Oh look, some Birmingham gigs NOT ANNOUNCED!
Sorry for the outburst.
Just seen Iron and Wine, and James Blake announce a handful of dates each, sans the Midlands. Which is all good and well, up to them, but is there a general feeling of acts not wanting to play Brum? Hell, MBV tacked a gig on after all their other dates, and Sigur Ros would rather play Wolverhampton! Which is saying something.
Your thoughts please?
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Similarly getting passed over a lot in Dublin.
I can understand the desire to avoid Birmingham
On account of it being such a truly dire place
Point conceded
To the point where I'm going to Notts for gigs, as they have some cracking nights/gigs and promoters.
Just annoyed that if I want to see the majority of well known acts, I'm having to schelp across the land for it.
why not move?
The armpit of England.
http://birminghampromoters.com/
I'm going to watch Killer Mike tonight and Ulrich Schnauss and possibly Bob Log III. It is pretty lame though, agreed. Swans are playing and i know they get a lot of love round here.
'Tours' these days for bands that play to more than about 500 people consist exclusively of London, Manchester and Glasgow innit
Yep, always those three
Birmingham usually has to scrap with Bristol and occasionally Wolves or Nottingham to represent the middle of the country. Also is it just me losing interest or does the Academy get less of the medium-to-big acts since it moved to the other side of town?
Still, Barn Owl in April, and I hope to attend Lapalux and Wild Nothing if I can afford them.
Surely not?
Does Bristol not have the population to support that kinda thing? Seems a bit sad, cities over here don't have anywhere near the population of those cities and we seem to be able to book out gigs 500+ fairly easily.
You're absolutely right - I'm always surprised at the number of 'tours' with no dates in Yorkshire
Given that the third, fourth and sixth biggest cities in the country are all within a thirty mile radius in West and South Yorks you'd think they warrant a visit.
I'm afraid this has been a problem for years
And it's mostly down to the Birmingham fans I'd say. I went to see Girls a few years back and there were about fifty people there. A Japandroids gig I went to was even worse.
It's not like we don't have a wealth of decent venues...
What are the decent venues in Birmingham?
I've never been to a gig there...
The word to bear in mind is decent - not meaning outstanding
The Hare and Hounds in Kings Heath is pretty decent - saw Real Estate and Fuck Buttons there recently.
The Custard Factory can be relied on for slightly artier gigs - I've seen Liars there a few times.
The Flapper and Firkin's alright for smaller noisier bands - I saw Japandroids and A Place to Bury Strangers there. And an awesome Liars gig.
The Rainbow's alright - Kimya Dawson and Los Campesinos
Sunflower Lounge were ok a few years back - saw No Age there which was pretty awesome.
Then there's the slightly bigger more souless venues - Barfly and Academy - tend to avoid the Academy like the plague but there's a few good smaller rooms at the Barfly - saw Surfer Blood there a few years back.
So anyway, there are decent venues and up and coming bands do come there, but usually the crowds are smaller and I think that discourages them from coming back when they make it a bit bigger.
Barfly closed a few years ago I think?
Hare and Hounds is good, Rainbow has had decent stuff on recently too.
Yeah, I meant Institute or whatever it's called now.
with Spectrals at the Hare & Hound?
It's different at capsule shows etc
but Brummie audiences can often be very, very flat. I say this as a Brummie, but I can see why bands might rather press on to Manchester if they're only doing a short tour...
As for Wolverhampton, I mean the Civic Hall is a decent building and a long-established bit of the gig circuit, for the longest time there just wasn't a medium sized gig venue in Birmingham... I think you could possibly see why not every band would jump at the chance to play the Academy!
And it's not THAT much hassle getting to Wolverhampton, really.
how well do gigs usually do in brum/how fast do they sell out if they do sell out
i think this blog post - not about brum but about this subject - is really interesting. if you build it will they come?
http://johnrostron.typepad.com/mostlyonamusictip/2010/07/why-you-should-buy-a-ticket-to-see-frankie-the-heartstrings-in-cardiff-and-other-shows.html
JULY 28, 2010
Why you should buy a ticket to see Frankie & The Heartstrings and other shows in Cardiff
A month or so ago I put on sale one of my SWN promoted shows, a triple bill of FRANKIE & THE HEARTSTRINGS, SUMMER CAMP and THE NEAT. A great triple bill of three new bands which I will promote in Cardiff in October. When you promote touring bands you often have to provide agents with twice weekly ticket figures - once every Monday and Friday. I did this for the first week sales, which was something like 50 odd tickets if I remember rightly, and I had a text from one of the agents, aghast, telling me we were outselling the rest of the UK. I knew that 50 sales, for a show of just 200 capacity, was very strong for an opening week. As the weeks have gone on and the sales have increased, I've run into other people associated with the shows and the sales have become a talking point.
If you've ever asked someone in the music industry why so many bands don't come to Cardiff, then ticket sales are inevitably one of the key things they'll bring up. Ticket sales in Cardiff (and Wales) are slow. I mean really s.l.o.w. Often shows will sellout *eventually* but never at the pace of the rest of the UK. Almost guaranteed, Cardiff will be last.
Take 2008. I promoted an amazing bill with FUTURE OF THE LEFT, THE JOY FORMIDABLE, PULLED APART BY HORSES, PSYCHIC PARAMOUNT and STRANGE NEWS FROM ANOTHER STAR at Clwb Ifor Bach. Future Of The Left have played Clwb Ifor Bach many, many times.They have a great following in Cardiff, and I imagine they could sellout Clwb Ifor Bach with their friends alone. We'd been looking to step the band up to a larger venue, and the show was going to be announced to take place at the 500 capacity The Point, but just prior to announcement The Point closed down, so we put it on sale at the 220 capacity Clwb Ifor Bach. Easy, we all thought. No. Sales dragged, and dragged. With a week to go we'd still only sold half the tickets. Then in a rush we sold out the night before, and on the day turned close to 100 people away. There'd been no single, no album launch, no TV appearance to kickstart that last minute rush. Just the usual slow take up on tickets.
Imagine you're a band or a manager or an agent planning a UK tour. You'll have a limited budget or limited days to tour, so when you're picking your route you'll probably prioritize the towns where there'll be the biggest crowds, or the quicker selling shows. If a gig's going to sellout, then better it sells out way in advance so you can talk it up. If you're a national promoter, then you'll pick the places that sell quickly, not the places where you have to work harder and spend more money - denying you and the band an income. As a result Cardiff doesn't ride as high up the lists as it should for a capital city, and bands will often play a dozen shows in England with at least one in Scotland, before considering to come to Wales.
So if you were thinking of coming to Frankie & The Heartstrings, Summer Camp and The Neat, then don't procrastinate. Buy your ticket now. Look, here's the ticket link http://www.wegottickets.com/event/85803 Believe it or not, those advance sales will make a difference, and the knock on effect will be that if Cardiff improves in selling more quickly then more bands and agents will prioritize Cardiff, and Wales, when routing a tour. If you're coming to the show anyway, then what have you got to lose?
These kind of people are the exact problem though. 50 people is a lot of people to come out and see some small band on a week night and bands should be honoured that they can play to so many people. How insulting to the people that did turn out to start whinging about the gig.
There's absolutely no reason that bands in the UK need to go out on multi-week nationwide tours when they could easily do a few (better [via lack of exhaustion])gigs every so often and play to the same amount of people without the stress/cost. Hundreds of bands do it even though they're several albums in.
i don't think he's whinging about 50 people coming to see a small band...
he's explaining to people who whinge about how bands never come to their town why the band/agent/manager/promoter, with a finite number of days to tour the uk in, might skip their town, and suggesting a way they can change it.
yeah it looks mega lazy when bands announce tours and it's just london manc glasgow, and it seems kind of dumb to NEVER go to the places where your band has fewer fans because well, then you're never going to make any fans there, are you? but say if it's a us band on a tight budget with 2 weeks to go all around europe then you're probably gonna go where your fans (and/or the media but that's a whole other kettle) are.
touring is more cost effective than doing stand alone gigs
if that's not obvious to you, you're stupid.
Depends on your location and how far you have to travel though surely? (even though what you say is /generally/ true)
The UK's not that big.
Economies of scale though.
Always going to be the case. You're hiring vans, equipment, people, publicity, taking time off work etc. etc.
Touring allows you to build up momentum too.
The guy isn't whining about the numbers of people that come to the show, he's just saying that one of the reasons that Cardiff doesn't necessarily get big names signing up to shows is that the city has a tendency to buy tickets very late or turn up on the door, rather than buying well in advance.
Birmingham and the Midlands in general do seem to be missed out of short tours
This pisses me off more when bands play Manchester and Leeds a day or two apart. To address some of the issues in this thread, I went to see Iron & Wine at the Birmingham Town Hall on his last tour, it was sold out but if you look at the places he is playing on this tour they are pretty special venues like the Opera House and I don't think he would fill the Symphony Hall. The Barfly is now part of the Institute, James Blake played there on his last tour and I'm sure he'll have a bigger tour lined up like Foals did once the record is out. Fuck Buttons played the Hare and Hounds over two years ago, so if you are calling that recently you are part of the problem! Wolverhampton is a shithole but the Civic Hall is a brilliant venue and I'm sure it will be amazing for Sigur Ros.
I only occasionally feel embarrassed at low attendances in Brum, but I'd much rather fewer people than bellends ramming a place out. Kthxbai.
wolvo isn't exactly miles from brum is it?
It could be worse, you could live in Nottingham.
Pretty much every band mentioned on this thread has missed us off their tour schedules.
it's gotten really bad recently hasn't it?
Really bad... :(
Was talking about this to a couple of people yesterday. So many bands seem to miss Nottingham nowadays - in fact the whole of the East Midlands. Says it all that we're halfway through February and I've only been to 2 gigs in the city so far this year.
Really surprised about this
I went to see Amusement Parks on Fire/Spotlight Kid there a few weeks ago, had a cracking time and there was a good turn out for them, even without a new album to promote.
I've found Notts to have a more varied and interesting set of acts playing there than Brum, which in honesty has some good bands play.
Just seems strange that the (supposedly) second city gets short shrift for decent live music.
I was at that APOF/SK gig too. (primarily for Spotlight Kid)
It was a good turn out. I like the Rescue Rooms. They don't rip you off at the bar like they do in most venues in London!
Yep I was there for SK too
For a low key gig, it was a great atmosphere in a great venue.
I'm not saying that Brum doesn't have those (Hare and Hounds, The Flapper and The Rainbow are all good), but there's not the big names.
Some good points mentioned throughout the thread about bands not wanting to go somewhere if there's no media interest, as Brum doesn't have much of that.
White Hills are playing The Hare & Hounds on April 14th
Definitely gonna try and make that.
The Victoria seems to have been really quiet a s a venue for a while. Seen some good gigs there.
I agree that The Flapper and Rainbow are fine venues.
Dead Skeletons at The End last year was an excellent gig as well. Only time I've been there.
The End/Birmingham Ballroom
has shut down, went into administration, which was a shame as I knew a few folks who worked there and were involved with the reopening of the venue.
It is frustrating to see bands missing out on Birmingham, though venue wise there's a definite gap of a venue with a capacity above the academy (which is a rather souless venue, the sound is great, but the layout and the look of the place just lacks any kind of character) to bridge the gap between the NEC/LG Arena capacity. The Institute is nice, especially the main room, but only holds 1,500.
My major gripe about bands missing out Brum is that because of medical/medication issues for myself, traveling/staying in hotels can be awkward, so traveling to London, Manchester and elsewhere to see bands is a major hassle.