Okay, we’ve come a long way with the “you’re actually going to play a gig” angle. We’ve talked about your set list, gear, transportation, advertising and getting your friends to help out for free. We’ve even talked about selling merchandise and building up a mailing list. Now I guess it’s time to start thinking about playing in the next town. Making that jump is tough, but if you want to get anywhere you’re going to have to do it sooner or later. (No, I’m not talking about getting record company people to see your band. I’m referring to the fact that guitar music is live music, and it’s up to you to bring it to the people-they’re not going to come to you.)
I’ve already mentioned in this column that when it comes to getting gigs, your most important tool, apart from having a good demo, is networking-communicating with people, and that means trying to meet everybody you can and building up contacts. For example, if you live in Chicago and you meet some kids at a show who are from Milwaukee (90 miles away), you could ask them for names of good places to play there and maybe swap phone numbers and addresses. See if you can get them to send you the local entertainment papers. Then, you can start contacting clubs and sending them your demo package. This will cost you money. Get used to it.
f you’re lucky enough to live near an alternative book or record store, go take a look. I’ve seen plenty of magazines and even books about booking your own gigs. There’s also a whole underground network of fanzines out there-people all over the world interviewing bands, reviewing gigs, albums and demos. Usually, when you buy one of these, it will have a listing of other similar fanzines.
Send your demo tape to these people. Tell whomever you’ve found that you might want to tour, and ask if they can help you out. We used to do this all the time. Our old booking agent, Sean Yseult, would call fanzine editors and ask where we could play in their town and also if they could think of a place for us to stay the night of the gig. We’d tell ’em, “Hey, we aren’t axe murderers. Can we stay at your house?” I’m not saying that because someone is a fanzine editor their house is automatically your bed and breakfast, but we’ve slept on the floors of quite a few of these people’s homes.
Now that I think about it, there’s all kinds of information right here on the Internet. There’s so much stuff out there that I haven’t even begun to scratch the surface as far as what’s available, but if you go looking on the Internet, I bet you’ll find something. Speaking of the Internet, it’s another great tool for getting gigs or even finding people to play with. You just have to be resourceful. Thanks to E-mail, people are now able to book whole tours without picking up a phone.
There are some websites out there that are specifically aimed at helping the D.I.Y. band. Here’s one to help you get started: The address is www.inyoureye.com and it consists of two parts. The first is a fanzine type of thing consisting of interviews, articles and features by and about players and bands who have done or are doing music in a do-it-yourself way. There are also pieces about booking shows, dealing with record labels, etc. The second part is a comprehensive database that contains booking contacts (established clubs and smaller promoters, too), press contacts and college radio contacts. And, to help you through it, the site is designed so you’ll be able to search and cross-reference information by musical genre, geographic region, venue capacity, etc. All right kids…get on-line and get in the van!
Last issue we learned the first four bars of my “Super Charger Heaven” [Astro Creep 2000…] intro solo. This month we’re gonna look at the second half of it. As you can see from FIGURE 1, it can be broken down into three distinct little phrases. Phrase 1 is identical to a phrase that is played twice in the first half of the solo while Phrase 2 is the same thing, but a beat longer. We then finish up with Phrase 3, a typical, rockabilly-like chord thing at the 14th fret. This is a funny kind of a chord-by itself it sounds really major and happy, but in the context of the song, it works completely differently.
We’ll do some more Chuck Berry “spy” soloing from “Super Charger Heaven” next issue and we’ll talk about choosing between touring and eating.
