Band & Gigging Advice

Pat D. Almighty

Voodoo runs all ages gigs on a Saturday afternoon as far as I know

The Volt

I enquired into setting one up. €2000 was the quote given, It'd be hard to break even, yet alone raise a few quid

Bastack

Hi all,

We are a new Dublin based band and looking for our 1st support gig to get us going. We are all experienced musicians with many years under our belt. Our music is Pop / Rock with a funk feel to it.

We are looking to get a support slot in a place like Voodoo, Dorans etc. Does any one need a support slot?

Any advice would be great. Thanks

Brian

upsidemark

Hi,
I just start gigging with my new band UpsideUp last month and I'm just looking for a bit of advise. Each one of these questions should probably be a whole new thread, but hopefully I can get a few responses here anyway.

Q1. What should we do at gigs when not performing? ie...drink, mingle, give out cd's, mailing list, etc...? Any suggestions much appreciated.

Q2. I used the same gig broker to get support slots for our first few gigs. I can get friends and family to pay €7 - €10 but how do I get more people to go? Are there venues with ready made audiences?

Q3. Is it worth it in the early stages to pay for flyers / posters?

Q4. What other merchandising would be a good idea for a band just starting out? ie...t-shirt, cd's?

Any suggestions of some successful ideas that has worked for your band would be greatly appreaciated.

UpsideMark

velouria07

Hi,
Does anyone have any contacts for Showcase night promoters in Dublin and around the country?? We're mad for gigs!

ECF

An Originals band putting on a gig that needs 300 people to attend.

Any ideas on what best approch is to sell tickets.
General consenssus from random punters is not to buy a ticket although they still want to attend the gig!!

Should tickets be given away for free when a crowd that big is required.

Any suggestions appreciated.

crashbangwollop

I am in an original band and we are almost ready to start giggin... I have been playin in cover bands since I was 12, but an original band is new to me (and more importantly what i want to do), what venues shud i be lookin at (nationwide)? We wud love to do a few support gigs first, anyone any ideas on that? All we want to do is play our music, but its hard finding the right venue... I would love to have a manager to arrange gigs as we are totally committed and willing to play every night of the week, any suggestions?

miju

wheres abouts are you based?

crashbangwollop

Based in Galway, but willing to travel nationwide

daycent

Don't do it!!! It's a soul destroying and frustrating process that can only end badly!!!!!

I'm only half joking;)

Jimkel

Here's a few tips for original bands starting out:

* Get your stage confidance in front of your mates in the likes of Voodoo lounge and Dorans, then get the hell out of there and start playing in pubs and clubs outside Dublin city to strangers. Dublin City is SATURATED with young rock bands and whens the last Dublin rock band you've seen make it big time ...hmmm U2! My point is Most Irish bands that make it big nowadays tend to come up outside dublin, because it's not as saturated in the smaller towns and citys and it's easier to gain attention. Remember many pub and club owners know one another and if you impress one they will spread the word and get you more gigs.

* Don't party too hard, drugs ruin bands, look at Aslan, they also stop great bands from ever really getting anything together.

* The internet is a great tool, but don't be lazy, the BEST and most effective way of getting gigs fast is by getting out there and meeting people.

* Don't just walk into places hand them a demo and leave. doing this rarely lands a gig, in fact the demo's rarely get listened to. just like people who walk into stores and hand a cv to a member of staff asking them to give it to the manager. The CV usually ends up in the bin and someone who was recommended to them usually gets the job. Making friends in the right places and word of mouth will get gigs. I have played in hundreds of different pubs and clubs so far and I never once used a demo to get these gigs.

* My original band played all over Ireland for 5 years, 2 - 3 times a week and we never had myspaces or bebos. We were supporting signed bands and in talks with record Companys attending signing parties and the like, unfortunatly Life, Women, Partying and musical differences split us up while we we're at our peak. Be watchful of this. Keep your focus and keep it clean.

And a quick message to the young "original" artists out there, if you want to get good fast come try professional session work for a year or so, you will learn allot from the experienced musos.

KoRn101

A lot has to be said about this topic really, and these posts have been invaluable to our explansion, but i have to say there is not that much online to promote bands, like a 3rd party who can assist! We have been lucky and found a great site that has done all the above and has helped our band out dramatically as well as boards.ie, increased the intrest shown and put a lot of time and effort into us and a lot of other bands, we asked them what they wanted out of it and they just replied, "we just love new irish bands!"

I thought that was a brilliant summation of how a manager/promoter should be for your band, one who is not 100% driven by money but one who is actually interested in the music!

So if you are going to pursue your bands future more, have a sit down and think about how much you want it, how much it means to you and set goals, listen to all the issues addressed above and you'l find yourself in a position you didnt think was ACTUALLY possible!

Best of luck to all you new bands! Gotta love em!

miju

KoRn101 wrote: »

I thought that was a brilliant summation of how a manager/promoter should be for your band, one who is not 100% driven by money but one who is actually interested in the music!

To be blunt a manager like that will fail time and time again and if nothing else shows your naivity. I have seen many "managers" operate on the good faith policy and it only ends one way. On the other hands the ones who get paid have both more time AND more incentive.

The rest of your post doesn't make much sense other than a thinly disguised sounding ad though I may be wrong

KoRn101

miju wrote: »

To be blunt a manager like that will fail time and time again and if nothing else shows your naivity. I have seen many "managers" operate on the good faith policy and it only ends one way. On the other hands the ones who get paid have both more time AND more incentive.

The rest of your post doesn't make much sense other than a thinly disguised sounding ad though I may be wrong

Maybe it is naivity, i guess i just feel that our manager is a part of our music, maybe he will fail, but im sure we will learn from it!

The rest of my post is bassically just trying to say that you can spend a lot of time putting so much work into gigging and playing for little or no money to sstart and that maybe you should step back and see if you can cope with it!

And GOD no advertisments from me! I recieved an infringment and thought i was banned, i was devastated! But got word back that im NOT actually banned! GREAT success!

Oh and was SOO not in the best state this morning writing the post! Only fully alive now really!

miju

KoRn101 wrote: »

Maybe it is naivity, i guess i just feel that our manager is a part of our music, maybe he will fail, but im sure we will learn from it!

Point I'm making is while you want a manager who "believes" in the band and while it is an important aspect it's not the be all and end all.

For example a more money orientated manager would be thinking about selling MP3s , Merch etc at the gigs which in turn helps to finance further gigs , promotion , recording.

We all know where I'm going with this. I wrote an article on band management and various aspects of it a while ago an active copy of which is here.

KoRn101

VERY nice article on managers man.. Appreciate that!

miju

cheers, always nice to have a supportive comment as many of those articles took me a LOOOONNNNG time to write

BangedUpDrummer

the wayward are a newly formed band..where looking for any bands to gig with or any numbers of promoters that will help us..also some feedback on our tunes at www.myspace.com/thewaywardmusic would be greatly appreciated!

LowEndFreq

miju wrote: »

Point I'm making is while you want a manager who "believes" in the band and while it is an important aspect it's not the be all and end all.

For example a more money orientated manager would be thinking about selling MP3s , Merch etc at the gigs which in turn helps to finance further gigs , promotion , recording.

We all know where I'm going with this. I wrote an article on band management and various aspects of it a while ago an active copy of which is here.

That was a great article man, i understand a lot of stuff now that i didn't know before! Cheers!

miju

glad you enjoyed it and found it useful / learned things as its my main aim and what I've always enjoyed doing

I've a whole heap of articles I wrote when I was running www.cpu.ie . I have emailed dionsiseire most of them so over the next while they should all appear up on goldenplec in one shape or form

trey99

hi could you please help me out. my band really needs to gig and we don't know how to get a support act with anybody. we have tried but it just isn't working. were situated in dublin and were a rock band with all our originals. we need a manager or something we have to get out there t ogig. any help on this would be very appreciated.

LowEndFreq

trey99 wrote: »

hi could you please help me out. my band really needs to gig and we don't know how to get a support act with anybody. we have tried but it just isn't working. were situated in dublin and were a rock band with all our originals. we need a manager or something we have to get out there t ogig. any help on this would be very appreciated.

i dont think you really need a manager, to be honest...

try signing up to a promoter such as debasement gigs or something, the head guy, paddy, gets gigs going in village, whelans, and dorans.

maxie

Hi Everyone, My brother is mad into music since he's a kid, guitar, synthensiser, drums etc... He has allot of songs which he's created in the last 2 years, Dance / House music. He is currently looking for a vocalist for some of his tunes then he wants to get into a professional recording studio to do a proper cd so he can then send it around to some record labels around Dublin to try and get recognized. He has a mysapce account. www.myspace.com/weebomatic1 He has 4 tracks on it, please feel free to listen to them and let us know if you think he has potential in the Dance / House music scene in Dublin. He thinks the song felt like this has no.1 potential as the lyrics are brilliant. Does anyone know any Dance record labels.

edvedd10

I am looking for Pubs that have live music? I am looking for some pubs in Dublin where i might be able to play acoustically? I play a range of different stuff acoustically as a 1piece or i can have a friend join for a 2 piece. Playing anything from the rock/grunge era, eg. Metallica,soundgarden,RHCP,nirvana,Pearl Jam,SOAD, etc... or i/we can do a full set as a tribute to Pearl Jam.. I have videos on youtube,just search edvedd and you will see them..
Do you know anywhere that is available?

LegacyUser

I know I might end up on a hitlist for sayin this ......

Is it worth skipping Dublin?

(I've always taught it was )

unknown band travelling to Dublin to make an impact is like using aftershave as mouth wash - an expensive way to waste money time and effort


My plan is for as much local gigs as possible - then to London - the gig or starve method!

miju

Dublin is worth it to build up some contacts with promoters who may invite you back (and therefore provide you with a hassle free , paid gig source)

other than that yes Dublin could be skipped as it's saturated with bands (and 99% of them are ****e)

franklern

Not to sound like an asswipe or anything but every band that has a link on this thread is muck. The quality of 'indie' bands these days is despicable, which is the main reason no one goes to these crap gigs. If you want to play gigs to people, try this
Get rid of your ****ing american accent you come from cabra not ****ing hollywood*
Throw away the metallica/u2 etc etc records and write some original songs.
Write lyrics that actually mean something instead of the usual meandering verbal scutter you're throwing out now.
Don't try and get gigs when you're just going to be doing what everyone else is doing, and being very bad at it.
Beware the lollipop of mediocrity, lick once and you'll suck for life....



(*REALLY ****ing important).

Royale with Cheese

Wow, you do sound like an asswipe.

miju

indeed Royal With Cheese he does. It's all very easyand one thing to throw out a load of common "buzz words / phrases" + "common advice" mixed in with pithy insults on a forum.

It's another thing to actaully coherently make your point.

The Volt

While that comment was asswipical, he made a fair point about the recycled American voice, stuff thats sounds like it was regurgitated by Blink 182 or worse. Not to say that it can't be done well, personally I think Home Star Runner are great, they have that generic americanised sound but they're original in their structures and melodies. It's just painful to see acts who effortlessly use the pop/punk genre again and again and again