Pay to Play

[flyfisher]

[quote name='steve-bbb' timestamp='1409227463' post='2537710']
but you wouldnt open up a shop and give it away for free would you?
[/quote]

Indeed not, because that's not my hobby. It's the hobby/enjoyment aspect of music that makes this whole thing a big debate because people clearly ARE prepared to earn a living some other way and then play music for free out of pure enjoyment.

Seems to me that the (perfectly reasonable) desire of some musicians to only play if they are paid actually takes the shine off some of the sheer enjoyment of playing music just for the sake of it.

[BILL POSTERS]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1409235922' post='2537824']
Indeed not, because that's not my hobby. It's the hobby/enjoyment aspect of music that makes this whole thing a big debate because people clearly ARE prepared to earn a living some other way and then play music for free out of pure enjoyment.

Seems to me that the (perfectly reasonable) desire of some musicians to only play if they are paid actually takes the shine off some of the sheer enjoyment of playing music just for the sake of it.
[/quote]

But how would you feel if someone was offering to do your job for free, or as per this thread, your boss asked someone to pay to do it just for experience - and they agreed ?

[Dropzone]

I'm with JTUK as why I do it but would add fun.

Norris, I think you prove my point. You think your band is worth an amount, you charge it and get it, hence you are worth it.

BP, if someone was willing to permanantly do my job, to my standard, skills, qualification etc. my empoyer would be mad not to sack me and employ them. However, they should question what is their motivation. . If I have chosen to try and make my living as a profession where there are thousands willing to do the job for free I would make sure I had a superior product that people were willing to pay for. It may sound harsh but if people aren't willing to pay you for it then reason stands it isn't worth paying for (at that precise time), I suppose sometimes the payment could be in exposure and opportunity, which is difficult to put a price on. Oh wait I have just found a tag and it is £9.99

Just my rantings

[Dad3353]

Just to underline the difference in approach... I wonder how many of those who treat music as their sole profession declare their revenues (and expenses...) for tax, pay National Health contributions, have a pension plan..? The self-employed, whatever the profession, have a hard time, generally, keeping up with outgoings of that nature; this would at least partly explain the necessity to place a lower limit on the sum their band can play for. One needs a lot of regular gigs, and/or complementary revenue (teaching, studio work, deps, writing...) to keep those outgoings up, and have enough over for mortgages, kids clothing and food on the table. Not all venues are able to afford the costs of such bands. 20 bods in a pub wouldn't be enough to make it worthwhile. A cheap, amateur band, however, could fit the bill in those circumstances, I should think..?

Edited August 28, 2014 by Dad3353

[flyfisher]

[quote name='BILL POSTERS' timestamp='1409236764' post='2537831']
But how would you feel if someone was offering to do your job for free, or as per this thread, your boss asked someone to pay to do it just for experience - and they agreed ?
[/quote]

Isn't that exactly what has been happening with loads of manufacturing jobs in British industry, with them being moved to other countries where labour costs are so much cheaper, indeed almost 'free' in comparison to UK wages? I'd bet you've bought stuff made by this 'cheap labour' at sometime, just like we all have.

Again, I could turn the question around and ask why anyone would choose to try to scrape a living by charging for something that many people will do for free.

Unless you believe you have some inherent right to earn a living by playing music then you just have to accept the big melting pot that is the market economy we live in. You don't have to like it, but you're not going to be able to change it.

[JTUK]

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1409239618' post='2537878']
Isn't that exactly what has been happening with loads of manufacturing jobs in British industry, with them being moved to other countries where labour costs are so much cheaper, indeed almost 'free' in comparison to UK wages? I'd bet you've bought stuff made by this 'cheap labour' at sometime, just like we all have.

Again, I could turn the question around and ask why anyone would choose to try to scrape a living by charging for something that many people will do for free.

Unless you believe you have some inherent right to earn a living by playing music then you just have to accept the big melting pot that is the market economy we live in. You don't have to like it, but you're not going to be able to change it.
[/quote]

I think we could legislate against it but as you say...that would force a lot of ppl to be more 'legal' than they are now...
so would probably be a non-starter to all intents and purposes. The Black economy exists elsewhere and it is very hard to shut down,
of course...
I do actually operate quite a strict policy of not buying music stuff from the far east...but that is mostly because I think the western stuff is better anyway... or certainly the kit I have. To my knowledge it isn't stuff that creeps over the Mexican border either.

I don't believe the vast majority of free bands are that competitive anyway... so the gigs they would get, no one really wants
as either they don't have the budget to pay, or they don't have a budget to do things properly.
The free festivals around here shout pretty loud but they don't really attract the numbers either, IME...
The places where they do affect things is in pubs as they can push the price down. Another reason to not knock
yourself out on the pubs. At festivals here, you can tell if the deal is free, by the bands that are on the bill.

Of course, the big City council fests are worth doing but they will have a budget if you ask... they just need to want you more than you want to do them...

[steve-bbb]

[quote name='BILL POSTERS' timestamp='1409236764' post='2537831']
But how would you feel if someone was offering to do your job for free, or as per this thread, your boss asked someone to pay to do it just for experience - and they agreed ?
[/quote]

im with JT too but yes i do this for a hobby but because i am as financially strapped as the proverbial church mouse then for me it must also be a hobby which at the very least pays for itself - with the only exceptions being very occasional charity gigs but even most of those we get expenses

[skankdelvar]

As mentioned earlier:

Curious as to the average publican's views about bands I wandered off to find some pub landlord forums. Well, there seem to be damn few of them - perhaps pub guvnors don't have time to go online.

The sense I get from those sites I visited is that live music occupies a pretty small space in the landlord's mind, being merely one of a number of traffic-driving initiatives alongside TV football, curry nights, background music and guest beers, etc. The issue of live music may perhaps occupy 10% of his consciousness on the night and 0.01% the rest of the time.

My explorations threw up three other interesting facts:

* The MU is soon to launch a campaign against Pay-To-Play (PDF download [url="http://livemusicexchange.org/wp-content/uploads/Fair-Play-Guide.pdf"]here[/url])

* PRS published some research a couple of years ago which showed that live music lifted an average pub's nightly take by £126 (Sun-Thurs) and £485 (Fri-Sat). Though the PRS reckons this is quite marvellous it sounds pretty discouraging to me given our collective aspirations.

* A handy hint from a website marketing 'advice services' to landlords:

[quote]Got a problem with drug users? Then spray all flat surfaces in the toilets with WD40 – the coke dissolves in the oil – don’t worry they won't complain to you.[/quote]

[color=#ffffff].[/color]

Edited August 28, 2014 by skankdelvar

[steve-bbb]

marvellous mister skank will have a read

also this is related i believe [url="http://www.musiciansunion.org.uk/news/2014/07/29/the-cultural-value-of-live-music-from-the-pub-to-the-stadium/"][b]http://www.musiciansunion.org.uk/news/2014/07/29/the-cultural-value-of-live-music-from-the-pub-to-the-stadium/[/b][/url]

[flyfisher]

[quote name='JTUK' timestamp='1409245176' post='2537945']

I don't believe the vast majority of free bands are that competitive anyway... so the gigs they would get, no one really wants

[/quote]

I suspect you're right about that. I certainly can't see anyone wanting to pay my lot four figures for a wedding or corporate gig - we don't have a big enough repertoire for a start and we're definitely not 'professional' enough. Having said that, we have done two weddings for friends who specifically asked us because they liked the stuff we do play, so go figure. We've even been asked about playing at a Christmas ball in one of the Cambridge colleges this year, which is something I'm a bit wary of because I worry we won't be good enough, but they are being pretty serious and are offering money, so who knows?

Perhaps there really is room out there for all bands, at all levels and for all 'deals'?

What I do find interesting is that it's the bands making money from playing that are doing all the moaning. I've not seen any play-for-free bands carping on about how other bands [u]shouldn't[/u] charge for playing. Live and let live?

[JTUK]

I wouldn't moan about a Christmas gig at one of the Cambridge colleges, so hand it over

[flyfisher]

What? just as we're on the brink of earning some dosh?

Seriously though, the organiser is one of the students and he knows us and has seen us many times, so he knows what he's letting himself in for as far as we're concerned. It's just that I'm a bit concerned that our stuff might not go down too well at a semi formal event for students. I guess there's only one way to find out.

But it's far from a done deal as yet. I'll let you know if it doesn't happen for us

[phil.c60]

[quote name='skankdelvar' timestamp='1409249612' post='2538006']
As mentioned earlier:

Curious as to the average publican's views about bands I wandered off to find some pub landlord forums. Well, there seem to be damn few of them - perhaps pub guvnors don't have time to go online.

The sense I get from those sites I visited is that live music occupies a pretty small space in the landlord's mind, being merely one of a number of traffic-driving initiatives alongside TV football, curry nights, background music and guest beers, etc. The issue of live music may perhaps occupy 10% of his consciousness on the night and 0.01% the rest of the time.

My explorations threw up three other interesting facts:

* The MU is soon to launch a campaign against Pay-To-Play (PDF download [url="http://livemusicexchange.org/wp-content/uploads/Fair-Play-Guide.pdf"]here[/url])

* PRS published some research a couple of years ago which showed that live music lifted an average pub's nightly take by £126 (Sun-Thurs) and £485 (Fri-Sat). Though the PRS reckons this is quite marvellous it sounds pretty discouraging to me given our collective aspirations.

* A handy hint from a website marketing 'advice services' to landlords:



[color=#ffffff].[/color]
[/quote]

So, an extra £485. The VAT element is approx.£90. We're down to £395. The average GP (gross profit) for most pubs on wet sales is 51%, so the actual extra money earned is about £200. If you pay the band £200 the actual extra money earned for all that effort is.......£0. And you wonder why they (publicans)don't bother. The sad fact is that across all the music genres, less people are going out to watch live music year on year. They're all at home watching f***cking "Strictly Come What The Who The Hell Cares" or "The Xcruciating Factor". The real issue is why. Unless you can find some pubs/publicans with a real interest in music and a clientele to match it's tough going. We've just had two gigs pulled (at a re-opened venue we haven't played yet, so it's not because we're sh*t, before you jump on me) because, and I quote: "Over the last four months, we've monitored our Customers response to live music and they seem to prefer DJ sets or similar. We have lost money on every live music night, so regretfully we have cancelled all upcoming band bookings and have no plans to reintroduce them in the foreseeable future". It's tough out there, folks, and if I didn't love it, and looked at it as a purely money making exercise I'd pack it in tomorrow, but I do love it, and while I won't "pay to play" I am well aware that we can only get what there is. The going rate is the same as when I started 5 years ago (yes, I'm an oldie but a newbie!) and according to friends who've been doing it an awful lot longer than me, the same as 10 or 20 years ago. I treat it as a self-funding hobby, and that's fine for me, it's not my living. Do I think I'm holding down other peoples potential earnings? Not in my sector (covers, Blues/Rock, pubs) - no. They can't pay more, the money isn't there. We get/charge the same rate as all the other bands. I just don't (fortunately) need to rely on it to support me.

[flyfisher]

At last a - a realist who deals with the world as it is and not as they think it should be.

[cheddatom]

wow, 51% on wet sales?! I wouldn't have thought it was that much!

Having said that earlier in the year I played a local pub with my folk band, we brought a support act (30 mins) and then played 2 hours at the most. There could not have been more than 40 people in the pub in total, and yet he paid us £300 for the evening. The support guy and the band get £50 each, the bassist who brought the PA gets £50 for that. How the hell does this make sense to the Landlord? Surely he'd have lost money?

[JTUK]

One of the better music pubs round here has a music fan LL. If you playing a Counting Crows number he will
love your band forever.. He has a top pay policy and he is sensible about it. Some pubs will pay £350
a night but the band better to be worth it and BS backfires on bands that go for that and 'fail'..so £250 is the figure
that a lot of pubs want to pay for most bands. It is all in the turn-out of course.
Audition nights are popular tho and it depends if you buy into the pub/LL being fair on the night as to whether you
should do them. If you do well, they might offer you a gig on a band night ( and pay a little bonus ..?) but mostly, bands who use these free
nights to prospect a gig aren't good enough.
Every band has can have less good nights and you can also luck out
and get a very well attended gig, but mostly you will find your level once you have played there a few times.
LL's tend to hear who the good bands are and what they do regards to pulling in people so will expect to pay.
It is only the chancers who want to pay nothing, and they are the gigs you'd want to avoid anyway.

We've always said pubs don't pay enough so the only ones you do are the ones that have a good regular audience
and the chance to have very good nights and pay enough to make the experience worth doing. £50 a night for a ***
gig at a *** pub isn't worth anything long term. You'll not get anything other than hassle or fights..and you wont pick up the
good party gigs and you'll go home thinking the whole thing was a waste of time.

To get £750 plus parties, you have to be a very good band and not flog it forever in a pub as the client tends to say
you work many pubs for £250 and you are takin g the p** asking for 3 times as much for my partty.

[tibpson]

In my experience I found that is very difficult to be payed when you're relative unknown.
Being in an instrumental band and being in Portugal it's very difficult to play and being rewarded by that. Here we don't have the same music culture has I imagine that you have in uk and we don't have also the money. So nobody wants to loose money, not the promoters not the owners of the "pubs", they don't care if you invested a lot in your album or music, they want a band and we need to play live in other to be better musicians and get visibility and name, so we need to put our money to cover part of the expenses (gas, food, drinks) unless we play local.
Even mainstream promoters try to put bands playing for free in some big festivals or has opening act to a big international name has change of visibility for that band and this is outrageous because everybody is earning money except the local band.

Yes, I'm paying to play but hope that my band can change that during the next year. At least in Portugal.

[JTUK]

Obviously paying £200 instead of £280 is attractive and the LL might think that earning £280 profit to pay the band is
not worth it when he can get bands that work cheaper. Not wortht he differene considering how many more wet sales they need to achieve.
That is how 'cheap' forces the prices down.

I have always thought there are too many pubs able to put on music on a whim and they aren't set up for it.
I'd be all for pubs being able to do 2-3-4 free music nights a year, ( free in terms of no license or registering and
electrical check etc ) and then they have to comply to a set of local rules to be able to run more regular nights.
This would be geared to making sure pubs approached this properly.
We tend to like pubs that have security as that means the LL/pub have considered the evening needs to meet certain costs...
and are all geared up for it.

[BigRedX]

[quote name='icastle' timestamp='1408912400' post='2534581']
It all sounds very much like the musical equivalent of vanity publishing to me.
[/quote]

But surely everything a band does that isn't paid for by some 3rd party (record label, promoter. etc.) is just vanity publishing - even sticking some recordings up on Bandcamp?

[quote name='BILL POSTERS' timestamp='1408918003' post='2534644']
But while people will play for free, Bands who can and do want to earn lose out...
[/quote]

But originals bands aren't really in competition with each other. One band is not really a substitute for another. When I go to gigs I go with the express purpose of seeing a particular band play live. People who don't do that aren't really watching or listening anyway so aren't really an audience.

[quote name='flyfisher' timestamp='1409070545' post='2536021']
I wonder what 'the future' means for BCers here who play in bands (or even if they don't at the moment)?

What do people see as their future in the world of music and how much planning do people really put into it all?

I've laid my cards on the table as a pure hobbyist band member with no aspirations of making any money out of my playing, never mind earning a comfortable ( or uncomfortable! ) living out of it. My motivation is simply playing for the sheer pleasure of it.

What other motivations are out there?
[/quote]

For me because I'd rather be playing my particular kind of music(s) than doing anything else. I have a job that I quite like and I'm pretty good at it, but it will always be a second best to being able to do music. In order to not have to do anything else (which is my ideal) I would have to be earning the same kind of money from my music as I do from my current job.


The analogies of other jobs that are being bandied about are wrong because you really need to look at creative jobs as comparisons.

I work in graphic design. I like it and I'm good at my job. However there are plenty of other things I'd rather be doing with my time (music, being with my friends, lying on the sofa scratching my balls etc.) so at the end of the day I want to leave and do those things instead. For most of the people I work with, being graphic designers is what they want to do with their lives. For them graphic design is like music is for me. Many of them have worked for free in the past - it was called holiday work experience and if they were lucky they might have got a few pounds to cover travelling expenses. All of them saw it as promotion - show keenness now and hopefully when a job vacancy becomes available they'll be considered. At the last place I worked that was the route in for over half of the creative work force.

[stingrayPete1977]

No one who is earning a living, not trying to earn a living, wannabe rock star, is doing pay to play. If you are trying to get an originals band off the ground losing a few quid to get a foot in the door is OK IMO, unless you make it big the cost of gear (not that kind of gear ), travel, practice room, recording, stage clothes etc etc etc etc will never be recovered anyway. If you are a covers band as many of us here are regardless of being a pro or not you should be paid something even if its £50 and a plate of sandwiches.

We do a little open jam night about once a month, it is a tiny hotel lounge we do it for £60 between 3 of us but I take very little stuff with me and its [b]fun[/b], all I took last night was DB its stand and a lead, it not far away and is basically a free practice for us, we pick up the odd gig from it and it is where I see many of my friends. Now the LL there is not going to put on JTUKs band for £750+ (they would not fit you all in anyway ;p ), so we are not taking away a potential gig from anyone other than someone prepared to do the same as us, my other function bands I would not gig there with but I know I have come home from this little jam happier than many wedding gigs with a pocket full of dosh.

In a way for me the function gigs pay for my gear to be able to play the jam sessions

[mcnach]

Don't do it.

Don't promote the existence of fake "promoters".