In the days when we had CAA book our tours life was easy. We would usually get a call or an email asking us if we wanted to open up for a national band on a national tour (that is how we ended up opening up for Glen Phillips, Everlast, James Taylor). Once we responded “Yes”, there was nothing else to do except turn up for the first show!
Life was equally easy when our record label, Sanctuary Records, would book the gigs for us. Usually, this meant one of the excellent young chaps at the label, either Eric Briner or Alex Hackford, would bust their balls getting us onto a bill such as Tegan and Sara, and again all we had to do was turn up and play.
Having an influential manager is also handy. It was the, by now legendary, Merck Mercuriadis, who put in a couple of calls and had the band booked and recorded at Bonnaroo. It was Jim DelBalzo who somehow got the band playing Tulip Fest in Albany.
So, what about now? We don’t have a booking agent or a label, and our managers hands are mostly tied because we don’t have big hit on radio. We book ourselves. Actually, we have tons of experience doing this. Even with a label and a booking agent we still booked over 100 shows a year ourselves – in case you were wondering, in this industry no one does right by you except for you. Yet, booking yourself is one of life’s major hassles predominantly because you end up having to work with some of the worlds biggest douche bags. It is the typical little guy in a little job who thinks he is in a big job and lets it all go to his head syndrome. Now, just for the sake of transparency, there are tons of great bookers out there who are super cool and we have been booking great shows with for a number of years. This is not a story about them.
This is a story about trying to book a gig in Brooklyn, the land of the hipster (let’s no go there as I have a whole slew of issues with the hipster). Anyway, long story short, we (buddahead) had a show planned for July 10th at Public Assembly in Brooklyn. This would actually have been our first Brooklyn show so we were super excited. We had worked hard on curating the night but, alas, in the last minute we hit a couple of stumbling blocks. ONE: Toby Evers our bass player who recently had a major back surgery has not been healing as well as expected and had to bow out of the show (the last time we played a show with out him the set sounded like someone had just tripped in the kitchen utensils section of Bed Bath and Beyond in the dark); TWO: Both other bands who had originally agreed to playing the show with us cancelled in the last minutes. Actually, one cancelled and the other did not bother confirm.
So, as soon as we realized the show was not likely to be a success I emailed the booker:
From: buddaheadmusic@mac.com
To: boyracerxxx@hotmail.com
Subject: Re: july 10 Buddahead @ Public assembly
Date: Sun, 28 Jun 2009 22:02:04 -0400
Hi Belvy,
Bad news! The other bands that were due to play on the 10th have pulled out last minute. I won’t be able to pull something together so close to the date. Let’s cancel this. I am so sorry.
Raman
In case you missed it, please note my apologetic tone in the email!! What I received back from young Belvy was therefore somewhat shocking and, well to be honest, not bloody nice!
From: boyracerxxx@hotmail.com
Subject: RE: july 10 Buddahead @ Public assembly
Date: June 29, 2009 12:04:12 AM EDT
To: buddaheadmusic@mac.com
ugh.
after having the date for 3 months you give us 10 days notice???
fine.
fyi – we NEVER rebook cancellations.
Belvy/General Manager, Program Director
Public Assembly
www.publicassemblynyc.com
Is the “we NEVER rebook cancellations” a real policy? If yes, is it a good policy? Is it just mean? Nasty? Angry? Unfriendly? Is not like we just didn’t show or promote the show. We have been promoting the show through our website, myspace, and ilike accounts for weeks. We are even losing the money we spent promoting the show on ilike.
I think any absolute is a half measure. Thankfully, I have never before had an encounter like this before. In my opinion, this is very poor behavior by Blevy and the venue that he represents. Over exercise of power for the sake of it.