Out of Gas: How Many Indie Tours Derailed by Gas Prices?
Are you in a rock 'n' roll band? Were you going to load up the Econoline and hit the road this summer, living off gas-station burritos and fart jokes for three months? Unless you had a sweet publishing deal (and didn't split pub money with your bandmates), then it's likely the cost of gas has crushed your chances of living the dream this year. And you wouldn't be the only one.
From CNN:
Steven Garcia pulled into a Houston gas station recently to fill up the old Dodge van his punk band uses on summer tours.For months, the 23-year-old singer-guitarist had been budgeting money and booking show dates for Something Fierce's third tour—but skyrocketing gas prices have put the brakes on those plans.
"Once I ran the numbers it was a 'There's no (expletive) way' kind of moment," Garcia said. After much hand-wringing and grumbling from bookers who'd scheduled the band to play, Garcia canceled the tour.
Cramming into a rusty, creaky van and playing dive bars and house parties is a summer ritual for many young musicians and ambitious independent bands trying to get exposure, make a living and maybe build a solid future in music.
But like everything else that requires lengthy time on the road, filling up at $4 a gallon or more is taking a toll.
Comments
Music should be free! Bands can live off of touring money! Oh wait...
Posted 06/23/2008 at 11:58:02 AMtraveling in a van these days is funny cause most gas stations won't even let you put more than $75 in your tank at a time and that only fills our 15 passenger van half way up.
Posted 06/23/2008 at 01:04:27 PMSo not only are you getting raped on the prices you also are stopping twice as much at gas stations to buy ice cream.
can't sell records, can't go on tour...eff this shite.
Posted 06/23/2008 at 01:28:46 PMNeil, that's probably because you're using plastic. $75 is what the pump authorizes, regardless of how much you get. If you want more, hang up the pump and slide your card again.
We are doing 5 weeks this summer and after my mileage calculations, we are going about 9,000 miles at 13mpg which means we will spend $2,769 on gas if it hovers around $4 a gallon. If we weren't support for another band and didn't have guarantees to rely on, there's no way we could do this. Even with our guarantees, we are not going to make hardly any money. We are just hopeful that merch makes up some ground for us.
Someone suggested I rent a mini van and consolidate gear with the other band. A mini van gets 22mpg on average this will save us $1,132 in gas money. However, a mini van costs about $250 a week to rent and, over 5 weeks, would cost us more than what we saved in gas.
Basically, it completely sucks.
Posted 06/23/2008 at 01:51:24 PMWe have two dates on the west coast at the Download Festivals. It's looking like it's going to be cheaper to fly than to drive. Of course, we're going to have to rent backline in LA and drive it to San Francisco. So, if anyone knows of cheap gear rental....
Posted 06/24/2008 at 12:08:22 AM