Economics of Touring Metal Bands

[ArtDecade]

bands need to form guilds ( not unions) like craftsmen in the days of yore and have an enforcement arrn like the Templars to keep venues and promoters in line by locking out their access to talent. divided we fall. e pluribus unum

Metallica starts a line of Metallica swords.

 

[ShredmasterD]

Metallica starts a line of Metallica swords.

and Metallica branded methril for the brawls sure to ensue

 

[warhead]

Last year I discovered a band called It Dies Today, they became one of my favourite bands but they "retired" a long time ago and I thought I would never see them live. Until just a couple of days ago when they said they would be playing Furnace Fest 2023. I seriously considered going from Spain but then I saw that only the plane tickets cost around 1200€. If it was way cheaper I would definetly go and they weren't a huge band, so it's not such a crazy idea...

I really wish I was wrong. But the question would be, how many times would you do a thing like that, and for how many bands? And still, you're mentioning a festival, not a home town gig of a small band. That is a totally different thing, off course people travel for festivals.

 

[budda]

Short version: expect $20-$100 per show for the whole band. Expect to pay $50+ day in fuel (probably $80 now?) for travel. All band costs out of band members pockets including printing merch and music. Expect to spend way more than you make as a band and do it because you love making and performing music. It is an expense.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

It's like any hobby. You lose money unless you're damn good or in the right place at the right time, often both.

 

[sleewell]

When gas was .75 cents a gallon and rent was 1/4 what is now and people make about the same its a shock they used to have more disposable income to spend at concerts.

Heck even just basics like milk, eggs, and bread are like 4x as expensive as they were 2 years ago.

Record labels used to help bands tour but streaming put a huge dent in album sales so that isnt the same as it was either.

 

[budda]

Record labels used to put money up front to be paid back. Smart band managers used that to tour. Labels are there to make money, not always actually help bands. Cant say how it looked in 2022 but i know established bands cancelled tours.

 

[McDefLau]

If I understand their story correctly they were touring last summer in Europe. To me it sounds like a lot of bad planning (they were TOLD hotels cost 60 euro a night, didn`t check or book beforehand apparantly) and a lot of bad luck. All the large metal bands were on tour here this summer, people went to see them and didn`t care much for the smaller bands. Gas prices were exploding due to the war in Ukraine, you could see that coming. Hotels were also overbooked because everyone had the chance to go on vacation after the pandemic and the cheaper ones always sell out faster.
All in all, the band expected too much i think...

 

[Lozek]

The other thing to understand is that all the peripheral related businesses that suffered during Covid are now also trying to recover. A tour bus that used to cost €20,000 for three weeks now costs €35000, and you'll be lucky if you can find one because so many companys went out of business/all the re-scheduled tour dates have them booked out. The same goes for lighting hire, audio hire, lots of crew re-trained when they couldn't work and have found the more stable lifestyle to be better for them.

Some countries are also finding that customers are reluctant to come back to live music, meaning even more un-predictability with recouping up-front costs.

 

[wheresthefbomb]

something about BTBAM eating ramen noodles

and that was pre-covid

it's all about planning and expectations, Steve Albini does a pretty good common sense breakdown of how to tour and not lose your entire ass as a smaller band. mostly just entails planning where you're playing, how they're paying, and where you're staying. this is likewise pre-covid wisdom, but the basics still apply. it's not all that different from figuring out how you're going to pay all the bills next month.

 

[GunpointMetal]

OK, but the band in the article sounds like they set out to lose money. They were getting hotels and renting shit on a $200/night guarantee? That's just bad business. That's what you do if you're touring the closest three states to home and crashing on opener's floors and shit, not fly to Europe and go out on the road for six weeks. The thing is, bands that nobody has heard of EXPECT to lose money when they go out on tours early in the band's existence and they plan the tour with that in mind. It is a lot harder to make money playing music live, especially as a band in a niche of a niche, but if you're realistic with yourself you can make it work. The band from the article did not set out with realistic expectations. Plan your stops as if you don't expect to sell any merch, plan your food and lodging as if you expect not to get all your guarantees.

 

[ramses]

OK, but the band in the article sounds like they set out to lose money. They were getting hotels and renting shit on a $200/night guarantee? That's just bad business. That's what you do if you're touring the closest three states to home and crashing on opener's floors and shit, not fly to Europe and go out on the road for six weeks. The thing is, bands that nobody has heard of EXPECT to lose money when they go out on tours early in the band's existence and they plan the tour with that in mind. It is a lot harder to make money playing music live, especially as a band in a niche of a niche, but if you're realistic with yourself you can make it work. The band from the article did not set out with realistic expectations. Plan your stops as if you don't expect to sell any merch, plan your food and lodging as if you expect not to get all your guarantees.

It sounds like they did not have a tour manager. Of course, that may have been an expense that they could not afford.

 

[GunpointMetal]

It sounds like they did not have a tour manager. Of course, that may have been an expense that they could not afford.

Most bands nobody has ever heard of don't have ae tour manager.

 

[McDefLau]

All the more reason to do more planning yourself. Thirty years ago not knowing things was a valid excuse, nowadays with internet it`s just lack of effort i would say. (of course combined with some bad luck)

 

[bostjan]

It's like any hobby. You lose money unless you're damn good or in the right place at the right time, often both.

This is true, but there is a greater point to my gripe.

It used to be not only possible, but fairly common for independent bands to turn a profit from touring. It is not only no longer commonplace, but it extremely rare nowadays.

There are also plenty of instances from both recent history and from decades ago, of artists who toured tirelessly and were very popular, but never made any money. So, it's more about getting screwed, and about how virtually every artist is getting screwed now by a larger margin than ever before in our lifetimes.

I never made being a musician my career orientation, but, back in the late 90's and early 2000's, I made more money from doing music than I made waiting tables or working at pawn shops or working in science labs. Even in the mid-2000's, I got a gig playing in a house band at a dive bar, taking home $150/night. Going into the 2008 financial crisis, gigs dried up. Decent paying gigs shifted from bars to private parties in the 2010's, venues for original music often just ceased to exist, and cops really started cracking down on private parties. Leading up to covid, cops started cracking down on bars for having bands, too, and I watched as the people whose bands are members of the Chamber of Commerce started gobbling up all of the few remaining gigs. Covid restrictions pretty much slaughtered live music, and now big name artists are charging $500 for nosebleed seats for their shows. I think this is jsut a sign that the entire music industry from the big bands and stadiums all the way down to garage bands and private parties is in a death spiral.

 

[MaxOfMetal]

This is true, but there is a greater point to my gripe.

It used to be not only possible, but fairly common for independent bands to turn a profit from touring. It is not only no longer commonplace, but it extremely rare nowadays.

There are also plenty of instances from both recent history and from decades ago, of artists who toured tirelessly and were very popular, but never made any money. So, it's more about getting screwed, and about how virtually every artist is getting screwed now by a larger margin than ever before in our lifetimes.

I never made being a musician my career orientation, but, back in the late 90's and early 2000's, I made more money from doing music than I made waiting tables or working at pawn shops or working in science labs. Even in the mid-2000's, I got a gig playing in a house band at a dive bar, taking home $150/night. Going into the 2008 financial crisis, gigs dried up. Decent paying gigs shifted from bars to private parties in the 2010's, venues for original music often just ceased to exist, and cops really started cracking down on private parties. Leading up to covid, cops started cracking down on bars for having bands, too, and I watched as the people whose bands are members of the Chamber of Commerce started gobbling up all of the few remaining gigs. Covid restrictions pretty much slaughtered live music, and now big name artists are charging $500 for nosebleed seats for their shows. I think this is jsut a sign that the entire music industry from the big bands and stadiums all the way down to garage bands and private parties is in a death spiral.

The product just isn't worth what it once was, and there's an endless stream of copycat acts willing to race to the bottom for what's left.

 

[ElRay]

As anyone that read Metal Maniacs in the 90s knows warehouse worker, delivery driver, and jobs that can be put on hold very common for the aspiring metal musician.

That's hits on the solution -- Just be a long-haul trucker and have a solo act. Then your bookings can coincide with the DOT-required rest stops.

 

[AMOS]

If you're from Sweden or Finland you at least have a decent local market.

 

[jonsick]

I said this was going to be where music ended up about ten years ago. As one here said, a bunch of YouTubers making singles. Yes, that is exactly what you're going to have left. Well, that and those making a career using Daddy's money or manufactured "metal" acts conjured up by 50 year olds who study markets and formulas.

We are in a time where the best you can hope for in terms of making it is to get so far and then figure out that you are no longer able to afford to exist. There are opportunities, such as a sold out tour, but to seize those opportunities it will cost you so much despite the sold-out shows that you will be coming home and trying to figure out how to pay off your huge debts or consider filing for bankruptcy. I can instantly think of two bands I know personally who got to exactly that point. And of course once you realise the dream is impossible, the impetus to carry on dissolves like butter in a hot pan.

I would correct myself though; that time started about 8 years ago. Nowadays? It's even harder.

Everyone is recovering from the pandemic. And given music as a whole has been living on borrowed time in terms of existing for many years, well two decades really, the pandemic has only served to kick that forward a little. And no, there will be no recovery.

And whose fault is it? Is it the greedy labels? Is it the greedy promoters? Is it the greedy XYZ? Well, yes they do have parts to play, but ultimately I blame the fans. When fans decided music was free and hit the napsters and limewires of the world, eventually relenting and paying a totally third party company (Spotify) what they should be paying for albums and considering themselves in the clear, sorry they are to blame.

I'm not blameless. I embraced the napster lifestyle for a time. And no, it wasn't OK when I did, but I learned very quickly what a rubbish deal I was getting from scamming bands out of their product. I returned pretty quickly to buying CDs and records (I never left records, their resurgence is just a thing that happened from my perspective).

The fact is, the fans have been the biggest change in music. They ripped the floor out from under the whole thing. The days of Earache taking a random chance on some guy in his basement producing grimey sludgy electronica and calling himself Ultraviolence or Godflesh? Gone. Zip. Outta here.

The chance on there being another most dangerous band in the world a-la Guns N Roses, or universally hated Marilyn Manson'esque figure, or a brutally relentless first release a-la Slipknot's self titled? Thing of the past. Coming up, paying your dues, getting a label to support a release, goneski!

The only people that have half a hope of making it are artists that built some semblance of a brand back when physical media still sold. Behemoth is a great example. Back when I first saw them sometime in the 1990s, they had basic equipment, I saw Nergal himself putting his own amplifier head on the Marshalls they were presumably borrowing from Deicide (headliner). But in these times of labels essentially working with already established brands, that's pretty much the only reason they have the stage production and investment required to do so. They were an established brand, thus pump money in and grow what you have.

If you want to keep doing this and make money at it, form a cover band. Really it's the only way. Theme it if you want to, there are Linkin Park, Nirvana and Pantera cover bands I've seen recently who do a great bang up job and ultimately do what the venues want them to do which is to get people through the door and spending money on the bar.

So yep. Singles from youtuber brickwalled to shit and £300 Def Leppard tickets is the future of metal music. Enjoy, it's what we as fans have paid for!

 

[ExMachina]

Ive heard some stories of venues trying to take a cut of merch sales, that's absolutely heinous if true. Outside of the poor decision making/planning and economic climate, if the musicians are getting hosed by venues that's tragic.