promoters

[Dmoney]

anybody else ever got annoyed with promoters they don't know emailing you out the blue and trying to mug you off for money before you even step foot near a venue?

as immortal technique said...
"wait a minute... you want me to go shopping, cook the food, lay it down in front of you... but you won't let me eat with you?... WHAT THE F**K IS THAT!"

[Dmoney]

The correct way to deal with poor promoters who pretend they are awesome....



i have given some serious thought to working with you in the near future. here are my thoughts based on discussions so far.

"...if you have never stepped into X, X, X, X, X, X on a X night then you would not have heard of us but we have been around for years..."

This statement leads me to believe that you don't do that much promotion. I pass some of those venues on a regular basis and I pay attention to what's on and i still don't know about your night. This doesnt fill me with confidence.

My question about why you contacted us was more about why you would ask us to play your nights. I found your reply slightly condescending.

"cross pollenating" fanbases sounds like a made up faux industry term. I looked at your venue sizes, at the ticket costs, and the payment scaling based on ticket sales. We've already established that you don't promote your own nights much so it sounds like you rely on bands promoting themselves hard, going out and selling tickets, dealing with the money, keeping track of whats sold, putting in the legwork, flyering, whatever... in order to collect decent amount of money. once that amount is gathered you take your percentage. from what i worked out using venue sizes and some arbitary figure, you take roughly 60% of the total bands takings. which obviously varies night to night.

so you're taking 60% of the money that the bands effort generated, you don't do much promotion and by your own admission id have to be inside one of your nights to find out about it. so it seems like you're asking bands to write music, record music, perform music, be salesmen, promoters, bring people to your night, their fans, their friends, who spend money at the bar get merry then leave, and you take a nice little wedge for doing what? I promote my bands shows as much as i can anyway, but im not into people taking advantage of my own work.

sounds like you want bands to go shopping, cook the food, put the food infront of you, but you wont let us sit down and eat with you? without bands you're nothing but a good idea, so stay in your place.


EDIT: I love good promoters. this is for bad ones. i emailed this to one such company

[Davey]

some promoters are downright ripoffs.

take metal camp for example, the small bands have to do all the promoting, ticket selling, etc etc .. so unless you got voted in, or are a known name in the biz, you have to do everything yourself.. and even then they reserve the right to not give you stage time, nor pay.


i usually only work with nationwide bands, because i currently dont have the means to get international bands (unless the offer is too good to refuse). do my own promoting (posters, flyers, web spamming). i do have help from friends and the bands promote their shows aswell, so i'm not doing ALL of it on my own.
but i do agree, some act like theyre gods messenger on earth and give ridiculous demands for the bands. i avoid dealing with such folk as much as i can.

[Dmoney]

i'll work with anyone who wants to book my band as long as you, they pull their weight, because im gonna pull mine.

at the moment im getting worked up because people are booking us to play smaller venues, then booking 12 other bands to play the same day! it just means the day is sooooo long, and once yoou have 13 bands in a venue, you dont have much room for paying customers, so how do you espext to pay bands?

ive seen people get threatened for money and walked to cash machines because they've done that and lost bands hundreds of pounds. and i think its fair enough. you cant put on a band and not have the money as backup if something goes wrong with your own organisation & promotion.

mostly it gets to me because it makes things a lot less fun for me personally.

[Davey]

i know what you mean. 4 bands is the max i'll put in a single evening. it's enough bands to see, while keeping cost low-ish and still keep it interesting, for that very reason.
i havent got my own venue, so i dont get any cash from drink sales. my only income is sold tickets, so i got to make sure enough people show up, so i can pay everyone. for me, a happy band is onne of the most important things, cos they'll be back, recomend me to other bands and so on.
 i'm a firm believer of Do unto others as others do unto you. it works. if someone's an ass to you, by all means get what's yours and dont give a $%&# if he'll have to reach in his own pocket to pay you, cos he wasnt smart enough to do his own promotion. i had to do that the first couple of shows, because we were still sorting our promotion channls and trying to figure out what would work best, cos i had noone to ask wtf to do, but the bands still got paid what we negotiated on, they didnt have to schlep their own gear (apart of heads and instruments) and had a good time, and in turn, the next 3 shows i got are pretty hard to get bands, for peanuts basically.

sooo.. what am i saying here anyway... yeah.. promotors are dicks.. and yes, sometimes you have to be, but at least some of us are trying to do our best

[Dmoney]

yeah man.
thats all cool, i know people who had had trouble, learned from it, and now they work real hard and do real good shows.

i dont hate all promoters, i guess that email and the title of this thread is a bit of a generalisation which was never intended. I appreciate good promoters.

its frustrating to think that behaviour like that from promoters is accepted as the norm in certain circles, outside of DIY shows and cool promoters... if that makes sense... like if you want to end up on huge festivals your gonna get fisted trying to get there. I know a certain US band got into THOUSANDS of dollars of debt by paying onto one big festival. same things happen here. ALSO booking agencies that dont care or think about how they book tours and who they give shows to are also at fault! but they dont care as long as they get their cut.

its like a minefield of people trying to screw you over before you even get anywhere, not just bands, but booking agencies screwing over promoters which in turn screws over bands.

i dont understand why it seems so accepted.

anyway. i meant no offence. promoters who do a good job are awesome.

[mikeluke]

Little story along the same line - local 'promoter' runs live music night at local pub/bar. We contacted him about doing a solo night - we are a 5 piece rock covers band, been gigging for about 2-3 years. Conversation went something like this:

"How much do you charge?"
"£200 for 2 x 45 minute sets"
"What??? I never pay more than £100 for the whole evening and that might be 6 bands. You are too expensive"

He basically gets local (kids) bands to play just to get air time and then pays them a pittance to do it!

Does £200 sound unreasonable to you???

We had an aging hippy who used to promote stuff our way for 10% of the fee but she has jacked it in now. But if anyone is looking for a good rock covers band in Hampshire/Surrey area..... give me a bell!

Mike

[Dmoney]

£200 sound fair to me. if he's doing 6 bands a night they probably aint doing 2x 45min sets. If hes getting local kids bands to play he may not make much, but may cover costs and pay whats left to the bands. i dunno. would suck if he gave them nothing then used the cash to pay his light bills.
but yeah, people sometimes expect you to play for the love, or because they can get you some extra exposure, and when you say the money they offer wont cover fuel or van hire, then they think you're all about money, when in actual fact you just can't afford to do stuff for free/next to nothing.

[Davey]

i dont understand why it seems so accepted.

anyway. i meant no offence. promoters who do a good job are awesome.

i dont understand either.. but at least it makes the good ones stand out the more :D

and none taken, i know how frustrating it can be. i got friends in various bands and everyone has a horror story about at least one gig.. they got no money back for the commute, had to pay for drinks and food and they didnt allow them to sell their stuff. so they basically had to pay to play there.
what i do hate is when bands insist on using all of their own gear, then refuse sharing the backline and want to pack up at the end of their set. i usually rent the backline (a 4x12 and standard battery of drums cos the venue hasnt got all the gear) and the renting is not a problem. it's tearing down the stuff and setting it all up again, do the soundcheck again and continue with the gig,  did this once.. never again. you either bring your own and share or play on rented stuff.. the other prob i got is the soundman >.< so frickin unreliable and always has something to argue about

[hamfist]

Does £200 sound unreasonable to you???

£200 sounds very reasonable. My 5 piece rock covers band (Hampshire-based) won't play for less than £200, unless there is a good cause to support or some other good reason to do a cheaper gig.

[Dmoney]

i dont understand why it seems so accepted.

anyway. i meant no offence. promoters who do a good job are awesome.

i dont understand either.. but at least it makes the good ones stand out the more :D

and none taken, i know how frustrating it can be

for sure! i'll use people ive had good times with over other people ive not met before.

[Gary]

Does £200 sound unreasonable to you???

£200 sounds very reasonable. My 5 piece rock covers band (Hampshire-based) won't play for less than £200, unless there is a good cause to support or some other good reason to do a cheaper gig.

Pretty much the same here - 5 piece, pop/ rock covers. £200 is minimum and most places pay £250 - £300. We only have one venue who go through an agent, usually we're dealing direct with the landlord. I see promoters as being more for originals bands and making any money playing your own material is usually pretty much impossible.

[mikeluke]

Hamfist

What is your band called and where are you based? Will look out for you 'on the circuit'!!

[Davey]

one other thing i just remembered... guest lists! girlfriends are fine, though in most cases, they pay cos they want to support the band/scene.. managers, sure if they have one and they come along, no problem.. but i had band members wanting to drag in whole $%&#ing families. one time the bassist of one of my friends bands came to me and said he wanted his folks to come in.. so i said, okay, how many are there. he said seven  :shock:  i mean come on.. three is pushing it, but seven is just plain retarded.

[nfe]

one other thing i just remembered... guest lists! girlfriends are fine, though in most cases, they pay cos they want to support the band/scene.. managers, sure if they have one and they come along, no problem.. but i had band members wanting to drag in whole $%&#ing families. one time the bassist of one of my friends bands came to me and said he wanted his folks to come in.. so i said, okay, how many are there. he said seven  :shock:  i mean come on.. three is pushing it, but seven is just plain retarded.

You want to try dealing with bigger name bands. A certain big name UK extreme metal band turned up to play a festival I was involved in last year with a list of twelve people they'd forgotten to guestlist beforehand. Over and above the TWENTY they aleady had.

 :roll: