windowlicker wrote:No-one's offered money so far, the fucks.

I can only estimate how many bands these A&R people contact, yeah, I'm sure it's a huge number.

Trust me, it is. I went for my one and only meeting with someone from a management company who wanted to 'invest' in my old band. It was a nice cup of coffee and it interested me that anyone from the 'real' music world was interested in my band. If you'd ever heard us, you'd understand. It wasn't exactly the stuff dreams are made of for the music industry (i.e. a bunch of guys, mostly in their mid to late 30s, making noise).
When the guy said
"we will obviously recoup our outlay with a % when you receive your first major label deal and subsequent advance"
I realised I was part of one of maybe 30 meetings that guy would have that day and I politely excused myself and left through the back exit.

There's one guy from a large label beginning with P and ending with arlaphone that emails everyone for CDs and gigging updates. His approach is to spread the net as wide as he can to see what bites. It's fine if you understand that, but like someone else said, don't let yourself get flattered too easily.

I think I even know the guy you're talking about. Are his initials J.S.?

There's been others though...the approach is, if it happens it happens...we're plodding on anyway.

The problem with windowlicker's record deal is that the deal may never come to fruition, even if they are acting like they will give you everything. More than likely at some point soon the phone calls will stop coming/being answered. Even if you have a really good band, which I'm sure you do, if you haven't built the kind of following and sales on your own that would merit attention from a stateside indie, a major probably won't take the monetary risk, even if they seem interested. Keep in mind, they're always interested but they rarely follow through on deals unless they are farily certain they will make a lot of money off your music. People in your position are ripe for being dropped by a label (if you're signed) because you are not in a position of strength. Most of these people are serious assholes that don't care about you or your family, they want to keep their jobs and become president by signing bands that they think will sell well. You may also be conversing with someone who is making promises but doesn't have signing autonomy, in that case at some point you will have to go through the higher up's.

Break it off with them before they stop calling you, make your own album in due time, save up by working an extra job after you graduate, record it at Electrical. Forget about labels for now and just make a record, distribute it yourself and maybe at some point someone will take you on, or maybe you will be satisfied playing music instead of thinking of it in career terms.

I could be totally wrong as I'm basing this on my experience, but the success stories are few and far between, they are like miracles. Some people have done okay on major labels, but most bands lose in the end.

davesec wrote:stop calling them "gigs"!

I gots no problems with "Gigs"... but "Gigbags" makes me gags.

windowlicker wrote:I think I even know the guy you're talking about. Are his initials J.S.?

There's been others though...the approach is, if it happens it happens...we're plodding on anyway.

Well, I think the odds of it happening and you ending up happy with the results are not good. There is nothing wrong with "plodding on." Delivering the rock ought to be the goal. Nobody's entitled to make a living off of it (not that you've stated that as a goal).

My good good friend John Mohr once said (and I'm paraphrasing): "You know, music is pretty fun, generally. Unless it's your job."

Arson Smith wrote:

davesec wrote:stop calling them "gigs"!

I gots no problems with "Gigs"... but "Gigbags" makes me gags.

How do you feel about a band called Pigbag who does songs like "Papa's got a brand new Pigbag".

I'm not sure whether I got to actually hear this piece of genius, but it gave us post-adolescents a nickname to tag a bunch o' morons with.

windowlicker wrote:We're not in a position to gig constantly and build an audience that way. Living where we do, it's relatively easy for a band to build an audience through being on the radio, there's a dedicated "alternative" station here.

Then maybe instead of worrying about whether or not a Major can suddenly bring you more exposure you should think about what sacrifices (i.e.: moving) you have to make to put yourself in a position to tour. Touring is the only real way to build a solid and significant fan base and it requiers a lot of dedication and sacrifice. If you're any good as a band or as human beings than people will open their doors to you while you are on the road and will help you out. That is how you make real connections and is one of the cooler things about being in a band.

Major Record labels tend to make their bands act aloof and disconnected from their fan base. You know, not human beings but "rock gods". If you really want to gain respect as a band and have any kind of longevity, even if you end up signing to a major down the line, touring is key! Can't stress that enough. Play live shows!

I say show 'we are playing a show'
I hate 'gig' sounds like something dudes who work at guitar center do
'we've been gigging around the northern suburbs doing our zeppelin set'
hate it

Do you remember the Saturday gigs?

We do, we do . . .

One of the worst music-biz related jobs I ever had was working for WEA's legal department.

Day in and day out, I had to redline/write contracts initiated by WEA to bands.

Some of the bands were bands that I was friendly with.

Some of the contracts were completely ridiculous, with clauses that dictated how their records could be displayed in stores, how much tour support they were required to accept from the label, who they could use to make graphics for their album covers.

I can assure you, since I was the person "writing" the contracts, that these documents are constructed in the most obfuscated and confusing language possible - namely, to keep band members from actually wanting to read through the whole thing. "That's what lawyers are for, right?" says the guitarist for the Hot New Band. "They will read it and tell me what it says."

Whilst employed by this particular lawyer, I made several dozen phone calls to various people encouraging them to attempt to read their contracts and ask questions. I did not give details, and I did not specify what questions to ask (in fact, I would be willing to bet that there's at least one someone reading this board was the recipient of one of these phone calls at one time.)

The idea that a band would sign a contract that stated that their records must be displayed in endcaps (which incurs more recoupable costs), or were required to accept 50k in tour support every time they embarked on a string of shows that lasted longer than a week made me sick.

I don't know if my boss ever got wise to what I was doing. I don't think so, because he was too busy trying to nickel and dime Cheap Trick. I eventually left there, and I never saw any of those horrible people again.

Oh, the stories I could tell.