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ch-scene - Re: stuff to do, week of February 28, 2009

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Subject: RTP-area local music and culture

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  • From: James Hepler <hepstyle AT gmail.com>
  • To: RTP-area local music and culture <ch-scene AT lists.ibiblio.org>
  • Subject: Re: stuff to do, week of February 28, 2009
  • Date: Mon, 2 Mar 2009 14:59:48 -0500

On Mon, Mar 2, 2009 at 2:21 PM, grady <grady AT ibiblio.org> wrote:

> James Hepler wrote:
>
> > all I ever have to do is start typing "local band" into my facebook
> search
> > and I don't even have to get to the first 'a' before I see:
> >
> > "Local Band-Local Beer w/ The T's & Static Minds"
> >
> > Bam, done. Of course it doesn't help me because I can almost never make
> the
> > thursday show at tir na nog unless I'm playing.
>
> Here is my point: this does not work for me, because I'm not FB friends
> with Chris, and/or I don't get the invites. And I have to assume that if
> *I* don't get these, then there are probably a lot of other potential
> fans/patrons who don't either. Facebook is a walled garden, and even if
> you have 500 friends, you're not getting the whole story.


Which is where my voltron reference comes in. But the point WRT your work
is valid. If I want YOU to know about it both as music lover and local
promoter of music, I need to let YOU know, not hope you see it on facebook
or whatever. That's always been how you've rolled. And there should be no
path untried in getting people out to shows.


> > Their last show was Troika. They have a giant banner up behind the bar
> > advertising their St. Patty's Day party with live music, raffles, etc,
> but
> > they had those made before the bands were confirmed.
>
>
> Glad to know I haven't missed anything, then. One would have to enter
> the bar, however, to see the banner, and for whatever reason (hint:
> smoke) I'm more than willing to walk up to the Pinhook for my beerz,
> even though Bull McCabe's is literally a block from my house.


I failed to mention that McCabes will be non-smoking from 4 until probably 9
or 10 or so! Some promoter I am! They also have a non-smoking room but I
assume it doesn't really do the job when there are 50 people smoking ten
feet away and no air flow.


> > But yeah, this kinda goes to my earlier point. Tir Na Nog hasn't been
> > having rock shows that long,
>
> First one I list is January 31, 2008, but I think there were more before
> that. So: shorter than Local 506, but longer than the Pinhook.


And let's not get started with Pinhooks website! I don't know if it has
improved since the new year, but damn, I think anyone who actually does
shows would say that updating the website is probably the worst part of
doing shows on the regular.


> > And while they should promote their shows better, we all
> > know that word of mouth/TriangleRock/Reverbnation/Facebook/Myspace/
> combine
> > to form a veritable Voltron of promotion.
>
> I agree up to a point, and that point is the point at which the whole
> thing becomes a cloistered club where you have to know the exact right
> place to look in order to find out about anything. In an ideal world,
> someone could move here from out of town and quickly find out about all
> the good stuff. Given the nature of Teh Internets, that would likely be
> via a Google search. Close second: picking up the local weekly paper.


Ya.


> Word of mouth/TriangleRock/Reverbnation/Facebook/Myspace come in a very
> distant third, as they all pre-assume some level of familiarity with the
> actors involved.
>
> The big lie of Teh Internets in general, and of Web 2.0/social
> networking in particular, is that it'll make things like event promotion
> so much easier. It does up to a point, but that point exactly coincides
> with the limits of your social network. I think we've all agreed at
> various points over the past couple of years that in order for the local
> music community to remain vital, we need to attract *new* audience members.


Shit, how long has that been the case now? Four bigass universities loaded
with potential audiences, and getting them to hit up a free show is still
the challenge of the day.


> I'm not trying to take Chris or Tir Na nOg (or you) to task about any of
> this. Just pointing out that if you're already connected to a circle or
> scene, the new tools make you seem that much *more* connected. Which can
> make it harder to remember to be sure you're reaching out to
> newcomers/outsiders.


I wonder though if promoting local rock shows would get newcomers/outsiders
to come or ensure that they stay away. Breaking down the "I only see bands
I already know" wall has been one step beyond sisyphusian for me.

> "literally" above. I don't know that you don't check facebook events!
>
> > If you're going to add this disclaimer you should at least remove the
>
> You sending me an invite that I don't see because I never click on the
> "event invitations" doodad in Facebook *does* mean that this is
> literally the first time I've heard of it.


Does that indicate that you also don't check your notifications? Because no
one gets an invite to anything with being told they've been invited. But
this ain't no cross-examination. Forget it! I know where you're coming
from. The only thing that makes me feel worse than saying "no" to an invite
is not responding, so...


> > Saying it's the first you've heard about it because you were plugging
> your
> > ears the actual first time you heard about it is hardly an excuse!
>
>
> How about this: you yelling it out to me from the sidewalk as I drive by
> with my windows rolled up, cranking that hot new IWTDI EP I downloaded,
> is *not* the same as actually telling me about it!


It's about expectations. I think it's reasonable to expect that if I FB
invite you to an event that you at least saw the invitation. I do not have
a reasonable expectation that you would hear me shouting to you through
closed windows while rocking out to our hot new single Done
Waiting<http://www.iwtdi.com>.
But now that I know that while so many people think highly enough of you to
actively invite you to their event, you're too good to actually condescend
to the tedium of spending three seconds apiece on said invites (hee!), I
suppose it is no longer reasonable to expect you to be aware. Gonna suck
for you on 4/25.

>What you're
> > saying is kinda like me saying I didn't know about a particular show
> because
> > I delete your things to do this week email without reading it because I
> get
> > so many emails every day.
>
>
> Sure, and that's your prerogative. Believe me, given the number of times
> that people ask me "hey, what's going on this weekend?" I'm more than
> comfortable with the notion that sending the email does not
> automatically inject all the data into peoples' brains.
>
> Which gets back to my earlier point: successful marketing of anything
> *still* has to take advantage of *all* channels. There is no single
> channel so dominant or foolproof as to enable ignoring all the rest of
> them. Not yet, anyway.


I totally agree with you about that.


> Or to put it the other way: I'm probably not the only person who ignores
> Facebook invites. What plan do you (or any other event coordinator) have
> in place to reach out to us? (and yes, I see in the next paragraph that
> you do have one -- it was a rhetorical question)


It's cool! We're both quite experienced with the paragraph by paragraph
responses!



> > Anyway, point taken about the facebook invite, and it's a fair point.
> Can't
> > make people look at shit they don't want to look at. This is why I try
> to
> > combine facebook with evites or actual, old fashioned emails when letting
> > people know about the exciting social events I expect you to skip!
>
>
> Evites! Gaaaaah. Another thing I refuse to look at. What happened to
> good old fashioned engraving and calligraphy? Are you out to
> singlehandedly destroy the stationery industry?


The last time I sent a physical invite was in 2005. I want to do that, but
physical addresses change more frequently than email addresses, and shit,
postage is going up AGAIN, and I can't be bothered to send out a boring old
piece of paper, calligraphy or no. No, I have to print out magnets and
stickers and god knows what else. That said, I did leave out the fact that
I also invite people to things in those rare moments when I'm actually
interacting face to face.

But yes, your point stands uncontested that if Tir Na Nog wants to have the
best chance of getting butts in seats, they would do well to keep their
website updated. I just felt the need to point out publicly that the one
representative of Tir Na Nog who is possibly the most responsible for that
isn't the point at which this breaks down, or maybe not as much. And he
(and the nog) deserves heaps of public praise, ten times more than any
criticism he(the nog) gets. My inner libra is satisfied!




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