Riders

[gafbass02]

In 'doublecross' on the tours with Styx and dokken we were properly looked after. Fed and a never ending fridge of beer, a neve ending fridge of soft drinks and a third endless fridge of water. The man would just come and restock every so often. We always took a rucksack to fill with as much as we could and then divvied up later. We were also given fresh towels everynight before and after and also on our amps which was nice.

[Musky]

As someone else mentioned the treatment you get in Europe puts venues in Britain to shame, even the notionally much poorer Eastern European ones.

Although not exactly a rider, my favourite was the place that said that if anybody smoked we'd find a bag in his office and we could help ourselves. The sound guy went to look for it a bit later, on top of the desk, on the shelves, in draws - nothing.

And then he spotted the stuffed bin bag in the corner...

[Ou7shined]

I've only ever had beer riders... even when we've requested some water we just got beer! Never had food.
We did a gig sponsored by Carling once and were very well looked after. My maddest rider was in the Lemon Tree, about 4-5 bands on all night and the rider was a huge tub thing (maybe 4 foot cubed) in the green room stacked to the brim with bottles and ice. Somehow we emptied it.
One of the regular venues we do has band rates at the bar. I find that more civilized as you can have a snifter of whatever you fancy each time you go up instead of cracking open a tube of the pot luck brew from the vip fridge.

[OldGit]

[quote name='gafbass02' post='612638' date='Sep 29 2009, 11:33 PM']In 'doublecross' on the tours with Styx and dokken we were properly looked after. Fed and a never ending fridge of beer, a neve ending fridge of soft drinks and a third endless fridge of water. The man would just come and restock every so often. [b]We always took a rucksack to fill with as much as we could and then divvied up later[/b]. We were also given fresh towels everynight before and after and also on our amps which was nice.[/quote]


One band I dep for regularly has a poor starvin' pro musician fiddle player. Every time we play a wedding she brings Tupperware and fills it up with wedding food and then lives on it for a few days .....
She usually brings a big flask of tea too which we share..

[Linus27]

Going back 10 years, when on tour, the record company would give us each £25 to feed and water us per day. You could not carry it over so if you did not spend it, you don't keep it but get another £25 for the next day. Can you imagine how great this was. Its hard enough now spending £25 a day on food and drink and a lot of the venues were providing food and drinks. So we ended up having a laugh and seeing who could buy the weirdest things. After a gig in Leeds, it was about 11.15pm and we had spent no money. So we went to the local 7-11 and I bought not one but an entire box of curly wurly. This shocked the sales assistant but I then realised I had money left over so I bought a second box. We had curly wurlys for the entire tour. Our singer bought a gigantic melon and a comb and our giutarist bought some tights We had bottles of whisky and vodka in endless supply on the tour bus and had some real nice meals out before gigs.

Good old days

[johnnylager]

Did a few gigs in Holland some years ago with limitless free lager & skunk. Seeing it all off on the boat home was fun too.

EDIT: Allegedly.

Edited September 30, 2009 by johnnylager

[jonny-lad]

I think that riders are a good idea for weddings or functions. Not so much to demand loads of extras, but just so you know what's going on in terms of getting fed and watered, and in terms of dressing rooms etc, especially for the badly organised gigs...same goes for using a contract for times and fees though. I try to make sure I can get these types of things sorted myself wherever possible so I know what's happening and that nothing's been overlooked.

I guess for anything that's not in writing though, you'll get what you're given, which is usually not alot, IME!

Per diems are nice if you're on tour, but I've only got them out in Dubai, where the beer costs a fortune. Food isn't too bad though, and taxis are really cheap.

Sometimes I do gigs where I get really well looked after, like The Jazz Festival in Leeds, where we got as much food and drink as we needed and all the beer we wanted and really nice dressing rooms underground at Millenium Square. I stayed well after our set too and kept getting the free beer right to the end! I was playing guitar on that gig though, but the bass player was just as well looked after!