How does the money work if you're in a band?

Dave!

Hey guys,

Forgive me if these questions appear naive or silly, but I'm pretty new to this stuff and so am both naive and silly

I'm in a band with a couple of other lads for a few months now, and am really liking it. Generally how we are working is that one guy is writing the basics of the songs, and then bringing them in to rehearsal where myself and the drummer complete them. I think I've contributed some important parts to some of the songs, whether it be the main hook on the piano which gives the song a whole feel, or else harmonies in certain parts. However it's the one guy who is generally the 'songwriter' as he's done the lyrics and melody, etc.

Anyways we're starting to get a bit more serious about it now, and will be recording a few tracks soon enough in a studio, will be doing the whole Facebook thing, some sort of video, and then ultimately some gigs hopefully. I'm looking forward to it all!

However I'm wondering, if hypothetically we were to become quite successful, how does the money side of it work? I gather that the songwriter gets any royalties from his songs, but what about the other members of the band? Should they get any money at all from sales, or should they just get paid for whatever hours they put in in the studio, for example? I imagine if the songwriter decided to use session musicians for some reason, that they would just get paid for the work they did. Does it work differently in a "band" scenario? We are going to be paying for the studio time ourselves (split between 3 of us).

And also how does it work with gigs generally? Does any money for that tend to get split evenly, or does the songwriter get the bulk of it again?

I have no expectations here, and think it's fair enough that the songwriter gets the bulk of the cash, but I just want to have some idea of what way things generally work so that it can inform any decisions I have to make, etc.

Thanks

Nervous Wreck

Generally, you make no money and end up spending far more money than you thought you would. Then, when you do get paid, you're so stupified with excitement that you waste it on beer and call it a celebration of a gig well played. Someone suggests that you "put the money back into the band" but then they want their instrument upgraded first and you all decide you'd rather have pints instead of buying that dick a new guitar. Then you don't play any gigs in two months and one of the lads just doesn't seem into it anymore so you and the drummer decide to 'start your own thing' which is never talking to each other again.

I'm very cynical in the evenings.

eoin1981

Nervous Wreck wrote: »

Generally, you make no money and end up spending far more money than you thought you would. Then, when you do get paid, you're so stupified with excitement that you waste it on beer and call it a celebration of a gig well played. Someone suggests that you "put the money back into the band" but then they want their instrument upgraded first and you all decide you'd rather have pints instead of buying that dick a new guitar. Then you don't play any gigs in two months and one of the lads just doesn't seem into it anymore so you and the drummer decide to 'start your own thing' which is never talking to each other again.

I'm very cynical in the evenings.

Nicely put.
OP - Don't worry about the money. Worry about writing good songs. Have fun and play for the joy.

Waking-Dreams

Dave! wrote: »

I'm in a band with a couple of other lads for a few months now, and am really liking it. Generally how we are working is that one guy is writing the basics of the songs, and then bringing them in to rehearsal where myself and the drummer complete them. I think I've contributed some important parts to some of the songs, whether it be the main hook on the piano which gives the song a whole feel, or else harmonies in certain parts. However it's the one guy who is generally the 'songwriter' as he's done the lyrics and melody, etc.

‘Songwriting’ is still decided upon 50% lyrics and 50% main melody. Yet, as we all know, many bands do have members who contribute and maybe rearrange parts of songs, building on the initial ideas the main songwriter(s) brought into the rehearsal room. So, the question is, should this contribution count for something? It depends how much you contribute to each song and how the main songwriter(s) feels about sharing future income.

Your band can make a decision now: to credit all the songs as being written by “The Band” or to go with individual writers depending on who writes what. It could get messy though as the main songwriter may not feel that adding a small melody justifies getting a shared songwriting credit.

Dave! wrote: »

However I'm wondering, if hypothetically we were to become quite successful, how does the money side of it work? I gather that the songwriter gets any royalties from his songs, but what about the other members of the band? Should they get any money at all from sales, or should they just get paid for whatever hours they put in in the studio, for example? I imagine if the songwriter decided to use session musicians for some reason, that they would just get paid for the work they did. Does it work differently in a "band" scenario? We are going to be paying for the studio time ourselves (split between 3 of us).

And also how does it work with gigs generally? Does any money for that tend to get split evenly, or does the songwriter get the bulk of it again?

In the beginning, everyone is usually happy to be part of something creative and because there’s no real money coming in, no prior agreements are ever put in place (it is assumed that the person who writes the music and lyrics is the songwriter - which is fair enough). When there’s no money being made this is fine and the other band members don’t really think about what happens if the band gets really big and money does start to flow in.

So, in the rare chance that things do take off and you start making much more money, all of sudden, now band members who don’t have songwriting credits will start to see the differences in their income and the income of maybe one or two members in the band getting royalty cheques every 6 months.

Every time your song is played in public (radio, TV, and which includes the band playing live) this generates income which the band’s publisher will be collecting from different agencies i.e. IMRO, etc.

Some bands will share income from touring and merchandise evenly. Others will simply pay their members a ‘wage’ for their services. So, you could be the guitarist in a very successful rock band which plays gigs and gets paid approx. €20,000 per night. But as the guitarist, you could be paid a weekly wage of €2,000 for your services, regardless of how much money is generated.

Most bands will split CD sales, tour income and merchandise equally though, as songwriters can appreciate that other members of the band still have to make some kind of living if they are to stay in the band at this kind of level.

daddybear 1

You are having a laugh arn't you!!!

the immortals

If you are paying for everything evenly you should split profits evenly, the only way to make any serious money from music is to be the songwriter or part of songwriting team,

maccored

ive been in many bands and the best advice I ever head was to make a decision early on and stick to it. If one person comes up wiht the ideas and the rest of you work on them and contribute, then you should all agree to split everything evenly.

You dont even need to make money for these decisions to come into play - writing a song and registering it with IMRO requires you to state the royalty split, so even before you make anything you'll have to decide who makes the money from the tunes. None of the bands I was in ever 'made it' so to speak, but I've collected a few grand in the past ten years in royalty payments from imro which I wouldnt have made had we never decided on how to split the money.