How To Start Touring As A Band
Starting out on tour can be really tough for anyone! There’s so much going on, not only are you trying to prepare for your show every night, but also finding ways to spend time with your friends and family while traveling. Plus, most music venues don’t offer free transportation or daily brunch sets, so it can feel like a struggle to make connections outside of shows.
It’s totally normal to feel overwhelmed at times, especially when money is an issue. Many artists start touring in their early twenties, making enough money to afford expensive hotels and flights back home, but not always enough to enjoy anything beyond basic food and shelter. This isn’t the case for everyone, however!
As you begin to focus more on your career as a musician, additional income will come in many forms - not just through performance fees, but also via publishing, songwriting, and other creative ventures. Plus, there are plenty of opportunities to network through the music community, including by attending festivals and conferences. If you're looking to take your career to the next level, now is the perfect time to get started.
The best way to learn how to navigate your budget and work-life balance while on tour is by doing it yourself first. By practicing what makes sense for you and your situation, you'll find that your skills improve along the way.
Make a list of bands you would like to see
Now, this is not saying that you should go out and get a drum set or start practicing your drums! That is definitely important first step in touring as a band.
But what you SHOULD do next is make a list of all the music stores in your area and determine which ones would be willing to take payment via credit card. This way, you can purchase all the equipment necessary (drumset, guitar, microphone) before you hit the road!
And don’t forget about practice spaces! Many local schools have their own studios they use for rehearsals and/or teaching purposes.
Create a band name
As mentioned earlier, creating an integral part of your touring career is deciding what you want to be called! This will include choosing a genre or style for your music, writing some basic lyrics, picking a song collection, and then finalizing your band’s name.
The hardest part about this is probably coming up with your band name. Many musicians make their life as a professional musician more difficult than needed by trying to use their own first or last names in their bands.
Why not just go with something simple? You can create a unique identity for yourself later! Plus, using your full name could potentially limit your opportunities because many employers and recruiters won’t allow it.
That isn’t to say that there are definitely not successful artists who use their whole name in the band, but it is pretty rare. Most have only one or two pieces of their given name in the band, sometimes even dropping the middle initial completely.
Register your band
The next step in launching your music career is registering your band! This includes creating an account on all of the major social media sites like Facebook, Twitter, YouTube, and Soundcloud, along with filling out the necessary forms for your business.
Most musicians are not rich at this stage of their careers so it’s important to find ways to bring in some extra money to invest in your music career. Many people start doing freelance work by offering their services online via websites or through friends who know they can be hired for things.
There are many ways to register your band, and most have you pay a small fee typically around the $10 range per site.
Get your album covers made
Your album cover is one of the most important components in marketing yourself as an artist. It can make or break how people perceive you as an artist!
Most music companies will ask you to choose your own album title and then have art directors create your album cover using that song’s lyrics and their artistic style.
But before they start creating artwork, you need to pick your favorite album covers and determine what styles you like. I would say it’s pretty easy to tell if an album is good quality material if you know some basics about graphic design.
So why not go into more detail by taking some basic graphics courses? Or better yet, take some business classes so you are able to run your studio more efficiently! You want to make sure you are investing in your career growth though, so don’t spend all your money on lessons and courses unless they are really worth it.
After you have determined which album designs you like, find out who does those types of layouts and get their permission to use their work as inspiration for your own. Sometimes artists won’t mind at all, but others may feel attached to their work and refuse to give it up!
And even if they do, be respectful and remember that their success was due in part to its look so try to be more creative than what they already were.
Buy your equipment
Now that you have done some of the hard work by finding your band, recording music for our song list, and learning how to play instruments, it is time to buy all of your gear!
All too often aspiring musicians spend lots of money on a guitar, bass or keyboard and then never use them because they do not have headphones with good quality sound. They may also purchase decent earbuds but no headphone jack to listen to music with. A headphone jack is important because it allows you to easily connect your device to test out your music before investing in more expensive headphones.
Good headphones will make listening to your music easier and better sounding. The quality of the audio depends mostly on two things: the materials used to make the headphones and what kind of amplifier the headphones use.
We recommend buying low latency professional level headphones so that the signal does not have to go through additional processing which can lower the quality of the sound. Some brands that are very well known for their high-quality headphones are Sennheiser, Bose, Sony, and Klipsch.
Find your audience
As we mentioned before, performing is mostly about connecting with an audience. If you are not able to connect with people then there is little hope for you to make it in this business!
Your potential audience comes from three main sources:
1) People who want what you have - Your music, your style, your messages - they can be internal (dreams or goals you’re trying to achieve), external (something you perceive someone else wants) or both.
2) People who listen to your type of music - if you are popular within that genre, crowd-pleasing artists within that genre will be interested in listening to your songs and supporting you by sharing their music collection or buying yours.
3) People who associate you with something - whether it’s through word of mouth, media coverage or performance footage online or TV.
The more ways you find to expose yourself to your ideal audience, the better. An easy way to do this is to create an event listing website or app such as Eventbrite, Livingsocial or Bookatable. These services list events anyone can contribute to so you could potentially reach a large audience.
Connect with a booking agent
After you have written your first song, it is time to find a place to play! The next step in becoming an artist is finding a venue or event that will accept you as an artist and give you exposure for your music.
This is where most musicians get stuck - they start trying to book events themselves without using a manager or booking agency.
It’s hard to do this alone and it can be expensive depending on how many events you want to go to. There are a lot of ways to work with professionals though, and one of the best routes is to connect with a professional musician’s friend or colleague.
A great way to do this is by talking about their experiences and offering to help them promote theirs event. This could mean working together to create content, spreading the word through social media, or even helping them pay for some of the costs.
Start touring
Are you dreaming of being famous, owning lots of cool clothes, traveling around the world, and playing in big venues? Then you should consider becoming a professional musician!
Becoming a professional musician is not for the inexperienced or those who can’t play their instrument well. Rather, it’s ideal for anyone that loves music and wants to be part of the industry.
The best way to start your career as a musician is by joining a band. A band is a group of musicians that travels together and performs outside schools, for parties, or for money. There are many ways to become a member of a band, so do some research and find one that fits you!
Having a good amount of skills before starting will help you get noticed more quickly because other members of the band will notice how skilled you are and invite you to join them. Starting off as an extra guitarist is the perfect way to begin if you aren’t sure what else there is to offer.