Promoting your band

As a new or young band it can be very hard to get noticed by a large audience, especially on a music scene that is virtually non-existent. Here are just a few simple ideas (if you haven't already thought of them) of how you can advertise your band.

Young and unsigned bands are always at the mercy of coorperate media in Ireland and abroad. Well known and well off record companies always have their foot in the door when it comes to getting on TV and/ or Radio but if you're not 'in the know', it's a hard road.

None the less there will always be some small outlet for lesser known bands and someone there to help out with promotion in some way. Some good radio outlets for unsigned bands would be:

If you want to by-pass the media all together there are other ways of getting your message out.

Flyer or poster campaign:
Design flyers or posters to promote a cd or gig and post them in strategic locations around your town or city such as colleges, pubs, super market bulletin boards, music shops etc...

Internet listings campaign:
Web bulletin boards, Irishbandlsist.com ;0p , gigsmartireland.com, thumped.com, blast.ie, mailing list.

Txting people about upcoming gigs:
Texting people seems to be a good way of getting people to your gigs these days. But make sure not to over txt people as this will upset some.

Gigs and Appearances:
Take it from someone who is used to doing plenty of gigs, it's an uphill struggle but doing gigs (and plenty of them) is THE way to get noticed. My old band used to play 4 gigs every week for about 6 months to a year. At first nobody came to the gigs, nobody knew or cared who we were and we thought carrying all the gear to venues, setting up, doing crappy sound checks was all a waste of time. But slowly the constructive comments started to come our way, the audiences slowly grew, soon enough people were contacting us for gigs and not the other way around.

That's all well and good for some but how do you get 4 gigs a week? Apart from looking on the web (gigsmartireland.com, thumped.com, boards.ie, blast.ie amongst others), ringing around and setting up your own, one of the easiest ways to get plenty of gigs (you'll always get great ones and you'll ALWAYS get really shit ones but it's all part of the experience) is to find some acquaintance who can sell you his/her dirty underwear! I'm talking about those people who can take a Garda's hat and sell it back to him at an inflated price, one of those people with balls of steel and a mouth that can talk it's way out of a shoebox. He/ She's your new manager! I've met plenty of these guys and the gigs they come up with are something. No matter how bad they sound, just do them!

If you've any other ideas or opinions about promoting bands put them on the message board and I'll make it a 'sticky'

For anymore info & opinion contact:

Kevin @ irishbandslist.com
[webmaster] Irishbandslist.com