Sure, I know of a lot of friends' bands who have gone on tour with bands, playing venues ranging in size from The Tunnels to The Music Hall and even bigger. None of these were support-slots-for-hire. Obviously, I don't know every single band in the world's workings, but I think it's fairly safe to say that paying-to-support is in the minority, and certainly not anywhere near 90%. It's probably even safer to say that this type of deal is only prevalent in 'pop' tours (I'm talking about X Factor, boy bands, etc...) and package tours. In the vast majority of cases, support will be decided on one or a number of the following; - member(s) of headline band like/know support band personally. - member(s) of headline band's management, booking agency, etc, like/know band personally. - support band is on same record label / management company / booking agency as headline band. - headline band can't quite sell out venues on their own, and so choose support band (at least partly) on the knowledge that they will be able to bring in 50 or so people on the strength of their name alone. Right now, record companies do not have enough money to provide tour support for their bands, let alone pay to even do the tour in the first place!!!