Sit On It
One thing I’ve realized when trying to book a residency is: giving it a rest. By that I mean, when you think of the greatest idea in the world, give it a little time. Don’t take action immediately, give it at least 24 hours and then see how you like it.
I’ve thought of so much in the last month. It’s been a good exercise in that. I’m really getting creative on thinking about what I want to do and thinking through it. Do I want to start a residency at someplace with no built-in crowd and where I’m going to have to bring that too? Very hard. Do I try to get in somewhere where it’s a little bit fancier, like a super hip hotel? How good would I feel there? Really need to go see what’s going on first. Scope that out. Local restaurants underutilizing patios, a.m. shows at coffee bars?
All great ideas, but do you want to be the guinea pig, and if it’s unsuccessful, can you go back there and eat? It’s so much work, and you don’t want to drill your friends, especially if the area is not somewhere where people typically like to see music or at times when there’s not really music. So there’s a lot to think about.
By my estimation eight out of 10 ideas probably aren’t it.
I reached out to two of the 10 this last week: booking agents. Reaching out to booking agent one, I heard nothing from. I think they do weddings, and I think that I said that I’m probably not good for weddings, like they mainly don’t do event-events. So I sharpened my attack, kind of thinking about what I would truly be good at. Sent that to the next one--and I knew them, but I got an immediate response, which probably means my email was good. We’ve had a little back-and-forth, and we’ll see.
Ideas are good, but not every immediate idea is good. They’re great in music, but they may not be the best in music business.
Sit on it.