper plugs do..they take 2 weeks to be made, mine arrive Friday, i will post a review a.s.a.p.
£165....yeah, it's a lot of dosh, but you cant buy back your hearing!
www.hearingprotection.co.uk check 'em out, they were recommended to me by a fellow muso

Another big thumbs up for Elacin ER20s from me. I have tinnitus and find the plugs let you hear whats going on without totally cutting out what you need to hear.

P.S I thought I was the only one on here that was daft enough to carry on gigging in the full knowledge that what we do is medically wrong! I feel a bit better now.

Be safe, play safe, use Alpine Safe Pro's, singer's should never leave home without them...

I don't wear earplugs during performance or rehearsal as we are all DI'd and have electronic drums, so we are only as loud as we need to be. I did wear them once for a performance and didn't like it at all. Despite being the kind that are supposed to attenuate the frequencies evenly, they didn't. I didn't get the same feel from the sound and it affected my performance. However, I do always carry them to gigs to wear when I have to sit through other bands and discos that are not so bothered about who they deafen.