General Music Chat

I think I shared this before and being the procrastinator I can be I havent done it with my current band.

But if you are starting a band from the ground up it might be prudent as a band leader to write out some sort of business plan for your group.

In my case our band has basically evolved to playing 1-3 gigs a month, so I would think that a band should address how much people really want to get out and play. Obviously if one member wants to play 5 nights a week and try to make his living playing, another member with a family and kids in little league isnt going to be able to committ to that kind of playing schedule.

Next what do the members expect from the band as far as pay. Our band basically works on the principle that we have to have $100 a man a night and that includes the soundman. So our base asking price is $500 a night. We ask more than that but will settle for 500, big money.

As far as material, I will address a cover band situation. I think you really need to look at who you are trying to play for. If you have certain venues you want to play, go see the successful bands that play there. What are they playing? If you are a competent cover musician there is no reason you cant have 100 or so songs in your song list. I would suggest 20-30% be the regular old standard songs that no one wants to play. Weve discussed this in countless threads. My band can play YYZ by Rush and no one gives a hoot other than the other musicians, then I break into Sweet Home and the place goes wild. Im not suggesting songs here just saying go see bands that are playing where you want to be playing and see what works and what doesnt. In short cover your ass.

Figure out where you want to play and add that to the plan.

Im getting real wide again, cause there is so much to cover.

A working band is a business. The members have to be compensated either monetarily or artistically enough to stay in the project. Some sort of audience must be addressed and made happy. Any venue owners have to be kept happy so you can keep playing gigs. Once again a written plan for a startup might be a good suggestion. Even go so far as having people sign the thing. That way down the road the "leader" can pull the plan out and say "Hey this is what we agreed to when we started"

Chippy - yer still on about chickens? You need to let it go, man...


In all of the bands I've ever been in, if I had no say, I left. Some of them were democratic, others had a leader, but I expected to have input.

There are places around here I just won't set foot in, for one thing. I have a hard & fast rule - if my wife can't protect me in a bar, I won't go there...heh heh heh This has caused some ill-feelings, but I don't need to mess up my pretty face or my equipment for a band.

I've worked with ppl who just liked to hold court, & were band leaders. I didn't stay long. I have no interest in listening to someone talk more than work on the music...

As far as booking is concerned, I agree that ONE person doing this is best, but there are often situations that come up in regular conversation that make it possible or necessary for someone else to step in to help out in this. A band calendar is an absolute must-have, with all members having copies, for this to work. And as in any relationship - communication is a must, esp in this area!

In-fighting can occur, & a peacemaker within the group really helps. (I really suck in this role, but I've pulled it off a time or two...)

(I find that in certain areas I can be a real pushy jerk. I demand that ppl be in tune, for example, & that bothers some ppl. I don't care. I expect ppl to be where they say they're gonna be, & when they aren't, I give 'em hell. I don't care if I'm the leader or not, if you're messing up my schedule or my life I'll give ya grief.)

TFRB has a leader - Dddonnie. He is pretty laid back, as leaders go, which is fine, as long as everyone does their jobs. When they don't, I find myself handling it more often than he does, but that's okay. Our new drummer is a real pro, too, & also helps with just about everything.

In any situation, democratic or not, the members either have a say or they don't stay, from my experience. The ppl who sing have more control over material, naturally. The guy who books has a certain control, as well, over the finances of the group. There's usually one person who's better at sound, or fixing equipment, who also has some control. The guy with the p/u or van who carries all the equipment also has control. In most bands, while a leader may be differed to, each member has to have input, & needs to contribute in his/her own unique way, & be acknowledged for that effort, in order for the band to work, no matter how your band is set up.

I dunno if any of this is what you're looking for, but it's my take on the subject...

The first band I joined when I moved here to Ozark (Average Citizen) was already formed and the guitarist had just moved away. It was the first professional band I was ever in. They already had a game plan and I fit right in. It was more a democracy with rules that I had no trouble following. We all had the same goals and this made it easy. Everyone in the band had an area of expertise and had the final word in each of the matters. Our drummer did the bookings and set the initial sound. Our bassist was in charge of stage setup and figured out where everything went and we all put it there. His step brother was the soundman and after the drummer set the initial sound, he tweaked it to perfection. The drummers wife was lead vocalist and played keyboards. She went along with whatever suggestions anyone else had. I did the same at first, until I found my niche. My dad had a woodshop, and I was real handy at building things. The band had speakers built with JBL design and still had the schematics so my dad and I built another exact set (subs, mids, horns) with the band paying for the materials. Later, I got creative and measured the height and width of my amp, the bass amp, and two keyboard speakers. I built boxes for lights, cables, and everything else like that, and built them of different lengths to match the amps and speakers. Then I built grill cloths on frames that velcro'd to the front of the boxes and we stood them up and set our amps and keyboard speakers on them and they all had a matched height on stage and looked like more speaker cabs. Also we didn't have any cases lying around or to be put back in the trailer. Later, I built a dry ice fog maching, fire pots (smokeless black powder) with foot switches to set them off, and other cool effects.
Hell, how did I get into all that? Anyway, that was a democracy, but now I'm the leader because the other guys don't give a sh*t one way or another and are happy to just show up and play, knowing that I'll be looking out for their interests as well as my own.

Ja selbstverständlich mein Leutnant

Chippy - yer still on about chickens? You need to let it go, man...

I appreciate everyone's comments (well, except maybe AirViking, who totally missed the point and thought I was gloryhounding or something... )

I brought this topic up because, as people probably guessed, something happened with our band, and I wanted to get some perspective.


I've come to the conclusion that when it comes to logistics, I think one person has to be in charge.

But I don't think a band is an either-or situation (either a democracy or a dictatorship). In fact, I think the opposite - I think you have to have both, and I think it depends on which facets of running a band that you're talking about whether you require a democracy or a leader.

When it comes to creativity, pay, how much to gig, song selection, all of that 'fun' stuff - I think everyone has to have input. And I frankly can't imagine being in a band where everyone didn't have input into that stuff. I know if it were me, I'd walk. I'd find another band.

But when it comes to logistics - booking especially, but also being a contact point for people and managing a calendar - I am a firm believer that you've got to have one person in charge (preferably someone with attention to detail and a reliable person). And most of you seem to agree with that.



For me, this post was really about logistics. The fun stuff - we've got it covered. We run a democracy and everyone has a say and I think we've done a real good job with that so far.


Our band got ourselves in a bit of a bad situation by having too many contact points. The short story is we ended up having someone come in to "audition" and it went really bad. Some members of the band thought it was going to be a much more formal audition, and expected the person to know several songs already (they didn't). Some people thought it was just going to be a loose jam. Expectations were disappointed all around. And some people didn't want the player to be there in the first place because it was an instrument that they didn't think we were ever going to include in the band... I mean, it was a giant mess.

The end result was that we had to clarify who was the lead on this sort of stuff, so that we end up with one contact point. It should make things easier and more unified going forward, but it was a tough thing to swallow while it was going down.

I think, when it comes to auditioning new members, you should tell the new prospect up front (without sounding too stuffy or formal) that it will be a band decision and that no matter how the audition goes, you will take a few days to decide and will get back with them. A professional will understand. An "I want to know now" type person isn't someone you'd want anyway. Also tell them that you want them to know about 3 specific songs and let them do the homework. Also, don't audition on a regular practice night. This way, after the 3 songs, there will be no need to tell them, "Go away, we're going to practice now." And if the person is a stellar player, you have the option of all sticking around and jamming. Either way, you don't lose valuable rehearsal time jamming with someone who doesn't cut it, or have a bad rehearsal worrying about if you came across as a d*ckhead for having to ask them to leave.

Just in the interest of clarity Colors, when I speak of logistics, I am refering to the act of getting to / from, with all the stuff, set up, sound, and teardown.
This is my baby in our band. Not that I do it by myself. But I accept the resposability of making sure we have what we need when we need it.
And that it all gets home. The booking of gigs is the resposability of the band member whom makes the first contact.
If at all possable. I go the week before the show and scout the venue.
The rest is handled by gentlemans agreement. Of which I am fortunate to be in the company of four of them.

Just in the interest of clarity Colors, when I speak of logistics, I am refering to the act of getting to / from, with all the stuff, set up, sound, and teardown.

I understand. And that's certainly part of the whole "logistics" picture.

I think, when it comes to auditioning new members, you should tell the new prospect up front (without sounding too stuffy or formal) that it will be a band decision and that no matter how the audition goes, you will take a few days to decide and will get back with them. A professional will understand. An "I want to know now" type person isn't someone you'd want anyway. Also tell them that you want them to know about 3 specific songs and let them do the homework. Also, don't audition on a regular practice night. This way, after the 3 songs, there will be no need to tell them, "Go away, we're going to practice now." And if the person is a stellar player, you have the option of all sticking around and jamming. Either way, you don't lose valuable rehearsal time jamming with someone who doesn't cut it, or have a bad rehearsal worrying about if you came across as a d*ckhead for having to ask them to leave.

All sound advice. And for the most part, that's the way I prefer to run things.

My preference is always to give potential recruits ample time to learn a specific number of songs. I like to give them a CD so they have the music and give them enough time to learn the material and be comfortable with it. This is basically my "how would I want to be treated for an audition' rule.

We are working-class folk with families, so auditions and rehearsals usually have to happen at the same time due to limitations on time. But what I like to do is schedule auditions at the end of a rehearsal, with ample time to do the audition and some extra time in case we really like them and want to jam some more. So as a band we might block out several hours in a day, do our rehearsals first, and hit the auditions at the back end. That works out real well.


Our problem this time was not the after-effect of the rehearsal or the person demanding an answer. It was simply a major screw up in communications between band members, which led to mixed expectations and subsequent disappointments. This thing went bad from the start - from before the person even got there.


I'm hesitant to reveal much more because it's basically water under the bridge now. We've patched things up internally and are moving forward.

What I've learned from this experience is is that if you're the person in charge of logistical stuff - if you're the contact point for the band - everyone in the band needs to understand that and to funnel phone numbers and e-mail addresses through you. Because if they don't, it's way too easy for signals to get mixed. You end up in a situation where the right hand doesn't know what the left hand is doing. And believe me - that's a bad thing. It leads to disparate expectations. And when you get that situation going, someone (more likely everyone) will end up disappointed when their expectations aren't met.

A lot of dealing with people and managing people is about managing expectations. And if people's expectations aren't on the same page, it leads to conflict, hurt feelings and a host of other problems.


I thought it would be interesting to talk about this though, because it's the sort of thing that doesn't seem to get discussed much, and yet it is crucial to maintaining a band and maintaining reputations.

I'm finding more and more than musicians can be very judgmental people; they can be very quick to form some pretty lasting impressions. And in a small sub-community (which musicians are) that's not a good thing.

If you think about it - we musicians are a 'minority'. So it's really dumb for us to bicker so much amongst ourselves. And yet that seems to be exactly what goes on in a musical community. I've witnessed musicians saying bad things about other musicians that they don't even know really, and bridges that are burned over some pretty trivial stuff. It's kind of depressing actually, when you think about it.

I guess an audition should be a democratic situation.

Im sorry, my group has been together so long that we all assume certain roles. When it comes to booking Im the guy. If you talk to another member he will simple say get in touch with John, heres his phone number. Thats not to say another member cant book something. If someone runs into a hot paying gig, then hopefully they will run with it on the spot and call me and see what our schedule is.

Auditions, I was in another group situation on here a ycouple of years ago and one member got in touch with people and set up the auditions. We tryed 4 people in one 2 hr block one time. The people coming in were told their time slot and strangly enough they all showed up at their time slots and everything was cool. They were all given a song list, which in my opinion was basic enough and expected to play or sing a few songs with us just to get and idea if we were on the same page.

Colors your band sounds kinda like mine in that we are a hobby weekend warrior band. I guess if you are auditioning then you need to talk to everyone and see what they want in the band and vote on how many people. For a basic cover band the less the better in my opinion. One of our members wanted to bring another guitarist in a few monthes ago. I haveing an ego the size of an elephant didnt want this. I basically said at this point there are 5 of us, so the money is split 5 ways. I want my fifth and you can give up enough to pay this person and see if any of the other members want to help pay for this person. That was the end of that, noone wanted to give anything up for this other person, who we had all played with before and not been happy with. Thats was my way of dealing with the situation. I at one point wanted to get a keyboard player involved to broaden our sound for higher paying gigs. This fell on deaf ears.

Thinking back on this our band is a democracy, just some people have different jobs within the context of the band.

Good Luck with your auditions.

Colors your band sounds kinda like mine in that we are a hobby weekend warrior band. I guess if you are auditioning then you need to talk to everyone and see what they want in the band and vote on how many people. For a basic cover band the less the better in my opinion.

Yep, we're the same kind of band - weekend warriors. And yep - my preference is to have fewer members too. I think the more people you have in a band, the easier it becomes to foul things up.

One of our members wanted to bring another guitarist in a few monthes ago. I haveing an ego the size of an elephant didnt want this.

I've had band members mention the same thing a couple times in passing - bringing in a second or rhythm guitar player. I'm against it. But not because my ego is huge - I fully feel like I'm an adequate guitar player, certainly not a great one. And I understand the textures and cool stuff you can do with a second guitarist.

But I just hate the idea of having a second person in the band that I'll always be comparing myself too. It's like standing naked next to John Holmes. No matter what I might think of my own abilities, I'm not going to be able to help comparing myself and feeling inadequate. And when that happens it will cease to be fun to be in a band.

One thing I've enjoyed about being in this band for the past 18 months or so is that because I am the only guitar player, I have to push myself to learn stuff that I normally wouldn't be comfortable with. If we had a second guitarist, I probably wouldn't work as hard and just pass off the things I don't feel comfortable doing to the other guy. I wouldn't be half the guitarist I am now. I like the pressure of being the only person and knowing I've got to work hard to learn a new song or solo or tackle some technique I've never really done before.

Colors Ive played with other guitarist before. The thing I hate is you have to have songs structured and know what parts you are going to play. For me its a lot easier to do what I do than try to follow what another guitar brings to the plate. We have a pretty freewheeling approach to what we do. Im able to change from minor to major or whatever suits me. Im good at covering lead and rythym at the same time ala old hendrix r&b riffs. For me it would be a lot of work to throw another guitar into what I do. I play with other people sometimes and I try to give them a lot of space.

I dont feel inadequate to any guitarist. Not that Im that great but in the context of the band Im in I know what to do and not do. It works. Plus we collectively have 200 to 250 songs that we can pull from. Another member would limit that number.

When someone in the band say a drummer mentions getting another guitar, just say how bout we add a second drummer or a percussionist. How about a second singer.

Years ago I used to bring a bass and we would double bass that Spinal Tap song Big Bottom.

I guess that would be a good response that if another member wants another guitarist, suggest adding the same instrument they play. Also you might try my ploy in that we have x amount of members so I want x amount for gigs. If you want another member thats not necesarry then the rest of you pay him out of your cut. That will ussually stop those conversations.

Im not sure if Im following you in this, but it sounds like they brought in another guitarist that you didnt know about. If so, you need to sit down with the rest of the members and make sure they have faith in you to carry your part of the load musically. If Im off base sorry. My situation was at the time my wife had left and filed for divorce and i was drinking too much. It was having an effect on my playing. Thru all my years of playing and 10 yrs of playing with these guys this had never been an issue, but for a month or so I went buck wild at gigs. They thought about bringing a former member in to "help" me thru this. I had to make a lot of apologys and there hasnt been a problem with me since. Its hard to admit stuff like this, but sometimes you have to look in the mirror at yourself. I had too and the band is better for it.

3-piece = more money, less attitudes.

I've been playing guitar in a 3-piece for years now and some of it may have had to do with ego, though I try not to be an egomaniac about it. Mainly, I liked it when people would come up and say that they've heard 5 and 6 piece bands that couldn't pull off some of the stuff that we did. Over the last couple of years I've played in a couple of 6-piece bands. They weren't anywhere near as tight as my 3-piece, but going back to my 3-piece, I'm missing some of the fullness of a larger band. Over the years, whenever I've been in a band with two or more guitars, I've been the better player (and that ain't sayin' much) and so I never had anyone I could learn things from. Also, there is the matter of the volume wars. Didn't matter who won, the overall sound lost, though I didn't worry about that back in the day. Now, it's all about the sound. If I could find another guitarist that shares that outlook and would agree to leave the volume knobs alone, I'd be a happy camper. Just as being a good leader in one band makes you a better follower in another, the same thing applies to guitar. I'm not actively looking to throw another band together right now. If anyone calls me, I can always throw Rat Sass together and pull off any gig. But when I get ready, I'll be looking for a metronome of a drummer, a bassist that keeps the groove going with the drummer, without depending on what the singer or guitarist is doing, and another guitarist that can handle rhythm and lead and maybe some keyboard, as I can play some keyboard too. I would also want all the band members to be capable of singing lead and harmony vocals. I think that would be the ultimate band for me.

Im not sure if Im following you in this, but it sounds like they brought in another guitarist that you didnt know about..

Nah, hehe. That wasn't it at all.

To be specific, a person in the band scheduled an audition with a keyboard player for the purposes of playing bass lines.... Since we don't currently have a bass player.

Myself and another band member were against this from the beginning for a number of reasons...


But we didn't articulate our disapproval as well as we thought we did (we didn't use a 2x4 on someone who didn't really get 'subtle'). So there was miscommunication #1. The keyboard player shows up, and we're of the understanding that he's had the material for a week and should know several songs. He didn't - he had only been exposed to some songs some 36 hours prior (miscommunication #2). The person who scheduled this audition did so without me ever talking to the keyboard player (I'm usually lead contact point for all new recruits). So miscommunication #3.


Needless to say - nightmare situation. But, we lived through it as a band. There were some pretty hurt feelings after that incident, but we were able to sit down as a band and talk it out and get back on the same page. So now everyone in the band knows that (a) we want a bass player for bass, not a keyboard player faking it and (b) if you want to recruit someone, you give them to the lead contact in the band and let that person work it out.

we want a bass player for bass, not a keyboard player faking it

Yeah, look how bad the Doors sucked.