Yada yada, Valentine’s Day… It’s a long way to the top if you wanna rock n roll so let’s get down to business. You got a great band together, ready to take on the world, one problem… No one’s heard of you. It’s time to book some shows but you’re still a musician and likely an insecure extrovert with no phone or clerical skills? Am I right? Well work on changing that but first here’s everything you need to know to start booking your band. It is easy. It doesn’t take much time. And again, IT IS EASY! Let’s get some of the myths out of the way.

First: You do not need a booking agent. The day will come I promise but not yet. Too many bands use this as an excuse to not book shows themselves or treat their music careers seriously. Stop waiting for your team to magically assemble and instead whoop some butt yourself… might even learn a thing or two about your industry.

Second: Do NOT make up a fake name/email account to book shows. I see insecure artists do this all the time and it’s a no-no! Entry level venues expect you to self-book and you’d be better getting over your fear, making some new friends, and booking honestly.

Third: DO NOT LIE! Not about anything. Not about where you played, how long you’ve been together, airplay, tours, NOTHING! Use your words creatively to put your best foot forward but keep it truthful. Few people are impressed by name dropping and it tends to show that you’re green rather than experienced.

Avoid those 3 mistakes and you’ll be starting stronger than most so let’s get on with how to skin this horse. Read our post on what you need to get your music career started HERE. You don’t need ALL of those things to start booking but it helps. You do however need a recording of your song and that’s it really it. Entry level venues usually don’t care much about your talent level so much as your ability to string notes together without killing their bartenders. YOU make yourself stand out with attendance and performance so now that you have a recording it’s time to make a plan.

Are you going to carefully plan 5 well timed shows a year to really show off your draw or are you going to try and play as many shows/venues as you can? Pros and cons to each but my suggestion to starting bands is the latter. Smash the hell out every show you can, my band The Offbeats played 100 shows a year for our first 2 years without ever having to leave Southern California. What this did was create a wide audience base for us. We hit the BIG name venues and the small-time dive bars, art shows, and city events. We played everything that had a pulse, even if it was a weak pulse, creating a wake of new friends and fans that each in turn have helped spread our music. Once you have a fan base, REAL sales, then you can start being more selective but right now think of your music as a virus and you need to spread it in as many places as possible if you wish your zombie horde to grow.

First pick a few spots that are appropriate for your genre – coffee houses if you are still solo acoustic, bars if you’re a band, post-apocalyptic warehouses if you’re a metal band, etc. Fastest way to book your show is usually to go to the venues website, most have specific instructions on how they prefer to be contacted about bookings. Alter from this at your own peril! Most places will not even consider booking your music if you can’t follow those simple instructions that help keep the bookers life more organized (there is no shortage of musicians so respect people’s time).

After you follow their instructions you will have emailed them a link to your song and usually a VERY brief introduction such as:

Hi,

I’m Byron Blocker and I’m interested in performing at Portfolio Coffeehouse. I sound like Tom waits playing jazz on an acoustic guitar. You can check out my music, bio, and more at the website below, thank you.

-Byron

Easy as that, definitely use your own words but keep it brief, to the point, and free of adjectives about how amazingly superlatively awesome you are. If you don’t have a media quote yet then don’t be the first one to say how great you are, earn it!

I suggest when you get started to only send out a few of these a week. People who carpet bomb local bookers usually burn bridges, many of these kats book for multiple places and they don’t appreciate seeing you book everything under the sun. DO book everything under the sun but don’t be a weenie – if you can swing a show every other week at the start then you’re doing well. Ramp up as you understand the process and business behind it more. For now pick a few spots a week and start introducing yourself, it may take a week for some of them to hit you back, some won’t even respond to your submission but this ain’t the old days and most places do not like follow up contacts for at least 2 weeks… so be patient young grasshoppa!

Having trouble thinking of venues? No worries, hop over to yelp.com, pick an area, and search live music. That’s an easy place to start but better than that is to actually care about your local music scene. Figure out who the good bands are and who are the crappy bands? Pay attention to where they book, no foul checking out where your friends are playing but GO BE THEIR FRIENDS! Go to that bands show, say hi, make connections. Don’t straight-up poach tour stops but do pay attention to your scene enough to learn where the kool kids hang out and where the burn out, going-nowhere bands play to an empty house… Trust me you want to skip those venues entirely if you can.

I hope this has given you a kick in the pants to start booking, it’s not scary probably just a bit foreign to you so dive in. Let me know if you have any questions you can email me at Byron@SoCalRecords.com

-Byron