Definitely, it is extremely rare though, and usually has a good reason for it. Had one guy I worked with who used to be Rihanna’s sound engineer, I asked him why he stopped doing that and started working for a local corporate AV company. His simple response was that it wasn’t worth the stress, and he got to stay home and see his kids.

Dude was easily one of the best sound engineers I’ve ever heard, he could make anything sound way better than it had any right to be, and yet he was the local guy pushing cases, running cable, and basically playing second chair to all the corporate AV guys thinking they were sound engineers, including myself for a while. All because it meant he could see his kids and not be stressed about it.

I ended up making him my go to audio guy anytime I needed someone, and stepped back so I could learn.

It’s not supposed to be played without belts, I’ll tell you that much.

Basically, also trains, so many trains.

I beat Factorio without using belts.

…

No, I’m not a masochist, why do you ask?

They do have a pitch, however because it is percussive as opposed to sustained, we don’t register the pitch as easily. Many will also purposely obfuscate the pitch, such as cymbals, they don’t hold a tone, but rather multiple tones at once, making a washing sound and working for any key. If you ever look at a cymbal you will see the rings and divots around the cymbal, because if they weren’t there it would ring like a bell which definitely has a pitch.

As for the drums themselves they definitely do a have a pitch and it is common for to tune them in fifths, or octaves. Think of a drumline, those drums all have pitches and tones, they also function identically to a traditional drum kit. You can very similarly to the cymbals obfuscate this tone by doing an offset tuning so your drum head resonates unevenly across the head creating multiple tonalities at once.

You can achieve this by being lazy and not tuning.

I’m a professional sound engineer and ex-professional drummer BTW.

Party of the rule of law… wait…

My entire career path.

I knew I liked concerts, and knew that people had to run that equipment, so I decided to get a job in an event company warehouse to learn what was happening. About 2 months in a sales guy apparently oversold a job and came running downstairs asking if anyone knew how to do video. No one did. So I said “have you got the manuals? I’ll learn.” He said, “Great! You’re going out on a North American arena tour in 6 weeks, good luck.”

Talk about getting thrown into it. I was the projector tech for a show that was running 10 screens and I had never touched a projector before then. I thankfully had a director who realized the crap I was in and helped me out.

That was almost 15 years ago now, I’m no longer on the road, but I’m still in it. Every show is different and every show is a learning experience.

I fuck up.

Let me guess. Boeing

Edit: yep Boeing 737-800

Watch it get bombed because “hamas”

Same but on the live side. Interestingly Sony has it down pat for their live cameras. The global standard for camera control is a Sony controller almost everyone supports them. Grass valley on the other hand hot garbage software, really good hardware.

Needles. I got allergy tested when I was little and they pricked my arms hundreds of times to see what I was allergic to. I was also super young do naturally I wanted to itch it, and they wouldn’t let me. It got to the point where they strapped my arms to the table and all I wanted to do was scratch the areas that they had poked me…

Maybe don’t do that to a five year old.

Yea I don’t like needles

Factorio.

My current record for game completion with no belts, was just over 36 hours.

Live entertainment production. Currently eastern United States, but I have used this method almost everywhere in the US. I am a production manager, so I let all the companies in town know I’m there, and freelance gigs just happen. Sometimes I’ve liked working with a company so much, I’ll accept their job offer, but usually I get more money working freelance.

Straight white male here.

Are you trying to sleep with me / I’m trying to sleep with you? I’d like for you to have a vagina and preferably be straight or bi.

Otherwise I don’t care about what’s between your legs. Men can be caretakers, women can be construction workers, some random gender can be a computer programmer. I don’t care, as long as the job gets done.

If it’s outside of the bedroom, gender / sex, means nothing to me.

I was doing some work with an academic center that provided continuing education for the teachers and caretakers at orphanages. We always worked with local administration or charities who would educate the administrators and caretakers on how to maneuver the legal system in their country, while we provided the technical training and education resources. The goal was to get the children trained in a trade skill so they could support themselves when they got out. The areas we were working in were often remote and never in good areas, but the teachers and caretakers usually tried, they just didn’t know what they were doing and needed a little help. But at least they were trying.

By this point I had worked all over latin America, and a handful of countries in Africa. All of these people and cultures were different, but you could tell they tried, and the people in the villages and towns respected, and in many cases helped those that tried. Honestly it was some of the best and most rewarding work I have ever done.

I’m saying all of this because back in 2008 I ended up seeing an opportunity to go to Russia and do the same type work. I thought I’ve never been to Europe or Asia, sure that sounds exciting. Expecting to see the same thing I had seen in 18 other countries by this point. People in rural areas who saw a need and stepped in, now they just need training.

Instead of a rural town or village, we ended up in Kostroma, a city of a quarter million people. We find out from our contact from the Ministry of Education, that children are usually kicked out of orphanages at 14 as they are no longer profitable. At that point we should have immediately started asking questions, alarm bells should have gone off, etc. But it was the first day in a new country, we’re still getting to know our contacts before we start training. So there’s still some cultural unknowns, could be a translation error, any number of things.

While we’re doing our training, the teachers and caretakers were very standoffish, much more than we were expecting, but whatever, we’re the new people. They also have very strict times of when we have to be out of there. Makes sense, end of the work day, you’ve got kids to take care of, we get it.

We stayed too late one night and we found out the reason why the kids could become, “no longer profitable.” Evidently all of the orphanages in the area would sell kids for a night, and when they got too old, people didn’t want them, so they got kicked out. When we found out, obviously the first thing we did was try and report it. But we were told by both our contacts from the Ministry of Education, and the police, that’s just how they do business. If the kids want to eat they have to work.

We broke our contract with the Ministry of Education stating what we witnessed and left. Don’t know if anything has changed, but I’ve not been a fan of Russia ever since.

Anyone who’s moved from up north to down south can attest to that.

And you are getting a relative pay cut. Doing the same amount of work, but the money you take home doesn’t go as far.

Sadly no, my company does, but many companies see employees as resources, not assets.

The other thing I always tell people is every year you don’t get a raise that’s at least equal to inflation you’re getting a pay cut. Finding a job that does cost of living increases every year is a huge benefit.