Buy a Day Planner: Booking DIY Shows

Behind every mind-smushingly awesome DIY show we’ve ever seen, was a person or people who toiled away at the thankless task of setting it up. They deal with egos, neighbors, and probably even set-up the sound, all just so you could have fun. I’ve had a bit of experience from both sides of the band/booker divide so I’m going to tell you some of the lessons I’ve gathered up from the worst booking mistakes I’ve made.

When I book a show I first choose a day, then I stick with that day no matter what. I do this because otherwise it’s going to get fucking confusing as bands take the standard line that, “we can’t do Friday but how about Saturday,“ and you might even end up with two or three halfway decent shows instead of one rocking one that you were imagining. If it’s a touring band than usually I do the opposite and make them stick to a specific day. But, depending on the limitations of your space, maybe you do want to have a show every night, it’s your choice.

Another important time thing to realize is that bands need some advance notice before they play. Bands have all sorts of responsibilities, and usually somewhere between three and five people and their respectively crazy schedules to consider. If you’re polite you’ll try and get it confirmed at least two or three weeks before hand. So, for me, a good rule of hand is to at least introduce my proposal to a band a month before hand, and then make sure I track down an answer by a week or two later. For bar-booking the advance notice probably needs to be doubled (be aware bar-bands will probably have these expectations).

People say that Myspace has revolutionized booking. This might be true for the initial contact but unless you have previous experience to the contrary, assume Myspace is sucking all those messages right into Rupert Murdoch’s inbox and make verbal contact with them. If you’re not on a phone-friend basis with anyone in the band then find someone who is. Call them, leave them the what-and-wherefores, and then call them again if you don’t hear back. Don’t rely on your shaky memory that drunk-you and drunk-musician heard the same things the other night at the bar. Introduce the idea to them and find out when they can find out if the rest of their band can do it. Then if you don’t hear back from them, call them back. It’s a mild form of harassment but it helps to iron out most misunderstandings.

So now that I’ve got a set date, it’s time to think about who I want to play. This may seem like a simple decision, right? I mean, you’ve got a thrash band that you really like why not get a few more bands that those guys are in, they could play too, they’ll be there anyway. But we all know how fragmented the punk world is, and let’s be honest and admit that maybe 80% of punk bands don’t even play DIY shows. Now that all that is out of the way, it’s ok for us to say that there’s a lot of interesting stuff going on in underground communities from art-punk to queer-core and folk-punk and back to the aforementioned thrash. It’s my own personal philosophy, and very few other peoples, that sometimes it’s good to mix genres. That way you end up mixing people. And that’s fun. And that’s a decision with political implications, I’d say.

That said, just don’t bother booking bands that you don’t like, personally or musically. If it’s a Crust band and you listen to mostly indie-twee and make fun of Crust (when they’re not around) for sounding like roadkilled zombie cat in a shrinking tin can (I don‘t know), then don’t book them. You’ll do them a favor too. I say this not only because you won’t enjoy yourself, and who wants to not enjoy a hobby, but because the punk scene is as much, if not more, full of assholes than the rest of the world. It’s as simple as, some bands are just assholes and have asshole friends. If people aren’t accustomed to your venue and how it functions or what the expectations are then they will likely disrespect it, not to mention your neighbors, not to mention you. Do you really want to have to baby-sit puking 14 year olds and pull taggers off your neighbors car? Again, it’s a good time to consider what the needs and focus of your venue are. Maybe you just want to have as many rocking shows as you can before the cops show up and find your trashed house. Just be aware.

That’s not to say that bands won’t harass you to get on the bill as soon as it starts looking fun. An artist friend of mine was just telling me that artists are snobby and elitist, but that musicians are friendly because they have to talk to other bands, bookers, and sound people. I corrected him, musicians are schmoozer’s. I resisted calling them snakes. And like everyone else in the radical or underground, they can be flakes. That said, shit happens. Bands cancel. People fight and whine about the order they play in. P.A.’s blow up. What are you going to fucking do? Sometimes things aren’t perfect but don’t let it stress you out too much. Even if no one is there yet, try and start at some reasonable time otherwise you’re setting a dangerous precedent for people who come to your shows not to show up until midnight. And try for gods sake to cap the number of bands, it might be fun to have 6 bands play every once in a while, but for both people hanging out and for you, it’ll get old.

So let’s say that you do get this show set up, you get bands confirmed. It’s your responsibility to make the flier and put it up all over town, certainly don’t assume that bands will do it. It’s part of your responsibility to them. And if you want lots of people to show up you have to create what corporate types call synergy. You can call it hype. It means you put up two fliers in different places. Two friends will see it separately. They will then have the following conversation:

“What’s going on tonight?“
“I heard Bla Bla Black Sheep is having a show.”
“I heard that too, let’s go! And let‘s buy them beer!”

I realize that it’s tempting in the age of Myspace to just send a bulletin about the show and be done with it. Myspace though, like the rest of that pornhole called the internet, suffers from information saturation. There’s too many people sending bulletins about their Spring Break plans for your little punk show to get noticed. And in any case, the DIY flier is a distinguished art form, you‘re obliged to carry it on.

Money is another important issue. No one charges more than $5. Sell cupcakes to drunk people if you need to make more. For touring bands, try and get them some gas money. No expects to get rich on tour but try and get them enough to keep going. Also, for touring bands, it’s proper etiquette for you to help them find someplace safe to sleep, and unless they are assholes they will love you forever if you feed them. (My roommate just made a breakfast of quinoa and oats for this touring band from California. They filled up their bowls with it, left the dirty dishes, went to White Castle, and then left their wrappers laying around the house. Fuck California.). Something that is completely infuriating is the kids who regularly show up without a cent. These are the same people who don’t mind spending money when bars and liquor stores force them to pay on threat of punishment, but who can’t dig into their pockets to help bands or support spaces. They have a sense of entitlement (which probably comes from the background of entitlement that you can see if you look hard enough past their aesthetic), and although I’ve never turned anyone away, everyone should know that these shows only exist because people work hard, dedicate their time, and sometimes, invest their pocket money. If I were you I wouldn’t be afraid to point it out.

I think that people who book shows occupy an interesting space in DIY culture. They’re not the people in the bands wallowing in adulation (ha), or the zinesters hiding in the shadows scribbling smarmy notes. It’s really a fun thing to be able to do, you hear and promote good music, and hang out with your friends. Don’t let people make you feel like you’re obliged to deal with their every little whim, or to let them play when they just show up (a despicable practice), or that you really have any obligation other than hosting the show. You’re not getting paid after all, so don’t worry about all the bullshit that people might expect or oblige of you! Just have fun!

Interstate 35 Bridge Collapse

The city of Minneapolis is still in shock from the collapse of the I-35 bridge during rush hour Wednesday. A local landmark spanning the Mississippi River, albeit a dreary concrete one, has been erased from the skyline, and an unknown number of people are dead. This morning, as I sat at the Mayday Cafe there was a sense of foreboding as the regulars talked about the collapse, and about the rumors, leaked by reporters desperate for new macabre angles, of cars filled with people and water at the bottom of the river. People are shocked, fittingly for Midwesterners, as much by the attention our city is receiving as by the disaster itself. We were, after all, on CNN. But, equally as appalling as cable news, is the fact that this happened here. Minnesota, a state with a long history of progressive social policies, has long been at the top of heap as far as our standard of living. You'd think that this wouldn't be happening in one of the wealthiest states in the richest country in the world. Maybe this is why we're on CNN.

As numerous commentators have pointed out, the American infrastructure is rapidly deteriorating. The American Society of Civil Engineers gave the condition of our infrastructure a grade of D in 2005 and estimated that it would take $1.6 trillion to bring it up to good condition, in other words a B grade. People have also been pointing out that the only other $1 trillion we ever hear is in reference to the amount the government has spent on the Iraq War. The tragedies are just piling up.

Rather than taking the obvious route and connecting this to the War on Terror (which, in my opinion, will be remembered as a human-rights travesty and black mark on American history long after Cheney installs his brain in a bowl), or the even more obvious route and calling for $1.6 trillion in spending on roads, maybe we should be wondering why our public infrastructure is so focused on an unsustainable, time-wasting, environmentally destructive 1960's car culture? And questioning why we would want to merely rebuild it when it's this very car culture that's gotten us into so many problems in the last half decade?

Americans spend an unholy amount of time in cars, 24 minute daily commutes on average which adds up to about 148 hours per year. The repercussions on commuter health such as obesity and hypertension are already well documented, as is the elevated rates of asthma in inner city populations that act as the spoke of suburban commuting. Is that worth not having to walk two blocks to the corner store?

And ever since Al Gore Jr. snorted that pocketful of coke and roared down the highway we, the American public, have realized what a big deal the environment is. 1/3 of CO2 is produced by cars, not to mention all sorts of other toxic chemicals that than enter our bodies and ecosystems. Add to this the environmental implications of building so many damn roads, and car manufacturers fixated on profit through planned obsolescence, rather than functionality and economy. There's 68 million of these beasts sitting around, after all.

If we wanted to be crass we could also talk about the economic price that we pay in order to just barely maintain these roads. This is money that could be going to schools, social services, or your pocket (or, let's be honest about what these assholes would really do with it, the war in Iraq). Hell, maybe we can finally even have the 20 hour work week! Add the billions of dollars spent on road maintenance to the billions spent on gas to the billions spent on health, and oh what a woeful state we are in. Benjamin Franklin would kick our ass. And we shouldn't fool ourselves that the taxes paid for these improvements are provided by the freight companies or corporations who are tearing up the highways with their semi's. In Minnesota the amount of taxes paid by corporations dropped 44% between 1998 and 2003. The tax burden, thanks to that weasel Pawlenty, is being borne by working people. Does it really make sense in the face of environmental catastrophe, to spend trillions of our dollars on renovating an antiqued system that will only make us more dependent on oil and cars? It's the 21st century! Where's my hover-board?

Would shifting our priority from widening clogged highways to creating livable local communities really prevent bridges from collapsing? Probably not. But using the money more wisely, to restrict dependence on automobiles, and in turn all their negative repercussions, could make these disasters more rare. In the same way that the highway boom of the 1960's led to the creation of distant suburbs and lengthy commutes, changing the infrastructure to reflect more sustainable transportation would transform our lifestyles. All in all, I'm not overly optimistic that Americans, and especially American politicians, will take any steps in this direction until its far too late and we've already voted Mad Max as President, but it seems an inescapable debate in the face of liberal calls for trillions to be spent on road infrastructure, and in the inescapable tragedy of these ghostly images of Minnesotans, trapped in their cars at the bottom of the Mississippi.