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[Stroopy121]

My band has decided to start looking into booking a tour round the UK. Anyone have any advice, or words of wisdom as to where to start and the best way to go about it?

[The Byre]

It sounds as if you need an agent.

[RossP]

Originally Posted by The Byre

It sounds as if you need an agent.

Opened a can of worms there...

Expect the usual response.

[PVH]

Originally Posted by Stroopy121

My band has decided to start looking into booking a tour round the UK. Anyone have any advice, or words of wisdom as to where to start and the best way to go about it?

You need to ask yourselves a few harsh questions first.

A: Can you afford to go on tour around the UK? You cant guarentee a good pay everynight on tour and you could be looking at big losses, with van rental, driver fee (optional), fuel, food, somewhere to stay (optional) it can be hard to break even on a £70-£100 nightly fee. And your average no named out of town band cant command these fee's.

B: Is your band mentally strong enough? When you are on tour you have to deal with the fact that you could potentially play everynight to no-one, or to people who wont give you any time of day what so ever. Is your band strong enough to cope when you get home after possibly everyone thinking you are properly shit everynight?

C: Do you have a decent backline that you are willing to share for X amount of nights everynight on tour? Touring bands generally provide the drum kit and guitar cabs etc...so are you ok with everyband using these things?

D: What credibilty does your band have? Have you played in your local area with major touring acts before? If not, then bookers are going to be sceptical on why you havent, if your not good enough to be getting good support slots at home, IMO you are not good enough to be doing your own tour.

E: Do you think you can cope with bastard promoters? Ones that wont pay you and dont give you somewhere to sleep? Sleeping in a van is pyshically and mentally tiring, could you deal with this maybe everynight on tour?

If you feel you can deal with all this, then do it, because touring is fucking fun.

Best of luck.

Oh and you dont really need an agent, places like Myspace can help you get gigs pretty easily these days.

[RossP]

Well played Hines, fantastic advice.

Also, if you do go on tour; local swimming pools are your best friend. As you can buy a Health pass for around £3-5 which means you can go in the steam room/sauna/jacuzzi/wave machine/flumes etc etc which is a great/healthy way to spend 2 hours in a strange city without spending a stupid amount of money.

We did a 2week UK tour in April, and we were swimming every day to recover from the previous night.

Oh, and Baby Wipes are essential.

[GraemeC]

Yeah.....what they ^ said...

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