Two recaps of this were posted about this meeting the next day, by Brittanie Shey of Houston Press and Jeremy Hart of Space City Rock. Brittanie’s piece provides a good flow of the conversation that was had about the local music community, especially the hot topic of staying up on local bands and why so few bands send in music or make any attempt to contact the press. Jeremy’s post gives a run down of those in attendance and his kind comments about how great the event was were shared by everyone in attendance. You should check those out as a companion to this post.

The most heated point of discussion related to Houston’s music press not being contacted by local musicians enough to keep them updated on their careers. I am squarely in this camp with the press and feel that there is too much apathy and reactivity (vs. proactivity) in Houston musicians and that musicians should be in better contact with their press. This was a topic that was directly mentioned by Craig Hlavaty at the last Bandcampus, re-addressed with a series of posts on this site and echoed with comments and other statements by Brittanie Shey and Sara Cress of 29-95.com.

On this topic Joe Mathlete had the most prescient comments. Joe said two things that deserve to be repeated, keep in mind I’m paraphrasing his quotes but attempting to conserve the ideas:

1. Music writers need to be doing a better job of getting out into the community and finding out what bands are doing.

2. Some band’s goals are simply to put out good music and have fun.

I’m happy to cede the first point and to share the burden of proactively contacting bands to keep tabs on them. As for the second point, it is both true and contributing to the problem of not enough contact between musicians and press. The issue is not that bands want to have fun and put out good music because that’s something that we can all get behind. The issue is not the additionally agreeable statement from Joe that some of these bands don’t care if they get written up because that’s not part of their success metrics. The problem is goals.

There are not enough bands who have goals to be financially/artistically successful telling the public this. There are not enough bands who have goals that include making good music and having fun telling the public this. These goals are neither mutually exclusive or in opposition of each other. But they are ideas of a path and a direction and hone in on what they bands want/need to achieve them. And that’s what’s really missing: there are not enough bands in Houston with goals. This is not the first time I’ve personally mentioned musician goals. The real problem with bands not having goals is that it creates confusion for the local music press who do have stated goals: to chronicle the Houston music community and write about it’s related media products.

There are a lot of places we can go from here. We could talk about the effect of an entire community of bands operating without stated goals. That this leaves the music press questioning 1) why they’re not hearing from musicians more and 2) whether they should write about the musicians or whether the musicians want them to write about them. Or we could talk about how band’s definitions of success may not include caring whether the music press writes about them at all or if it does they want to be sought out by the music press. That this creates a vibrant cottage music community driven by parties and self released albums and fan driven interactions.

…

I’ve tried to write up my thoughts on the previous paragraph’s topics and have stalled out with something long, getting longer, and requiring considerable editing. I’m just going to take a right turn and just say I’m super fucking proud of Houston’s music press and the hard work they put in every day. At this point it’s not clear where we’re going to go from here; it’s up to the community to continue to the discussion. In one short meeting we got a discussion started in person that then flowed back to the web through a couple posts and some good comments. That’s as good a start as any.

The following bands were in attendance:

• Espantapajaros
• The Bottom Four
• <Insert Name Here>
• I-45
• Wayside Drive
• Inner Lights
• Golden Cities
• Prairie Cadets
• THEM
• Winter Wallace
• Glasnost
• Reckless Endeavor
• Golden Narrow Holy Face
• Hollywood Floss
• Council Music
• Nosaprise
• Fat Tony

The session began late as printing of the ebooks took longer than expected (85 pages each!!!). Thanks to Jeremy Osborn of Wayside Drive for helping with the cover and the printing transport. Ebook copies went fast, the ones who came late had to share it and wait for it to be made available online (later today). We reviewed the process of booking a live show, beginning with two assumptions, 1) each band had prepared a digital toolbox of press, bio, pictures, media, stage setup to send to bookers or promoters as needed. 2) if the band had contacts or relationships with other bands or booker/promoters in desired cities, that would be the first place to start when booking a live show, aside from the following process. Then, we reviewed the planning steps for booking shows; selecting desired dates and targeting venues based on genre similarities and the size of venue.  Next we talked about the phone follow-up, the importance of writing out a script and remaining to-the-point and professional. For each of these steps we highlighted the specific sections of the ebook for the bands to refer to later.

During the discussion session, before getting down and contacting venues, several points were raised by Golden Cities, I-45 and Glasnost, three bands who have set up everything from their own shows to regional and national tours.

• Lance and Marcus of Golden Cities say: the most difficult thing is getting venues to reply. You have to understand and get over the fact that not everyone is going to reply to your email ever.
• Chuck of Glasnost recommends also having a standard contract for your band as part of your digital toolbox. Glasnost compiled theirs from several different examples available online. Here is an article from Music Biz Academy with several example contracts
• All bands agreed that asking for money can be the most difficult part and that the actual rate is completely negotiable and situational. It is not recommended to play for free though.

Additionally we had several members of the media in attendance:

• David Sadof
• Craig Hlavaty
• Marc Brubaker
• Adam Newton

The most rousing portion of the entire session was the discussion that ensued when Houston Press Music Writer Craig Hlavaty stood up and let bands know that they needed to take better advantage of the musical infrastructure that exists to help them:

• Music writers love to write about local bands, local bands seem to not understand this or take advantage of this opportunity
• Craig spends a ridiculous amount of time looking at venue and band sites to find out who is playing and when, because venues don’t list it themselves
• Local Bands need to be sending information about their upcoming shows to the music writers 1.5 weeks in advance of the show (minimum)
• Bands need to send: The cost of the show, the bands on the bill, the time and venue of the show
• Bands expressed a lack of knowledge on who their local music writers actually are (I have a two-part post for tomorrow and Wednesday opening this up for musicians)

With the ebook in hand bands were ready to start booking themselves live shows in and around Houston. We will be following up with each and every band to make sure that they actually work towards this and not sink into a hole of apathy. By discussing how these bands are using the ebook and leveraging community-based support every band in the Houston Music Community can begin to practice these career building steps.

More information about the next Bandcampus: SXSW PREP coming this week.

Check out some other press on this round of Bandcampus: BOOKING PARTY

• Houston Calling
• Houstonist
• Houston Examiner
• Space City Rock