WHY PLAY LIVE?
Let me debug the common theory of the road to a band's commercial success: Good live shows lead to fans, a regular following by fans leads to more gigs and more fans, fans lead to CD sales, CD sales lead to Top 40 charting sales, the charting sales means radio can't continue to ignore you and plays your songs, radio play leads to more sales, fame and fortune. A successful band based on a good live show.
This theory falls over in 2 areas:
The DEMOGRAPHIC going to live gigs might not be the target demographic for your act.
THE NUMBERS
How many people are in a pub with live music? Take away the members of other bands and their friends, how many are left? Let's say an average of 120 on a good Friday or Saturday night. As you have been building a good following a quarter of the people there have seen you before so there are 90 people who are seeing you for the first time. Lets be super optimistic and say one third of them like your band enough to want to go to a shop and buy your CD. Half of them will not have the money because they are students, unemployed, drug addicts, don't remember you the next morning or, will copy their mate's copy of your CD on their CD burner.
This leaves us with sales of 15 CDs from a single gig. How many gigs like this
would you have to do to get a gold record? 2,334 gigs or, 3 gigs a week for
15 years. Even on a slow week you have to sell over 1,000 singles per week to get into
the charts. If you are only selling to the people who have seen you live that
means doing how many gigs that week?
Two gigs a week, to full rooms, for 2 years means maybe 10,000 people would
see you. How many bands are pulling this number of gigs? (If you get a chance
to play a gig in front of a large audience, at a festival or something, it could
expose you to more people than would otherwise see you in years.)
Obviously you will never be seen by enough people just playing live to develop
the critical mass to sell enough CDs to be of any interest to a record company.
THE DEMOGRAPHIC
The culture of live venues in your area may not suit your music. An inner-city rock audience might expect the guitar, bass, drum and non-harmonised vocal act that dominates original pub rock. How do you think you would go if you turned up with an act that used sequenced techno drums and keyboards, layers of pre-recorded vocals, 3 singers who danced rather than played instruments, a funk bass player, an electronic percussionist, samples, loops and a bunch of songs with a commercial dance groove?
If your songs are targeted at 16 year olds, who are the largest buyers of music, then your material may not work on an 18+ age group in a pub. Your music may be excellent but if it does not fit the culture of the pubs and clubs then you are not going to play there.
The worst news is that live music has lost its market status with the younger market. I regularly meet younger people who have NEVER SEEN a live band. Forget poker machines or noise laws the real reason for the decline in live music is that live music has become less fashionable.
Simply, if live music pulled people in then the venues would allocate the space and put in the sound proofing to make it happen. This is what they have done for dance music.
Have a look at the report Vanishing Acts at: http://www.arts.nsw.gov.au/ for ideas on addressing declining live opportunities.
HOW DID YOU FIRST FIND OUT ABOUT THE BANDS IN YOUR MUSIC COLLECTION?
Lets look at your music buying habits. Who are the artists in your music collection and how did you first hear about them? If your CD collection is like most other people's then maybe 1 in 50 CDs came from bands you saw live before you heard of them through the media. Now ask the same questions of a typical member of your target audience.
Remember, your target audience is likely to be different to you. They are music consumers not creators. Have you thought about their age, gender, race, employment status, single, social status, Web surfing habits, life style? How are you going to get your music and IMAGE to your target market?
The answer you will most commonly come up with is: I heard about this artist for the first time when their song was played on the radio or Video Hits. This may bring you to the conclusion that to sell records you have to be played on the radio or TV.
GOOD REASONS TO PLAY LIVE
There are good reasons to play live.
To get media attention through the reviews of the shows.
To record your gigs and release them on the Internet. That way one gig in a local pub can be seen world wide. This way you can be seen by a 14 year old in her bedroom in New York or Iran.
To spread the band name through the advertising of the gig so people would have heard of you even if the don't attend the show.
To sell your CDs, T-shirts and other merchandise to punters in the audience as these are high margin sales. You will earn more from these sales or Internet sales than any other sales in your career as you keep the retail margin and distribution costs.
The best reason is, you just love playing live. (I know I love playing live, even if there are only 20 people in the pub).
The most important reason to play live is to develop a vibe in the media through editorial and advertising. Bookers, agents, A&R people, program directors and others keep in touch with the rising acts through reading the music press. If these people see advertising and editorial about you every week in the media then there they will be more receptive to your approaches.
A&R people at record companies often gauge a band's ability sell CDs by the interest they create around themselves from their live performances.
DOING IT FOR THE MONEY?
If you are an original band, without a hit single, thinking about playing live for the money, forget it, you will make heaps more delivering pizzas. It will cost you money to perform. Don't even think about making money from it. In the beginning it is Pay to Play. In the beginning you are buying an audience, they are not buying you.
The music business is like a tournament. There are many competitors with a large prise for the winner and all the rest go home with nothing but bruises. This is not a good way to make money!
The music industry is the worst "Get rich quick" plan I have heard of since I was offered shares in a Lunar Minerals company. Even if your are quite successful you are unlikely to be able to make a life long career out of performing.
KNOW WHAT YOU ARE TRYING TO ACHIEVE PLAYING LIVE
If you know what you are trying to achieve then it may give you a better idea of what gigs to look for and how to promote them. It may be that your best promotion is done to a guy who writes reviews for street press before the gig or after the gig with a press release. Several years ago I got exposure for my covers band on the 6.00pm news through a clever press release. It was about a free gig we were doing in the Civic centre of Canberra on New Years Eve.
DOWN TO THE BOTTOM LINE
Basically you get famous by: Building a buzz around yourselves using the media, Internet and live performances. While the buzz is on the boil, record and release a series of "radio friendly unit movers" that become HITS. The HITS are what make you famous.
To sell an interesting number of CDs you need tens of thousands of people out there who have had a positive experience of your music. This experience can come from: Downloading an MP3 from your web site, downloading a QuickTime video of a live gig, seeing you live, hearing yon on the radio or seeing your film clip on TV. The experience can be reinforced by things in the print media and advertising. Advertising alone can not sell music. It is a numbers game.
Remember: Everything in the music industry is bull shit until it actually happens.
I value your feedback. Please send me your comments to: info@digitalharmony.com.au
Copyright © 2003, 2007, 2008 Mark Ellis