Betty & The Id + Peoples Republic Of Mercia  (Tap & Spile 07/06/08)

We wanted to put a gig on where we could thank everyone who has been to see us over the last year, choose our own line up and DJ's and try and make the night a bit more special than the "four bands who have nothing in common for four quid" mentality that currently prevails in Brum. This gig was our first attempt at promoting ourselves with the main idea being to cut out as many middle men as possible.

Antony had found the pub, the Tap & Spile, and is continuing to promote there with a gig from Glitters From Billy  on the 26/07/08. 

The Tap & Spile is a real ale pub just off Broad Street and is probably most famous for once featuring in the Cliff Richard film Take Me High, which features much great footage of seventies Birmingham. Cliff walks past the Tap & Spile on the way to his luxury barge on Gas St basin! See the footage here.

Anyway having lugged the back line and ancient seventies disco gear several miles from the nearest parking space and up the rickety stairs we were ready to sound check. No sound man required as we just used a vocal p.a and no mic's on the  back-line. Due to the wooden floor it was still  trouser flappingly loud!

The deal for the night was that for your £3 entry fee you got a copy of our Neutron World CD EP, a live set from Peoples Republic Of Mercia and see us do our entire repertoire in tribute to Sparks recently doing the same. To be fair Sparks had to remember 21albums to our 17 songs, but as Antony and Allan had been to no fewer than 13 of the 21 gigs, it seemed like a good idea at the time!  

Peoples Republic Of Mercia got proceedings off to a rollicking start with their own brand of no nonsense rock n roll and classic punk rock. There's loads of humour in their lyrics and they've supported the likes of Eddie & The Hot Rods and Wilko Johnson in the past so you knew that you were in safe hands. With it being a warm night all of the windows were open in the pub resulting in quite a few bemused  punters from the "foam party" in the club on the other side of the canal coming onto the balcony to see what was going on.

We did our 17 song set relatively unscathed barring one or two memory lapses, Sparks must have had an autocue! Discojen then took to the decks and entertained the crowd with some classic glam, weird disco and 7 inch oddities.

So we came to the conclusion that self  promoted gigs has to be the way forward. The bands got paid, the crowd of about 40 got to see two bands a dj and a free cd to take home, everyone's a winner

All that remained then was to get the gear home through the 2am Broad St crowds, we saw some sights i'll tell ya!

Our next gigs are tonight ( Saturday 19/07/08) at the Actress & Bishop, Ludgate Hill. Then next Saturday 26/07/08 we are performing at an all-ages benefit gig for Friends Of Moseley Road Baths. We will be onstage very shortly after the 3pm start so get down there early. We hope you can make it down support this very good cause.

Duty Now,

JS 

As we bump along the lower strata of the Birmingham gig scene I think it's time to lift the lid on the mechanics of how it all works. It can go from almost pyramid sales techniques to pure music lovers in the space of a gig and the last two gigs have encapsulated both extremes of gig promotion in Birmingham. The promoters can be split into three categories for our purposes, the "career" promoter and the "music fan" promoter and the "Third way" promoter.

The "career" promoter is usually looking for a way into the music biz, these gigs are usually four bands for £4 entry fee and unless you get 15 people who say they've come to see you then you will be paid nothing whether you've had to transport the back line in two cars or not. Here's a quote from the email we got from Club Uncooked.

"Tickets
This gig has a £4 entry fee. When each band reaches there minimum target of 15 they will receive a £1 per ticket. When a band gets over 25 they receive £2 per ticket sold. "

The "third way" promoter will pay the bands a pound each for whoever comes through the door and this increases to £1.50 a head if you get over 30 people eg Catapult Club

The gig at The Flapper on 01/05/08 was promoted by Club Uncooked and falls into the category of "career" promoter. We were launching our new EP  and it was a good gig with great sets from Gamble Gamble and Cobweb Dilemma's. As we didn't reach his target of people coming through the door on a wet Thursday night and despite us providing the back line and headlining the gig the promoter didn't even bung us a token £10 for petrol.  That smacks of  pay to play in my book and I don't think we'll be doing any more of these kind of gigs. Club Uncooked aren't the only ones who work this way, the worst case i've seen is  headline bands at the Mono Bar  have to  buy 20 tickets at £80 and support acts 15 tickets at £60  before you can play.

In total contrast the gig at the island bar on the 09/05/08 was organised by Mike and Hils who run Freakin Legend music co-operative promotions and who definitely come under the category of music fan promoters.They are in it for the music and have the insane glow of  people on a mission.They run their gigs as non profit so all the door after expenses goes to the bands. The gig was another stormer with a really eclectic line up including Jazz Thrash Assassins,  Reverie ("This is our first time in Leicester!") and Lime Chalks. The crowd were a good reflection of the promoters philosophy, judging by the great responses given to all the bands. A special mention to the Jazz Thrash Assassins drummer who refused to let anyone use his drum stool as it had been specially moulded to his specific buttock requirements!

Here's a copy of the Freakin Legends Manifesto

This whole subject links in with this discussion going on at Created in Birmingham 

Next gig is a Catapult Club promoted gig at the Hare and Hounds supporting The Clouds on Thursday 29/05/08 onstage 10pm.

Next weeks subject, sound-men! 

JS

The Ford Squad who promote these regular nights at the Shrewsbury Arms pride themselves on having an ecclectic line up and this was certainly the case for our gig there on Friday night.

Proceedings were started in a fairly normal manner with a couple of folk acts, Girl Peculiar and Nomad Jones but soon took a strange turn with the introduction of a barbershop quartet called Under The Influence, who certainly put the wind up us with their close harmony set. 

Next up was Staffords answer to John Cooper Clarke, The Trent Vale Poet who despite having to battle the deafening karaoke from the back room, had us laughing along merrily to his tales of being beaten up in Wetherspoons. There then followed a potty mouthed Punch & Judy Show by Jamie Fletcher.

At one point Punch lead the crowd in a hearty chorus of "All you need is love", it was that kind of night! There was also supposed to be an act called Men with Bananas who didn't turn up (the mind boggles!)

It was a hard act to follow but we did our thing and got the good people of Stafford up and dancing and generally lived up to our billing on the poster, "Betty & The Id (LOUD)"

The new EP CD's were delivered just in time for the gig and we did a brisk trade with the heroically drunken Stafford crowd, so make sure you're at our upcoming Birmingham shows to secure your copy, see www.bettyandtheid.com for details or contact us at bettyandtheid@hotmail.com. These are limited to 200 hundred copies.

A special mention to the landlady of the Shrewsbury Arms who took great interest in us numbering the CD's round the pub table, served us her own brand Deb's Special bitter and even bought a CD! 

Next up is a gig at The Flapper on Thursday 1st May with the great Cobweb Dilemmas.

See you there,

JS

Well, here is a new thing for Betty & The Id.  We have tentatively joined the 21st century with our new blog.  Kicking a little bit, but excited about it all.  Surely a band that has some equipment older than the band members should not be indulging in this kind of behaviour? 

Well, we are.  Come and join us!

B&Id