Friday, March 9th, 2007
Rub a dub dub three men in a pub
by Phil Planet
Rub a dub dub, four men in a pub
It is my opinion that the days when playing local venues in the hope of finding fame and fortune are long gone, It was never really that good even in the seventies when I used to play "The Pub Circuit", about the only thing that has not changed over the years is that everyone still gets ripped off as regards to money, I have spoken to a few young bands out on this circuit and to my utter astonishment found that the "gig" money has hardly gone up in 25 years!.
The people who run these so called venues mostly dont care as long as they sell a few extra pints, on this basis new bands should avoid at all costs agreeing to accept "door money", unless they are already known at the place, otherwise you are giving the proprietor a "get out of jail free card", these "door" gigs are normaly only offered on crap nights like Wednesday when there is nobody in, in fact on most occasions the publican / proprietor will make money out of the actual band and there friends!.
In a nutshell, if you feel that you just want to promote your band, it may be better to do it via the Internet, consider this:
When you do a gig at a local boozer, count up the hours you spend:
1. Stripping all your gear down and loading the van,(usually cellar steps involved).
2. Driving to the gig unloading and then settting it up again,
3. Playing the actual gig and hanging around in between shows.
4. Stripping the gear down again loading the van, then driving back home.
5. Humping everything back down the cellar at 1.30 am.(set it up tomorrow!)
Add the total hours spent and the multiply by the number of people in the band including roadies, when you have a total (you will more than likely to have spent lets say 50 hours or more, the result: you have played to an audience of say 50 / 100 people, who by the next day have forgot all about you, and whats more by the time you deduct everyones expenses and money spent over the bar, you'll be lucky if your not out of pocket, depressing huh!, no consider this:
If all the band personnel spend the same amount of time (ie.50 hours) promoting the band on the Internet, all the effort is still there the next day, and the day after.
I am not trying to tell people how to suck eggs here, (come to think of it I dont know how to suck eggs anyway!), I am sure that you are IT literate or you would not be reading this article, but the fact is that most bands seem to bang up an off the shelf site on lets say, isound, and then say well that's that done, what I am saying is spend as much time as you can re-inventing your site and making it more interesting, upload new tunes, and make sure you got a gig list up there for them door money days!
Break a Leg, Ya'all. Phil Planet. www.magicwardrobe.co.uk
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Posted By magicwardrobe @ 12:58 PM
Author's site: http://www.jahkope.co.uk
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