have you ever put up an ad to form a band?

Yep. I put an ad in the City Pages here in Minneapolis back in 1995 and I found my Colossamite band mate John Dietrich that way. John plays in Deerhoof, Gorge Trio and The Natural Dreamers nowadays. I never thought it would work, but it did.

connor_Archive

have you ever put up an ad to form a band?

16 by connor_Archive

Apparently Mission of Burma found Peter Prescott through an ad. I can't imagine them without his pounding (or throaty yelling). NOT CRAP.

I particularly enjoy flipping through the Austin Chronicle to see what kinds of bands are looking for drummers. I love the frequency with which Sonic Youth is listed as an influence or point of reference. Then you go to the website listed to check out their mp3s, and they sound exactly like either Franz Ferdinand or Dashboard Confessional.

But I should mention that my band has had terrible luck with DRUMMER WANTED SO HARD ads around Austin. I'd say there's a certain art to creating a good drummer wanted ad. An art we have obviously not perfected. Almost everyone who calls, I shit you not, mentions Tool within 2 minutes.

One guy who was really into Rapeman berated me on the phone for about 15 minutes, repeating "I'm for real, motherfucker. I'm a fucking drummer, motherfucker." Then his baby would cry and he'd giggle. "Yeah, motherfucker. What the fuck are you? Let's go motherfucker, I'm for real. I'm ready, motherfucker. NOW!"

There must be something about listing Breadwinner, The Ex, Blue Cheer, Television, and Fugazi that attracts these people.

Connor

jesse_Archive

have you ever put up an ad to form a band?

17 by jesse_Archive

my ex always used to run ads that mentioned Come. anybody that responded saying they loved Come was usually good for making some interesting music. i think the key with that is to throw out an amazing yet quasi-obscure band. people that bite on that may be winners.

Picking which bands to include in an ad is an art form. Never include pseudo-famous awesome bands like Fugazi or even Shellac, because in addition to cool peeps, many people with absolutely no musical taste or ability have heard of them. Even if your list of influences includes 8 other obscure bands, weird people will latch on to the one band they recognize and think "perfect match!" The last Shellac "fan" I played with could not play a bass line unless it involved hitting an open E string every other note. This was... limiting. Other do-not-include-even-if-you-like-them bands include "Sunny Day Real Estate," "Sonic Youth" and "Pavement."

Some day, a dummer will respond to an ad mentioning "Long Fin Killie" and I will rock the world.

Also, include negative keywords. I used to put "no fans of Dave Mathews" on my ads at school, which I believe saved me countless hours of pain. And never play with a guitarist who sites "Stevie Ray" or "Hendrix" as an influence.

www.jessekates.com