On the road again...

So, for the past ten years or so, before even graduating from college, I've worked for record labels, often charged with the task of "supporting" touring artists while on the road. Said "support" consists basically of alerting the local media well in advance of the gig -- press, radio, local societies and such. I hesitate to say it's a thankless job. It's more like covering your ass...you want to be sure to have at least one or two big media hits (like a juicy radio interview or a feature in the local paper), so that when no one shows up to the gig, you can say, "But we had a big feature in the Buttscrunch Journal." The actual correlation between local media and show attendance is, of course, fleeting and unproven.

It was interesting to be on the other side of the fence a few weeks ago, when my young-ish band (we've been together about a year and four months) took in a short tour of the southeast. It was the first time for all of us, and even though it was only six days, I think we learned some lessons...those being:

1. Sleep
If you do one night where you get less than 7 or 8 hours of sleep, you leave yourself open to infection and grumpiness. And headaches. It's a vicious cycle.

2. Eat Well
Fast food and donuts also lead to headaches, crankiness, and indigestion.

3. Friends Are Great
Call it playing it safe, but for this first round we hit towns where we had a lot of friends and family. They came. They bought a lot of merch. They brought us snacks. They cheered loudly.

4. The Media May Not Matter
We didn't have any big media hits, outside of some good radio spins in one town. And it didn't seem to make much difference...which is fine, because local press and radio were astonishingly unfriendly and unhelpful.

5. Seven Hours Is Probably Too Long
Driving seven hours (which turned into eight-plus with traffic) and doing a show that night may be too much. Again, tired and headaches and crankiness can result.

The above makes it sound like the tour was a big malnourished crank-fest, which it wasn't! We just noticed that these little things would start to come up, and fortunately my buddies are all too nice and civil to act on any ill-achieved impulse. It was great fun...