Circe's Vendetta Rants & Ravings

Our Many Delightful Experiences With Concert Companies

They promise the world...exposure, playing in well known local clubs, prizes...some even go so far as to say that talent scouts come to their shows looking for new talent. The only thing that they are really telling the truth about is playing in bigger clubs....and getting exposure is a half truth. You'll get some, but certainly not the way that they do. They over-embelish themselves...and they don't tell you about all the bullshit that they expect of you until you've agreed to playing a show with them. They prey upon young bands looking for a chance to play.

This is how the companies actually work: Once you have agreed to play a show for them, you are called down to at least two, (usually three) fairly pointless meetings. The first meeting is really the only necessary one of all. You go to pick up tickets to sell (more on this part a little later) and the company explains how the show will work. This is fine for first time performing bands...but those that have experience playing with concert companies shouldn't have to listen to all that crap, yet they do anyways. The tickets are an obscenely high price considering that all of the bands on the lineup are relatively unheard of...usually the tickets are priced at $10, $12-$15 at the door. So now, you get to chase down and hound your family, friends, and basically every single person that you know to pay this outrageous price to come and see you play for no more than half an hour. If you don't manage to shaft enough people into coming to this rip-off of a show, you wind up with either the earliest or latest set times possible. Meeting two is always my favorite...you are called down to the club, totally screwing up your schedule, simply so that they can ask about how many tickets you've sold, inquire how many tickets you think that you will sell, and tell you how many tickets they think you should sell. Oh, and sometimes you get the added privillage of hearing them talk about "the great venue" that you're playing in....the companies are quite smug when they manage to get into a place that ISN'T a total dive. Finally, the third meeting is to collect your ticket sales, and determine your set time...supposedly. This meeting is set the day before your show. Yet, somehow on the day of the show, you are expected to arrive at the venue at least three hours before the actual show starts, and usually you don't even get a soundcheck out of the whole ordeal. Not only that, but they actually assign your set times on this day (usually) so everything you thought from the night before was wrong. As if that isn't enough, occasionally other bands will cut into your set time, and you don't even get the chance to play your full, well-timed set because of their incompetance.

Oh, and one last charming detail....those rip-off $10 tickets....less than half of that is used to cover the rent of the club....so take approximately 25 tickets per band, ($250 made off of each band) multiply that by about 14...and what do you get? That's right, boys and girls! A fuckload of money that you won't see a single cent of! So now you can see why this rant exists.

Companies to look out for if you live in Southern Ontario....R.O.R., Loud Sound Development, and Supernova....ripoffs, where the staff are assholes to boot! (though there are a few exceptions...ie.Melanie from Supernova, who actually treats people like human beings)

Circe's Vendetta shows their opinion of concert companies.