Si the Sigh
27-09-2005, 11:09 AM
This was posted by Aaron (The Enticer) on the Faction board this week, its referring to a gabber / breakcore night but I think a lot of it makes sense when applied to any type of club.
WARNING! THIS IS A BIG POST! IF YOU HAVENT GOT THE TIME OR THE ATTENTION SPAN GIVE UP NOW!
Also, I'd like to point out I am posting this just as a read and I do NOT 100% agree with everything thats been written. I just thought it was an interesting read.
Some of you guys need to take a look at what you're saying, and why you're getting involved. I'm not going to point the finger this time, but certain comments are worrying me. For example, Techno's involvement. I honestly don't see the point. I don't really know the ins and outs and the full scale of what's available, but there already seems to be a lot of nights available. As far as I can gather, the whole point of doing a night like S.C.U.M. was to offer something in the North West that's been missing for too long. It's not about self promotion, that kind of me, me, me attitude is what's caused most of the problems to begin with. Also the bickering between camps involved, although not particularly harsh, it's going to start creating bigger divides than you've already got, particularly if it seems one group is getting it more their own way. It's all good joining forces, but too many cooks ya know. If there has to be so many people involved, you need to find a happy medium. Pick a DJ/Artist each maybe, although that probably won't work because everyone’s going to want their headliner so it would end up far too expensive. Probably the fairest thing to do would be each camp, pick a headliner each, put it on a scrap of paper, and do a lotto. Pick two from the selection on offer, and to make it fair, the people whose choice wasn't picked, get to play the role of resident/undercard on the night. Then the next night you swap round. This way the gamble you make has no selfish connotation. You want to see someone play on the night, then you don't get to play. There needs to be a certain level of sacrifice to make this work. Team work! You've also got to be careful who you're selecting. Build some kind of database of artists, it's no good just picking someone and then finding out you can't really afford them and then start cutting corners on everything else. Make sure each camps headliner charges roughly the same price etc. Find some kind of balance. What will also assist the balance is finding artists everyone is happy with, they’re going to reduce each camp feeling neglected. If two camps agree on one headliner, that means less people to choose from, and more chance each camp will get at least one of their picks on the night.
You also need to be careful who you're booking. On paper it may look safe because you know they pull a crowd, but bringing in the same people over and over assists nobody, it just builds hierarchies, again, another very prominent problem this scene has suffered from in the past. And now things are different anyway, it's too late for the easy option, the easy options been and gone with that whole Trance and Rave bullshit. Show some balls, give people a proper a selection of the experimental music which you're supposed to have been so bowled over by you're all hating on Frenchore now. Of course there's a risk involved, but even playing it safe comes with a risk. You may as well go all out and gauge your response. For all the years certain promoters have said they can't accomplish this and that, how do we actually know? Most of the negativity I've seen in regard to this has been from people who are more interested in running a business, not offering something different. You need to listen to your heart more and ignore the bullshit logic all our brains are prone to. You may be shocked at the results.
In addition to building up the database of names and prices, start doing some mailouts looking for interested artists who are going to be in the area at the time, cheap options. The mail I get from the gabber list is sporadic, but there's people visiting the UK all the time. Perfect example, Andreas (Sunjammer) & Anders came over a few months back on holiday and didn't play out anywhere. Sort out your dates and book them. Use all the other forums available, C8, Gabber.org, Planet-Mu, blah blah, find out who's where and planning what. It's not just about who you want and then whether you can afford them, it's also about who's worth booking and will be cheap. Tours have become the cool thing these days, everyone wants to be a laptop rockstar so take advantage of that. In addition, as you're questioning artists and finding out what their plans are, build as many ties with other open minded groups. As an example, a few days ago I got mail from some Spanish dudes offering to take me over there if I could get them a booking in return here. See who else does shit like that, people you maybe want to book. Say for example, the Breakcore Gives Me Wood guys, or the Peace Off camp etc. You build a proper community group, you have selected delegates, you have people who take a back seat and just do donkey work. There's a lot of people who just like being involved, they don't have to be super important, they don't want to play at every night, if at all.
Another possibility, which I'm not sure about but could maybe work (it kind of means the night has to be on a Saturday, but I'll suggest it anyway), is expanding the community aspect and running some kind of workshop thing in addition to the main night of music. Through the day, get a hall somewhere, and do some stuff, be creative. Get the artists you plan on playing in earlier and have them attend, maybe making music there, showing how they plan on playing out later on maybe. Give the music a face. That's always been the downside to things of a more experimental nature, especially electronic, you're just guys in a club standing behind decks or a laptop most of the time. You hear Hardcore for the first time, it can be challenging, and without people you can identify with, without realising artists making and performing this shit are influenced by so much more than just Bang Bang Bang, you can be turned off pretty quickly. Stop that happening. Run webcasts prior to the event to give people an idea of what's going to get played on the night, don't give them any excuses. Maybe get local artists, fashion kiddies and video artists in to showcase work at the workshop and also decorate/VJ/model on the night. Expand the collective concept. Eventually you can build a product. Products sell. Just be careful how far you go with product idea, you want to break even, at best make a little profit, just remember that you aren't creating an empire here. But yeah, don't just have printed on mass hoodies and t-shirts, have limited edition runs made by the people within this extended collective. A product, promotional material, and something that's pretty damn cool all in one.
Run a CD-R label. They're cheap and awesome promotion. Every single artist out there has spare tracks. Give them something in return, a booking for example, maybe they'll let you put one out. Build a compilation for each night you do. If you're doing them every few months this should give you enough time. Eventually you build up a catalogue, and as long as you're booking good people, you should be offering something that people want but can only get if they come to your night. It's going to cost you like £20 for 200 CD's, share the responsibility of burning and printing (I'd suggest spraying the CD's a single colour and then stencilling them, it's easy, cheap and looks cool). It's amazing how effective little personal touches are. You want to build up some kind of uniform, something you can be identified by. Your flyers, the CD-R, any other promotional material you use. Make sure everything is catalogued as well. The next S.C.U.M. is #002. The flyer for it is #003. The CD-R you give away is #004. The t-shirts you print are #005, etc. Keep pushing the fact if you don't come you lose out in peoples faces. You need to be aggressive.
Once the night is over, exploit the online aspect. Make sure you record every single set. Someone doing a PA may not be very comfortable with the recording being on your site, but if you front the hosting charges and let them use the set on their own site, maybe using a lower bitrate so they don't feel ripped off, and they'll be less likely to say no. Spam boards with the audio and any video you've collected. It's probably best to also make this member only, get something in return and show people what they missed while expanding your community base. There needs to be a forum like this somewhere. This is near perfect if it wasn't for Faction being seen as king of the castle. There needs to be no favouritism, just a central database of information basically. A community built up of smaller communities. You can hawk your promotional material online, you can link directly to the artists you will have playing, you can assist them sell their product through the free advertising, you can do your webcasts here, run exclusive online promotions, blah blah, the possibilities when it comes to online interaction these days are almost endless.
Most of this stuff is all obvious and just a matter of logic, but it's also about pre-planning. Every single detail should be researched, every possibility. This scene has always had a pretty bad D.I.Y. quality to it, like everything’s thrown together at the last minute. You'll still be doing it all yourselves, but it doesn't have to be a botch job if you do your research and are well prepared. It’s no point just deciding, ok, in a couple of months we’ll do the night. Give yourself plenty of time to get everything well prepared. I don’t think I’ve seen a single site for a night that has ever been finished, they’re always partially complete or a running project. This screams after thought. Make sure there’s rock solid foundations, in every aspect, ‘cause if you're going to end up failing it may as well be spectacularly, where you had every base covered, 'cause then there's no excuses, you can pack it in and say it wasn't your fault. Fail feeling content, don't fail knowing you didn't put 100% into it.
WARNING! THIS IS A BIG POST! IF YOU HAVENT GOT THE TIME OR THE ATTENTION SPAN GIVE UP NOW!
Also, I'd like to point out I am posting this just as a read and I do NOT 100% agree with everything thats been written. I just thought it was an interesting read.
Some of you guys need to take a look at what you're saying, and why you're getting involved. I'm not going to point the finger this time, but certain comments are worrying me. For example, Techno's involvement. I honestly don't see the point. I don't really know the ins and outs and the full scale of what's available, but there already seems to be a lot of nights available. As far as I can gather, the whole point of doing a night like S.C.U.M. was to offer something in the North West that's been missing for too long. It's not about self promotion, that kind of me, me, me attitude is what's caused most of the problems to begin with. Also the bickering between camps involved, although not particularly harsh, it's going to start creating bigger divides than you've already got, particularly if it seems one group is getting it more their own way. It's all good joining forces, but too many cooks ya know. If there has to be so many people involved, you need to find a happy medium. Pick a DJ/Artist each maybe, although that probably won't work because everyone’s going to want their headliner so it would end up far too expensive. Probably the fairest thing to do would be each camp, pick a headliner each, put it on a scrap of paper, and do a lotto. Pick two from the selection on offer, and to make it fair, the people whose choice wasn't picked, get to play the role of resident/undercard on the night. Then the next night you swap round. This way the gamble you make has no selfish connotation. You want to see someone play on the night, then you don't get to play. There needs to be a certain level of sacrifice to make this work. Team work! You've also got to be careful who you're selecting. Build some kind of database of artists, it's no good just picking someone and then finding out you can't really afford them and then start cutting corners on everything else. Make sure each camps headliner charges roughly the same price etc. Find some kind of balance. What will also assist the balance is finding artists everyone is happy with, they’re going to reduce each camp feeling neglected. If two camps agree on one headliner, that means less people to choose from, and more chance each camp will get at least one of their picks on the night.
You also need to be careful who you're booking. On paper it may look safe because you know they pull a crowd, but bringing in the same people over and over assists nobody, it just builds hierarchies, again, another very prominent problem this scene has suffered from in the past. And now things are different anyway, it's too late for the easy option, the easy options been and gone with that whole Trance and Rave bullshit. Show some balls, give people a proper a selection of the experimental music which you're supposed to have been so bowled over by you're all hating on Frenchore now. Of course there's a risk involved, but even playing it safe comes with a risk. You may as well go all out and gauge your response. For all the years certain promoters have said they can't accomplish this and that, how do we actually know? Most of the negativity I've seen in regard to this has been from people who are more interested in running a business, not offering something different. You need to listen to your heart more and ignore the bullshit logic all our brains are prone to. You may be shocked at the results.
In addition to building up the database of names and prices, start doing some mailouts looking for interested artists who are going to be in the area at the time, cheap options. The mail I get from the gabber list is sporadic, but there's people visiting the UK all the time. Perfect example, Andreas (Sunjammer) & Anders came over a few months back on holiday and didn't play out anywhere. Sort out your dates and book them. Use all the other forums available, C8, Gabber.org, Planet-Mu, blah blah, find out who's where and planning what. It's not just about who you want and then whether you can afford them, it's also about who's worth booking and will be cheap. Tours have become the cool thing these days, everyone wants to be a laptop rockstar so take advantage of that. In addition, as you're questioning artists and finding out what their plans are, build as many ties with other open minded groups. As an example, a few days ago I got mail from some Spanish dudes offering to take me over there if I could get them a booking in return here. See who else does shit like that, people you maybe want to book. Say for example, the Breakcore Gives Me Wood guys, or the Peace Off camp etc. You build a proper community group, you have selected delegates, you have people who take a back seat and just do donkey work. There's a lot of people who just like being involved, they don't have to be super important, they don't want to play at every night, if at all.
Another possibility, which I'm not sure about but could maybe work (it kind of means the night has to be on a Saturday, but I'll suggest it anyway), is expanding the community aspect and running some kind of workshop thing in addition to the main night of music. Through the day, get a hall somewhere, and do some stuff, be creative. Get the artists you plan on playing in earlier and have them attend, maybe making music there, showing how they plan on playing out later on maybe. Give the music a face. That's always been the downside to things of a more experimental nature, especially electronic, you're just guys in a club standing behind decks or a laptop most of the time. You hear Hardcore for the first time, it can be challenging, and without people you can identify with, without realising artists making and performing this shit are influenced by so much more than just Bang Bang Bang, you can be turned off pretty quickly. Stop that happening. Run webcasts prior to the event to give people an idea of what's going to get played on the night, don't give them any excuses. Maybe get local artists, fashion kiddies and video artists in to showcase work at the workshop and also decorate/VJ/model on the night. Expand the collective concept. Eventually you can build a product. Products sell. Just be careful how far you go with product idea, you want to break even, at best make a little profit, just remember that you aren't creating an empire here. But yeah, don't just have printed on mass hoodies and t-shirts, have limited edition runs made by the people within this extended collective. A product, promotional material, and something that's pretty damn cool all in one.
Run a CD-R label. They're cheap and awesome promotion. Every single artist out there has spare tracks. Give them something in return, a booking for example, maybe they'll let you put one out. Build a compilation for each night you do. If you're doing them every few months this should give you enough time. Eventually you build up a catalogue, and as long as you're booking good people, you should be offering something that people want but can only get if they come to your night. It's going to cost you like £20 for 200 CD's, share the responsibility of burning and printing (I'd suggest spraying the CD's a single colour and then stencilling them, it's easy, cheap and looks cool). It's amazing how effective little personal touches are. You want to build up some kind of uniform, something you can be identified by. Your flyers, the CD-R, any other promotional material you use. Make sure everything is catalogued as well. The next S.C.U.M. is #002. The flyer for it is #003. The CD-R you give away is #004. The t-shirts you print are #005, etc. Keep pushing the fact if you don't come you lose out in peoples faces. You need to be aggressive.
Once the night is over, exploit the online aspect. Make sure you record every single set. Someone doing a PA may not be very comfortable with the recording being on your site, but if you front the hosting charges and let them use the set on their own site, maybe using a lower bitrate so they don't feel ripped off, and they'll be less likely to say no. Spam boards with the audio and any video you've collected. It's probably best to also make this member only, get something in return and show people what they missed while expanding your community base. There needs to be a forum like this somewhere. This is near perfect if it wasn't for Faction being seen as king of the castle. There needs to be no favouritism, just a central database of information basically. A community built up of smaller communities. You can hawk your promotional material online, you can link directly to the artists you will have playing, you can assist them sell their product through the free advertising, you can do your webcasts here, run exclusive online promotions, blah blah, the possibilities when it comes to online interaction these days are almost endless.
Most of this stuff is all obvious and just a matter of logic, but it's also about pre-planning. Every single detail should be researched, every possibility. This scene has always had a pretty bad D.I.Y. quality to it, like everything’s thrown together at the last minute. You'll still be doing it all yourselves, but it doesn't have to be a botch job if you do your research and are well prepared. It’s no point just deciding, ok, in a couple of months we’ll do the night. Give yourself plenty of time to get everything well prepared. I don’t think I’ve seen a single site for a night that has ever been finished, they’re always partially complete or a running project. This screams after thought. Make sure there’s rock solid foundations, in every aspect, ‘cause if you're going to end up failing it may as well be spectacularly, where you had every base covered, 'cause then there's no excuses, you can pack it in and say it wasn't your fault. Fail feeling content, don't fail knowing you didn't put 100% into it.