How long till I call the project off?

[hrodbert696]

Since last May or June or so, I've been working on getting a covers project together with a keys player/singer. We spent the summer getting a list of songs we could play down, so that we wouldn't fumble like idiots over them when auditioning a guitarist and drummer. We also needed a PA for practice, which was a hurdle since we're both basically broke, but he came up with some speakers from his old band and $200 for a new head (the old one was dead) and we can get by on that front.

He's had a lot more band experience and wanted to be in charge of the CL ad. Put a lot of information in it in order to weed out casual weekend warriors; we're not expecting this to be full-time salary, but we'd like it to be a professional working band, not just buddies jamming on the weekend over a beer and gigging once a month. Since we started posting the ad, we've had a few people email or call him, but not one soul has showed up to play.

I've mentioned it to everyone I could, had a guitarist and drummer come by one time but they really weren't into the idea of regular gigging, then the son of a family from my church who was great but says he's too busy with college to commit, in two weeks the guitarist from an old power trio I was in is coming by so we'll see if he works out.

I like this singer, he knows what he's doing and has experience, we're on the same page as far as music goes. I'm feeling reluctant to cut loose. But we're also approaching the six month mark and I'm starting to think that if we haven't found people by now, we're not going to and we should cut our losses and save time. I do have another band, which has full membership, it's far from home but close to my current work.

So... thoughts? How long should I give it? I'm leaning towards six months from when we started, which would mean calling it done around Thanksgiving. How long did your bands take to find people and gel?

 

[spaz21387]

You havent even passed the hardest part... getting your band gigs and earning a following...

 

[prd004]

Putting bands together via craigslist can take ages, patience is key.
Luckily for you the singer, the bassist and the drummer are the three hardest parts to find and at least you have two of them covered from day one.
If you like this singer, hang tight and be patient, you can still play with your other guys music doesn't have to be monogomous, I play with two or three bands all the time.
FWIW, I have had more luck with craigslist the LESS pre-screening I do. I know it seems wise to weed out as many undesirables and wanna-bees as you possibly can but I got more positive responses with less pre-qualifying. Sure there have been painful auditions, but sometimes that's what you have to do to find good players.

 

[etoncrow]

Is there any reason why you can't do both bands? I live in West Virginia. The whole state has a population 1.8 million scattered over pretty rough terrain. Finding people that not only play but also match your taste and interest in music is tough. It does not make sense to me that you would toss the guy you have found to start all over again.

 

[bluewine]

In this economy it will be hard to attract good players unless you have something to offer.

If you don't have any gigs or a sound mechanism to book the band it's going to be tough. If you are doing covers and your real good and agency would work with you.

However, if nobody in the band has conections you might end up working hard and only gigging 1 or 2 times every 3 months if your lucky. And if your doing originals the booking becomes a real challenge.

It's your call on whether or not to bail.

It's a tough business

I wish you luck.

 

[bassbully]

Whats wrong with getting weekend warriors who want a gig or two a month? That's more than you have now...lower your expectations and see if that gets someone in the door. Most people who play these days cant gig every weekend and good luck finding that many quality gigs with a start up band. If not this band is a time waster and maybe time to bail.

 

[Depth_Charge]

You've already given six months of your time and not one slots been filled? Even long enough to work out someone isn't a fit??? Somethings amiss.

I'd be warning the BL something's gotta give, starting with my giving 4 weeks notice. I'll also offer to assist in the audition process to try and see if there's a pattern or if a different approach may produce results.

At some point, I want a return on my time. If I'm not getting that, whats the point?

+1 to the "whats wrong with weekend warrior" comment. A couple of fill in weekend warriors on the books willing to drop kit and play on short notice, and your problems are solved. Book away! Sometimes, having a swag of on call fillins for covers is better than a static lineup that can't always do all the shows you want. Sure, there's extra running around to do to get em in place, but what would you rather do? Jam endlessly, or spend a few hours lining players up for a paying gig?

 

[cycler]

Duos work a lot more than quintets....

 

[Depth_Charge]

Neither the OP nor the OP's bandleader perceive the project to be a duo though, so its highly likely the music they are playing (and the band vision) is not compatible with that solution.

 

[hrodbert696]

Thanks for the responses so far, y'all... just for clarification, I mentioned the other band not because I'm feeling forced to choose between the two (so far both are fitting the schedule) but because it means this project is not my only outlet to play. If I did call it off I'd still have the other band to play with.

I have no problem with weekend warriors, and that wasn't intended as a criticism. The one pair of guitar and drums we played with were great guys. It's just that our concept is "gig as much as possible" and their concept is "jam on the weekend for fun and occasionally play a gig." We'd be happy to jam with them anytime but it was apparent that we didn't want the same thing.

It is (or is supposed to become) an alt-rock covers band, pretty flexible list to play in bars but leaning a little more 90s-present rather than classic rock. Wouldn't work too well as a duo. We may try hitting open mics with what we have and see if that leads to any more contacts.

 

[Muttleybass]

Sometimes it can take ages...

My drummer buddy and I took almost a year and a half to find the right guitar player. There was a lot of false starts and wasted time, for sure, and even some gigs with guys who weren't quite right. In the meantime, I played with a couple of other projects while we did our search. At one time, I was in 3 bands at once. When we finally found the right guitar guy, it took another 8 months to find the right singer. 4 months later, the drummer decided he didn't like the direction and quit. Fortunately it only took 2 months to find the perfect guy.

So, basically, after 2 1/2 years, I finally found the perfect band for me (my own) and dropped the other 2. Hopefully it lasts, but if someone decides to move on, we (I) will replace them.

I think I've finally reached a point where the band exists beyond the individual members. People might come and go, but as long as there's me, there's the band. Not to say I'm the "leader", as I view it as a democracy, but as long as I have the PA, space, and get the gigs, there's the band.

I guess my point is, what would you be doing if you weren't trying to find other players? You don't need to quit your existing project. In the meantime, you have to decide whether the right guys just aren't out there at the moment or you'd be better off trying to join an existing established project. That might take just as long. You could even try doing both. Bands change personel by the minute and looking for a project vs. finding the right people to join yours is pretty much a wash, IMO.

My philosophy is to just keep throwing stuff at the wall and see what sticks.

 

[Marko 1]

...

I guess my point is, what would you be doing if you weren't trying to find other players? You don't need to quit your existing project. In the meantime, you have to decide whether the right guys just aren't out there at the moment or you'd be better off trying to join an existing established project. That might take just as long. You could even try doing both. Bands change personel by the minute and looking for a project vs. finding the right people to join yours is pretty much a wash, IMO.

My philosophy is to just keep throwing stuff at the wall and see what sticks.

+1

 

[aztomr]

I was talking to the guitarist who started our band with me, we noted how we finally have gotten to the point where we wanted to be. We have four sets of music, a steady reliable drummer, PA and lights. We're starting to build an audience, starting to develop realtionships with owners and managers of bars in our town. We started three years ago, spent a year going through drummers, I moved away for a year, we started at square on(almost) 15 months ago. Its been an incredibly frustrating thing, but we kept faith. How long you stick with it is your decision, if it's what you want, you should be willing to work for it.

 

[ErikW]

Why not recruit some players from your current band?

 

[hrodbert696]

Why not recruit some players from your current band?

I thought about this, but the commute makes it unlikely. The one that has full members is near work (Manchester NH) but my work is a 45 minute commute from home; all the other guys live nearby over there and we practice after work on Tuesdays. The band that's not finding members is near home (Seacoast area of NH) and practices Saturdays. I don't get a feel that anyone is interested in the commute just to have an additional band to play in. Also, the drummer in the full band already has another band he's in himself and I don't think he'd have the time for a third.

 

[Stumbo]

How about getting 4 sets down with the keyboard/vocalist? Then advertise for subs to audition.
Get yourself a list of subs, make some demos and start booking gigs. Maybe have two sub guitar players and two sub drummers? Something like that. Or how about a guitar player and a drum machine?

Or maybe you can learn some duo material and start playing out on your own? Then keep looking for others.

 

[TBrett]

If you think it’s worth waiting for, I believe you will eventually connect with the right people. I was up against some pretty big odds for finding the right guys when I started our band, but in time, we found each other. For sure, there were plenty of times when I was ready to throw in the towel. (Where does that expression come from, anyway?) Eventually, my patience – and frustration – were rewarded. I think part of the trick is to remain as open minded as you can while being clear about where you want to go, if that makes any sense to you.

At the end of the day, only you know what’s best for life right now. Gotta say, though, good singers are hard enough to come by, let alone ones that share your vision. And keys to boot? With experience? And you enjoy working together? I’d be very reluctant to let that go.

Open mic nights might be a good idea. Try everything. And best of luck!

 

[hrodbert696]

How about getting 4 sets down with the keyboard/vocalist? Then advertise for subs to audition.
Get yourself a list of subs, make some demos and start booking gigs. Maybe have two sub guitar players and two sub drummers? Something like that. Or how about a guitar player and a drum machine?

Or maybe you can learn some duo material and start playing out on your own? Then keep looking for others.

Good ideas. We've kind of played with ideas like these but it's uncharted territory so we've not taken the plunge to do it. I was just looking at the list of songs we've been working on with the two of us and it's up to 31 tunes already. We've always practiced them playing only our own parts from the recordings, with the assumption that the rest would be filled in by guitar and drums when we got them. So we'd need to retool to fill in the gaps to make it work as a duo, but it might be worth it.

If you think it’s worth waiting for, I believe you will eventually connect with the right people. I was up against some pretty big odds for finding the right guys when I started our band, but in time, we found each other. For sure, there were plenty of times when I was ready to throw in the towel. (Where does that expression come from, anyway?) Eventually, my patience – and frustration – were rewarded. I think part of the trick is to remain as open minded as you can while being clear about where you want to go, if that makes any sense to you.

At the end of the day, only you know what’s best for life right now. Gotta say, though, good singers are hard enough to come by, let alone ones that share your vision. And keys to boot? With experience? And you enjoy working together? I’d be very reluctant to let that go.

Open mic nights might be a good idea. Try everything. And best of luck!

Encouraging, thanks. We'll see where it goes.

 

[Stumbo]

...we've been working on with the two of us and it's up to 31 tunes already. We've always practiced them playing only our own parts from the recordings, with the assumption that the rest would be filled in by guitar and drums when we got them.

Another thing to think about: since you have so many tunes, you'll have to find people that want/like to play those exact tunes(or at least most of them). They would kinda be like sidemen.

Seems to me a "band" usually picks the tunes together with a certain goal in mind(gigging in a certain market). Since you don't have gigs, it may be way more beneficial to kick the "duo" sooner rather than later, get some gigs and keep looking for the other parts to your band as you go.

If you get a drummer, then you'll be a trio until you get the guitar player, and so on.

To me, the main goal is get out gigging asap and not let things go stale.

Good luck.

 

[hrodbert696]

Another thing to think about: since you have so many tunes, you'll have to find people that want/like to play those exact tunes(or at least most of them). They would kinda be like sidemen.

That list kind of happened by accident. We started out saying we'd have four tunes to audition people on, and spent a couple of weeks making sure that we had those down. We didn't want to run the kind of audition where someone shows up to play and WE fumble around trying to remember the songs. Then we started posting ads... no responses... and just kept on learning new material so as not to go stale while we tried to find people. Next thing you know we have 31 songs. It probably was a factor in the lack of response; for a while we were posting CL ads with the whole song list right there. We tried to stress that this was NOT an intended set list, just things we had been working on, but it probably did scare people off. The goal was always get a roster of people, and then sort out from everyone's abilities and interests where to go with "real" song choices.

We have a guitarist coming this Saturday. If he works out, we may just go with the three of us and a drum machine or get a friend to sub until we find someone permanent. I'll keep you posted.