One of our local music festivals turned into a pay-to-play scheme this year.

[BEAD]

We've had a festival here the last few years that was originally called North By Northwest, and recently switched to being called Musicfest Northwest. It's basically a SxSW ripoff, where folks can pay for a bracelet and then enter pretty much any venue all night.

 

Until this year they accepted electronic submissions as well as physical press kits. This year they decided they only wanted electronic submissions, and the only way to submit was to pay $10 to a third party to set up a kit on their page and then pay another $10 to submit the kit to the Musicfest folks.

 

There aren't all that many pay-to-play scams in Portland, so we were a bit surprised by all of this. $20 for a chance to play in a club we'd get paid to play any other night of the year.

 

What do you guys think? Are we being too inflexible or are we doing the right thing? Would y'all have paid to submit an application?

[Jugghaid]

Hollywood (all of LA actually) was pay-to play back in the 80's. {censored}, we paid up to $500 a night to play he better venues (Roxy, Whiskey, Gazzaris, Rainbow) or to open up for national acts.

 

Never had to do that in Denver though.

 

Depends on the scene there and the type of exposure you're going to be getting. also depends on what your band goals are. If you're looking to get signed, then $20 is a small proce o pay for good exposure and possible radio play.