How to find bands to share gigs with?

[GigDoggy]

Hey poeple.

The title kind of says it all

Any advice?

Cheers.

Gig.

[Obe]

Originally Posted by GigDoggy

Hey poeple.

The title kind of says it all

Any advice?

Cheers.

Gig.

Hi Gig, we've done this several ways. Most of the time we go by contacts, friends or friends of friends who have bands. We talk to the club owners and especially the bartenders, sound men and bouncers, they see a lot of bands and have some good ideas on who would go well with us, and usually can get in contact with them. If we can, we'll go out and see bands and talk to them about sharing or trading gigs. There is also MySpace.

Hope this helps.

[Jehos]

In person. Start spending a lot of nights hanging out at places that have live music from the kind of bands you'd want to play with. Introduce yourself to the good ones. The best possible situation you can be in is to have gigs lined up where you need another band to fill an opener spot or whatever, so when you talk to the band you can say "I saw your set and really liked what you did. I'd like to see if we can swap out some gigs. I've got a gig on X date where I need somebody to play for X minutes, would you all be interested?"

If you're looking to get your start by opening for bands, it can be a little tougher. That's when it pays to be good friends with one or more band members so you can ask them for a favor. It's hard to walk up to an established band and basically ask them for an opening spot without being able to show them anything like a demo CD or video of a past performance.