A Band's Guide to Not Pissing Off Your Sound Tech

As long as I have been working live sound, I've heard musicians sharing stories about irritable (or worse, careless) sound engineers throwing off their set. Though I do find that behavior to be unacceptable under pretty much all circumstances, to be fair, we often also find ourselves in a position where it might be rude to assume someone doesn't know how they are hindering their own ability to sound good in a given space, so it can be difficult to find a tactful way to speak up. Then, we're being prevented from doing our best work by factors we can't control, and are often going to catch the blame for it not sounding good when our hands were tied to begin with. It honestly can be frustrating! Here are some things your sound tech might be having an attitude about if they're not handling that frustration so well.