10 Things That Need To Change To Save Independent Venues

[SteveK]

[quote]What do we think?[/quote]
I think this Andy Inglis sounds like an idiot.
He claims to have been in the business for 26 years promoting, tour managing etc., and yet seems to be clueless about life on the road, and how promoting bands works.

[UglyDog]

[quote][b]Guest lists need to be universally banned[/b]
Thor Harris of Swans famously said “[i]Guest list is for friends, family and people you might want to f**k. Everyone else can pay. They have day-jobs[/i].” Thor Harris is wrong. If your friends, family and people you might want to f**k have day-jobs, they can pay too.[/quote]

Absolute bollocks. If Mrs.PrettyBitch comes along to a gig and has to pay at the door, that's money going straight out of her and therefore also my pocket. I am effectively giving part of my fee straight back to the venue. Not happening, sorry.

I'm also quite amused at Mr. Inglis complaining about bands and venues having an "attitude" and then in the very next breath he describes Carl Barat as a 'talent vacuum'**. Attitude, you were saying..?
He's making a few good points but overall he's just coming across as a bit of a shouty knob.

**[size=2] He may well be, I don't know as I'm not familiar with his work. But it's not really the point.[/size]

Edited January 28, 2014 by UglyDog

[Roland Rock]

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1390913326' post='2351136']


Absolutely.
It seems like every gig I go to these days I have to have a go at some gobby, self-obsessed twat who thinks everybody is there to listen to him rather than the band.
I know lots of people who feel the same too, to the extent that many of them just don't even bother going to gigs anymore because of the amount of w***ers in the audience. Years ago this seemed to be primarily a London thing but now it's the same everywhere.
[/quote]

FYI I am not particularly gobby, definitely not self-obsessed, nor am I a twat or a w***er :-)
We were near the back (let's say 90% towards the bar from the stage) and got a bit chatty, but we did quieten down when asked. I think it's about balance - you don't want people to spoil the show for you, but also banning conversation (not sure where you stand on the issue of cheering and dancing too?) would lead to a pretty dead atmosphere.

[BigRedX]

[quote name='M-Bass-M' timestamp='1390913022' post='2351129']
I'm sure the reason why there's less interest in new music probably has a lot to do with reality TV shows, and the increased availability of music on the internet. How many bands put anything they record on the internet for free download? We certainly do, and I wonder if the impact is that people download the music first and then decide if the band are worth watching. Years ago it used to be the other way around.
[/quote]

The you have to give your audience something in the live performance that they can get sitting at home listening to your tracks that they have downloaded. Too many bands/musicians still think that standing on stage playing your songs is sufficient. It's not. If you can't entertain your audience you probably shouldn't be clogging up the venue.

[PaulWarning]

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1390916911' post='2351219']
The you have to give your audience something in the live performance that they can get sitting at home listening to your tracks that they have downloaded. Too many bands/musicians still think that standing on stage playing your songs is sufficient. It's not. If you can't entertain your audience you probably shouldn't be clogging up the venue.
[/quote]
Yep I agree with that, too many bands out there just stand there, playing, looking like they've just walked of a building site, no attempt to interact with the audience at all, bass players are probably the worst offenders too, I blame Bill Wyman

[flyfisher]

Alternatively, it could be argued that you only need to 'put on a show' if your music is not enough alone to entertain the audience.

Look, there are no rules. We do what we do and some will like it and some won't. No big deal either way.

I think M-Bass-M makes a lot of good points. In the 'good old days' music was a fairly rare commodity and live bands were the only way to get to hear it. Since then, every technological advance has been another step towards music being ubiquitous and, pretty much, free. Heck, these days people can walk around with more music in their pocket than they could reasonably listen to in their entire lives! Against this sort of background is it any wonder that it's such a difficult way to make a decent living? Might as well 'go amateur', pick and choose your gigs and just play for the love of it. But the genie is out of the bottle and no amount of whinging and whining is going to get him back in there.

[JTUK]

[quote name='RhysP' timestamp='1390913054' post='2351130']
The scary thing in that scenario is who decides what a "good" band is?
Like it or not, a lot of the bands that draw decent crowds, certainly in University towns like Cardiff, are not what most muso types would call "good" bands.
[/quote]

yep.... Local band sold out a venue of 350 plus in 29 hrs..so they say and I can believe it.
That is pretty decent going by any stretch .. IMO.
What you may think of the band tends to become irrelevant...

But there are too many bands and too few venues which is why the bands are desperate to play..even for free.
Everyone knows this..and venues know this, for sure, and there is nothing to break this chain.
The bands wont do it and the venues wont want to...

Who decides who is a good band or not...? yep, scary..!!
I think a good band in any area is the band that other bands rate, so as long as they pull in people, then that is about all there can be to it, IMO.

[TimR]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1390912782' post='2351122']


Perhaps. So why does it seem to still be so prevalent?
[/quote]

Chancers with gift of the gab?

Most of us are aware that to get gigs you need a cd or video and enough front to go into a venue and persuade them you're the next big thing.

I think the promoters need to wise up a bit and check out the bands properly.

As posted above a 'good' band is one that people want to come and listen to. The true test of that isn't how many friends they can bring along from out of town, it's how many locals turn up to see them next time they play.

[EliasMooseblaster]

[quote name='TimR' timestamp='1390912266' post='2351115']
Not really. It's a comment in the state of music.

When venue owners are complaining that it's the bands that are the problem, the venues are the ones that should be exercising some sort of quality control.

It's all well and good packing your venue with band A's 'fans' bussed in from out of town one week, but then you can't moan when the next week no one turns up to see band B.

It's a short sighted business plan doomed from the start. Most 'hobby' musicians are very unorganised.
[/quote]
[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1390912782' post='2351122']
Perhaps. So why does it seem to still be so prevalent?
[/quote]

I obviously won't be the first to point out that the problem cuts both ways - I've shared bills with plenty of juvenile bands who behaved like they were owed a living, and I've encountered several venue owners and promoters who don't see why they should pay for a band, when they can find plenty who will play for free.

Unfortunately, a lot of bands need to put away the romantic side of things when off-stage and run things more like a business - bookings, promotion, sensible touring schedules, etc. For example, I've not been to a Dick Venom gig, but it's clear, when you compare their onstage image against BRX's posts on here, that they've struck the right balance between the two. When a venue owner asks why he should pay an 'originals' band for making some noise in his/her licensed space, perhaps the band needs to be able to answer,
"You're hiring professional musicians. We'll set up, play and clear off on time with surgical precision, and do what we can to keep your punters entertained, and keep them drinking. If you want a free band, don't come crying to us when you get a bunch of stroppy, disorganised sixth-formers behaving like Axl Rose on your stage area."

On the other hand, the promoter or venue owner needs to be firm about who they do and don't invite back - or even who they cut short. I've never forgotten a particularly stroppy bunch of kids at one gig who turned up late, borrowed bits of kits that they'd forgotten to bring, went to the bar instead of the stage when they were due to go on, and shouted abuse back at anyone who tried to hurry them along. In the end, it was the sound engineer who went and told them, "if you don't stop f**king around, you won't play at all." By this point the promoter in charge of the night was, of course, nowhere to be seen!

[M-Bass-M]

[quote name='BigRedX' timestamp='1390916911' post='2351219']
The you have to give your audience something in the live performance that they can get sitting at home listening to your tracks that they have downloaded. Too many bands/musicians still think that standing on stage playing your songs is sufficient. It's not. If you can't entertain your audience you probably shouldn't be clogging up the venue.
[/quote]
It's hard to disagree with that. When I go and see massive established bands, you don't want to just listen to them play a note-perfect imitation of what they have recorded, you want some interaction, something different, something unique. Inevitably though you're still at the same point - you have to get the punters through the door before they can see how different you are on stage.

[oggiesnr]

Clubs need to get more imaginative (and clean up their act), promoters ditto, bands ditto. All the parties are in this together and if one of them is making out like a bandit and the others are losing then eventually they all lose.

A quick example of imaginative. A folk promoter who promotes out in the sticks put on a Sunday afternoon show. Name headliner and up and coming support so serious money on the line and proper ticket prices. Result was an almost full house, people coming from up to an hour and a half's drive away (us included), the club made bar money in a dead time and everyone came out on top. The promoter is now seriously looking at doing a Sunday afternoon series next winter. OK you can argue it's only folk but I imagine that it could work across a number of genres.

Steve

[skankdelvar]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1390917975' post='2351244']
In the 'good old days' music was a fairly rare commodity and live bands were the only way to get to hear it.
[/quote]

And before the good old days - that is to say, up till the 1950's - people did not go to 'see bands'. They went to dances where the band was there to be heard, not to be listened to (there's a difference).

OK, there might be concerts (classical, jazz, musical comedy) and there might be musical performances during Variety Shows, but in only a few instances did 'popular music' bands draw an audience based solely upon their reputation - Ellington, Basie, Miller, James, Dorsey. And even then the band was pretty much a utility to enable dancing.

Long story short, the 'Band as something to be looked at and listened to' thing is relatively recent and looks to be a short-lived anomaly. The biz will revert to the previous model: large-scale paid concerts in seated venues by name artists and a scattering of free gigs in pubs, rather like the 'Sessions' so often instanced by Irish Tourist Board advertisements. Face it, bands in pubs and small venues is dying out; we're more than halfway there so best get used to it.

In other news; in the future, as now, dancing will take place to the accompaniment of pre-recorded music; no change there, given that so many of today's bands are completely undanceable.

[Jigster]

[color=#333333][font=Times]"Arts Council England gives London's Southbank Centre £20,000,000 in block funding each year (which means they can spend it on what they like without much in the way of detailed accountability). Some of ACE's funding comes from you, the tax-payer, which makes it quite likely that, when you last visited Royal Festival Hall and took a sh*t, you wiped your arse with toilet roll that you helped pay for. And The Barbican? Only £583,000 in funding in 2013, but that's topped up by £19,800,000 from the City of London. Forty million for two arts centres. What do Le Pub in Newport or Clwb Ifor Bach in Cardiff get? f***-all. Why can't we take a million each off Southbank and Barbican, stick it in a fund which small venues could apply to, up to a maximum of twenty grand per venue, then we could transform one hundred small UK venues in one move. We could create a world-class small venue circuit. We could be the best. The Southbank is a charity too. Perhaps it could start being a bit more f***ing charitable.

"[/font][/color]

[font=arial,helvetica,sans-serif][color=#333333][size=4]This a tired argument, never to be resolved. It cuts across all art forms - [i]The Arts Council aren't interested[/i]. It doesn't serve their controlling view of culture (even though it's paid for by you and I) to NOT give vast amounts of subsidy to needy over priced middle class Metropolitan bastions of high culture.[/size][/color][/font]

[skankdelvar]

To be fair, the Arts Council also gives bundles of cash to museums, libraries and touring projects. Whether the Southbank and The Barbican take a disproportionate amount - £20m - of the Council's £1.4bn budget is debatable.

But I'd rather any spare cash went on school trips or maintaining library services than to keeping whiny gig promoters in Rizlas and beer.

Let 'em sink or swim. And if man's best efforts cannot keep the independent venue scene alive, then there's no market and it's just throwing good money after bad.

[TimR]

[quote name='skankdelvar' timestamp='1390922981' post='2351342']

...

In other news; in the future, as now, dancing will take place to the accompaniment of pre-recorded music; no change there, given that so many of today's bands are completely undanceable.
[/quote]

There you go.

Girls come to dance, boys come to watch girls dance.

If you want a big audience there's your answer.

[Happy Jack]

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E7iXpTJk15s

[SteveK]

So, the lack of sympathy for Mr Inglis and his views would appear to be fairly unanimous.

[Tomjbass]

IMO, there's just no reason that attracts people to small venues anymore, at least not from a music perspective. As has been said, 'good' (read popular) music is readily available for free in many formats and, why risk going to a venue where you might see music being performed badly, or at best that you just might not connect with, especially when you can go to a club and dance to/watch girls dance to music that you have heard before and therefore adequately performs the role you want it to.

There's just no real scene for actually seeing live music, and the majority of the venues, it seems, are attended by people that are there so that they can go to work/college/wherever else the next day and tell their friends that they were in such-and-such bar, which therefore makes them cool. Whether they saw a good band, a bad band, a ventriloquist or just sat by themselves and stared at a vintage film poster all night is totally irrelevant. And this is based on having been in an originals band playing in lots of small venues around the country for the last 7 years.

[Tomjbass]

[quote name='SteveK' timestamp='1390925943' post='2351376']
So, the lack of sympathy for Mr Inglis and his views would appear to be fairly unanimous.
[/quote]

I'd definitely agree with that, reading his article does not paint the picture of a massively sympathetic character. He makes some good points, but he totally misses the point on the others and doesn't come across as trying to make a difference, he comes across as someone having a whinge.

[skankdelvar]

[quote name='Tomjbass' timestamp='1390926193' post='2351378']
IMO, there's just no reason that attracts people to small venues anymore, at least not from a music perspective. [/quote]

Many would agree and not just punters.

The reason Mr Inglis' analysis fails is that it advocates external funding and restrictive practices in support of a model that's suffering from a decline customer take-up. Thing is, there are so many factors in play that it's difficult to prioritise any one course of action.

With some honourable exceptions, few seem to be applying the simplest maxim of all; 'Find out what people want and give it to them'. It would be a start.

Edited January 28, 2014 by skankdelvar

[Zenitram]

Clearly, everyone wants dancing girls.

And while we're at it:

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=XNvZn-ww-Lg

[flyfisher]

Absolutely. I suppose there must be some people out there who embrace change and the opportunities it can bring, but mostly we only hear about people whinging about how 'fings ain't wot they used to be' and how it would be wonderful to turn back the clock . . . pubs, village shops, high street shops, milkmen, vinyl records . . . .

[Zenitram]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1390930524' post='2351452']
pubs, village shops, high street shops, milkmen, vinyl records . . . .
[/quote]

That was quite a weekend, let me tell you.

[thisnameistaken]

[quote name='Happy Jack' timestamp='1390898335' post='2350916']
Look around you. Every summer sees another 10,000 music graduates dumped on the market. ... They all understand music theory and can sight-read written parts. They have stored on their phones the numbers of hundreds of other musicians who they were at college with, and they can form multiple scratch bands in any [i]genre [/i]with a couple of texts.
[/quote]

Half my current band is those people. If I had to replace my whole band they would be the ones I wouldn't struggle with.

Similarly the last band I was in, the most important member knew the least about music and wasn't a very good instrumentalist. The band would not work without him, whereas everybody else was entirely replaceable.

Being able to put together a band in any genre is fine, but they'll always be second rate compared to bands who actually care about that genre.

[Happy Jack]

[quote name='thisnameistaken' timestamp='1390947944' post='2351719']

Being able to put together a band in any genre is fine, but they'll always be second rate compared to bands who actually care about that genre.
[/quote]

Amen to that.