Encores

[MarkMgibson]

Originally Posted by kjpollo

I've never been involved in it personally, but a guitarist I used to hang with said that when he was starting out back in the 80's there were several venues in our area (Central CT) that did this.
From what he told me, the most common tactic was that a club owner would say, "we'll let you play (for an hour, half-hour, whatever) BUT you have to sell X number of tickets for that night's show" and hand them a stack. The more stage time you wanted, the bigger the stack of tickets was.
So those cases, the band members would pay for the tickets themselves so they were guaranteed the spot and then try to re-sell the tickets they had already paid for.
Feel free to take this with a grain of salt though. I'm just repeating what I was told by somebody else.

That is usually the way it works, and it's been going on for years. It seems to be most common with Metal bands (at least around here), though I'm not sure why that is.

[troy mcclure]

On a similar note, our cover band always ends 10 minutes early because we know the drunks will ask for 1 more and then another so we build it in.

I think many folks are being hard on mr13...he did what the organizer asked...the organizer should have added the 5mins at the end of the gig rather than steal it from the next band.

[kjpollo]

I'm not being hard on him at all. I said all along that its the organizer who owes the other band either a reduced rate next time or should've extended the overall show length and not docked the time from the next band's set.

[Winfred]

To the OP: You got ripped off. The band behind you got ripped off. The only guy that made money was the pimp that organized the event.

I'm glad you got to play, and I'm very glad the crowd liked you, but pay to play is one step worse than not getting paid at all. Musicians are already on the low-end of the pay scale, especially when you factor in how many hours of work and practice go into it. Pay to play makes musicians even "broker" than they already are.

[LiquidMidnight]

Originally Posted by MarkMgibson

I'm rather old-fashioned when it comes to encores. I dislike the current trend where bands keep songs in reserve to play for an encore. It used to be the case that bands played their full repertoire of songs, and "if" they were called for an encore, they would play a cover. Nowadays, encores are built into the show, and that's not how it's supposed to be.

MarkM

P.S DownunderW. is right about the "pay to play" thing - it's just wrong (even Kiwi's are right once in a while)

I agree that an encore should at least seem spontaneous, but many bands don't exhuast their entire repertoires every gig. So there should always be a few songs that they can call upon for an encore.

What I hate is when an audience all but ignores you for an entire gig; then they decide to get up and have fun two songs from the end of the last set and beg for an encore.

As far as the issue in the original post - in social science and assessment there is a thing called a Guttman Scale. It's based on the idea that if you have one particular feature, belief, intelligence, etc., you're likely to have other similar related things. For instance, if you hold a certain thelogical belief, there's a good chance that you'll hold other beliefs related to that religion.

My point: If a promoter is a big enough jackass to push pay-to-play, it's not surprising that they're a big enough jackass to cut a band's set time.

[alembicguy]

Pay to play? Is that a real thing that bands do??

[mellowinman]

I'm so glad I'm an old dude.

I don't have a clue what the f any of you are even talking about on here. It costs money to play music? Why would it cost money to play music? I get paid to play music, and sometimes, I play for free.

I thought if you did "pay to play," it was some deal where you paid up front, and recouped your money via ticket sales. If that was the case, who cares how long any band played?

So you were asked to do an encore; the audience wanted an encore; and then the band who followed you was somehow "gypped" or "ripped off" because their set was shortened?

I am so glad that, not only do I not understand this, I do not WANT TO.

Here's the deal:

If you're not in the big time, the music business SUCKS.

Get used to it. I work hard at my day job, and I play because I need to. I always try to find a way to make a few bucks, but ultimately, I play because I cannot help it.

But I will never pay to play.

[Bert Slide]

Two things.

1. NEVER pay to play.

2. **** the encore!!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kuol1RXH_I

[One Drop]

Originally Posted by Bert Slide

Two things.

1. NEVER pay to play.

2. **** the encore!!!!!!!!!!!!!
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5kuol1RXH_I

They might as well have gone off and come back on, he took as long explaining it and bored everyone out of their skulls!

[mellowinman]

Originally Posted by One Drop

They might as well have gone off and come back on, he took as long explaining it and bored everyone out of their skulls!

Well, he wouldn't have bored me, because I wouldn't have been there. That band just doesn't do it for me at all!

[MarkMgibson]

Originally Posted by One Drop

They might as well have gone off and come back on, he took as long explaining it and bored everyone out of their skulls!

How ironic to talk about treating an audience with respect, and then blabbering on with that load of pretentious crap.

[fraublugher]

You still have the stink of pay to play on you , the band after you could smell it right away.
Best hit the showers.

[TRCat]

Originally Posted by MarkMgibson

How ironic to talk about treating an audience with respect, and then blabbering on with that load of pretentious crap.

Amen!

[DwaynieAD]

Originally Posted by Downunderwonder

Don't pay to play.

+1

[MarkMgibson]

Originally Posted by fraublugher

You still have the stink of pay to play on you , the band after you could smell it right away.
Best hit the showers.

LOL. Yes, it truly is a pitiful practise and bands that are stupid enough to do it only help promote more of the same. In the 80's in Australia, the practise became so wide spread, that a few of the really heavy-hitting bands of the time rallied for a boycott. They got on the radio and basically shamed any band or club owner who dared to partake of such a painfully, putrid and poultry policy. It worked too - pay for play practically disappeared for many years.

[MatticusMania]

Originally Posted by MarkMgibson

You really shouldn't do "pay to play" shows at all. You're not only doing yourself a disservice, but every other young band as well. These club owners are just exploiting you, pure and simple.

Im not a fan of pay-to-play myself, however, if youre in a band that draws well, pay to play can actually be quite worth it.
If the band is told to sell 30 tickets at $10 each, but they have the means to sell 100 tickets at $10 each, well, that band made $700 for the night. Sure, the promoter/venue made some money off the band, but in exchange the band gets to play at a well known venue. If the band cannot move that many tickets, and scrapes by on the minimum sales, then yes, pay-to-play is a bad idea.

[DwaynieAD]

Originally Posted by MatticusMania

Im not a fan of pay-to-play myself, however, if youre in a band that draws well, pay to play can actually be quite worth it.
If the band is told to sell 30 tickets at $10 each, but they have the means to sell 100 tickets at $10 each, well, that band made $700 for the night. Sure, the promoter/venue made some money off the band, but in exchange the band gets to play at a well known venue. If the band cannot move that many tickets, and scrapes by on the minimum sales, then yes, pay-to-play is a bad idea.

not how it works around here. if you are given 100 tickets you have to turn in all unsold tickets and all money. meaning you are going to be handing them the 1000 dollars and being at their whim as to how much money they actually pay you.

now in the situation you presented, and I've seen areas that do it this way, it could be very lucrative for an originals band. but two things, how many originals bands have that kinda of draw power? and how many venues are doing it that way?

[MatticusMania]

Originally Posted by DwaynieAD

not how it works around here. if you are given 100 tickets you have to turn in all unsold tickets and all money. meaning you are going to be handing them the 1000 dollars and being at their whim as to how much money they actually pay you.

now in the situation you presented, and I've seen areas that do it this way, it could be very lucrative for an originals band. but two things, how many originals bands have that kinda of draw power? and how many venues are doing it that way?

To answer your questions... most of the pay-to-play venues around here do it this way. They require that you sell x amount of tickets, and will hand you more than double that if you ask them. Now as to how many original bands have that kind of draw, likely not many, as most original bands really lack strong marketing. But they are out there, Ive seen them.

[bluewine]

Originally Posted by MatticusMania

To answer your questions... most of the pay-to-play venues around here do it this way. They require that you sell x amount of tickets, and will hand you more than double that if you ask them. Now as to how many original bands have that kind of draw, likely not many, as most original bands really lack strong marketing. But they are out there, Ive seen them.

In Milwaukee the originals bands that have a draw don't pay to play.

I know of 2 bands that can pack a venue at $10.00 a head. But it took them 40 years to build up that base.

Blue

[LiquidMidnight]

Bottom-line, promoters need to do their ******* jobs! A promoter's job is to sell tickets. The promoter having the band sell tickets is like if you went in to have your tonsils taken out and the surgeon hands you a scalpel and says, "Go to town." The surgeon's job to to perform surgery. The promoter's job is to promote.

So many people in the music business would fail so miserably in the "real world."