Heres a funny story from my early 20s. My cousin and i were once in a rock band. He was the singer and i was the bassist. The band eventually went on to be pretty big playing all the big tours and my cousin a current top 40 music producer and song writer. Anyways, at the time the band was relatively small and we entered into a battle of the bands contest at universal studios hard rock cafe there.

So the night of the contest we're all there at the hard rock cafe. Were all set up and waiting for our turn on stage to play our set. So what do we do. Well most everyone else in the band played it cool and just mingled. Me. I went to the bar and started plowing shots.

A few people there knew me from prior gigs as i was a bassist with a reputation of being a showman on stage. So they kept buying me drinks. Maybe to sabotage the band so that their band could win. There was a 1000 dollar cash prize involved. Maybe just cause they thought i was cool. I dunno.

So anyways about two hours in of me just drinking and getting drunker and drunker i notice my band mates across from the bar giving me death stares. I notice the bands girl friends giving me the knock it off gesture and glaring at me disapprovingly.

But i was confident and blew them off.

Anyways its show time. I get up on stage and am staggering around. I almost fell over and nearly tripped over my own amp cord. I could barely see the audience.

Howd the gig go?

I nailed it. Luckily i was a damned good bass player and the songs were cake to me. Even trashed i played the set perfectly.

Some people thought my drunkenness on stage was just an act that night. But i really was that drunk.

We also won the contest hands down. We crushed the competition that night. One of the judges mentioned that it was the drunk bass player that helped seal the win. It was just so rock n roll to him.

Later i promised the band mates id never do that again.