General Music Chat

I have blogged about this already but i need some advice and what better place to ask for advice than on a public forum right?

Anyway, I was recently talked into promoting 2 local bands with relatively small followings. my cousin plays in one of them and his buddy in the other.
*note* i did this because i made a stupid drunken bet...dont ask!

my cousins band we will call band one and his buddies band is band 2

band 2 has been together for about 3 years and they sound decent not really ready for bigger gigs than what they are currently playing. Bar gigs and small openers 3-500 a gig shows.

band 1 has been together several years as well and have a decent local following 30-40 faithful at every show..mostly made up of other bands and a few good friends and family. they have played one major opening for Stained...they won a battle of the bands to get the spot other than that 2- 3 shows per month at the same local bars (3 of them).

I took band 2 (friend band) and did a promotion for them using the web and a few phone calls...did everything for free and put in some long hours instead of cash......I did a local press release called a few new places....printed out a few flyers and had friends distribute them....it took two weeks of working for band 2 and we got them set up with 5 shows this month at a rate or 500 min and 10% of the door and at thier first show they cleared 1k and they averaged about 700 a show when all was siad and done ( of course i was not cut in on the profits.....brats!) anyway they are making more money now and thier fan base is growing slowly ...but its growing.

Band 1- band one had been together for a while so they had some money saved up from gigs they gave me a 1500$ budget to work with....i spent 2 weeks working on thier promotions as well. I took the 1500 and got them a professional website, set them up 13 shows in the next two months at 750 minimum a night with a share in alcohol sales durring thier show time and 3% of the door for the night...sweet deal actually....i also set them up on a mini tour from boston to atlanta with several stops in each state to start in june....i set them up a street team section on thier website and a new myspace page that i sent traffic to and have doubled thier plays and fan club....put thier music on itunes and got a mass press release in our local area as well as in the citeis they will be playing in on thier mini tour...the releases will happen a wek before the sho and i also liked them in with the local promoters of the places they will be playing so hope fully they get good showing at the shows.....I paid for a radio spot on a local college station and got a feature article in three local music related news releases all said and done i spent 100$ of my own money on the project but they have since paid me back...and some.....thier fan base is getting reallly large and the local newspaper is running a profile on them complete with bookings and tour inof...website myspace and street team / fan club info.....thier songs are being played on the college circut now and they are making god money at shows from both door sales and cd t shirt sales.....they have had three major labels contact them (one of wich is sony shhhh) and several indies have offered as well....they are currently looking for a manager though i have advised against it and they have retained a lawyer for legal stuff in the future....a cd release party is currently being discussed....anyway back to my question


I have been entertaining the idea of opening a promotion company....i have checked around and the going rate for the things i did for band 1 run around the 5k mark ...i did it for 1600...thats a big profit margin...even if I undercut the other companies by half i still make good money...it will take a lot of time and i will have to do a lot of work till i can hire people who know what they are doing ...and i would have to get the word out etc...but im torn on weather i should give it a shot or just say yeah i did good and it was fun but its not a business.....what do you guys think ..help me out...i reallly want ot give it a shot but am gun shy....what should i do?

Dez;

Only you can decide if this is worth exploring more deeply. It certainly sounds as if you have a talent for it.

Wish you were closer...I could use your help as I suck at the whole self-promoting thing - I say too little, and answer questions too abruptly, I've been told, but that's just the way I am. I get a bit embarrassed about promoting myself in person, although I do okay (if a bit wordy) in print. Most of my gigs come from other ppl hearing me, or friends referring me.

There is obviously $ to be made, & that is always a serious consideration. Your success thus far is something to be proud of, & you can use these experiences & referrals to further your cause in getting more acts to sign up for your service.

The only warning I could give is to make sure that your acts are capable of handling the gigs you get them, but I'm sure you're taking that into consideration already. I'm sure you know fully well that getting big venues for less than accomplished acts will hurt you in the long run with these venues.

I don't see any reason why you shouldn't start your own production company, & I'm not sure why you are asking for our opinion on it. Seems like you have it all pretty well figured out.