Rickresource Rickenbacker Forum

Hotzenplotz wrote:At the weekend?!

Yes.Friday and Saturday nights. If anyone would care to check out our website, www.thekarmakings.com and check the videos and tell us what we're doing wrong, we'd sure appreciate it.

Basically, Cleveland sucks.

The now very strict and enforced drinking & driving laws keep many folks from partying late in the US and the bars are feeling this as well as the effects of the economy. Your band has a good playlist but I can see it appeals to older crowd. Here the 45-60 Somethings typically come to eat, drink, listen and dance between 7-9 or 10 and then bail. Do what my friend's band has done who plays a similar playlist, find a bar that closes at 11. They play 2 sets starting 7-ish and last set goes until 10 or 10:30. Trying to keep the Beatles crowd up until 1 would be a hard thing to do for even The Beatles nowadays. Your covers are well done and it is a nice selection. Search for a different venue perhaps that fits your playlist.

I'm afraid to say that I haven't read most of this post because I find it to be quite demoralizing. I still have a lot of money in the bank from playing jobs many years ago. I also quit playing for pay many years ago, considering that it might put a risk on my real job, you know something to the effect of burning the candle at both ends.

A local pub was advertising a micromanagement approach, where you would be booked- provided that are able convince them of a track record of generating your own clients (or bar patrons). Since this was a preposterous offer, the bar has now locked its doors indefinitely, and announced that they are again, out of business.

So when it comes down to me, I have no problem performing for free at my leisure, provided of course that it will not really risk costing me my own money in any way to do so. Meanwhile I saw a certain poor quality band that was paid $150 per night, while the pub owner admitted to me that he has been losing money, but at least it gives the public the illusion that he is running a "place where its really happening".

It is unfortunate in these parts that many bands expect the clubs to do all the work to build the bands fan base and cough up the bands fee and drinks. The bands expect this.

Those were the terms that we had, considering that a $2 cover charge was also paid at the door, whenever we played. But I believe it is a new day, and a new way today.

Full Cleveland wrote:Let me emphasize; no one has asked us to pay to play. It's just that we have had what we thought were successful gigs, where there were plenty of customers and they liked us, and the managers said they liked us, but when we asked for more bookings they gave us the "We'll see."

I know my post was pretty long, but the point was that this is your opportunity to put together a proposal, and to be wary of being screwed. You can use the links I posted to generate said proposal; they are both completely free to use. It sounds like this is a venue at which you want to play, so take the initiative.

There's no secret hand-shake, and don't grease anyone's palm; just act like a professional contractor and submit a proposal.

I should have clarified that I was talking about the original band I play in. The cover band I play in is always paid an agreed minimum; we don't even take the stage unless each player's paid $80-$100 minimum, and that's for one set.

manta wrote:The now very strict and enforced drinking & driving laws keep many folks from partying late in the US and the bars are feeling this as well as the effects of the economy. Your band has a good playlist but I can see it appeals to older crowd. Here the 45-60 Somethings typically come to eat, drink, listen and dance between 7-9 or 10 and then bail. Do what my friend's band has done who plays a similar playlist, find a bar that closes at 11. They play 2 sets starting 7-ish and last set goes until 10 or 10:30. Trying to keep the Beatles crowd up until 1 would be a hard thing to do for even The Beatles nowadays. Your covers are well done and it is a nice selection. Search for a different venue perhaps that fits your playlist.

I like this approach. We'll see if we can find such an establishment.

I remember back when people went to a club as that was the thing to do, go see whatever band happened to be playing at the time, have a good time, etc. Besides Timothy's mentioning the drunk driving laws and such, there are a lot more things these days that competes with going out to a club, like TV, video games, the interweb, supposedly smart phones (I can't believe some people's lives actually revolve around a phone!), etc.

My feeling is that the payment to a band playing in a club would be just like any other bill/cost (electric, water, gas, payroll, etc.), it's just the entertainment bill that should be figured in along with everything else that goes into the overhead of running a place.