Releasing Music Yourself -versus- Not Unless We Get a Deal (1 Viewer)

[Vinnie]

Here's the very simple problem: you're budgeting as if the bands will recoup no money. If the band's prospects of making any money are that low then why on earth would they be playing 2-400 capacity venues and blowing 8k on a single? Who operates like this? Who stays in hotels when they have no money? Sleep on floors! And you didn't include the cost of getting absolutely fucking rat arsed every single night.

Right, back to proper discussion...

€30 x 6 people x 3 nights accom = €540
€100 petrol x 2 cars = €200
Food €15 a day x 4 days on the road x 6 people = €360
Venue booking
Crawdaddy = €350
Cypress Ave = €200
Spirit Store = €150
Roisin Dubh = €200

When you take into account all the costs, it takes a good bit of cash to get jobless teenagers around Ireland for a few days.

I can't see how you'd get around the four counties for any less and the food budget is miniscule. You could do supports instead of headline gigs but this particular band saw this as less suitable for launching a single. It doesn't make too much odds seeing as you can break even on the door take at a headliner or play a support for free.

 

[Pantone247]

two cars as well!

TWO!

who do you think you are? Picturehouse?

 

[jane]

Right, back to proper discussion...

€30 x 6 people x 3 nights accom = €540
€100 petrol x 2 cars = €200
Food €15 a day x 4 days on the road x 6 people = €360
Venue booking
Crawdaddy = €350
Cypress Ave = €200
Spirit Store = €150
Roisin Dubh = €200

When you take into account all the costs, it takes a good bit of cash to get jobless teenagers around Ireland for a few days.

I can't see how you'd get around the four counties for any less and the food budget is miniscule. You could do supports instead of headline gigs but this particular band saw this as less suitable for launching a single. It doesn't make too much odds seeing as you can break even on the door take at a headliner or play a support for free.

I think the point is that the way you're describing is actually quite different from the way most people who post on here would do things. Someone pointed out the distinction earlier on in the thread, but it's the difference between self-funding in the way you describe and the DIY spirit, which involves doing things more economically, not just because it's cheaper, but because it's more fun, and part of the reason people even do it is because it's just enjoyable.

It's the difference between 'independent' and 'unsigned', as in 'doing things ourselves because we can do it our way, and it might be cool to make a living at it but it's fun either way' and 'we're doing things ourselves until such a time as we convince someone to do it for us'. What you are describing is the latter, and some of the frustration is coming from the fact that on Thumped, the ethos of DIY-for-its-own-sake is something that we take for granted. Yes, it's a public forum, and you're more than welcome to express your views and open up a debate, but most people on here who initially started posting because of music did so because the music scene we're all part of is a particular type of community.

The way a lot of bands on here would organise tours is to work through an independent promoter, not someone who is in it for the business, but who does it in order to bring the bands they want to see to their town. People sleep on floors, promoters or mates cook for the bands, gigs are put on wherever there is space, and people have a good time, in part because everyone's pitching in. That's not to say that the concept of financial or commercial success is absent from the whole scene, or that people lack the desire for it, but that the primary interest is for fun. You can rent a van, sleep on floors, and play in basement pub function rooms, put out your own stuff for cheap, and have just as much fun, and in an ideal world, the arts media will give just as much of a chance to a totally DIY project as to a commercial one. But having commercial success as too much of a priority can hinder the creative process, and can actually strip some of the fun out of it. And if you aren't enjoying making your art, people won't enjoy watching it or reading it or whatever. Sure, we don't live in an ideal world, but since we don't, and since the music 'business' doesn't necessarily reward creative innovation and talent, people have created their own artistic communities where they define their own priorities.

It's the way with most forms of art. I don't make music, but I like to write stuff. I don't publish except for the occasional journalistic piece, and my fiction is something I write and send to my mates in case they want to see it. I'd love it if I could make it my job, but it's not my main priority, and a failure to write a bestseller, in my eyes, is not tantamount to total failure because I just plain enjoy making up stories and writing them down. Of course I hope it's good, and of course I want to develop and get better at it, and I hope that people who might someday read it will enjoy doing so (so it's not a matter of not caring about other's approval -- that does come into it). That's most people's attitude here toward music.

It's not that people don't see what you're saying, it's just very far from the approach that most of us here would have.

 

[waterfall]

Here's the very simple problem: you're budgeting as if the bands will recoup no money. If the band's prospects of making any money are that low then why on earth would they be playing 2-400 capacity venues and blowing 8k on a single? Who operates like this? Who stays in hotels when they have no money? Sleep on floors! And you didn't include the cost of getting absolutely fucking rat arsed every single night.

This is not a budget, it's the expense of the 4 gigs.
Money is recouped in the future, after the expenses are incurred.
The only thing you can use recouped money for is to pay back the loan.

You're looking at it at the end of the day and you're right. But whay I'm sayinig is, to actually do this you need to have the money in your pocket starting out.

I'm not arguing that this is the way to go, I seem to be just proving that I'm not telling lies. There are bands out there that do this.

 

[therealjohnny]

Perfect!


please , jesus, mary and joseph, please let that be the end of this thread

 

[waterfall]

two cars as well!

TWO!

who do you think you are? Picturehouse?

Singer = one back seat

 

[RSJ]

€30 x 6 people x 3 nights accom = €540
€100 petrol x 2 cars = €200
Food €15 a day x 4 days on the road x 6 people = €360
Venue booking
Crawdaddy = €350
Cypress Ave = €200
Spirit Store = €150
Roisin Dubh = €200

Hostel would cost around e10-15 each, or why not book one hotel room and sneak everyone in? That would save probably e360. Plus you could knock €200 off the booking for the roisin if you just ask gugai for a booking, plus he gives free accomodation to some bands if they're travelling. Also, as vinnie said, this assumes you make no money whatsoever off the gigs, which could happen but it's doubtful - surely at the worst, at least ten people will show up to each gig, seven euro each (cheapo estimate, if the band is spending this much they'll probably charge €15 or whatever), four gigs, €240. Two cars - why not get one van? Save a good chunk.

 

[jane]

Here's the very simple problem: you're budgeting as if the bands will recoup no money. If the band's prospects of making any money are that low then why on earth would they be playing 2-400 capacity venues and blowing 8k on a single? Who operates like this? Who stays in hotels when they have no money? Sleep on floors! And you didn't include the cost of getting absolutely fucking rat arsed every single night.

What Vinnie said. You don't say, "I can't be a painter because I can't afford a studio" or "I can't write novels because I can't afford a windswept seaside cottage from which to derive my complicated and overwrought descriptions of the Irish landscape" or whatever. You do what the rest of us do. You work a job. If you have an idea for something, you get up at 5am and work at it because your drive to do so is so strong that you can't resist it, not because if you don't, you'll die a dishwasher in a provincial hotel.

 

[billygannon]

Singer = one back seat

Do you do birthdays?

 

[jane]

Hostel would cost around e10-15 each, or why not book one hotel room and sneak everyone in? That would save probably e360. Plus you could knock €200 off the booking for the roisin if you just ask gugai for a booking, plus he gives free accomodation to some bands if they're travelling. Also, as vinnie said, this assumes you make no money whatsoever off the gigs, which could happen but it's doubtful - surely at the worst, at least ten people will show up to each gig, seven euro each (cheapo estimate, if the band is spending this much they'll probably charge €15 or whatever), four gigs, €240. Two cars - why not get one van? Save a good chunk.

Yeah, and if you're not making money off gigs because only your mates come to see you, then just book a pub function room, or play a house party and it won't cost you much at all. Your mates will come see you, it will be a good laugh, and then, once you're a bit more developed musically, you can look into taking the show on the road. It's just that a lot of young bands are duped into believing that once you can strum a guitar, you should go looking for someone to give you a record deal, when that's really not necessary.

 

[Pantone247]

Singer = one back seat

ah I see... he's a GENTLEMAN OF LARGER PROPORTIONS yeah?


sorry, sorry, sorry... it's like the Beth Ditto episode all over again...

 

[waterfall]

Plus you could knock €200 off the booking for the roisin if you just ask gugai for a booking, plus he gives free accomodation to some bands if they're travelling.

Have you got a contact for Gugai? We'd very much like to headline Roisin Dubh for free and possibly with free accomodation.

 

[waterfall]

ah I see... he's a fat fuck yeah?

also a sexual deviant apparently

seriously like

 

[Pantone247]

also a sexual deviant apparently

seriously like

dude, you've got bigger problems to sort out then where you're going to get 8 grand from

 

[hugh]

also a sexual deviant apparently

seriously like

Gugai is a sexual deviant? No-one told me about this before!

 

[RSJ]

Have you got a contact for Gugai? We'd very much like to headline Roisin Dubh for free and possibly with free accomodation.

I don't but here's a tip - check the roisin website for his address/phone number, it's under "booking"

 

[therealjohnny]

I mentioned earlier ( and I will continue to do so) that my band are releasing our CD next month. Its going to cost us under a grand to get the cds pressed-also I did the artwork myself, so that was one expense out of the way.

The gig will take place in the Voodoo Lounge-it'll cost us the grand total of nothing and we'll get paid too- not much probably but still..

The promoter is in it for the love of music- any profits will go into getting other bands to play

Fair enough the arguement in this thread is - (or ocassionally is): "Independant music versus getting signed to a recognised Industry label"

People are getting irritated for reasons eloquently expressed in Janes post, so I wont repeat them but..


May I draw attention to the first word in this title:

 

[Space]

I don't but here's a tip - check the roisin website for his address/phone number, it's under "booking"

Sure he posts here doesn't he under gugai if I'm not mistaken?

 

[snakybus]

I mentioned earlier ( and I will continue to do so) that my band are releasing our CD next month. Its going to cost us under a grand to get the cds pressed-also I did the artwork myself, so that was one expense out of the way.

Hey johnny did you do the artwork for the Spellbound album?

 

[waterfall]

I mentioned earlier ( and I will continue to do so) that my band are releasing our CD next month. Its going to cost us under a grand to get the cds pressed-also I did the artwork myself, so that was one expense out of the way.

The gig will take place in the Voodoo Lounge-it'll cost us the grand total of nothing and we'll get paid too- not much probably but still..

The promoter is in it for the love of music- any profits will go into getting other bands to play

Fair enough the arguement in this thread is - (or ocassionally is): "Independant music versus getting signed to a recognised Industry label"

People are getting irritated for reasons eloquently expressed in Janes post, so I wont repeat them but..


May I draw attention to the first word in this title:

Read the full opening post