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Supporting Pay-to-Play??? part 2
07/30/2007 07:58:17 / other
The biggest problem is that most all-age venues don't serve liquor and are pay-to-play and most other venues do serve liquor and are not pay-to-play. Venues make money on 1. Its ticket sales and 2. Its liquor sales or concessions (i.e., food, drinks, etc.). Bars have booking agents and all-age venues have (so called) promoters.
It is the promoter’s job to get people to spend money at the venue. Most promoters only do one thing well and that is promoting themselves (it’s not their fault since that is all they really know). They don’t listen to the bands (just look at the line-ups at some of these shows). A lot of them know nothing about music or the music business. Most of them are only doing this because they had a backyard party once and made a lot of money off the door or they see it as the only way their band would be able to get on bigger shows. So after they do their first show at a venue and no one shows up, they are stuck trying to figure out how they are going to make some cash on the next show. Then they hear about some band bitching about having to pre-sell tickets at another venue. The little light bulb above their heads pops on and the thought is formed, "The only way for a show to make money is to have bands pre-sell tickets." Well, if you have 6 local bands playing a show, each band will get (say) 50 tickets to pawn off on their friends. Who are their friends? Other musicians probably, with maybe one or two females that hang out with them (i.e., girlfriends). More than likely those other musicians won't be able to make it to the show because they have a show of their own or they are on that show and are stuck trying to sell tickets as well. Now, the bands are responsible for practicing & playing the show, promoting the show, and selling tickets for the show. What is the promoter doing? Good question, what ARE they doing? Promoters... come on and answer the question. Tell us what it is exactly that these venues want.
Well, since no one is answering the question. I will go out on a limb and answer it for them. You want as much money as you can get for as little work as possible. Don't bullshit and say its respect because if that was the case, you wouldn't ask bands to pay-to-play. So, now how much work do you actually do to make a show successful? Post an ad in the OC Weekly (hardly, you use the ad that the club puts in), put up flyers (no, you let the bands do that), sell tickets (no, the bands again) so what do you actually do? You set up a deal with the venue owner allowing you to book bands at their clubs. I see you and I see clubs but what I don’t see is the bands. Everything you do is for the venue or yourself (but we know you aren’t making that much money because we have seen the draw these shows actually have). So forcing bands to sell tickets is not going to get people to go see a show... Then what will get people to go see a show? 1. Having a show that people want to see.2. Advertising (and I don't mean just a little dinky ad in the OC Weekly).3. Charging less to see a show ($13 for 6 local bands and it's not like any of those bands will get any of the money anyway) 4. Having a line-up of bands that complement each other instead of sounding exactly like each other.5. Not having the same 5 bands playing night after night (if no one goes to see them on the first night, what makes you think anyone would want to see them the second night, or the third, etc.)
But the main problem with these promoters is they seem to only want to give shows to bands that are of a certain age. Bands with older members rarely get a chance to play all-age shows because 1. They won’t pay-to-play 2. They are seen as not having a draw unless the band (or the name of the band) has been around for 20 years and 3. Promoters have never heard (or heard of) these bands because they are too young to get into a bar, period.
It time for bands to start taking back what is rightfully theirs, the venues. Quit catering to these guys and for those of you that feel you must cater to them (or your band will never play a show again), FOR GODS SAKE, QUIT SNIVELLING ABOUT IT.
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