I have never taken this too seriously, imagining the comments were for people who played OUT instruments loud enough to drown everyone else OUT. At a session in the Shipwrights Arms, Plymouth, I sit opposite Brian, another mudcatter. He plays banjo, and I play accordion and occasionally bodrahn. I think we play pretty sensitively and he certainly is a fancy player.

We've never been kicked out yet, but who knows....the pub is very near the water...........

I can't think of any instrument I dread seeing arrive. The only time sound ever got to me was at a Celtic festival when I was in a room with around twenty highland pipers tuning up....THAT was noisy....
D