How do you get gigs?

horse · November 2018

iheartreverb said:

I was on here to post exactly the same thing really so I’ll tag on here if that’s ok.
basically I wasn’t also looking on advice of how to get gigs. I play in an all originals band which we have professionally recorded and self released music (at our own cost) and I no want understand how lucky we are in what followed after reading the above.
through a friend we were offered a gig supporting a band with (for reference of their size only) just over 3k “likes” on Facebook. When it got to the gig there were only about 20 people there, but getting something in a very high profile venue with a well enough liked band was good enough.
through another friend we were offered a second gig playing before two high profile bands (in a nieche genre) with 50k followers between them online, there were around £150 people there.
it might seem like from this that we are doing really well but even getting these gigs more than six months apart has been difficult.
promoters where we are seem to oppoerste in such a closed off way.
Some expect you to create a whole profile on Music Glue uploading music Andy photos just to submit and interest of working with them, nothing. Ones back from that.
others simply operate a generically email address.
we have send a very well presented version of our electronic press kit that offers all the information they would need and have still had nothing back. We have also reached out to bands and managers directly when we see gigs that we assume we could offer something at, nothing.

im sorry for such a short long post, I’m going to follow this with genuine interest as to what people suggest, I just wanted to give more details on my specific case should someone be able to help

It can be really tough / feel almost impossible to get a foothold. I'd say that once you know who the local promoters are in your genre, you need to get in with them.

So show up at the gigs they put on, talk to them, give them a cd, get to know them a bit, make it so that they like you and want to help you out. Then maybe you'll start to get more support slot offers and go from there.

If there is a UK 'scene' or genuine community for your genre, then winning over the various key influencers can obviously help massively, but it's hard to get their attention because they're being bombarded all the time (as are the local promoters to be fair).

Freebird · November 2018

When it comes to original music, time should be spent mostly on songwriting and fine-tuning the product, before entering radio talent competitions or similar. This is where the talent sniffers hang out.

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How do you get gigs?

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