Gig instructions....

SquadLeader

SquadLeader

Gold Member
Just been offered a gig and received the following email.

No catch, no sinister motiviation, I just wonder what people's thoughts are when reading it....

Here is some general information about Band Night. Have a read and let me know if you're happy with it all. If you are i'll go ahead and book you in.
Band Night Information
The way Band Night works is that we have 4/5 bands on, we ask you all to try and bring at least 20 people down. That way it's nice and busy for everyone and you all get chance to be seen by a new group of people and hopefully extend your fan bases.
There's no fee for the night I'm afraid. We are happy for you to flog CDs afterwards.
The door entry fees, just £2 per ticket go towards paying for the sound and lighting men.
The K has its own radio show on a thursday morning on Radio, if you send in a CD we'll do our best to get your played.
Get in for all bands playing is 6pm, don't be late as this will mean you have no set up time. You need to bring your own equipment with you, drums and so on. For unloading bring your vehicle round the back of the pub onto the cobbled area, this way you wont get a parking ticket.
We'll put the bands in touch with each other before the night and hopefully you can agree on sharing bass amp or drum kit shell. This will make things easier for you all.
Our door person will keep a note of who is coming to see which band. This means if you get a good crowd down we'll invite you back regularly, if you make no effort with promoting your gig then we wont.
Thanks
Best wishes
 
Ah, the old "You do all the work, we keep all the money" routine.

...there's probably a good TV show on that night. Or, hey, what about a gig that pays real grown-up money?
 
alparrott said:
Ah, the old "You do all the work, we keep all the money" routine.

...there's probably a good TV show on that night. Or, hey, what about a gig that pays real grown-up money?
Click to expand...

Phew...not just me then...
What a great little setup they've got there eh?
Threaten bands into bringing a following....
Not only don't pay the bands...
But get THE BANDS FOLLOWINGS to pay THEIR staff...
Brilliant.

The funny thing is I don't actually object to an unpaid gig so long as we take something from it...give us free beer for the night, or decent promotion, or pay our expenses and hell I'll play the gig for the love of the music/it's a cheaper rehearsal....

But I read this and thought...err.....not while I'm breathing
 
SquadLeader said:
you all get chance to be seen by a new group of people and hopefully extend your fan bases
Click to expand...

HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA . . . Oh that's priceless, I never get tired of hearing that load of old bollocks . . .

SquadLeader said:
if you get a good crowd down we'll invite you back regularly, if you make no effort with promoting your gig then we wont
Click to expand...

Oh stop, STOP - you're killing me . . . my sides . . .

Another 12 year old who wants to play at having a "Band Night". That's adorable: presumably he does "Band Night" on Monday night, then 5-a-side football on Tuesday night, Cub Scouts on Wednesday, and if he's a really good boy Mummy and Daddy will take him bowling on Thursday and he can have fish fingers for his tea.

What a wanker.
 
SquadLeader said:
...if you get a good crowd down we'll invite you back regularly, if you make no effort with promoting your gig then we wont...
Click to expand...

Invite you back...to play for free again???? Whoopdee doo....I can see doing this to get some gigging experience, or to get some exposure, but on a repeat basis??? Nahhhh...

My theory has been (unless it is a benefit for some good cause) "If you make money, I must make money".
 
Masheanhed said:
I can see doing this to get some gigging experience, or to get some exposure, but on a repeat basis??? Nahhhh....
Click to expand...

You can get gigging experience *and* get paid for it, in my experience. And "exposure" happens at paid gigs, too.

People like this are perfectly willing to pay a DJ three figures for two hours of pushing keys on a computer, but see no problem in telling three to six people to schlep all their stuff on stage, play their hearts out for one to six hours, for "exposure".

Every time someone says, "that sounds fair", we *all* take a step backwards.
 
I mean no offense by this, but it sounds like you're being a little unfair on them. Have they explicitly said they do no promotion for the gig? They mention they have an affiliate radio show and are willing to play your music if you give them a CD, sounds like pretty good promotion to me.

I'm not trying to cast aspurtions on you or your band, I'm talking in general here about local bands in the UK so forgive me if it come across that way. There are too many bands who think all they have to do is sit back, play the music and that it's everybody else's job to get the name out there and people to their gigs. It doesn't work like, it's imperative that bands put as much effort and more, than venues do into promotion of a gig and promotion in general. If the venue gives a flyer to one person, you need to be giving a flyer to 20 people.

You can't cultivate a good fan-base if you're not directly engaging with the people you hope to attract. I like to use this analogy; it's like the guy who goes to a club in hope of finding a girlfriend and just sits in a corner hoping a girl is going to come talk to him, it doesn't work. The guy who see's a girl he likes and approaches her is the one who has more chance of finding romance. And getting his best friend to approach her for him? Forget it. Same applies for music, yeah people might turn you down, but you're not gonna get the audience by sitting in the corner and hoping they come to you, or living in the false hope that someone else i.e. the venue is going to hook you up. The job of a venue in it's rawest form is to provide you a platform to 'sell' your music, you, the band have to take the responsibility of marketing yourselves to get that audience to your platform.

On the subject of pay, the Live Music Act passed by parliament at the start of this month should start having an impact as time goes on. You might find this article by the Musicians Industry News Network interesting: http://tinyurl.com/minnarticle It may take a while for this to have effect and I do sympathise with the venues, fact is the money just isn't there anymore. Pubs and venues are being squeezed tighter every tax year by their breweries and it's hard enough for them to keep the numbers of regular punters up. It's a horrible situation but one that isn't their fault.

Apologies again if it sound like a bit of a rant!

Hope you're well,

Kev
 
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Bad Tempered Clavier said:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA . . . Oh that's priceless, I never get tired of hearing that load of old bollocks . . .



Oh stop, STOP - you're killing me . . . my sides . . .

Another 12 year old who wants to play at having a "Band Night". That's adorable: presumably he does "Band Night" on Monday night, then 5-a-side football on Tuesday night, Cub Scouts on Wednesday, and if he's a really good boy Mummy and Daddy will take him bowling on Thursday and he can have fish fingers for his tea.

What a wanker.
Click to expand...

LOL.....too funny. And so true.

On the other hand, this place sounds like 1/2 the places in Los Angeles.

At least they didn't ask you to pre-sell your tickets.
 
K.Howden said:
I mean no offense by this, but it sounds like you're being a little unfair on them. Have they explicitly said they do no promotion for the gig? They mention they have an affiliate radio show and are willing to play your music if you give them a CD, sounds like pretty good promotion to me.

I'm not trying to cast aspurtions on you or your band, I'm talking in general here about local bands in the UK so forgive me if it come across that way. There are too many bands who think all they have to do is sit back, play the music and that it's everybody else's job to get the name out there and people to their gigs. It doesn't work like, it's imperative that bands put as much effort and more, than venues do into promotion of a gig and promotion in general. If the venue gives a flyer to one person, you need to be giving a flyer to 20 people.

You can't cultivate a good fan-base if you're not directly engaging with the people you hope to attract. I like to use this analogy; it's like the guy who goes to a club in hope of finding a girlfriend and just sits in a corner hoping a girl is going to come talk to him, it doesn't work. The guy who see's a girl he likes and approaches her is the one who has more chance of finding romance. And getting his best friend to approach her for him? Forget it. Same applies for music, yeah people might turn you down, but you're not gonna get the audience by sitting in the corner and hoping they come to you, or living in the false hope that someone else i.e. the venue is going to hook you up. The job of a venue in it's rawest form is to provide you a platform to 'sell' your music, you, the band have to take the responsibility of marketing themselves to get that audience to your platform.

On the subject of pay, the Live Music Act passed by parliament at the start of this month should start having an impact as time goes on. You might find this article by the Musicians Industry News Network interesting: http://tinyurl.com/minnarticle It may take a while for this to have effect and I do sympathise with the venues, fact is the money just isn't there anymore. Pubs and venues are being squeezed tighter every tax year by their breweries and it's hard enough for them to keep the numbers of regular punters up. It's a horrible situation but one that isn't their fault.

Apologies again if it sound like a bit of a rant!

Hope you're well,

Kev
Click to expand...

There's nothing in your message which I take offence at Kev.
I posted the message initially because the situation is that two of our band say "yeah no problem", and the other two say "fuck that".
We've a decent following already...we promote heavily and can easy get a group of anywhere between 30 and 40 out to see us.
However, it's a week before we play the biggest gig we'll ever have played, or ever likely play in our lives so we think it will be a struggle to get any meaningful following out in a rough part of Manchester for this.
I've suggested we decline on this basis....but in reality I've been a bit put of by their cheeky email.
What I think you fail to mention in your response is that.....if we took a following of 50 people, or 500 people, along....we'd get sweet Fanny Adams...nada....they'd make a good amount...£2 per ticket and our following DRINKS.....LOTS....
It's that which offends me.

Our big gig is supporting the UK Subs.....favourites of ours when we were growing up as youngsters...we're now in our 40s...it's a bit of a dream come true.
We've agreed on that night that anyone coming to see us can have £4 knocked off the ticket price (using our promotional flyer). The promoter still thinks there will be a pot of money left over for us...not a lot but it will pay expenses....so we've agreed that anything we might earn go to the UK Subs' nominated charity (RNLI).

So...hopefully you'll see....we're not unreasonable, and we're certainly not greedy....but I don't like to be taken advantage of...it's a pet hate of mine from having played the music scene as a 16-24 year old and had the piss taken out of us royally in that time.

As per your email...no offence intended either....just chewing the fat
 
SquadLeader said:
What I think you fail to mention in your response is that.....if we took a following of 50 people, or 500 people, along....we'd get sweet Fanny Adams...nada....they'd make a good amount...£2 per ticket and our following DRINKS.....LOTS....
It's that which offends me.
t
Click to expand...

Good, good! I have a habit of getting set off on rants from posts haha.

You're quite right, I guess it's all dependant on whether venues really can't pay you or just won't, both of which I've experienced. If they're making a bomb out of it then that's a bit off, you'd at least expect travel expenses or free drinks, as you said. Maybe tease some more info out of them about the radio show thing, could be good whether you play the gig or not.

Have you looked into joining the MU (Musicians Union) or PRS (Performing Rights Society)? If the venue draws a reasonably sized audience (as defined by PRS) and you own the rights to the material you're playing you can fill out a PRS form with the songs you played and they'll send you the royalties for it quarterly i.e. you get paid for playing your own songs! It's not a massive amount of money, but every little helps right?

Like I said, the Live Music Act 2012 and the efforts the MU are putting into helping venues with the legislation, will hopefully improve the situation.

Kev

p.s. got a link you could post where we can hear your band?
 
seems pretty reasonable to me... it's tough to be on the promoter end, if 5 bands did manage to each bring in 20 people, at 2 pounds a head, that's 200 pounds to pay each band, the sound guy, pay for posters, and however else you promote it.

that would be about equivalent to $4 Canadian here, we usually go for a $5 cover, but people still turn away at that. a hundred people coming in and paying would beat the best night I've ever had as a promoter.
 
These things to me always sound like the same thing: some bar owner wants to get his traffic up, decides he wants to have bands, but doesn't want to hire a promoter, or do the job of booking bands. Instead, he does one of these things where the bands manage, book and promote their own show, while he stands by and rakes in the bar tab off the band's fans and friends.
It's not much of an even shake to me. But then different situations call for different things, and this happens plenty everywhere.
It just reminds me too much of pay-to-play, and that's a drag. And holding the carrot on the stick of possible gigs there again....sheesh....

If the owner/manager/barguy putting the thing on put the slightest thought into it, they wouldn't have to do that.
2 bucks to pay the staff....that's what the bar's for.
At the very least, 50/50 door split with the bands. It won't amount to much, but it will be incentive enough for the bands to want to do the gig with the slightest enthusiasm.
 
I would more about the Radio play. That seems to be good incentive.

Do you think the bar would be mad if you said you weren't being paid that night and ask the audience for some donations?
 
alparrott said:
You can get gigging experience *and* get paid for it, in my experience. And "exposure" happens at paid gigs, too.
Click to expand...

Yes...you can, but when a band first starts out (and I don't mean established professionals forming a band, I mean amatuers first starting out) it sometimes is necessary to play a freebie that can get a decent crowd just to get a little experience in the "gigging world". Didn't say it was a rule, just sometimes necessary evil.
 
Thanks for all the mixed opinions guys.
It's very valuable info for us to have.
Martin
 
Bad Tempered Clavier said:
HAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHAHA . . . Oh that's priceless, I never get tired of hearing that load of old bollocks . . .



Oh stop, STOP - you're killing me . . . my sides . . .

Another 12 year old who wants to play at having a "Band Night". That's adorable: presumably he does "Band Night" on Monday night, then 5-a-side football on Tuesday night, Cub Scouts on Wednesday, and if he's a really good boy Mummy and Daddy will take him bowling on Thursday and he can have fish fingers for his tea.
Click to expand...
Spot on.

Bands should boycott this type of thing, it is purely a way of venues making money on the door and over the bar on what would otherwise be a quiet night.

The Musician's Union is totaly against playing for free

"The Musicians’ Union have launched to find out more about how many UK musicians are being asked to play for free or exploited by employers, venues and promoters.

The union state that most musicians are not well paid and that music fans and musicians should join their campaign to ensure that making and playing music continues to be a viable profession."

“We are concerned at a growing trend of professional musicians not being paid for their work. The Olympics brought the issue to the fore, but we’ve uncovered numerous examples since – including Café Rouge expecting musicians to work for no fee at charity events where only a third of the revenue is going to charity.

“The MU will be launching a major new public awareness campaign targetted at this issue in the next couple of months and we need case studies.”

If you feel that you have been mistreated or exploited as a musician, and are prepared to give a short summary of your experiences, then contact [email protected].
 
Bad Tempered Clavier said:
What a wanker.
Click to expand...

I think this most accurately covers my thoughts on the issue.

As long as bands keep accepting these "terms of employment", then I know I'm going to keep seeing threads asking why musicians are ripped off, underpaid and otherwise undervalued.

But ultimately who's the bigger wanker? The guy offering to stich up a band for free, or the band dumb enough to accept the terms in the first place?

Freebies in front of a large crowd can certainly lead to bigger things.....but at the dink local venue in front of 4 people and the bar staff?? Spare me.
 
Masheanhed said:
Yes...you can, but when a band first starts out (and I don't mean established professionals forming a band, I mean amatuers first starting out) it sometimes is necessary to play a freebie that can get a decent crowd just to get a little experience in the "gigging world". Didn't say it was a rule, just sometimes necessary evil.
Click to expand...

That is to some extent true. But that starting-out band should look for other opportunities than this, in my opinion. I don't buy the whole radio play angle on this at all. The bar is looking for people to be brought to them to buy drinks, for nothing. Nobody else looks to benefit.
 
Never play for free.
Encourage other bands to not play for free.
Announce in your town's Craigslist music section, and any other music board in town, that this bar doesn't pay bands.
Stop playing bars. Unless they pay well, that is. It doesn't happen much.
 
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