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Stay Away From Pay To Play (aka Pre-Sale)



Last Updated: 10/6/2009

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Gender: Female
Status: Single
Age: 99
Sign: Scorpio

State: Washington
Country: US
Signup Date: 7/5/2007

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Tuesday, October 06, 2009 

You may have noticed the article on the pay-to-play tours run by the XIL company. Unfortunately there have been other rumblings of these pay-to-play tours being initiated by some national companies. Just like local shows, there is never a reason to hand money over to be on one of these tours. Many bands have been recently complaining that I only give the negative side of paying-to-play, especially when it comes to touring. They say I don’t offer any advice. That’s fair. It seems pretty obvious to me, but if a little of our experiences can sway a band to try this on their own and not pay $1500 to travel on a coach bus to play to nobody, I’m game. Since I’ve been on many tours all over the US, Canada and Europe, maybe I actually do have a couple of insights and ideas that might be helpful.

Just like I state with my opinions on playing without paying, this is just my opinion. This is how our band has done things and it’s worked for us. We've logged a lot of miles over the years so I’m going to discuss a few of the particulars. -Bon/Girl Trouble

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INTRO
Touring is hell. There, I said it. Even though it can be exciting, even though it can be fun, even though it can be exhilarating, going on tour is HELL. If you’ve watched videos from rock bands depicting how glamorous it is to be on the road, bagging the smokin’ hot babes, participating in one giant orgy of sex, drugs and rock and roll, get that image out of your head immediately and never think of it again! Actually, once you’ve really been on tour, you won’t ever think of it anyway. When I hear songs and see videos about how hard life on the road is for some brooding rocker who gets driven from city to city and only sees a series of hotel rooms I think, “Somebody DRIVES him!? He actually gets a hotel room? How lucky can you get?! And he’s whining about that? Jeez!” On the road being able to afford a hotel room is like Heaven and the only guy that’s going drive you around is a member of your own band! When the rubber meets the road you’ll be sleeping on somebody’s sofa or floor (and thank God for those people), eating at Burger King for the 20th time in 20 days, listening to the constant roar of the van for so long it never leaves you, and probably getting the dreaded “tour cold”. When you’ve finally located the club, double parked it in heavy traffic, and unloaded the van...it’s time to get up and play a “fantastic” show! By the second week this grind usually hits like a ton of bricks. The Girl Trouble name for the result of bad road food is called Goofy Goo. You’ll know it when you get it, and you will get it.

WHY GO ON TOUR?
So why do we do it? Girl Trouble tours because we feel it’s an important step in band life. You have to go out a peddle your wares every so often and it must be “hands-on”. There’s nothing like having people see our band play live. That’s where our strength is. There’s no amount of records/CDs, youtube videos or internet connections that you make that can take the place of actually meeting people and other bands. There are times when you’ve just got to get out there with the people. We haven’t toured in awhile but we will again. The very thought makes me shudder.

WHY DO YOU WANT TO TOUR?
This has got to be the first question you ask yourselves. What are you trying to achieve? Do you just want a wild experience? Do you just want to be able to claim you’re a band that’s been on tour? Or are you making a organized plan to promote yourselves and your music in another city? A good self examination of your reasons will help you to know what your goal is and if you really are serious about being a band on the road. There has to be a reason.

BEFORE YOU LEAVE THE DRIVEWAY...

HOW WELL DO YOU GET ALONG?
The first question I ask any band who is contemplating going on tour is: how well are you currently getting along with each other? Playing shows aside, this trip will be an endurance test of your ability to tolerate each other in extremely difficult circumstances, when you are at your lowest. It’s very similar to all those popular survivor reality shows. Our temporary Girl Trouble member David Duet always used to say, "Going on tour either makes a band stronger or it makes them come back separately". How many bands have we watched drive off in their van for that big exciting tour, only to face hardships that ultimately broke them apart when they got home? We’ve lost count. Touring can do some heavy damage so you must be absolutely sure each member is up to the challenge.

Everybody has little habits that drive the rest of the band crazy. This is just normal human behavior. There isn’t a person alive that doesn’t annoy somebody at some point. Before going on tour you really need to think about how well you are all getting along. If there are already band fights, misunderstandings and constant arguments during practice, you can be sure that being stuck in a van all day will bring that out faster than you can get out of town.

Does the guitar player tell the same stupid jokes over and over that drive you nuts? Is it hard to watch the drummer constantly flossing his teeth? Are you annoyed when your singer will only eat a certain type of food or wears the same shirt every day? Take any of the little insignificant things that drive you crazy about your band mates and then think of five weeks of being stuck with them day after day in a confined space that jars your insides. If I’m not being too corny, for touring to really work, you’ve got to love these people a whole heap and think of them as family. And they’ve got to love you back.

BE TOLERANT, BE FLEXIBLE, AND DON’T GET YOUR PANTIES IN A TWIST
You can set all kinds of goals for your tour but if you can do your setup shows and come back safe and friendly with each other...that is a hugely successful tour. At some point the shit WILL hit the fan. It will come in a broken down van, or a gig that isn’t what you expected, or somebody having problems at home and not being able to be there, etc. And it will come when you least expect it. This is why you need to be flexible and tolerant of everything that’s going on. Don’t sweat the little stuff. Pretend you are a ping pong ball that just bounces with whatever comes your way. You’ll learn this on your first big tour. We did. But more than any help we can give you, it’s so important to be there for each other. This is your family. You are a team. It’s you against the world. If you can remember that, you can weather any storm that’s coming your way.
A ROCK AND ROLL BUSINESS TRIP
Think of your tour as a business trip. Even though touring can be a fantastic experience with lots of laughs and fun, ultimately you are working. Like a salesman who goes out of town to sell his wares or gain new contacts, you are taking your band out of town to spread your music farther than your own back yard. You are making new friends and broadening your fanbase. Your band should get in the tour van with this in mind. It is up to everybody to pull his/her weight. Partying is not the primary objective. If one of you decides to stay f'd-up for the duration of the trip, the other band members are going to get really sick of it. On top of that, if your new band friends think you have a jerk in the group, they aren’t going to be so happy to have you come back. Even though it’s inevitable for each of you to occasionally stray from this and get totally messed up and throw up on somebody’s futon (after-gig parties can be hard to resist), partying should not be your only reason to go on tour. Remember that for this to work, you are out on the road for the purpose of representing your band and showing off your music.

And here’s an important sub-step: Leave the “significant other” at home. This is not a vacation or a romantic getaway. You will not have enough time to devote to your girlfriend/boyfriend. Romance and touring do not mix. Since the significant other is not part of the band there is no payoff for them. All they do is hang around and watch you. That might seem exciting/interesting the first couple days but wait until you are on week two of a grueling five week tour. They get bored and start complaining. The rest of the band gets to either watch the couple fight, or sometimes worse, be all lovey dovey. No van full of horny guys (and to be frank from the time men leave to go on tour they instantly become 8th grade boys - this is a scientific experiment I have conducted numerous times) wants to watch one of the band members getting all the benefits of love while they are running on empty and pining for their special someones back home.

And here’s a sub-step to the sub-step: No sexy unattached merch girls/boys either. We’ve been with enough bands who thought adding the sexy T-shirt girl would enhance their sales. We’ve watched the extreme high drama that followed as each guy tried to hit on their band sales girl. It’s excruciating to watch and can come close to busting the band up. Touring is hard enough on its own. Leave the drama and the romance at home. Make this policy right now amongst your band members. No romance. Send travel postcards instead.

BUT AT THE SAME TIME...
Try to keep the mood as light as possible. When you are all spending so much time together, laughter really is the best medicine. All of you together, making fun of something that should piss you off can release a lot of the pressures of dealing with the annoying things that are bound to crop up. You can turn a negative experience into the tour in-joke.

READY TO GO ON TOUR...

BUY A BAND VAN:
Like a guitar player needs an amp, if you are going to tour your band needs a van. There’s no touring band on the road who doesn’t own their own. If you are serious about taking your band out on the road, you’ll need to have one. This will be the first step to good touring. So bite the bullet and buy a van. Used vans work great. It doesn’t have to be fancy. Find a mechanic you trust to check it out for you. My personal requirement was making sure it was a window van. I refused to travel 10,000 miles in the back of a van I couldn’t see out of. You’ll have your own list of necessities. And it’s best not to get fancy. I know school buses and hearses look totally bitchin’ but when you are broke down in Kansas and in need of major repair, having a regular vehicle with standard parts is a blessing. And we think it works to keep it looking as non-rock as possible. We kept ours looking like a broken down van for camping. Putting lots of stickers and painting your band name on it is code for "Equipment inside, rip me off now!" It’s up to your band demographic how ownership will work, who’s name it will be under, how you’ll work the insurance. We have our van under one name and the band fund (all our gig money goes back to the band) pays off the insurance and upkeep. We mostly try to keep the van for official use only.

And our personal advice...get Triple A, and be sure it's the AAA Plus. No, we don’t work for them but they have saved our skins more than once out on the road. This is worth every penny you spend on it. You want to get the Plus because of the amount of towing. In Rochester NY we got our van towed back to a garage (the back axle came apart on the freeway!) AND several hours later they also towed the borrowed car from the club booker at the Bug Jar (also broke down). Two tows in one day! You might think your van is running perfectly when you leave home, but after putting 5,000 miles on it, sometimes shit happens. And it always seems to happen on the freeway. When you are alone on some desolate highway at 2 AM and that tow truck is coming to help you out, you are going to thank me.

HAVE A FAN BASE IN YOUR TOWN:
Before you decide to conquer lands beyond, it’s a good idea to have built up a consistent fanbase in your own town. If you can’t get family and friends to come see you on a regular basis, you need to work on that first. Make sure you are doing well in your own town. And having that consistent amount of people show up will be an important asset when you start to trade shows with out of town band friends. If you can’t draw a crowd within 10 miles, what makes you think you can draw them from 500 miles? Think of this as popularity that radiates outward from your central location. So make sure you have your town covered before you cover somebody else's.

DIP YOUR FOOT/FEET IN THE WATER:
Before you take the full plunge of touring, shorter out of town shows are a good way to see what a tour is like. You’ll be able to see how your band handles themselves in a town where they are lost, late for the show and everybody has to pee. Find the next biggest city next to you within a few hours of driving and book a show. Doing it as an over-nighter is good too, or go to a couple of cities over a three day weekend. For us living in Tacoma, we would travel to Portland OR or Bellingham WA. That’s around 120 miles. That gave us a lot of ideas before we went far enough where it was too late to turn back. We gradually learned what worked and what didn’t by going 200 miles out of town instead of 2,000.
PARTNER UP WITH OTHER BANDS:
All initial out of town gigs are best gotten by having bands in that town “host” you. They’ll set up the show and you’ll do the same for them. Myspace is now a great tool for meeting and knowing about out of town bands you’d like to play with. Try not to be pushy about it. Get to know the band first before you start suggesting they set shows up for you. A cold call from a band you never heard of can be off putting, but a call from friends sounds like fun. And in turn, be sure you do the same for them.

THE BIG BAND TRADE-OFF:
As you become more friendly with other bands in cities farther away, there are usually a few that you automatically click with. This is where you have the opportunity to trade groups of shows in your respective areas. We did this with a little known band from the Bay Area called the Mummies. They had a good fanbase and so did we. So we decided that they’d set up shows for us and we’d do the same. We set up shows including Seattle and Bellingham so they could come up for a long weekend and play with us. We did all the promoting, made sure our friends were there to see them and put them up at GT guitarist Kahuna’s house. The shows went great and we had fun showing them our town. About a month later we went to their hometown and played great shows that they’d set up including San Francisco and San Jose. They also rolled out the red carpet, let us stay with them, took us to their favorite thrift and record stores. For the Mummies it was their first shows in the Northwest and they went on to be legendary in garage rock circles. For us it was a chance to play in the Bay Area and make friends and contacts we might not have made so quickly. Girl Trouble and the Mummies went on to do lots of shows together over the years and we are still friends. Where setting up shows in a faraway town might be almost impossible, your band friends might be able to do it with no problems. And these bands can get you out of a jam, offer you a safe place to park the van and equipment, entertain you...so when they are in your town it’s important to make sure they are taken care of. We’ve got many band friends (and just GT fans/friends in general) who’ve save our butts and occasionally we’ve been able to rescue a few in return. All of you will sort of turn into one big family without even realizing it. Tours like these can keep increasing as you venture out a little farther with each tour. Pretty soon you'll end up having friends in every city.

US TOURING
I’m not going to claim that this is the gospel on doing a U.S. tour. For every point I make there will probably be another band to tell you they do it different. But I’m going to tell you what we’ve experienced. Again, this is just to give you some ideas.

HIRE A REAL BOOKING AGENT
Either your record company will already have somebody they work with or you will find somebody who’s good by asking other touring bands. You can get away with booking a week or two down the coast and trading shows with other bands, but when it comes to really booking a full-blown five-six weeks around the country, you probably won’t have enough contacts. This is like a giant jigsaw puzzle that they must assemble and for a tour this size, we always felt it was best to leave it to the professionals. Another good feature of a real tour booker is the leverage they have when they want a guarantee for you but the club doesn’t think you are worth the price (not every club booker will be into your band). They normally work with a roster of bands and the club realizes that to get Band A they need to work with Band B. Doing the booking alone will not give you the clout you need to negotiate with some clubs.

GUARANTEE
What the booker does is get you a guarantee at each club. For all this work, to set up each show so it makes sense as you are driving (not killing you on the miles), to keep the big cities for the weekends, to make sure you get a guarantee, you will pay a percentage of the total of the guarantees you get from the tour. This will all be agreed upon before they even pick up the phone or send the first email. You’ll sign a contract so each party knows what’s expected of them. You are trusting them to get the best shows possible and they are trusting you to do each show to the best of your ability. They will also have you pay for any mailing, sometimes phone stuff and the preliminaries of getting everything together (sometimes you pay and sometimes your record company will foot that bill). It’s a huge job and these people are worth every penny they make (unlike pay-to-play “bookers”). And if a gig goes bad, they'll be available to iron it out for you. A good booking agent can save you some real headaches and advise you what to do. Booking agents we dealt with charged from 10 - 20% depending on who we booked
through (percentages may have changed but the set percent should always be fully discussed prior to setting up the tour). We never had to pay up front for our US tours. Before you go they will send you the tour itinerary which will have info on every show, the club address, possibly what bands you are playing with, what the guarantee is, if you'll get a meal, etc. On the road it’s best to alos keep a record of the money you’ve collected (we also keep a log of gas fill-ups and mileage) because later it’s difficult to remember. After we came back from every tour, we figured out how much we owed and sent the booker their cut. Be sure to get that money to your booker in a timely manner. We always managed to get it out within a week of being back home. We always appreciated all the hard work it took and we’re happy to recommend them to other bands. We salute real booking agents!

TOUR ON A MAJOR RELEASE:
The only real reason to go out on a full US tour is to pump up the sales/visibility of your latest full length album. Many bookers won’t even touch a band that doesn’t have a new major release (and they won’t work off a single record either). The reason for this is simple. What you want from a tour is lots of press for your record/CD. Sometimes just showing up in a town is not enough to get you any notice. If a music paper can have a new CD to review, a bio or interview to write about...and you will be in town on a certain date to play live...now that’s newsworthy! Many times you can work in some interviews on college or indie radio stations too. It’s works way better when they can talk to you and then play a cut off the new release. Having a new CD will also give you something substantial to sell during the “merch portion” of your tour and help you to keep more money flowing through the gas tank.

SENDING OUT YOUR PROMO STUFF:
Timing is important to get everything in the right hands to every city you’ll be playing in. Your booker will give you details about that but we’ve found it’s usually around a month before you leave. Sometimes your label will send the necessary items and sometimes it will be up to you. The EPK (electronic press kit) has taken the place of the old big manila envelopes and cuts down on all those leftover 8 X 10 glossy band publicity photos that some bands still have piled around in their practice shed (who us?). However I feel that sending a physical CD to each city’s music paper is still important. It’s evidence that you really do have something real released. Again, your booking agent will let you know how to handle it all. But when it works correctly there’s nothing like pulling into a city you’ve never played and finding a prominent article/review (and your band photo) in the local music magazine to meet you.

TOURING WITH ANOTHER BAND:
Even though it seems like fun, booking agents generally frown on doing an entire US tour together with another band (unless you are specifically doing support for a bigger act). The main reason is that when they are trying to get your guarantee it’s harder to get double the price for the two bands. Clubs will often try to get a “two for one” deal and that’s not going to help either band. A more suitable solution is to meet up with your band friends who are touring at the same time from another direction. You’ll play a series of four or five shows and then continue on. The booking agent will be able to negotiate for both bands separately. It really gives you something to look forward to when you know after 2 1/2 weeks on the road you will get to meet up with your best friends who are in the same boat. The term “sight for sore eyes” never applied more.
DIVERT YOUR ATTENTION:
After a few weeks, seeing the inside of a bar/club day after day can get pretty boring. They all look the same and there’s not much to do other than play pool/video games, listen to blasting music you didn’t pick out and drink. Getting away from the whole “rock” environment can recharge the batteries of even the most weary, burnt-out band. If time allows (and it doesn’t always so you can never really plan ahead) we like to visit historic landmarks, amusement parks and weird roadside attractions. When we play in LA we always save up and go to Disneyland. A day at the “happiest place on Earth” can shake those rock and roll cobwebs off fast, especially when accompanied by some of your band pals. We’ve climbed up into the Statue of Liberty, been to Independence Hall and seen the Liberty Bell, toured the Smithsonian Institute’s aviation and US history museums, been inside the Corn Palace in Mitchell, South Dakota and ridden the Cyclone roller coaster at Coney Island to name a few. Doing something other than rocking is important to keep your head clear.

THINK OF THE TOUR AS A WHOLE:
On your tour, you will undoubtedly come up with shows that are less than desirable. Some gigs will be so fantastic you won't believe you are actually doing them, and the next one will be so awful you'll want to turn around and drive straight home. It's important to remember that with every stinker, there will be dream gigs. You can't predict them and you'll never be able to count on them. So don't sweat it when 25 people show up in a city of seven million. The next show down the road might surprise you.
MERCH - DON'T LEAVE HOME WITHOUT IT
It's hard to gauge the merch thing but you absolutely need it. Some bands have super-salesmen and come out with a line of 25 items in assortments of colors and be able to sell the whole thing. Other bands have a few shirts. No matter what you decide on, merch is always important. You'll have your new CD to sell and sometimes that's easier than a shirt, but we've found shirts to be popular. When the show didn't do well, sometimes selling a couple extra T-shirts can make the difference. And don't forget that these are also important compensation for somebody who's done you a big favor. If someone puts you up at their place and lets you all take showers and made you some scrambled eggs and toast for breakfast, the least you can do is give them a shirt and CD. That is a small price to pay for those good samaritans who will let you take over their homes. And when in doubt, don't forget that your T-shirt is also great advertising.

CONGRATULATIONS!
Being able to tour isn’t for everybody. If you pulled it off you should be damn proud of yourselves. Each time you go out you’ll learn a little bit more about what works and what doesn’t (and you’ll probably tell me to take a hike on my stupid “suggestions”). When we roll into Tacoma, I always feel like we’ve come home from a major battle. No sleep, crappy food, loud music, grueling miles, adversities and total boredom...but we made it! We played our music to people who loved it, we made all kinds of new friends, we saw places we've never seen before, we worked as a team and had an absolute blast in the process. You’ll experience it all. We wish you the best tour ever!
4:40 AM 
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Sunday, August 23, 2009 
I posted this as a bulletin but I think it's good enough to keep posted for awhile.  Watch out for these big "exposure" showcases!  This is a long story but I promise it's pretty good:

In October of 2008 some of you may remember the bulletin I posted about the biggest pay-to-play show I’d ever heard of...The Rock Gone Wild festival.  I got an email from Chaz T of the Iowa band GearDown concerning an email they’d received about paying huge amount of money to grab a stage on the festival, taking place starting Thursday through Sunday, August 20-23.  The event was to be held at Freedom Park in Algona, IA.  Chaz wasn’t buying it and wanted to know my opinion.

I’ll give you the original prices at the end of this bulletin but they ranged from an outrageous $4,000 spot (for a half hour at 11:45 on Stage One - obviously not the Big Stage) to the even more outrageous $10,000 slot (for the after-party).  Of course their estimated value on the email was:

PRICELESS. 

Needless to say, I told Chaz this was the biggest scam I’d ever heard of and any band that could afford even the “cheap seats” at the $4,000 amount could use that money to put out a CD or go on tour or pay rent on a practice space.  The supposed “exposure” they were raving about wasn’t worth it.

But more than that, after checking it out, I had my doubts about the entire festival.  It had a few red flags that I normally look for.  This was an astronomical undertaking (50 bands in four days), in a small town in Iowa, run by people who didn’t seem to have experience ever running a festival of that magnitude, and who lived outside of the area.  But the biggie...this was the FIRST Rock Gone Wild Fest and they claimed it would be huge.  At the time they were sending out these feeler emails, the big national acts hadn’t been listed.  There have been recent festivals that have gone sour ripping bands off, including Thunder of Gods in Texas and Rock Summit in Florida, and they all have these similarities. 

I kept watching all the Rock Gone Wild promos and website and would check on them periodically.  I had to admit, it looked like they were going to prove me wrong.  It WAS huge! 



Even though I still would have advised any local band to save that money for something that would actually benefit them, the line-up was pretty impressive:

Thursday, August 20: Saxon, Jackyl, Warrant, April Wine, Honeymoon Suite, Tyketto, Black ‘N Blue, Tigertailz, Ernie and the Automatics (featuring former Boston members Barry Goudreau and Sib Hashian), Sick of Sarah and Savior.

Friday, August 21: Puddle of Mudd, Saliva, Saigon Kick, Cherie Currie (of the Runaways), Powerman 5000, Marcy Playground, Rhino Bucket, Throw the Fight, Crazy Lixx, Ashamed and Attention.

Saturday, August 22: Twisted Sister, Skid Row, Lita Ford, Dokken, Great White, Kix, L.A. Guns (featuring Phil Lewis), Hardcore Superstar, Primal Fear, Dangerous Toys, Helix, Junkyard, Frankenstein 3000, Sex Department, Mighty Swine and Stallion.

Sunday, August 23: George Thorogood and the Destroyers, Candlebox, Sevendust, Saving Abel, Eve 6, Tantric, Armored Saint, Lizzy Borden, Dirty Looks, Lillian Axe, The Texas Hippie Coalition, Downtread and Stuck on Stupid.
Additional bands to be announced. 

Wow...

And the website was massive with different tour package prices, camping arrangements, slick promo videos, message boards.  Even the little town of Algona seemed pretty thrilled with the whole thing. 

The most impressive package was the Platinum VIP package.  Four days that included...

Seating in the first 10 rows the entire four days,
Full service bar with Martinis, High Balls, cocktails, spirits, shooters and more
Beer, beer, beer and more beer
Unlimited soft drinks and water
Unlimited food: buffet style breakfast, lunch, dinner and late night snacks
Air conditioned tent
a hologram lanyard, a limited edition illustrated festival poster, a limited edition festival T-shirt
AND access to THE PLATINUM LOUNGE, Sinners Lounge entertainment area. (“Where the drinks will be flowin’, girls will be dancin, bands will be hangin’, walls will be glowin’, jaws will be droppin’, and you’ll be smilin’)
Price is $565 per person.”  

Okay, even if it is $565 per person, those figures just didn’t add up right.  Four days makes it $141 per day.  The regular priced tickets were $45 per day.  So subtracting that, it’s $96 for some kind of lodging and all the food and liquor you can handle?  I’ve been around the rock crowd long enough to know that some of those dudes can handle a hell of a lot of food and even more liquor.  Plus, if you didn’t get your fill of alcohol for the day, just step into the Platinum Sinners Lounge where the “drinks will be flowing” (and the rockers will be puking).  Factor in all the after party clean-up and I really feel that the RGW projected expense sheet needed adjusting. 

Of course, besides the straight pay-to-play sites, they even decided to hold a pay-to-play battle of the bands.  You pay $150 and battle through rounds of shows yadda yadda yadda (you know the drill) until you win the chance to play on the coveted Rock Gone Wild stage.  That was run by S & S Entertainment and the finale was held on August 2nd.  The band Calous won and would be appearing on Friday at 2:10 on Stage 2. 

So last weekend I just randomly took another look at the big Rock Gone Wild festival website to see how things were progressive. 

GONE.  Everything was gone, all the flashing bands names, all the details for tickets, all the campground info and this was in its place:

 Press Release August 7, 2009 4:52 pm CST

Rock Gone Wild, an Iowa based LLC was informed by Diamond Jo Casino, LLC legal counsel on August 5, 2009, that “the event cannot take place anywhere on the licensed premises”.

Due to Diamond Jo Casino, LLC refusing to honor its obligation to provide the venue, we are unable to produce the event as planned. This matter has been referred to legal counsel.

All inquires should be addressed to:
Sporer & Flanagan, PC
Law Firm
Attn: Ted Sporer

WHAT'S LEFT OF THE OFFICIAL ROCK GONE WILD WEBSITE

---------------------------
I knew it!  I knew I was right!  It had all the earmarks of falling to pieces and apparently that’s what it did.  They tried to change the venue a few weeks ago and it fell like a house of cards after that.  And as with the other festivals that have gone belly up, this one is taking the same form.  All the people who had their names connected with this thing are pretty much scattering.  Ever gone into a dark room full of cockroaches and turned on a light?  It’s sort of like that.  These people can’t get away from their crumbling event fast enough.  Everyone is blaming everyone else, they are getting lawyers, they’ve deleted personal facebook and myspace accounts, they aren’t taking any calls, their email boxes are full.  I predict it will be years until this one is all sorted out.   Names associated with most with this mess are Nathalie Faghihi and Donnie Frizzle but really, who knows?  

But the real losers are some unfortunate bands who didn’t follow the no pay-to-play rule.  There’s a band from Italy that paid $7,500!  The stage they’d play on, the timeslot and set time progressively got worse.  There’s another from Sweden, from New Jersey, from Cincinnati, and Kansas.  They all paid thousands to get on the bill.  Demetrius (Deme) Bermudez who runs DNG Booking (see the big email enticement below) claims he’ll personally refund the money.  I say he shouldn’t have taken that money in the first place.  Pay-to-play is always a ripoff, but making bands pony up that kind of cash for one show is immoral.  Oh yeah...he isn’t responsible either. 

Besides these local bands being out, there are many others who’ve lost much.   There’s all the high priced ticket purchasers who were expecting the “drinks to be flowing and the jaws to be dropping” who were out their hard earned money (okay, I’m sure their jaws really are dropping now!).  There are businesses who would provide food and services, who already made commemorative T-shirts, and were depending on a ton of festival goers to help the local economy.   There are national acts who now have a weekend gap in their tour schedules (prime times they could have played elsewhere).  There is anybody who was dumb enough to invest in this thing, either time or money.     

There’s a really good blog that was written by Allyson Crawford who does the “Bring Back Glam” blog.  She’s got seven parts to this so far, but I’m sure there will be more. 

Rock Gone Wild = Rock Gone. 

Here’s the original email with prices:


Here are the time and pricing schedules below. One of the main things to look at is the advertising side of the package. Once you sign on, your band will be included in ALL WORLDWIDE ADVERTISING AND RADIO PROMOTIONS. All questions can be directed to me if needed.
Thank You
Demetrius (Deme)
DNG Booking
www. dngbooking. com

Stage 1 Time Slots:
$4,000 package:
# of slots available per day: 1 (one)
Set Length: 30 minutes
11:45am - 12:15pm
3, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell, giveaway for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $780 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks the day;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day ), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forums
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel , artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)

- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.

Stage 1 Time Slots:
$5,000 package:
# of slots available per day: 1 (One)
Set Length: 30 minutes
12:45pm - 01:15pm
3, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell, giveaway for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $780 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band price + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forum
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel , artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)

- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.

Stage 1 Time Slots:
$6,000 package:
# of slots available per day: 1 (One)
Set Length: 30 minutes
01:45pm - 02:15pm
5, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell or give away for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $1300 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forums
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel , artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)

- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.

Stage 1 Time Slots:
$7,500 package:
# of slots available per day: 1 (One) (not available on Sunday)
Set Length: 60 minutes
02:45pm - 03:45pm
6, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell or give away for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $1560 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forum
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel , artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)

- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.


Stage 2 Time Slots:
$4,000 package:
# of slots available per day: 1 (one)
Set Length: 30 minutes
11:15am - 11:45am
12:15pm - 12:45pm
3, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell, giveaway for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $780 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forums
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel , artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)

- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.



Stage 2 Time Slots:
$5,000 package:
# of slots available per day: 2 ( Two)
Set Length: 30 minutes
01:15pm - 01:45pm
3, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell, giveaway for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $780 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band price + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forum
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel , artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)

- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.


Stage 2 Time Slots:
$6,000 package:
# of slots available per day: 1 (One)
Set Length: 30 minutes
02:15pm - 02:45pm
5, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell or give away for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $1300 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forums
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel , artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)

- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.

Stage 2 Time Slots:
(After Party 1am-2am)
$10,000 package:
# of slots available per day: 1 (One) (not available on Sunday )
Set Length: 60 minutes

8, 4-day GA tickets for band to sell, giveaway for promotional proposes:
value = $225 per ticket plus fees = $2080 value
Band members + 1 all access passes, for the day band is playing, which will allow access to backstage area for that day
Value = priceless
VIP pass for the day band is playing, which will give band access to VIP food tent for food, beer & drinks;
value = $60 per person = $300 (4 member band + 1)
General admission wristbands for band + 1 for all 5 days of the festival (including the pre-party day), which will allow bands access to festival grounds for the remainder of the festival, if the band chooses to hang out for all 5 days ;
Value = $ 70/ day/ person = $70 X 4 remaining days, X 5 (4 member band + 1) = $1400
Advertising, via our press releases, website, and forums
Your name on all of our merchandise along with all national artists on the bill.
Your photo, bio in our festival program
Your own bio/photo/ music page on rockgonewild. com
1 Free parking pass for the remainder of your stay.
Media tent schedule, where media may interview you at their own discretion
1 song on our festival Indie compilation CD, which will go out free to all of our ticket holders, sponsors, agents, media personnel, artist management and music industry professionals that are present at the festival.
Band Member only Access to the National Artist Sinner’s Lounge backstage

Extras add-ons you may choose to purchase with your promotional package:

- Extra band banner placement and advertisement on perimeter fencing, VIP food tent (based on quantity, location, availability)
Perimeter fencing advertisement: $600.
VIP foot tent interior: $600
(Band must provide Rock Gone Wild with the banners, Rock Gone wild not responsible for lost, damaged, stolen banners)

- Premier website banner placement (based banner size, placement, and duration: please inquire about prices if interested)

- Band merchandise sales through festival's official website prior to event (Festival takes 30% of gross merchandise sales, credit card and processing fees charged , will be deducted separately)


- Have our PR department Schedule interviews with various press and media outlets prior to event (i.e. Radio, Blogs, Magazines, and more) , Service Fee will vary depending on the publication, outlet, etc.
- Main Stage Jumbotron Ad rotation, Price TBD, based on number of rotations and main stage acts, please contact us for further inquiries.

 
11:12 PM 
5 Comments
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Monday, July 06, 2009 
Due to popular demand, I'm listing the full pay-to-play tour story on our new website.  Please direct anybody to that if you want to read it.  I've also re-printed the email from the promoter.  Enjoy this story.

PAY TO PLAY TOUR (TO HELL!)

And here's the website if that doesn't work.  Just click on the TOUR link on the menu.  This site is in progress.  We're adding all the pages from the Girl Trouble site and updating too. 

neverpaytoplay.com

Thanks for all your support everybody and keep rockin'!
Bon and Girl Trouble
12:21 AM 
3 Comments
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Thursday, May 21, 2009 
Hi gang! 

I want to thank you for all the support you've given this site.  It's been a real experience (and sometimes kind of a bummer!) finding out how wide-spread a problem pay-to-play is. But on the other hand, it's been amazing.  Through this site we've met and learned about musicians and bands we never would have known about. 

I'm getting a lot of great info from bands in different areas but frankly, I'm having a tough time keeping up.  I've decided that instead of me just posting it myself here in Tacoma, it would be better coming from the bands who are dealing with it in their towns.

This is the blog for you.  State your experiences, warn other bands in your area about pay-to-play promoters, and connect with other musicians in your area.  Please don't just rant without bringing the facts.  The more proof the better.  Links to prove ticket-selling is good.  If you've done a pay-to-play show, the more details you can give, the better it will help others to see how these work. 

Let's give this a try.  State where you are located first and let us know what is happening. 

Thanks to you all and keep up the good work!
Bon and Girl Trouble
9:38 PM 
8 Comments
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Thursday, January 08, 2009 

8-24-08: Below is the updated list of all the Big Time reps who are currently booking their pay-to-play shows.   These are grouped by the person and then what city they book.  You can clearly see that none of these people could personally be taking care of these shows.  They do it all from their computers at home.  Check the list to see who your rep is.

1-7-09: NEW SHAKE-UP AT AFTON (formerly Big Time Entertainment).  They changed their name and also shuffled their reps.  Ryan seems to be out of the actual booking.  Also Sam and Joe have scaled back.  They've been replaced by Kristine and Jake.  Just so you know, all these people live in Oregon.  They are not in your area.  They've never been to the clubs they book.  They don't attend the shows they set-up.  They stay behind their computers  and sign up bands.  

RYAN BOOKS PAY-TO-PLAY SHOWS IN...

Portland, Oregon (Satryicon, Hawthorne) DELETED

Manchester, NH (Milly's) (TAKEN OVER BY KRISTINE)

Pittsburgh, PA (Shadow Lounge) (TAKEN OVER BY KRISTINE)

Des Moines, IA (Shooter's Hidaway, House of Bricks) (TAKEN OVER BY KRISTINE)

Denver, CO (Oriental Theater, Hodis, Hi-Dive, Cervantes) (TAKEN OVER BY MIKE)

St. Louis, MO (Creepy Crawl, Ciceros) (TAKEN OVER BY KRISTINE)

Dallas, TX (The Door, The Bone) DELETED

Maimi, FL (Wallflower) (TAKEN OVER BY MIKE)

AMY BOOKS PAY-TO-PLAY SHOWS IN...

Richmond, VA (Alley Katz)

Worcester, MA (Tammany Hall) (TAKEN OVER BY JAKE)

Indianapolis, IN

San Antonio, TX (The Venue)  (TAKEN OVER BY JAKE)

Phoenix, AZ, San Jose, CA and General Booking (Phoenix - The Sets, Clubhouse. San Jose - Voodoo)

Sacramento, CA (Club Retro)

Cinncinati, OH (Blue Note)

Hartford, CT (The Space, Webster)

Houston, TX (The Jet Lounge, Engine Room, Walters on Washington)

Nashville, TN (Rocketown, The Muse)

Rochester, NY (Dub Land) (TAKEN OVER BY JAKE)

Chicago, IL area (US Beer Co, Bill's Blues [Evanston])

JOE BOOKS PAY-TO-PLAY SHOWS IN

New York, NY (Sputnik) DELETED

Cleveland, OH (Wilberts, The HiFi Club)

Little Rock, AR (Juanita's) (TAKEN OVER BY JAKE)

Tampa, FL (Orpheum) (TAKEN OVER BY KRISTINE)

Milwaukee, WI (The Miramar Theater, The Rave) (TAKEN OVER BY KRISTINE)

Austin, TX (Red 7) (TAKEN OVER BY COURT)

Omaha, NE (Sokol Underground) (TAKEN OVER BY JAKE)

SAM BOOKS PAY-TO-PLAY SHOWS IN...

Seattle, WA (Studio Seven, El Corazon) (TAKEN OVER BY AMY)

Twin Cities, MN (Dinkeytowner Cafe, Varsity Theater) (TAKEN OVER BY AMY)

General - Booking Director

MIKE IS BOOKING PAY-TO-PLAY IN...

Syracuse, NY (Funkin Waffles)

Virginia Beach, VA (Steppin' Out)

-------------------------------------------------------- 

Big Time Entertainment, the pay-to-play company that keeps on giving, is still doing just that...giving it to the music community.  On Dec. 9, 2007, I just got this very interesting email from Tami, aka Freak Flag Risen.  I'll let Tami explain...

I agree. This company is bullshit. Several weeks ago, around the beginning of November, they contacted me through my site, asking me if i wanted to play a rock night at El Corazon or Studio Seven. I emailed them back and told them I thought I'd prefer to play something near the end of the month, and they gave me the date November 28 at Studio Seven. Now I just feel stupid. Here's nore: I was scheduled to play with 3 bands, whose names I won't mention, and everyone arrived at the club 25-45 minutes before load in. What they did to us next was plain crappy. The show was scheduled to start at 7, and load in time was 5:15. Get this: By 6:15, no one had showed up to let us in! And I was slightly sick with a cold, sitting in my car, freezing. At 6:40, 20 minutes before start time, a man showed up and had a few words with one of the other bands, while I listened. I didn't hear everything, but I heard him say something about the show being canceled, so I went over there to find out what was going on.

He says, "Did you hear the news?"

What news, I asked.

"Big Time cancelled the show."

What the fuck?

Believe me, I was pissed off as hell!

yesterday, they text messaged my phone, telling me the show had been canceled because of the venue staff, but of course, not giving me any more details than that. They said the show would be rescheduled. I emailed them back, and told them not to bother putting me on the bill for this "rescheduling." I told them they should have contacted me sooner about the cancellation, and I would not play for them again.

Fucking jerks.
Freak Flag Risen
-------------------------------------
This email peaked my interest in what happened to the tickets she sold, did she have to find people to refund money, has Big Time changed their requirement for pre-selling tickets?  This was her reply...

Yes, each band was told to presell at least 35 tix. Me, I just gave the damn things away, for the most part. I even went to Studio Seven and tried to get the club staff to sell them, and they refused. I wondered, If Bigtime is connected with these clubs in any way, is there a good reason why the club can't sell them? And no, I didn't presell 35 tickets. I am not a good salesperson at all. I never have been, so as far as that goes, I'd have a hell of a time trying to get 35 people to fork over $8 for a night of rock. Simple as that. Especially if they'd made other plans for the night. But, some friends of mine did show up, and the next day, I heard about it. They were all wondering why, when they arrived, they didn't see anyone there. I had to explain what happened, how the show got canceled at the last minute. And when BigTime sent me that phone message, they told me to email them and all, but the night of the show, I got no explanation as to WHY the show was canceled, just "They canceled it." The person who contacted me by phone said it was canceled because of the club staff, and left it at that. No explanation whatsoever, just this vague crap.

If you want, you can use these emails on the page. This happened to me but if I can keep it from happening to another band, or artist, that makes me feel better.

Well, BTE is still at it!  Thanks to Tami for sharing her unfortunate experience.  If anybody else has a Big Time encounter, let us hear about it!  Great idea BTE, when the shit hits the fan...blame the club!

4:36 AM 
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Tuesday, November 25, 2008 

I'm going to post some of the questions that I often get asked. These are all real questions/comments that people have emailed to me. If you have a question, please look through this first. Maybe it's already been asked by others. I'm hoping that this will be generally helpful and you can direct friends/bandmates to this when there is a pay-to-play discussion. Also it will save me from writing the same thing over and over.  -Bon

What is pay-to-play?

Paying to Play is the practice where independent promotion companies (not affiliated with any specific club) exploits young, inexperienced musicians for their profit. These promoters rent "dead nights" at local clubs to host pay-to-play shows. They typically send flattering spam emails through myspace to new bands notifying them of shows they can play, either straight shows or Battles of the Bands (BOTB). Many of these new bands have barely formed. In order to play these shows, the company requires that the band sell a quota of expensive tickets with all the money being turned over to the representative before showtime (or obligates the band to purchase tickets outright). The band sees a very small percentage, or often times nothing, for all their hard work. The promotion company pays the club rent and takes the biggest profit for themselves with very little effort and no promotion. These pay-to-play companies are acting as unnecessary middlemen. However, in certain areas it's actually the clubs themselves (as in the Sunset Strip, the home of pay-to-play) who orchestrate the ticket-selling policies.

Who do these companies want to work with?

The pay-to-play companies primarily target new, young, naive bands who are just starting out. These bands are ripe for the pickin'. They've gotten very few (or no) real shows, don't know how it's done and are more than eager to get up on that stage...for a price. The pay-to-play company is expert at knowing just what to say or promise their targets to get them to sell as many tickets as possible. No legitimate band will fall for this routine, so these shows are normally made up of bands who aren't really ready for the big stage. Real bands consider these shows a rip-off.

Are there good pay-to-play shows and bad pay-to-play shows?

I get this one all the time, mostly from clubs/promoters operating pay-to-play shows and trying to get me to admit they aren't so bad. Sorry, ain't gonna happen. As for the whole "is it pay-to-play or not" the only thing I go by is if the band/musician pays the booker/promoter/club money before they play. If they do...it's paying to play. Some bands will tell me, "well, it's not my money, I collected it from somebody else through ticket selling or whatever, it didn't come from me". Doesn't matter. I don't care where they get the money from...if the artist pays before doing a show, he's done a pay-to-play show. If it's this "cut and dried", then I never get into that realm of "is it a good pay-to-play show, with good intentions, or a bad rip-off pay-to-play show?" It makes it simple. There's an action that must be done to qualify as pay-to-play. Nobody has to argue about value judgements on what the booker's intentions are, if they really meant well, or whatever other excuse these guys can find. Did you hand money over before you played? That's my only question.

We only do pre-sale shows or pre-sale BOTBs and NEVER pay-to-play shows.

What part of this aren't you understanding? I'm going to go over this one more time...

PRE-SALE IS PAY-TO-PLAY!

Companies, clubs and promoters know that the term "pay-to-play" is like poison in the music community. They understand that they can't be saddled with that negative term so they simply changed the game slightly. Nobody takes money up front for shows anymore. They can't detach themselves from the fact that a musician paying straight out of pocket is undeniable pay-to-play. So they've all come up with this pre-sale ticket routine, either pre-sale shows or pre-sale battles. It's brilliant. The result is the same for them and they can claim they aren't doing pay-to-play shows because it isn't the musician's money. Don't be fooled by this new terminology!

This is a business. P2P companies are only getting musicians to learn that business is part of the music industry.

Some people will tell me, as a way of defending pay-to-play, that this is a business. I agree. Here's my business model of how a show works. I believe that the club is hiring entertainment as a way to get people into their establishment to drink. That's how I feel when we play a show. You will call me up and ask if my band can do a job (entertain your crowd and bring people through the door and keep them there). When I agree to play, that means our band has accepted the job. We will show up, act in a professional way, do our best to bring our crowd and put on a good show that everyone will enjoy. We will do our best to promote the show we sign up for...BUT we will not also pay you for the privilege. When you hire a plumber to fix the toilet, do you also charge him? Of course not. You expect him to bring his tools, his knowledge and do the job. We bring our equipment, years of experience, hours of preparation, original material and we do the job. When we and the plumber are done, you pay us.

Shouldn't musicians help promote the show?

Absolutely! If you want people to come see you, you'll need to get the word out. But first, make sure it is A SHOW. A cool show with a fantastic lineup of bands will get people in the club faster than any ticket selling. It's good to contact the other bands so you are all working as a team. Myspace is a perfect place for this and if you weren't already friends, you usually make some new ones. Form a team, make flyers and get them around to all the record stores, pass out handbills at shows (make sure it's at the club the show is at - clubs rightfully frown on promotion from other clubs in their establishments), contact the local music papers and radio stations that do free concert calendars. If you want people to come to the club, you gotta get the word out in the street.

Should we ever do a show with no money? When do we start making money?

This is where the pay-to-play companies really do all bands a disservice. This is the evil part. Nobody should even be talking about getting paid at the point where you can hardly get a show. Money should be about the farthest thing from your mind at the beginning stages. That will all come later, with experience. Would you want to see you? Would you pay good money to see you? This is a question we all must ask ourselves.

On the other hand, as a band, you must look each situation individually. It's easy to "read the room". You can even do a quick head-count to give you an idea of how much money is coming through the door, and how much you might expect to receive (and be sure to figure in for all the club expenses and other bands). But sometimes, no matter how well you promote, how many people you contacted, the show will tank. This is a fact of band life. It happens to all bands - even the big ones. You can't expect the club to give you a big payout when nobody showed up. So be flexible and understanding. Sometimes your booker will remember you more for being cool than for how well you played. This is why it's best to develop a good relationship/friendship with every promoter you deal with. Their job is not an easy one. Cut them some slack if it didn't go well and they'll return the favor to you when you have problems.

Is renting a hall and putting on a show considered pay-to-play?

No, this is Do-It-Yourself (DIY). If you are actually putting up money to rent the hall/club yourself, you become the promoter. It's your baby. Unlike pay-to-play gigs, you are in full charge. You get the bands together, decide on the admission price, make the fliers, submit the show to all the free calendar listings, and make sure you have PA, sound person, door people, etc. When the show is over, you pay expenses including your rent, and then divide the rest to the bands. Forming a team with other bands can work well also. Everybody puts money in to rent the hall, flip a coin or decide how the lineup will go. At the end all parties are paid back and the rest of the money is divided evenly among the bands. DIY is a fantastic learning experience.

Isn't doing a DIY show taking a chance?

You bet! That's why you need to do some homework before you try to pull it off. You need to know the bands you'll be working with and really go into it with a plan, be aware of all your expenses, think everything through before you commit to a full-blown show. This is something that takes time, effort and organization, but it can be very rewarding when you've pulled off the show everybody is still talking about.

Won't pay-to-play force lazy bands to get off their butts and have better shows?

This question always kills me! Why do you care?! If the band is lazy, so what? They won't get shows and they'll break up, or they'll figure it out and start working harder. It makes no difference. Those bands weren't serious about it in the first place, and will find something else to occupy their time. The only people worried about forcing "lazy" bands to get off their butts is the guy who's got a band that's not selling enough tickets to his show. He's worried that his sales will drop off and he won't make enough of a profit.

Doesn't ticket selling keep your audience coming back?

Absolutely not! The only way, the absolute only way you'll keep them coming back is by putting on a great show. Make it entertaining, make it hard-hitting, make it kick-ass, but the show is the thing! There is no other substitute. What these pay-to-play companies won't tell you is that with every time you sell the tickets, you'll sell less. Every band I've talked to has backed this fact up. They all said that the ticket sales went down, not up. At first everybody wants to buy tickets from you. It's typically your first show, so your friends, schoolmates, co-workers, and relatives will all want to support you. By the next show, it's a little harder sell to all those people. After three shows people will run from you when they see those damn tickets! This is why pay-to-play companies must continue to spam new bands. The ones who've done it have decided it doesn't work.

We can't get shows on our own. This is the only way. How can my band build up a following without paying-to-play? How do I get signed?

First of all you need to be patient. Is your band planning on breaking up tomorrow? Think of your band life as a marathon, not a sprint. Stop acting like you are trying to get the last lifeboat off the Titanic! That's where pay-to-play companies are winning. You are panicking and they aren't. You are not going to instantly go to a club and get a big weekend show. This takes time and meeting with lots of bands and promoters. See my blog on PLAYING WITHOUT PAYING.

In addition, there isn't a better thing I've read on this that what Jack Endino has on his website. It's brilliant and totally true. You may know about Jack from all the albums he's recorded with bands like Nirvana, Mudhoney and Soundgarden as well as being in his own Seattle band, Skin Yard. His newest band is called Kandi Coded. Jack has been extremely supportive of the Stay Away From Pay To Play site and there's nobody better to give you a few words of advice. This is reprinted by permission from his official website AND HERE'S THE LINK (this is taken from Jack's Frequently Asked Questions list) if you want to check it all out. Jack says...

Remember please: I record records, I don't know how to sell 'em or promote 'em. I'm a freelance studio guy, not a record company guy.

However, I was once in a band and learned a thing or two. Here's some steps a typical 'rock band' should follow:

1) Make a tape, any quality at all. Use it to get...
2) gigs. Play lots of gigs and get...
3) fans. Get better at playing and get...
4) lots of fans. If you get enough fans, and you play well enough, it will...
5) get people talking about you. At THAT point, not before, you can consider...
6) making a better sounding tape, and either...
7) send it around, or...
8) release it yourself on a CD, or BOTH. If you release anything yourself, you can get...
9) reviews. Send it to 'zines. People read these. If you can...
10) make enough of a buzz, the record industry will either come to you, or pathways will present themselves for you to get your foot in the door so to speak (thru people you meet, other bands that like you, etc). Good luck.

Won't pay-to-play shows get us a bigger fan base?

I'll give you a little taste of reality. Real music fans never go to pay-to-play shows. Here's who you want to like/see your band: The person who is a total music lover, who goes to lots of shows, knows the bands, buys CDs, makes the scene, blabs to others about who's a good band. These are the people who make up a fan base. Nobody who goes to real shows ever goes to pay-to-play shows. Pay-to-play shows are notorious well-known stinkeroos. Music fans avoid these like the plague. Pay-to-play shows very seldom have anybody you'd want to see, there are too many bands playing too short of a set, they are usually held on weeknights and they always cost way more than really great shows with big local acts. Why would anybody want to go to that? The only people who come to pay-to-play shows are friends/family of the bands. And that's about all the fan base you'll gain, and frankly, aren't those people already your fan base?

Don't industry reps find new talent through pay-to-play shows? This could be a faster way to be discovered.

Reality check 2: Industry reps very rarely (mostly never) attend pay-to-play shows. Even the Battles that claim there will be industry reps often times are fudging the details. In fact, there have been accounts where people have written on blogs about posing as the "industry" guy for some local BOTB. It's easy to claim and hard to fact-check. Real industry people want to check out bands that are already somewhat established and have a good buzz from the local music fans and clubs. If they think it's worth it, they'll make an effort to see bands who are doing well and might be good to work with. Work towards that.

If we don't support pay-to-play shows, the club will suffer. If we want to keep the club going, we HAVE to do these shows.

If the club can only survive by charging the bands to play there, they shouldn't be in business. Hosting crappy pay-to-play shows is not the way to keep the crowd continually coming in and the club prosperous. Supporting the club is highly recommended, in fact it's essential. Good clubs are hard to come by and can be an extremely important part of your music community. So how do you support the club? YOU GO THERE! Go to shows (skip the guest list and pay the door fee) and buy drinks (alcoholic or non). Do they serve food? Eat there. Go often, bring your friends, tell people that's the spot where you hang out. I'm absolutely shocked that these pay-to-play companies (and sometimes the clubs themselves) could try to convince bands that "supporting" the club means doing rip-off, pay-to-play shows. That's crazy!

How does paying-to-play hurt the music scene?

First it creates competition where there should be more cooperation. These shows pit bands against one another for a show that they should be promoting together. When ticket sales is the primary objective, nobody worries about working as a team with all the other musicians on the bill. They are trying to outsell each other. But a strong scene isn't just made up of musicians. It takes all forms of artists (and fans too) to make it work. Graphic artists, photographers, writers, designers and many other creative people are vital to a strong music scene. Think of any music scene from the past and you'll no doubt come up with graphic images, photographs, writing, magazines, that helped to form each big music movement. The Seattle grunge scene, the NY and LA and British punk scenes, the San Francisco hippie scene, and so on...it wasn't just the bands, it was a community of artists that made it happen. Pay-to-play companies are not interested in any of that. They discourage it. Some of them even say directly that they frown on making posters for shows! All they care about is the money the bands can generate for their company. In fact, most of these companies aren't local so they really don't give a toss about your music community or supporting your local scene.

How do you know? Have you ever done a show like this? Shouldn't you do one of these shows or enter a BOTB before you start slagging them?

I've gotten this from P2P company reps. No, I'm not going to sign my 25 year old band (who's been doing this long enough to get just about any show we want) for a Tuesday night pay-to-play show or battle. We are against pay-to-play. That means we won't do these shows. But we wouldn't have gone for this crap when we were first starting out either. We would have rather done no shows, than to be forced to act like a bunch of Girl Scouts selling cookies. We didn't think pay-to-play sounded very "punk" and we still don't. All you need to do is talk to bands who've done these shows to find out what they are all about. Plus, we've attended some of them. They were depressing. Nobody needs to be hit by a truck to know that it is a really bad experience.

You are ruining people's hopes and dreams.

Who's ruining who's hopes and dreams? Am I, by telling people that these Battles won't get them anywhere? Or are these companies, by telling these bands they'll get fame and fortune if they win one of these things, or that paying-to-play is the way bands get shows.

There are more important things in the world for you to be concerned with than paying-to-play.

The only people who ever say this are pay-to-play companies. This is the "nothing to see here" tactic. They don't like that I'm ranting about this practice so they think they can shame me into ranting about something other than pay-to-play. Don't worry, this is only one of my causes. I can do several at once.

Why do you care? You are probably bitter or jealous or aren't able to sell enough tickets.

Jealous of what? We've put out records, toured US, Canada and Europe, gotten to play with many great musicians (including some of our heroes) and most of all made some very close friends along the way. We're still excited when we get on stage and happy when people like what we're doing. After all these 25 years, we still laugh at practice. We still like to hang out together. We love being in this band.

And this is why we do care! We've gotten to see and do things we never dreamed of. We want every band out there to have the same chance. We want them to know how cool this all can be, regardless of whether you "make it big". We want the best for each and every one of you. It's our belief that paying-to-play will ruin that awesome experience. That's why we care. Keep rockin' everybody!

12:05 PM 
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Friday, October 17, 2008 

THE MISC BLOG HAS MOVED TO OUR WEBSITE

This blog got very large and specific with many links.  We will now be posting this information on our band site.  These companies are listed by category but the information is still the same.  And from what we understand, this list will always be growing.  Here are the miscellaneous pay-to-play categories (again, check the website for the specifics) that people have written me about.  These are companies where you'll have to pay a whole lot of money for what they are offering.  It's up to you to make the call.

THE CATEGORIES WE COVER INCLUDE:

BATTLES OF THE BANDS

CD COMPILATIONS AND ZINES

SHOWCASES AND REPS

OPENERS FOR NATIONAL ACTS

PUBLICITY "A & R" FIRMS

LOCAL PAY-TO-PLAY

5:29 AM 
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Wednesday, August 27, 2008 

Rob Wessels is a country singer/songwriter/guitarist from Beaverton, Oregon. He signed up to do a Big Time Entertainment show at The Satyricon in Portland and started selling tickets. But after he checked out a bunch of sources, including this site, Rob did something that I consider to be pretty amazing. He thought it over and decided to cancel his Big Time show. He respectfully gave Big Time a 3 1/2 week advance notice (plenty of time for them to fill the slot) and returned his collected ticket money to 78 people!

I've talked to musicians who, after doing a little research, decided to just play one pay-to-play show, or musicians who decided to stop selling the tickets and play anyway for free, but it is extremely rare (and demonstrates Rob's integrity) for a musician who decides that the right thing to do is refund the ticket money for a pay-to-play show they no longer support. Of course, you can guess that BTE wasn't very happy about this.

Rob was nice enough to send me all the correspondence he had with Ryan, founder/owner of Big Time Entertainment. It's fascinating stuff that Rob has allowed me to share. But first I just want to reprint Rob's final email to Ryan and Big Time. It says it all. A big thanks to Rob for letting us see this. I think it might help others who are considering doing a pay-to-play show.

Rob writes to Ryan:
Actually I tried emailing you. I even sent you the links showing your detractors. I gave you my phone you never gave me yours or tried to call me back until this last week. I sent you the cancellation email over 3 and 1/2 weeks ago. All I can do is go with my gut and the information I'm given. If missing a opportunity to do a show under your banner holds me back so be it. One curiosity though. I haven't seen any promotionals in ANY musical or trade mags. Not even on the free concert calendars of ANY websites or even Willamette Week or the Portland Mercury. It seems to me that if I was to put my self out there in promoting this show that my promotions company would do the same. I just don't see you doing anything but collecting money paying the club and paying yourselves.

Right on! Let's give Rob a big "Hell, Yeah!" I couldn't have put this any better myself.  Rob is one of our Top Friends so give him a myspace high-five.

And now for the huge email from Ryan at Big Time. I could spend a lot of time rebutting every point he makes but I don't want to bore the crap out of you, and a lot of it I've mentioned in other blogs etc. I'll reprint the whole thing at the bottom as Rob sent it if you want to really go through it. But there are a few key points that Ryan makes to Rob that I just can't let go.

Ryan tells Rob:
IF YOU DONT WANT TO PLAY, thats fine man. Play Satyricon on your own terms? thats fine. tell me how that goes. they are pretty backed up and usually the demo's and all that sit in a box from the local bands... so i would be curious to know when you get a show there, let me know. that is why we exist, clubs either DONT WANT TO book local acts, or they dont have the time to book them.

I say:
This is SCARE TACTICS 101! I want everybody to take a good look at the above paragraph because this is a good example of how these pay-to-play companies work. Won't play ball with BTE? Then you'll never get a real show on your own! This sentence especially: "Play Satyricon on your own terms? thats fine. tell me how that goes." Did you catch that? Ryan is trying to make Rob believe that he can't get a good show without him. This is one of the things that makes my blood boil. Rob is mature enough to know psychological intimidation when he hears it but Ryan obviously also pulls this crap with 16 year old kids. They might be naive enough to be deceived by a statement like this. And the Satyricon? We played there many many times. Even in it's updated sanitized form, "Career Maker" it ain't! Portland is a music town. If the Satyricon isn't available, there are hundreds of clubs to play.

Ryan tells Rob:
The site you found is made by a lady in tacoma (who is kinda crazy). she has never booked a show with us. In this day and age anyone can put up a website. i know its hard to not get intrigued by intense negativy about a topic... but BigTIme has worked with over 10,000 bands. so the facta handful of people had a bad experience seems llike a reality. even with a satisfaction rate of 99% that still leaves 100 bands (1% of 10,000) that had a negative experience.

I say:
1. "lady in tacoma (who is kinda crazy)": Okay, I can't argue that one.

2. "she has never booked a show with us". Is Ryan kidding? Damn right! We're AGAINST pay-to-play. Get it? That means we don't do pay-to-play shows, ever. After 24 years in a band, we know how a real show works. We don't need to sell tickets for Ryan to see if what? "a Big Time Entertainment show is good fit for our band?" We already know the answer. We would never stoop that low. It would be an insult to us and anybody who'd come to see us to do a pay-to-play show. We actually get paid to play or we'll do it for charity but we will never pay for a show. Oh yeah, we also play Fridays and Saturdays, not Tuesdays and Sundays.

3. "In this day and age anyone can put up a website" AND anyone can run a national pay-to-play booking company and pretend they have any experience at all. Works both ways there, doesn't it? Ryan has a huge interactive website, at least five booking reps working full-time, with myspace sites in 30 cities (1000-5000 friends on each). I've got info on my own band website and this ONE myspace site. David and Goliath come to mind.

4. "but BigTIme has worked with over 10,000 bands" Where Ryan uses this little fact as a testament to what a great job they do, I see it as proof that BTE is just running as many bands as they can through their pay-to-play machinery. This number is staggering! Think about it! 10,000 bands!? in 4 years? How can Big Time possibly form any kind of relationship with this many musicians? They can't. This figure only proves that BTE is a revolving door, a conveyer belt of acts that come and go so fast they will only end up a statistic. This is not what you want in a booking company. At this stage of the game (since most of Big Time's musicians are new at this) you want the booker/promoter to know you on a personal level. Get a booker who actually lives in the town they are booking from (unless it's a US tour) and works with a few less than 10,000 bands!

Ryan tells Rob:
So, in no way are we a scam. We make sure any wierd bands that dont want to put in ANY work to promoting their show just DONT PLAY FOR US. That's why we strive to be as informative as possible for everything we do. It ends up that bands that wouldnt have fun at our shows find that out throughout the booking form before they book with us. SO if their not happy with something they just go get shows elsewhere, and tahts fine.

I say:
Wierd is spelled weird. And what is this about? So in other words, bands that don't want to put "ANY work" (aka pre-selling quotas of tickets and handing the money to their Big Time rep before they play) is "weird". This is just more psychological intimidation. And speaking of weird, take a look at that Big Time booking form again.

Ryan tells Rob:
That crazy lady makes it sound like any ticket money not paid to bands goes to BigTime. As you and I know, there are so many costs that go into making these shows happen, as illustrated on that site. Big Time gets 8 cents of every dollar on average as our cut, one of the lowest payouts—and we use that to further our mission and improve our software and web resources. so even that 8% doesn't go directly into anyones pocket. Bands know where money goest before they even book shows with us.

I say:
Damn, I went from "kinda crazy" to just plain crazy in a couple of paragraphs. Again, guilty. But I'm holding fast to this one. Yes, the ticket money goes to Big Time. Their overhead isn't really the bands' concern. Big Time thinks they can make a fancy interactive graphic (and it is pretty) listing every possible expense they can think of. Unfortunately these pumped up expenses are fabricated. Big Time doesn't employ 30 security teams, or sound people for each city. Big Time doesn't own sound equipment, or a club in all their 30 markets (with light bills, insurance, etc), but they list these as their expenses in their "breakdown". They rent the club in each city for the night, just like you would for a birthday party. Everything to put on the show (other than the Big Time money handler) is included in the rent of the club. After the bands are paid a small amount, and the rent is paid, Big Time gets the rest. It's always a bigger amount than the bands.

Ryan tells Rob:
Everyone is entitled to their own opinion—however the "opinions" that this crazy lady's site has are mainly FALSE facts, and alot of misinformation. Which is frustrating, because the site claims to help bands—but instead it just contains misinformation and non-factual data about our company.

I say:
After reading that paragraph I think I have a headache.

Here's the entire email Ryan sent to Rob.

> Date: Mon, 4 Aug 2008 18:32:46 -0700
> Subject: Let me know your thoughts ROB
> From: portland@bigtimeentertainment.net

> Hey Rob,

> First off, why didn't you TALK to me about this?

> You pre-sold 78 tickets, meaning you were headed for $3.50 or $4.00 per ticket you sold, PLUS bonus pay next time you played.

> SECOND OF ALL: You found a blog online and just BELIEVED it without even talking to me? Seems strange. Usually if a club or a band tells me a band i booked is flaky I CHECK WITH THEM ON THINGS FIRST before canceling them.

> you found a blog online (we all know everything you read online MUST be true... right? lol) and a couple acts you know said stuff. cool, that should raise red flags, yes. you should talk to me about your concerns, then make an informed decision.

> instead you just flip out, get worried and refund 78 people their tickets?? im really confused. ive been nothing but up front with you and doing what i can to ensure you have a fun show, and obviously im here for you if you have concerns you want to talk to me about!

> IF YOU DONT WANT TO PLAY, thats fine man. Play Satyricon on your own terms? thats fine. tell me how that goes. they are pretty backed up and usually the demo's and all that sit in a box from the local bands... so i would be curious to know when you get a show there, let me know. that is why we exist, clubs either DONT WANT TO book local acts, or they dont have the time to book them.


> Bottom line, we are UP FRONT about all details and everything we do. You konw that, cause you saw the booking form YOU FILLED OUT. NOTHING is kept from our bands.

That stupid lady? give me a break, we have THE LOWEST margins in our industry. The money NOT paid to bands goes a variety of places, and when all is said and done we pocket about 8%. is that too much? c'mon man. Dont come at me telling me that what we do is a deception at all.

> I have literally a thousand bands saying how much they like us and appreciate what we do:
> http://www. BigTimeFeedback. com>
>
> today alone ive read 7 positive feedback emails. so your "ONE" complaint about this BS site that is non factual, and slanderous doesnt really phaze me. just had a band today find that exact site and emailed me to tell me how BS it is and that its a shame that lady has to be so deceiving.

> ID LIKE TO KNOW YOUR THOUGHTS ROB. seriously. everyone here works their asses off to help our bands, THAT is why we exist. if we were in this for money we would be in another fucking industry. not working with local artists! below i address that site a bit more, let me know what you think.


> AGAIN id like to dialogue, and get you the facts.
>
> ======
please let me know, I'd really like to have a dialogue with you about this, rather than just leave it at you found some website, i want to know what your thoughts are on this..

> The site you found is made by a lady in tacoma (who is kinda crazy). she has never booked a show with us. In this day and age anyone can put up a website. i know its hard to not get intrigued by intense negativy about a topic... but BigTIme has worked with over 10,000 bands. so the facta handful of people had a bad experience seems llike a reality. even with a satisfaction rate of 99% that still leaves 100 bands (1% of 10,000) that had a negative experience.

> also if you think about it, happy clients don't make entire websites about how awesome their experience was. this is why almost all companies have a site or two about how much they suck, and very few (if any) sites made by the customer about how that company is awesome.
> the bands that think we are awesome dont make an entire site devoted to telling people we are awesome, lol. they just write feedback to us, you can see what our bands say about us here:
> http://www. BigTimeFeedback. com

> Everyone is entitled to their own opinion—however the "opinions" that this crazy lady's site has are mainly FALSE facts, and alot of misinformation. Which is frustrating, because the site claims to help bands—but instead it just contains misinformation and non-factual data about our company.

> In NO WAY do we ever mislead or misinform our bands. There is nothing dishonest that we do either, so I dont know what she is talking about with the word "scam." We are all artists ourselves, and go out of our way to make sure that artists know exactly how we do things so that they can decide for themselves if they'd like to book with us.

> We inform our bands of absolutely EVERYTHING. From show details, what to expect at the show, whose on the line ups, Payment, band order, policies, etc. We even send EVERY band we work with in the booking form process to this site so they can see clearly see WHERE their fans money is going:
> http://www. BigTimeFeedback. com/Breakdown

> That crazy lady makes it sound like any ticket money not paid to bands goes to BigTime. As you and I know, there are so many costs that go into making these shows happen, as illustrated on that site. BigTime gets 8 cents of every dollar on average as our cut, one of the lowest payouts—and we use that to further our mission and improve our software and web resources. so even that 8% doesn't go directly into anyones pocket. Bands know where money goest before they even book shows with us.

> You can see what bands have to say about their experience with us, as well as venues and our staff, at:
> http://www. BigTimeFeedback. com

> Also, in the booking process we send bands to this site to let them know we are NOT the only place to book in town, and we encourage them to book through the venue directly when possible. we dont want bands to think we are the only option. we want them to know we always are an option IF they feel we are a good fit for their needs! > http://www. BigTimeEntertainment. org

> We work at educating our artists with alternative strategies we have found effective. In fact most of the BigTime staff has USED these strategies to grow their fan base from 20 to 200 with their bands in the past. They did NOT use paper fliers, print ads, or radio ads. They instead used these strategies since they are much more effective for local artists that have a consistent draw of under 300 fans per show: http://www. BigTime-Artist-Resources. com

> We have 15 good feedback experiences sent in for every 1 complaint we get. And MOST of the complaints, the rare times we get them, are like "the soundman cut us off a little early" or "venue staff was a little rude," in those cases we always make it up to the band on the next show with special accomodations. We Also give bands an email feedback form to rate how we're doing. We consistently score 8/10 or above in all categories: Booking Process, Venue Staff & Soundman, Show Manager, and Overall experience. the amount of happy bands far outweighs unhappy bands with BIgTime!

> So, in no way are we a scam. We make sure any wierd bands that dont want to put in ANY work to promoting their show just DONT PLAY FOR US. That's why we strive to be as informative as possible for everything we do. It ends up that bands that wouldnt have fun at our shows find that out throughout the booking form before they book with us. SO if their not happy with something they just go get shows elsewhere, and tahts fine.

> I assure you nothing we will ever do will be dishonest or "shady" in any way, because as artists ourselves who have done every single thing we have our bands do—we want our bands to have a good time and repeat book with us. our company was founded on fairness, honesty, and integrity and if any of those were ever abandoned i assure you our office staff would all quit!

> I ALSO want to note that this crazy lady ALSO disects (again with false information on most of it) what some Battle of the Bands companies such as EMERGENZA (international company), BoDog Battle (a multimillion dollar company) and Gorilla Productions (a national company). Everyone on bigtime staff is morally opposed to battle of the bands... We just don't feel that they are good for bands really. HOWEVER, none of these companies are dishonest or a scam in any way either. In fact, though we all are opposed to battle of the bands and don't think battle of the bands are that great for local artists, we all agree that IF a band DOES want to play a battle of the bands at all—EMERGENZA and BoDog ARE the best ways to do it.

> So let me know your thoughts, and if you have ANY questions or concerns please let me know. Im here for you and i like to dialogue about anything my bands have a problem with.

> Thanks!
> Ryan > BigTime Booking Director
> BIGTIME ENTERTAINMENT, LLC
> http://www. BigTime-Artist-Resources. com

2:21 AM 
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Saturday, August 09, 2008 

The one criticism I get most often is that I have been calling these pay-to-play companies - whether it's Big Time or Emergenza or Illumina or Bodog - a scam. Some people (including the pay-to-play companies) say that I am in error. They claim these companies can't be considered a scam because they don't lie and are not dishonest. But does a scam always include a lie or complete dishonesty? I say, often times it doesn't. To me, in this context, a scam is a venture perpetrated for profit upon someone who is so naive, so inexperienced or so eager for a fast track to success, they'll go to any lengths to acheive their goal. The pay-to-play companies don't actually lie, they just don't give all the important details, or they make outrageous claims that could only apply in the rarest of circumstances, or they give misinformation based on their advantage, or they provide a service that isn't really necessary to success. They can skirt around the issues like an Olympic ice skater, BUT they don't specifically lie.

LEARNING FROM THE PAST
I think it would do us well to look at a practice that's been going on in the music industry since recordings began. Over many years thousands and thousands of people have been talked out of their hard earned money, hoping for that career in the music industry and a shot at fame and fortune. You probably have already heard about it.

THIS IS THE SONG-POEM INDUSTRY.

Look in the back of any pulp movie/music/specialty magazine (especially from the 40s to the 70s). In amongst the ads for personal vibrators, X-ray specs and bust enhancers you will see small bold ads inviting you to submit your poems to songwriting companies. "Your Poems Set To Music", "Songwriters Needs Poems" "$100,000 Recording Contract Possible" and "Hollywood Needs Songwriters" were just a few of the tempting headlines. These ads enticed potential "lyricists" to submit their material to a panel of experts who would judge its potential. This was commonly referred to as "song sharking". No matter how disjointed, how un-music-like, how crazy, the poem was always given the TOP RATING and immediately accepted by the company to be on their label. You would receive a letter from the company praising your work and giving you an offer for their team of expert musicians to record your song. Who could pass up a chance like that? The experts have spoken: YOU HAVE POTENTIAL! and with the right treatment you could be famous and successful. It would normally take a $200 (for a trio) to $400 (orchestra) show of good faith to make those dreams come true. A sizeable investment for the poor people who fell for this, but a small price to pay for a new and exciting career.

These companies were set up to knock out a song almost faster than humanly possible. I highly recommend you see the film (available on DVD) called "Off The Charts" to understand how fast these pros could work. Dozens of companies were set up to crank out a record with such speed and efficiency it is unbelievable. There were two primary ways these records were made. One way was for the company to quickly think up a tune and write the charts for professional session musicians to sight read in one take. These musicians were usually down on their luck or at the end of a real career in recording. They claim these session guys could sight-read and record 30 songs in an hour and a half of studio time! The other way was for one musician/company owner to handle the poem from start to finish (writing, performing, and recording could take as little as 45 minutes to complete). Once the poem was recorded, a vinyl 45 RPM record was quickly pressed. The company would produce a small quantity - just enough for the song-writer to have for their own needs (pass out to family and friends) and that's as far as it went. The cash invested covered the small pressing of records and the profit for the company. The more serious of these songwriters even went as far as releasing albums!

Thousands of down on their luck, star-struck people paid hundreds, often times thousands, of dollars they couldn't afford for that chance of a major songwriting career. Songs like "Jimmy Carter Says Yes", "Non-Violent TaeKwonDo Troopers", "Convertibles and Headbands" and "Human Breakdown of Absurdity" (to name but a few) would be pressed into records with the hope that each disc would sell millions. There is now a cult (and put me down as a member!) of people who collect and enjoy this weird art form. The famous "Peace and Love" (aka "Blind Man's Penis") was penned by an 18 year old John Trubee in 1976 to test the theory that these guys would record anything for the correct amount of money. Read all about it here. Many song-poem writers would continue, with the encouragement of the song-poem company, to submit poem after poem, thinking that if they just kept at it eventually they'd get that "hit" of their dreams. Fame and riches could be as close as that next record...

So the question is: WAS THIS PRACTICE A SCAM? These companies didn't exactly lie to these songwriters. Nobody was twisting their arms, nobody was forcing them to send cash to get these songs published. The song-poem companies gave them the facts:

* Their song WAS judged and approved by "industry experts". (Song poem companies were indeed part of the industry, although it was the lowest rung.)

* For the correct fee you DID indeed receive a 45 RPM record of your poem put to music or in more expensive cases you were included on an album (even though it was cranked out faster than any legitimate recording).

* It WAS released on a label (there were hundreds of song-poem labels) and distributed (although the distribution might have gotten as far as your immediate family and friends).

* These songs sometimes GOT radio play. The larger song-poem companies would book dead hours on tiny independent radio stations to play their clients recordings.

* Song-poems DID appear on song charts. Song-poem companies also published charts to track all the songs on their label. These never made it to legitimate charts.

SO WERE SONG-POEMS A SCAM?

The companies certainly didn't think so. Most of them actually claimed they were helping people realize their dreams by offering a gateway to showbiz. Lots of the "poets" claim they aren't. Of course they don't want to admit they spent a lot of money for nothing. Many song-poets still believe that submitting song-poems keeps their hand in showbiz or that they will eventually get that hit.

But even considering all the opinions, you can't argue with the last epilog of the documentary "Off the Charts" which reads...

"Between 1900 and 2002 there has been an estimated 200,000 song-poems produced."

"There has yet to be a hit song among them."

--------------------------------------------

Still haven't decided if this practice was a scam? Check out one of the song-poem writers, Caglar Juan Singletary and his works, "Non-Violent TaeKwonDo Troopers" and "Annie Oakley" featured on our main page.

FOR MORE INFORMATION ON SONG-POEMS CHECK OUT THIS INCREDIBLE WEBSITE!

5:36 AM 
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Monday, July 07, 2008 

ATTENTION EVERYBODY: We'll keep this for updates (and the comment are still helpful) but for right now everything we have is on the Girl Trouble page.

MISCELLANEOUS PAY-TO-PLAY

12:30 PM 
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