advice on booking shows?

[charles]

how do you guys do it? I can't get a show here to save my life. do you use a press kit? did you make your own? demos? pictures?

anything will help. I'm clueless.

[kaboom]

It was more difficult before i turned 21, but a good start would be to talk to the bands when you go see local shows. They can usually give you the name of who you might want to talk to at the venue, or they might even set up a show with you.

[D.o.S.]

Don't suck.

[Quiet Things]

For us, it's been nothing but networking. No press kits or anything like that. We just started going to shows that were in the vein that we were working in at the time, shaking some hands, and a few months later we had our first show. We played that show and immediately had offers from two or three people to do other shows. We rode that wave for the first year, and now we've got some really tight connections and can just kind of ask around to see if anyone has an opening on a bill; or if there's an open day at one of the venues we have regular contact with we're friends with enough other bands we can usually put together a decent lineup.

[jfrey]

There's usually a few people that if you get to know them can take care of booking for you. I did booking for a while for places in Boston.

[dase]

sort of depends on what music you're playing a bit as well? If it's more underground, DIY stuff just going to shows, talking to people, maybe trying to set your own stuff up and asking their band to play, is going to help. Press kits and the like in that sort of scene might turn a lot of people off.

[The4455]

Make your own shows, contact a venue and tell them you have five bands lined up and what night could you play, money, the like. Also, people go to benefits more so than just another concert. I organized concerts locally at a church fro high school bands, the biggest one was for the Tsunami in Japan, two years ago.

[dase]

pretty much. If it's anything like here you're going to be doing midweek nights to few people but those are the shows that make you good. Then you get better, more people like you, you get to know other bands and start getting better shows happening.

Also look into all ages spaces and more unconventional places and the like. The most fun shows are always in galleries, record stores, parks, people's kitchens, whatever.