Start-up bands, how long does it take to start gigging?

[thebrig]

For the third time in as many years, the band that myself and the guitarist who I’ve been with for a number of years has imploded due to a lack of commitment, so we are now in the process of getting yet another band together.

Give us a set of songs to learn and we will get on and learn them, but it seems that most of the musicians that we’ve played with over the past few years just don’t seem to have the drive and commitment to get the songs sorted, I find it so frustrating and wonder if we are ever going to find a bunch of muso’s who all want the same thing as us, all we want is to get a set of songs tight enough to go out and play live on a regular basis.

My question is:

Is this a common thing with start-up bands, or are we just unlucky?

And how long did it take your band to start gigging?

Edited to add: we are both experienced musicians who have played in bands and gigged for a number of years, its just these last few years where we've had problems finding committed people who are prepared to get a band off the ground.

Edited January 15, 2018 by thebrig

[gs_triumph]

This should be interesting 

(given my band has never gigged yet...) 

Edited January 15, 2018 by gs_triumph

[T-Bay]

I started learning the bass October 2016, first rehearsal was back end of October, first gig was late December. We had 26 songs, mostly pretty simple ones to be fair but it’s doable with commitment. The key was that rehearsal was just that, not practice to work out individuals bits. We each learnt or parts and the rehearsal time put them together. So it is possible.

Edited January 15, 2018 by T-Bay

[Happy Jack]

Imploding startups are very common. The vast majority of so-called musicians I've met in the last 10 years (in a band situation anyway) have been either flakes or fantasists, sometimes both at once.

How long to reach gigging speed? Depends on so many factors - quality of musician, nature of the music, fussiness about venues & money, etc.

Four experienced people wanting to play blues standards for beer, I'd allow a month. Four inexperienced people wanting to form a Yes tribute act and charge £500 a night, well, could be a long time waiting.

[Frank Blank]

I think it is extremely rare to find committed musicians prepared to work. They are either young and wanting disproportionate success to the amount of work they are prepared to put in or older and too jaded to put work in,it seems difficult to find a sweet spot, I have rarely found musicians who are willing to work in order to get a good set together, it’s either musos wanting a compliant platform from which they can flaunt their virtuosity or pedestrians who didn’t realise making good music is a difficult and arduous task. I think the answer is that you need more luck than anything else and don’t let go of that guitarist. Good luck.

[Musashimonkey]

Joined a new band at the start of December, first gig is next week! It’s a new start up too, the rest of the guys had a months head start on me. Rock and pop covers, but everyone seems to be professional enough to get on with their own parts. 

[Frank Blank]

I started playing in bands at 15 yrs of age and it took  over twenty years to find a stable committed band and after that finished another ten years to settle into the duo I’m part of now. If my musical collaborator left now I’d pack it in.

Actually, thinking about it, my current musical project began in 2004 and we did our first gig in late 2017, so I can’t really comment as I think we are mad. What I might suggest is that if you are good musicians doing covers you might be quicker at getting a set together than bands that are writing original material. Not saying one is superior to the other here btw.

Edited January 15, 2018 by Frank Blank

[thepurpleblob]

Are we talking covers? It takes a reasonable amount of effort to learn a full set. With a bit of experience, you can do it in a weekend but the experience really is knowing what you can leave out. 

The trick, I think, is to keep it moving. It's VERY easy to get stuck practicing the same five songs. 

Having said that, I now avoid startup bands like the plague. I'd much rather join a gigging band.

Edited January 15, 2018 by thepurpleblob

[la bam]

Ive found that a lot of the time if youre not lucky to find 4 driven musicians, you need one person leading or bossing the direction in order for things not to just fizzle out.

[Wilco]

Current band started this time last year & had a mid year wobble with a change of keyboard player, but played first two gigs in December.

Spent the previous two years on a project that went nowhere in the end..... 😤

[MartinB]

How long it takes to be able to gig is simple - as long as it takes you to learn the 30 / 45 / 90 minutes of material you need.

How long it takes to get your first gig depends on whether you have someone in the band who's prepared to do the work of contacting venues and promoters, and whether they have the experience and contacts to do it well. If you get your whole setlist together without figuring out who's doing the booking, there's a high chance of fizzle-out...

Edited January 15, 2018 by MartinB

[thebrig]

1 hour ago, MartinB said:

How long it takes to be able to gig is simple - as long as it takes you to learn the 30 / 45 / 90 minutes of material you need.

How long it takes to get your first gig depends on whether you have someone in the band who's prepared to do the work of contacting venues and promoters, and whether they have the experience and contacts to do it well. If you get your whole setlist together without figuring out who's doing the booking, there's a high chance of fizzle-out...

Most of the organising and gig getting is usually down to me, and trying to get the songs up to gigging standard is also down to me, I'd rather not do it because I know that band members less committed, think that I'm getting on their case all the time, and I'm wary of booking gigs until I'm happy that we are ready because if it all goes pear shaped, then its me who has to cancel them.

Edited January 16, 2018 by thebrig

[dmccombe7]

On one hand with a 70's covers band was 3weeks from scratch learning 34 songs with key changes made a week into it and doing 2 gigs in one weekend.

Current band took 4 mths to get to first rehearsal just last week altho it was a good rehearsal.

Lot of variable but i have a max limit 1 year and if not gigging by then its time to move on.

I would expect to be gigging within 6mths with most bands tho

Dave

Edited January 16, 2018 by dmccombe7

[Lozz196]

We formed our band in Sep 2013, by Jan 2014 we were recording our first 6 track EP, gigging by Feb 2014 (o1 Feb to be precise). Nothing fancy, just plain & simple fun rehearsing every week. It of course helps that we`re an originals band so our first gigs were 30mins, although given that many of our then songs were less than 2 minutes long we still had a good few songs to both write and rehearse.

[musicbassman]

9 hours ago, thepurpleblob said:

Are we talking covers? It takes a reasonable amount of effort to learn a full set. With a bit of experience, you can do it in a weekend but the experience really is knowing what you can leave out. 

The trick, I think, is to keep it moving. It's VERY easy to get stuck practicing the same five songs. 

Having said that, I now avoid startup bands like the plague. I'd much rather join a gigging band.

This.

So, for a covers band, always try and join an already well established band with solid gig and personnel history

If a recent 'audition' for a start up covers band I went to is anything to go by, I'm going to be looking for decent gig for a good while yet..................

So, I turn up on time at the audition, having learnt (or refreshed my memory) of numbers the band say they want to run through for my audition.

- Drummer listens to song for first time ever, and starts trying to work out drum parts.

- Keyboard player announces he might already be leaving the band because of work pressures (!)

- Lengthy argument between drummer and guitarist about someone else's wife, and what she did or didn't do.

- Huge sulks from keyboard player when I merely suggest that one of the chords he's playing might not be correct?

And these are guys in their 50's, who apparently have been gigging for years in various bands...................a complete waste of time, they're never going to be gigging.

[dmccombe7]

OUCH that sounds like the audition from hell 

[uk_lefty]

You could look at it another way... I'm assuming that you and the guitarist don't sing. Find a singer or maybe a singer songwriter and be their backing. Get some gigs doing acoustic sets. If you do sing, don't look for a singer, but do the acoustic sets! Then get a drummer. Then do bigger gigs. Open mic nights can be good to polish things and inject some momentum and urgency to rehearsal, if there's something to aim for people pull their socks up. Did it myself where there was a singer and guitarist who were flatmates, I played bass for them and we did some open mics while looking for a drummer. A good drummer will want to know you're moving in some direction and not being yet another load of dreamers, so it helps.

[Marc S]

Joining an already established covers band is usually the better option.
When you do this, as the new member, the pressure is then usually immediately on you, to learn the songs and get up to speed - so they can get back out there gigging
Start up bands frequently implode, either before the first gig or shortly afterwards..... 

That said, established cover bands can do the same thing too - either way, it's just luck of the draw I'm afraid.
If you want to stick with your guitarist pal (and I think I would, as he seems to be as committed as yourself) then you've got the task of finding a band who need a bass player and guitarist
But stick at it, keep jamming with your guitarist pal - because that'll make you both tighter in the long run

Best of luck with your search

[fretmeister]

I think the shortest time from 1st rehearsal to gig for me was about 3 weeks, But we'd all done the cover band thing before and we made a set up of tunes we already knew just to get going quickly.

 

Other bands have taken months.

[Happy Jack]

36 minutes ago, musicbassman said:

So, I turn up on time at the audition, having learnt (or refreshed my memory) of numbers the band say they want to run through for my audition.

- Drummer listens to song for first time ever, and starts trying to work out drum parts.

- Keyboard player announces he might already be leaving the band because of work pressures (!)

- Lengthy argument between drummer and guitarist about someone else's wife, and what she did or didn't do.

- Huge sulks from keyboard player when I merely suggest that one of the chords he's playing might not be correct?

And these are guys in their 50's, who apparently have been gigging for years in various bands...................a complete waste of time, they're never going to be gigging.

Yup, as I said, they're flakes and fantasists. 

I've encountered very similar scenarios (and, frankly, far worse than this) several times in recent years.

[itsmedunc]

One originals band took 18 months. We were super tight though. Last covers band took 3 rehearsals. It really all depends on many different factors.

One band hat I play in never do their homework and if it wasn't for me pushing to get more material done, we would still be doing the same songs from 10 years ago. Encouragement rather than telling them works far better. Takes longer but the same result. Think we are on 12 years together now.

[Happy Jack]

16 minutes ago, Marc S said:

Joining an already established covers band is usually the better option.
When you do this, as the new member, the pressure is then usually immediately on you, to learn the songs and get up to speed - so they can get back out there gigging
 

In principle, yes. In practice, this can backfire too!

The others have been playing together for years, have a bunch of in-jokes and shared memories that mean nothing to you, and there's usually at least one of them who misses the player you're trying to replace.

They're offended when you suggest new material, and interpret any comment as a criticism.

It's like tap-dancing through a minefield ...

My solution? Erm ... I'll get back to you with that ...

[uk_lefty]

22 minutes ago, Happy Jack said:

In principle, yes. In practice, this can backfire too!

The others have been playing together for years, have a bunch of in-jokes and shared memories that mean nothing to you, and there's usually at least one of them who misses the player you're trying to replace.

They're offended when you suggest new material, and interpret any comment as a criticism.

It's like tap-dancing through a minefield ...

My solution? Erm ... I'll get back to you with that ...

It's not always like that... I joined a five piece who lost their bass player and rhythm guitarist. New rhythm player is already pals with the drummer. I've been in the band nearly two years and can hand on heart say they are really good friends as well as being a kick donkey band.

[uk_lefty]

1 hour ago, musicbassman said:

- Huge sulks from keyboard player when I merely suggest that one of the chords he's playing might not be correct?

I have been put off keys players for life by one guy who took an hour to set up his Rik Wakeman stuff, banged on about playing big festivals and needing all kinds of complicated sound equipment. Could barely string two notes together. Had never heard of most popular music from the last forty years (and he was about forty so age was no excuse!). He also got sacked at the second rehearsal then went to pack away his gear and had lost his car keys. Had all of us turn out our gear, I'd got bored and driven half an hour towards home when I got the call to go through my kit to see if o picked up his keys... Anyway after two hours of searching for his car keys he found them in his pocket.

Never again.

[Jus Lukin]

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Edited March 1, 2022 by Jus Lukin