how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

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terly
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by terly »

Nice to read some responses. Void, couldn't you bring your own sound and light to a club and just install them in front (or even in tandem) with what is there? We do that sometimes, although it's so much easier to use a venue with a decent rig.

Any tips for budgeting when the turnout is uncertain?

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Lost to the Void »

Venues rarely have decent rigs, at least by my standards, and they are rarely engineered properly.
I don't really want to use a club as there are always restrictions on what you can do to the place.
All the blank canvass venues in London that we've used in the past have pretty much gone now.
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by terly »

That's too bad there are no rental halls available. Where do people hold weddings or fundraisers?

I agree that it is better to use a blank space, but the costs and labour involved make it a lot harder. In a small club I can count on 75-100 people and still break even. In a hall, it's more like 150-200 (also at a higher ticket price) which may not seem to be a big difference, but out here getting 100 people to a techno night would be a feat.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Mattias »

[wesellboxes] wrote:private parties may be the way forward.
This have been happening a lot during the last 3 years. I'm nearly exclusively playing private / invite-only parties these days. It feels like a home coming to me, more authentic. While there clearly are nice "regular" gigs to get as well I prefer the first mentioned option. It's boring when organizers of events are forced to book a high-fee act and therefor only usually can afford one mid-tier act. Instead of the good old one main act and several medium tier acts. Most of the private parties I've done they have invited many of us medium acts to play and we have had a lot of fun doing spontaneous b2b, flipping places with each-other playing other slots and all kinds of things.
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by WOLF! »

Mattias wrote:
[wesellboxes] wrote:private parties may be the way forward.
This have been happening a lot during the last 3 years. I'm nearly exclusively playing private / invite-only parties these days. It feels like a home coming to me, more authentic. While there clearly are nice "regular" gigs to get as well I prefer the first mentioned option. It's boring when organizers of events are forced to book a high-fee act and therefor only usually can afford one mid-tier act. Instead of the good old one main act and several medium tier acts. Most of the private parties I've done they have invited many of us medium acts to play and we have had a lot of fun doing spontaneous b2b, flipping places with each-other playing other slots and all kinds of things.
Sounds a bit like returning to the 'underground'.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by terly »

Mattias wrote:
[wesellboxes] wrote:private parties may be the way forward.
This have been happening a lot during the last 3 years. I'm nearly exclusively playing private / invite-only parties these days. It feels like a home coming to me, more authentic. While there clearly are nice "regular" gigs to get as well I prefer the first mentioned option. It's boring when organizers of events are forced to book a high-fee act and therefor only usually can afford one mid-tier act. Instead of the good old one main act and several medium tier acts. Most of the private parties I've done they have invited many of us medium acts to play and we have had a lot of fun doing spontaneous b2b, flipping places with each-other playing other slots and all kinds of things.
yes, in the nearest bigger city close to me they have been doing private parties like this for a few years. Out here, it's generally one "name" act and then a few locals to fill out the lineup. Those parties always have a great vibe and feel more secure.

Where I am, we have done a couple special invite-only parties where the location was revealed only to advance-ticket holders, but usually most people only decide to go the night of and therefore pay at the door, so it is unwise to try the private party model for the most part.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Plyphon »

All the blank canvass venues in London that we've used in the past have pretty much gone now.
Have you been to Oval Space recently?

Not a blank canvas - but they've recently refurbished the indoor bit with a new system and it's pretty fucking good. We saw Krankbrother, Pangea and Shed there quite recently.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Barfunkel »

Strange, I think the situation in Helsinki is a lot better than it was 10-15 years ago. More clubs, more DJ bars more people in those places, more choices. Lots of quality DJ's, both local and foreign with very reasonable entrance fees. Some people disagree with this of course, but most of them are 40+ years old who don't even go to clubs anymore and when they do they just complain that wtf is this, I wanna hear a Prodigy song from 1991 or whatever.


When that EDM craze started I was like fuck, this is gonna ruin everything. In reality what happened was that a good chunk of those EDM kids started to investigate where that music came from originally and some of them found out that they prefer techno, house etc, compared to that EDM stuff.

Before that but after the early to mid 90's dance music craze, "normal" young people were mostly listening to either heavy metal, hip hop or basic chart pop (which at the time was less EDM-y). There's a huge leap from those to a dark techno club. A commercial club playing Deadmau5 is not THAT far from that dark techno club. A Metallica concert is.


This is not miles away from my youth actually. I'm too young and live in the wrong continent to have any idea what was it like to hear Acid Tracks in Music Box in 1987. What I heard was a commercial radio station playing LA Style's James Brown Is Dead or something like Technotronic a bit earlier or even 2 Unlimited. 80's house and techno veterans were probably like WTF is this shit, it has nothing to do with what we had, it's commercial, it's ruining everything! In reality what happened is that for most people it was the first time they heard anything resembling house or techno and many caught the bug and started to investigate the music a bit deeper. Without those commercial acts many would have never heard any of the good techno and house stuff either.

And now in 2017 the same people just repeat history.

This is of course coming from a Finnish perspective. The clubs and events seem to be packed all the time, even when there are just some locals playing. Of course, gentrification has hit us also but it's mainly affecting the Helsinki city centre, which is pretty dead and no one goes there anymore, due to most bars and clubs having moved away from there.
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Lost to the Void »

Plyphon wrote:
All the blank canvass venues in London that we've used in the past have pretty much gone now.
Have you been to Oval Space recently?

Not a blank canvas - but they've recently refurbished the indoor bit with a new system and it's pretty fucking good. We saw Krankbrother, Pangea and Shed there quite recently.
In hip and expensive bethnal green?
Yeah, we are staying out of hipsterville, want to keep this affordable, maximum ticket price of £10.
Looking somewhere more industrial and we want to use our own system, not using an in house system unless we can have 100% control over it, which is basically never, when it comes to in house systems.
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by intrusav »

EDM - the gateway to all that is good?! Naaaah!!! Just kidding, can see how that might come about ..

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Plyphon »

Lost to the Void wrote:
Plyphon wrote:
All the blank canvass venues in London that we've used in the past have pretty much gone now.
Have you been to Oval Space recently?

Not a blank canvas - but they've recently refurbished the indoor bit with a new system and it's pretty fucking good. We saw Krankbrother, Pangea and Shed there quite recently.
In hip and expensive bethnal green?
Yeah, we are staying out of hipsterville, want to keep this affordable, maximum ticket price of £10.
Looking somewhere more industrial and we want to use our own system, not using an in house system unless we can have 100% control over it, which is basically never, when it comes to in house systems.
Yeah, guess so:

https://www.google.co.uk/maps/place/Ova ... -0.0592409

Though I think I only paid £10 or so when I went there last.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Hades »

Lost to the Void wrote: I`ll only play Germany if it`s not Berlin.
I did a gig for a punk/squat collective last year In Oberhausen, west germ nay...
:D
I don't want to sound rude, but does it really still matter nowadays to talk about west or east Germany ?
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made my day. ;)
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Hades »

terly wrote:Nice to read some responses. Void, couldn't you bring your own sound and light to a club and just install them in front (or even in tandem) with what is there? We do that sometimes, although it's so much easier to use a venue with a decent rig.

Any tips for budgeting when the turnout is uncertain?
where are you even located, if I may ask ?
because correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you specified this in this topic,
and it might seem relevant to the discussion, no ? :)
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by jacksonick »

Plyphon wrote:That's cool Voidloss, I live real close to Electrowertz and see some real interesting looking chaps going in (and coming out at 8am) to that place, I keep looking for a night there that might be a touch more approachable for someone not into EBM as I'd like to check it out inside.


On another note, Phonox in Brixton is doing a great job keeping the lineups coming through but keeping the cost down. It's never more than £10 advanced I think. Some great lineups, tends to be more house than techno but they do put on a lot of techno also. Great club also.

But they also have the backing of a big "conglomerate" of clubs/spaces behind them, so it's easier to do.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by jacksonick »

Well, that will teach me to not try posting on the tube.

I used to live around the corner from elektrowerkz, central street.

As for putting on parties in home town I did a few in york. Small venue that I could pretty much fill with friends and very little competition helped. In hindsight I should have kept it to one-offs though. Regular nights became a chew as I wasn't very good at asking for help at the time.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by terly »

Hades wrote: where are you even located, if I may ask ?
because correct me if I'm wrong, but I don't think you specified this in this topic,
and it might seem relevant to the discussion, no ? :)
It is highly relevant. I am in Saskatoon, SK - literally the middle of nowhere.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Lost to the Void »

Hades wrote:
Lost to the Void wrote: I`ll only play Germany if it`s not Berlin.
I did a gig for a punk/squat collective last year In Oberhausen, west germ nay...
:D
I don't want to sound rude, but does it really still matter nowadays to talk about west or east Germany ?
As far as I am aware, geography still exists, maps still exist. And there is an east, west, north and south Germany, geographically speaking.
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Hades »

Lost to the Void wrote:
Hades wrote:
Lost to the Void wrote: I`ll only play Germany if it`s not Berlin.
I did a gig for a punk/squat collective last year In Oberhausen, west germ nay...
:D
I don't want to sound rude, but does it really still matter nowadays to talk about west or east Germany ?
As far as I am aware, geography still exists, maps still exist. And there is an east, west, north and south Germany, geographically speaking.
I wasn't exactly referring to the geographical parts,
but maybe my mind is too much focused on history most of the time.
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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by terly »

Some amazing venues have fallen into my lap. For example, I got a small but very nice location 20 minutes outside of town, pretty much the whole weekend for $315. Granted, the capacity there is 50. Now I have one mini-festival in the works and 2 more urban afterhours that only go til 4am. Hopefully it all goes well.

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Re: how hard is it to put on a show where you live?

Post by Prophän »

I live in Rabat, morocco, and there is a very flourishing and growing tech-house /house scene over here, there are literally events two to three weekends(including friday) a month, which would have been unthinkable 4 years ago.

However concerning techno there is literally nothing, so naturally we started throwing our own nights in a specific club which is usually given a bad reputation, but is the only club here that is not a roof top or a boat or a poolside kind of thing, and just dealing with all the difficulties, but it's been a great experience !


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