[Ramshackles]

Here is a little dilemma we've found ourselves in.
Our band has been practicing ferociously in anticipation of gigs. We got contacted by a new venue owner via a 'search for musicians' website (we need a drummer ):

' Love your sound, I'm taking over the lease of venue next week and am looking for bands, interested?'

'Sure' we say, thinking that a nice little unknown venue is what we need for a first gig; 'But give us another month of practicing'.

The venue owner writes back saying:
'Lovely, please send contact details and your price'
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PRICE ?!

I haven't gigged since I was 16/17 but back then the payment was pizza and perhaps free drinks. And we had to guarantee that we would bring in 25 people or so....

So...what price should we ask for?
There are 5 of us in the band so far....

[Boydie]

It deoends on area but for a general pub I think you are looking at around £200 - £300

Larger pubs / venues £300 - £500

Functions can go from £300 - £1,000s +

Weddings are usually more £700+

The thing to bear in mind with pubs is that it is tough times for them at the moment so price will be more of a "business decision" than a "quality" decision

A crap band that brings in loads of "fans" that drink all night will be better for a pub than a really tight band that doesn't bring anyone

If you can come up with some clever marketing ideas - "we will promote the night ourselves by..." you may give the venue more confidence and you can up the price a little

The other model is for the pub to sell tickets for the event where the band gets the "on the door" money and the pub makes on the drinks - I dont like this model as it limits the crowd so neither party really wins

If you are starting out I would suggest pitching at around £150 - £200 as an "introductory offer" and then you can negotiate for a string of gigs - e.g. "our normal price is ####, but if you commit to 4 bookings we will do them for ####"

You could even offer a "freebie" to try it out if the venue was undecided but it looks line you have already made the sale!

Are these the kind of figures you were thinking?

Ultimately you need to decide what makes it worth it

I still really enjoy playing live and as long as I get a few pints of Fosters and a kebab anything else is a bonus!!!


Finally, if yiu ever get challenged on price you can always use the following:

"Gets a quote for 5 plumbers to turn up from 7pm 'till midnight and we will charge half of that!!!" 

[Ramshackles]

Thanks for the reply Boydie. This is a general pub place, I think...
Those prices are a lot more than I initially thought!!

I do have some qualms about this though as we are definitely not your typical 'pub rock' band. We dont really do covers, and we have so far a fairly small collection of original stuff (10 songs or so).

So...are your estimates based on a band turning up at say 8 and playing all night?

I figured before answering the nice lady with a price I should ask her:
- How long are we expected to play for
- What kind of gear do you have (i'd rather not have to go to the trouble of hiring a PA and finding a sound engineer...or I'd like to know if I have to do that!)...

[James Nighthawk]

The prices Boydie has given are for your standard Pub covers band. On for an hour and half, break, back for another hour or so.

As an originals artist you may have to play the game differently.

The gig I did recently, and a few I am looking into going forward, pay per person through the door. On multiheader nights they ask at the door whom the ticket buyer is there to see, and they tally up the results. You get YOUR cut off the door that way.

As my last gig was last minute booking I earned £20 lol. Covered the petrol I suppose  At least with that gig there was a sound guy on hand, all gear provided. I just turned up with my guitar and played!

If you are expected to provide PA and all gear, you should be expected to charge more, naturally.

You may want to PM some of the members on here that gig more regularly (estreet is one) for some more opinions 

[Boydie]

Yeah, I am referring to a pub band playing for the evening

We do play covers and this is where "art meets business"

I would say that 99% of the punters want to hear covers so if you have 10 originals I would suggest bulking this out with some covers to get a halkf decent set - if you are playing al night you want at least 40 or so songs

We usually play from around 8pm to midnight - but have gone 'till 2am if the crowd are up for it but we have been together for over 15 years so have enough material to play for days on end!!!!

If you want to play exclusively original material and are not a typical pub band you will be hard pushed to get a regular booking without bringing a huge crowd (unless the pub is a "muso" pub expecting original material)

Taking all of this in to account I would suggest going back with an initial price of say £50 to cover costs and then see how well it goes

The aim of the game is to get a REGULAR booking - any band can go in and negotiate a high price for a one off gig that flops to never play there again

The key is to negotiate a price where everyone is happy so you can get a regular slot

You could use the opportunity as a free rehearsal / tester and offer freebie - although you have already been asked for a price so it would be daft not to get something out of it

I think the £50 mark would be fair as a starting point, taking in to account your concerns

It would tick my "Fosters & kebab" minimum!

[estreet]

I have a foot in both camps, so to speak:  I play in several rock covers bands and I also have a band playing all my own original material. It does vary from area to area for sure, but I would say that Boydie's estimates are a bit high compared to what you can pull around here (Dorset/Hants), where I can't imagine any pub of any size paying anyone £500. Although I agree with his prices for functions, clubs and weddings, here you are looking at £180 - £240 in any pub - although the wine bars will pay a little more.

The venue doesn't really care whether you play covers or originals as long as there's a crowd, but if you play originals and there isn't any punters they will probably blame it on you playing stuff people don't know - so you'd better get family and friends to fill the place. Also, if you go out touting for gigs in various venues, you will find it hard to sell them an original band unless you can convince them you will have people there. I do find this varies from town to town though - Bournemouth is definitely not arty, whereas you can get more interest in that kind of gig in Salisbury or Winchester.

Ten songs is obviously not enough, because the venue will expect at least 2x45m sets. When my own originals band didn't have enough material, we used a support act to play a 45m set before we played an hour. We picked them mostly from what we'd enjoyed at local open-mic nights and I rather liked that situation. However, you will get the people who come to see you moaning about having to wait for your set: as we gigged more and more, people cottoned on to us playing later and arrived later to miss the support slots, which was rather uncharitable in my opinion. In the end I wrote a few more songs and we did four covers to make up 2x45m on our own. The covers we did were pretty obscure and were by artists that often inspired my own stuff, so there was no clash between originals and covers. It wasn't like we were 'selling out' and playing Mustang Sally ...lol.

The bottom line for your situation is this in my opinion: say you will do the first one for £150 subject to review if it's successful. Learn a few fitting covers so that you have at least an hour to play and use a support solo/duo acoustic act (keeps the gear simple). Most venues will expect you to bring your own PA and to be honest, we do if even if they don't - because we want control of our own sound. There's no need to get involved with mic'ing up drums in a small venue - just have a nice, clear little setup for voices and acoustic instruments. A really compact and effective system that is used by many - including all our bands - is one of the Yamaha mixer amps and a pair of Peavey Impulse speakers. Costs less than a grand and will serve you extremely well for donkey's years.

[Boydie]

I think the support act idea is a good one - it also increases the chance of getting a bigger crowd with the friends & family of a support act

Finding a "new" act from an open mic is a great idea but I would add a word of caution...

A new act, especially a younger one, is likely to pull in lots of people, especially if it is one of their first gigs

In this situation they will bring mums, dads, grannies, uncles, friends from school etc.

There is a danger the opposite will happen of what estreet mentioned - where the crowd that came to see the support act leave in the break before you play! Which wouldn't look too good (I have seen this happen more than once)


The prices I quote are North Kent, London & Essex so I guess the "going rate" is a little higher - and we are quite established so slightly lower would be acceptable and I would agree with the £150 figure

Good luck and let us know how you get on!

[estreet]

I think the support act idea is a good one - it also increases the chance of getting a bigger crowd with the friends & family of a support act

Finding a "new" act from an open mic is a great idea but I would add a word of caution...

A new act, especially a younger one, is likely to pull in lots of people, especially if it is one of their first gigs

In this situation they will bring mums, dads, grannies, uncles, friends from school etc.

There is a danger the opposite will happen of what estreet mentioned - where the crowd that came to see the support act leave in the break before you play! Which wouldn't look too good (I have seen this happen more than once)

Yeah, that is a good point. You need to pick your act wisely.

[Ramshackles]

Decided to go with total honesty first.

We dont want to be a pub rock band, we arent gonna play meaningless covers for hours on end. I asked how long we would be expected to play for, if she has any equipment and exactly what kind of venue she is planning it to be.

I explained what we do, who we are and what kind of gigs we are expecting...so we will see what she says.

We have no shortage of offers for dedicated music venues (i.e. where you are expected to put in a 30-60min set of originals, own engineer etc..) but this is the only one that upfront offered to pay us

but we can bide our time and choose the right gigs if need be...

[estreet]

I don't think anyone was suggesting that you do meaningless covers for hours on end or that you try to be a pub rock band. The gigs that we do with the original band are as different as chalk from cheese to the cover gigs. Nonetheless I don't think that even in a 90% original band that the odd cover is automatically meaningless if it comes from a source that underpins and informs your own work. Like when Dylan covered Woody Gutherie songs or when Tom Waits or Nick Cave cover 'John The Revealator', it can give an extra dimension and sense of context to your performance. When we do a full gig (2x45m) with Eden, we play two to four covers none of which were already familiar to our audience - but I get a kick out of bringing what I think are truly great songs to people's attention.

[Ramshackles]

I don't think anyone was suggesting that you do meaningless covers for hours on end or that you try to be a pub rock band. The gigs that we do with the original band are as different as chalk from cheese to the cover gigs. Nonetheless I don't think that even in a 90% original band that the odd cover is automatically meaningless if it comes from a source that underpins and informs your own work. Like when Dylan covered Woody Gutherie songs or when Tom Waits or Nick Cave cover 'John The Revealator', it can give an extra dimension and sense of context to your performance. When we do a full gig (2x45m) with Eden, we play two to four covers none of which were already familiar to our audience - but I get a kick out of bringing what I think are truly great songs to people's attention.

Sorry, wasnt knocking covers at all. We rehearse 2 or 3 we think fit in well and there are some excellent covers out there (Bon Ivers version of Come Talk to Me by Peter Gabriel for one). It was more out loud thinking of what she might be expecting from a band and the kind of pub rock you generally see in...pubs...

I just thought it is best to be totally sure. Our music is probably more suited to dedicated venues or more intimate cafes. The last thing I want to do is turn up and she is expecting something totally different...We want to market ourselves to the right crowd