Jump to content

My Plan...Leaving Nashville, Starting Entertainment Company in Florida.


sventvkg

Recommended Posts

  • Members

Nashville's been a tough but rewarding experience for the past 3 1/2 years but ultimately I have little faith in the "biz" end of things here and we can't financially hold on any longer. The lost income from not performing full time in 4 1/2 years and the debt incurred over that time while we tried to make it work on really one income has gotten to a point where we're done. We feel really good and happy about everything. At ease about the move and don't regret anything about coming here. The sheer talent in this city is incredible and I found I do DO have what it takes and can hang as a writer, singer, player, producer. But the industry is fickle, there's only so many seats at the table, established players have all the connections, get the good artists, and industry trends are such that I really don't identify with them so...It's time to put my plan B, Retirement plan into place. We decided on the Space Coast, Brevard County, north of Melbourne, FL, near Cape Canaveral for a variety of reasons. Proximity to Orlando but with a beach. Orlando seems to be a nexus point for the Corporate entertainment business so I want to be close. Plus it's got a lot of opportunities for solo, duo, Tribute work and lots of industry. Not to mention we have family there and industry connections. It makes sense to be close. Also, the Space Coast area has over 750 places that have live entertainment and SO MANY opportunities for me to start making cash again playing solo, Duo with Mark, Band stuff on weekends etc. I expect to be working full time again in 3-6 months and will use this thriving music scene as a jumping off point while we're building our entertainment business.

 

You've all heard me talk about my plans to start an entertainment company..With Variety bands, DJ's, Corporate/private entertainment, tribute bands, video production, wedding photography, etc..Well My partner and I have been working on just that since the beginning of this year and it's going great. We've worked up 2 Tribute bands complete with backing parts as needed, and a variety Band which will ultimately be the seed of our wedding/corporate band as well as our 80's theme band. Currently we have over 80 songs finished with multi-track backing tracks and have another 40 that we are working on and it's on going. The plan is to hit the ground running in FL and start getting work as a Duo running whatever tracks we need behind us as well as acoustic gigs with no tracks. My drummer as well as the guitarist from one of my tribute bands we started working on here this Summer are both Moving down to the same area of FL as us. They've had it with Nashville too. (A bunch of people I know or friends of mine know are also moving..It's LITERALLY A MASS Migration)..So shortly we'll have the nucleus of the tributes and the Variety/Corporate/Wedding Band to get started. We need a good chick singer and a want an R&B/Pop Male vocalist that can do the Bruno Mars, Timberlake, Michael Jackson type stuff which I think will be easy to find out of Orlando.

 

I have a KILLER 80's hair metal singer friend of mine who lives in Tampa that's going to sing and we're also adding an 80's Hair band tribute to the lineup when we get there so there's a lot of work that needs to be done! We'll definitely have our hands full getting gigs, working up the various acts and bands, working up backing tracks, and shows etc...Oh since I mentioned it let me geek out a little and tell you about our show.

 

So we've designed a pretty cool high tech show which Ill go over the basics of. The PA is a Behringer X32 Compact with S16 Digital Snake which gives us 32 Pre's and the ability to split up the IO at the FOH and in a rack on stage for the Drums. Bass, Vocalists to plug into. The speakers are powered EVs. For backing tracks we're running multi-track stems in Abelton's Live out of a Macbook pro with SSD via Ethernet using a DANTE software that enables us to run a DANTE network and stream audio with very little latency into the X32 with Dante card installed. It's very cool. The software we'll probably use is called Dante Via by Audinate. Live will also contain Midi data for program changes on the keyboard rig as well as my Kemper Profile Amp as needed and Midi data to sync to the Video/lights on another Macbook Pro. We're doing a completely In ears, No Stage volume band with everything running direct. This is very easy to do with the X32 as there's an IOS app you can use for your own Monitor send (there are 10 stereo aux's for IEM's) or you can connect scores of P16 personal monitoring boxes if you wish. We're all on ears in my band now with an X32 Compact and it works FLAWLESSLY and my stereo ears mix is KILLER!

 

For Video we are running a 2nd MBP which will run Resolume VJ software which is just flat out incredible kit! We will have a triple head Matrox external video card and some black box splitters and other adapters to get video out to any number of LED TV's. To start will we will have a 70 center back and 2 55-60's that we can assign different video to. Eventually we'll have two 70"s in the back the two smaller ones and a number or even smaller screens scattered around the stage. This can be accomplished converting all the video into lower res analog and split to different screens. Since my partner is a motion graphics guru he has it all worked out and is going to start on the visuals for the variety band be the end of the month. I also edit and have begun to compile clips and catalog what we are going to use for what and I'll do a lot of the dirty work cutting while he gets the final edit, effects and visuals together. Resolume makes this very easy and light on your computer with small visual stuff you can buy and tweak to put in between your clips etc. Very cool software and POWERFUL!

 

For lights we'll run Mydmx or Dmxis synced up to ableton as well via MIDI and we're going to start out with a small Wireless DMX system consisting of a few moving head lights, spots and strips plus Haze. All WIFLY wireless and we'll build up from there. Fast setup and no wires is an investment I will definitely make!

 

This is the same system will be using for all bands and eventually when the variety band gets busy we'll just replicate it and start another one to fill in more dates. Build a brand over the years. Once we've built the system so it's plug and play I can use any number or a stable of musicians for all the positions and the band will not miss a beat. All the visuals, Backing tracks, system, lights etc will all be congruent to the system. Franchise but done REALLY HIGH END and the HIGHEST possible quality. I have no doubt the brand will build as long as we adhere to mark and my RIDICULOUS standards!!

 

For a DJ system we're putting together a starter kit based around Abelton, a Macbook Pro, lights, sound and fun! This is a private events, wedding/corporate function DJ service. NOT an EDM thing. MC fo the event, keep the crowd dancing, partying type of thing. Mark and I both shoot and edit video so offering those services for Wedding and private events are a no brainer. We have killer equipment already on that end and will eventually link up with some contractors to work with us as well as contract out still photography when it makes sense for us to start offering that service.

 

Now for this system we're building it will work whether we play as a Duo, Trio or up to however many pieces we need for the budget of the event and have the same consistent sound and show. So we will be able to get the client something for most any budget. That's the goal.

 

So, it's an ambitious endeavor!!! I know it's going to take a lot of work, advertising, and grass roots building of the brand over time. We will have a video for our duo and a website up before we move and will have professional video and websites up for our acts as they come online as well as a site for our company, a new corporation and DBA, a trailer and truck to pull it and some investment to get up and running. Being in the band i'm in this year as given me some perspective and experience in the wedding/corporate world and I can see the potential. The plan was to use services like Gigmasters, Wedding Wire, The Knot as well as attend wedding and bridal shows in the region etc.

 

What I'm going to ask is if anyone here of the many who have experience in these arena has any advice or anything to add as far as what I should do to position myself to get more work, I'd love for you to share it here. Not to argue among ourselves etc but I genuinely value your experience having been there and done that! ANY help and or advice I can get I'll GLADLY take!! I try to use my experience on these forums to help others and so do you all! Thanks!!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

That all sounds really exciting and wow! what a lot of balls to keep in the air at the same time! Good luck and well wishes for sure. And definitely keep us up to date.

 

I've only got one bit of advice at this point: tread carefully with wedding faires. I have a couple of experiences with them and neither were any good. But, of course, every market is different, so I'll tell you my stories so you can hopefully do better with them should you decide to go that route.

 

Because of the area I live in, most of the weddings we play are destination weddings. People coming in from way out of state (a lot of people from back east) who are flying out to get married in Lake Tahoe, the Napa Valley wine country, or San Francisco. But we thought we might rent a booth at a wedding faire to try and capture some more of the local market. The costs of renting a booth at a faire varies greatly depending on the size of the faire and the location. From a few hundred dollars for one in Sacramento to several thousand dollars for bigger shows in San Francisco. We opted to try out a cheaper show in Sac. As soon as we saw the brides file in, we knew this wasn't "our crowd". Hate to be so judgmental, but it was obvious these girls were not throwing high-dollar weddings. Consequently, beyond having some very nice girls stop by our booth and check out our video and our promo and talk to us a bit, we didn't get so much as a single call for even an inquiry, let alone a gig out of it.

 

At least in Sacramento, the high-dollar brides weren't attending wedding faires. Or at least not this one. Or maybe they'll be having their own destination weddings in Florida? We might have had better luck with the more expensive faire in SF. Was it more expensive because they catered to a higher-end customer? Or just because the show itself was bigger and reached more people? I dunno. We never bothered to find out.

 

We also bought a space at a "wedding store" this girl had opened in Reno. I don't know how common these sorts of stores are, but the concept is it is a storefront where various vendors rent permanent space and the employees at the store act as semi-wedding coordinators to help a bride choose different vendors and plan her event. After a year, we didn't get even a single inquiry, so we gave it up. I don't know if she's still in business or not. I thought it was a cool idea, but she was just starting it up. Maybe if we stayed with it longer as her business (hopefully) took off we'd have gotten a couple of gigs out of it, but we didn't get anything while we were there.

 

Having said that, I'm always open to new avenues for which to promote the band and connect with potential clients, and always open to revisiting old ideas that didn't work in the past in case things have changed, or we can think of ways to do them better next time.

 

So the long-story-short line here is: make sure any wedding faire you spend money on is reaching the right market for you. Spending an afternoon trying to sell yourself to a bunch of Bargain-Basement-Bettys will certainly be a waste of time.

 

But since you're also offering DJ services and music at various price points, none of that will probably be an issue for you so....nevermind my rant....lol

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Good advice Guido....My band leader said after the first couple years most of his calendar is full from word of mouth or people seeing us at a former wedding. So he's gone to a Free profile on Wedding Wire and The Knot. We also get a lot of work from Gigmasters these days. He said those wedding Fair's are BS too.. This really confirms it and I appreciate your experience and advice Thanks.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

Awesome man. I wish you well with that. I'm trying something similar.. transitioning from simply booking and playing in a bar band to creating a band that can function as a few different acts (a wedding/event band... a 90s band.. a country band).. as well as getting into the booking agent side of things. My girlfriend is a photographer (almost through her 4 year degree for it), and I plan on trying to incorporate that as well.

 

Lots of things to consider, for sure!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members

I used to work for a one stop wedding outfit in Volusia County Florida, no bands but DJ, Photography, Limo, and connections for Tuxedos and country clubs. Also did pool decks for Spring Break, corporate parties, even some special events at Disney Hotels. It's a great area that I remember as having more class than down here in S. Florida.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

  • Members
Blackbird where are ya located?

 

Sorry.. I forgot that this new HC doesn't display our location. I'm in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia...Virginia Beach-ish.

 

My previous username was Blackbird 13.. locked out of that account for some reason. Current projects are http://www.brokebysunday.com , http://www.popwireband.com , and http://www.thefeenies.com (Broke By Sunday the steady working bar band, Popwire the in-progress wedding/corporate band, and The Feenies the 90s band aimed more at corporates/frat parties/recurring weekly bar gig for "90s night").

 

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Archived

This topic is now archived and is closed to further replies.

×
×
  • Create New...