Welcome to Bucket City...
334 shows and counting/don't fuck it up for the rest of us
334 shows so far this year.
5 cancellations (3 due to a blizzard and 2 shakey venues)
3 getting screwed (promoters fault)
Lessons learned:
Promoters, don't put up guarantees for money that you don't have -you never know what's going to go wrong. In the Casino business, this practice is illegal.
Getting guarantees is not about what the band wants and certainly not about what the band needs. Your needs having nothing to do with what is available. For example, I "need" a new car, but that doesn't mean that one is available.
What is available to you is, for the most part, based upon how many people show up. This may be based on speculation, estimation, experience (built in crowd), or information (Pollstar and Celebrity Access reporting). You don't get paid for being good, you get paid for having draw. Your draw may be related to how good you are, but not vice versa. If you're good, then promote. If you're bad... promote anyway.
Losses are bad for business and bad for morale. While it sucks to play to a empty room, enough losses will put a venue/promoter out of business and that's one less market available to you, the rest of us and 1 less establishment of employment and one less opportunity to create art. In the recent US economy, bands have taken on the additional burden of being partly responsible to keep these establishments open. Don't care? Think you don't care? Don't fuck it up for the rest of us. Promote your shows and give back to the infrastructure that supports you.
You can do this by, to the best of your ability, promoting the show from your end. Venues and promoters should be doing the same. Its in everybody's interest.
MySpace is not enough. Repeat that to your self 10 times and then remind yourself that its not 2005. When you finally catch up with the times, use every outlet that you have from posters to Twitter to email lists and beyond. The social media revolution is not happening, its already happened by the time you read this.
Record labels: Oh, you? You're still around? Get a real job. Your distribution is the same as everyone else's, your posters go out to late to the venues and your pockets are shallow for a reason.
Drinks: Venues... you're killing me. At least give the bands free draft beer. We all know how much you pay for a keg of beer and that band is helping you to sell it. 4 heavy drinks can get wasted on draft beer and it costs you $10. $10 for hospitality, are you kidding me? That's a deal for anyone. You charge than bands to drink beer and I'll charge you for bandwidth storage for booking emails. How about charing you tax on the performance and then reporting you to the IRS if you don't pay it? This can go as deep as you want. Bands aren't patrons, they are contracted entertainment. Period. Have a different view of this subject? I foresee a out of business sign on your front door. Don't believe me? Ask any venue in Indianapolis... oh wait, they're all closed.
Which brings us to our next point: Indianapolis sucks for live music. After beating my head against the wall, I learned that at any given "good" show in Indianapolis, the fans are from somewhere else. The key to a "successful" Indianapolis show? Go somewhere else.
5 cancellations (3 due to a blizzard and 2 shakey venues)
3 getting screwed (promoters fault)
Lessons learned:
Promoters, don't put up guarantees for money that you don't have -you never know what's going to go wrong. In the Casino business, this practice is illegal.
Getting guarantees is not about what the band wants and certainly not about what the band needs. Your needs having nothing to do with what is available. For example, I "need" a new car, but that doesn't mean that one is available.
What is available to you is, for the most part, based upon how many people show up. This may be based on speculation, estimation, experience (built in crowd), or information (Pollstar and Celebrity Access reporting). You don't get paid for being good, you get paid for having draw. Your draw may be related to how good you are, but not vice versa. If you're good, then promote. If you're bad... promote anyway.
Losses are bad for business and bad for morale. While it sucks to play to a empty room, enough losses will put a venue/promoter out of business and that's one less market available to you, the rest of us and 1 less establishment of employment and one less opportunity to create art. In the recent US economy, bands have taken on the additional burden of being partly responsible to keep these establishments open. Don't care? Think you don't care? Don't fuck it up for the rest of us. Promote your shows and give back to the infrastructure that supports you.
You can do this by, to the best of your ability, promoting the show from your end. Venues and promoters should be doing the same. Its in everybody's interest.
MySpace is not enough. Repeat that to your self 10 times and then remind yourself that its not 2005. When you finally catch up with the times, use every outlet that you have from posters to Twitter to email lists and beyond. The social media revolution is not happening, its already happened by the time you read this.
Record labels: Oh, you? You're still around? Get a real job. Your distribution is the same as everyone else's, your posters go out to late to the venues and your pockets are shallow for a reason.
Drinks: Venues... you're killing me. At least give the bands free draft beer. We all know how much you pay for a keg of beer and that band is helping you to sell it. 4 heavy drinks can get wasted on draft beer and it costs you $10. $10 for hospitality, are you kidding me? That's a deal for anyone. You charge than bands to drink beer and I'll charge you for bandwidth storage for booking emails. How about charing you tax on the performance and then reporting you to the IRS if you don't pay it? This can go as deep as you want. Bands aren't patrons, they are contracted entertainment. Period. Have a different view of this subject? I foresee a out of business sign on your front door. Don't believe me? Ask any venue in Indianapolis... oh wait, they're all closed.
Which brings us to our next point: Indianapolis sucks for live music. After beating my head against the wall, I learned that at any given "good" show in Indianapolis, the fans are from somewhere else. The key to a "successful" Indianapolis show? Go somewhere else.
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Mom&Pop Productions on -
Yes yes yes. I'll spend at least 30 hours (probably way more than that) promoting 1 show. It's imperative that bands do the same. I wouldn’t expect a touring band to do that much. But emails, bulletins, even hand bills the day of the show help. You may have access to fans that venues and promoters don’t.
I would like to say that venues most definitely need to spend some time (and money) on promoting shows. I think that the biggest reason Indianapolis fails time and time again is that they will not put any effort into promotion (although there are a few good venues, actually 2 to my knowledge). You have to at least hang a poster. That is simple. Let your patrons know. Send someone out to hang them up at your record store. A band from Georgia playing in Indianapolis probably will not have time to do this. You have to support the bands that play there. People don’t come to shows they don’t know about. And if your dumb ass cannot send an email to the paper or hang a flyer up in your own bar, don’t blame the band and stiff them if it’s a light night. Chances are if there were at least 30 people there the band did their part and you didn’t. There is more to a show than just saying "yes, you can play".
Local support is key as well. Especially in Indy. There are lots of established local acts that can introduce their fans to touring bands. I've seen plenty of successful shows happen because locals will get the word out and bring some friends.
Too many times bars think that its not their job to help promote the acts. Who’s playing, times, and cost should be posted on your website and should be accurate.
It’s true, if the promoter eats large sums of money and the bar doesn’t make any there will not be a place to play anymore. Times are tuff and we have to help each other out. It’s a symbiotic relationship.
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