Why You Should Plan More Days Off For Your Band's Next Tour
If you’re like most bands, you probably make sure that you fill every possible date when planning a tour. Let us tell you why that might be a mistake and why you should plan more days off on tour to make your experience on the road a good one.
Promote Your Next Gig
A lot of bands give up on promotion when they’re on the road. It’s easy to do – you barely have enough time to make it to the next town, how are you going to find the time to flyer your next concert? Easy, make the time. Book a day off and get to the next town a day early. Call up local radio stations and ask if you can drop in for a quick interview. Check out local TV programming ahead of time to see if they have live music on their morning shows and ask if you can perform on the air. And be sure to head out to the club you’re playing and flyer the night before your show – be sure to check out our article on creative promotion for some ideas on more effective flyering.
Work On New Material
It’s incredibly easy to fall into a rut on tour. Being in a band on the road is all routine, you wake up and drive several hours to the next town, load in to the club, play the same set you did the night before, load out, then do it all again the next day. People tend to think that touring is constant excitement and partying, and while it certainly has its moments, it can also be very monotonous. So do something to break up the monotony, plan a day off to get your creative spark back. Rent out a practice space (or ask one of the bands you’re playing with the next night if you can use theirs) and write new songs or work new material into your set, make a demo, do something to make you feel like being in a band is fun rather than feeling like a robot that’s programmed to do the same routine day after day.
Save Your Sanity
Touring can be a great way to bring a band closer together, but it can tear your band apart just as easily. 12 hours a day in a cramped tour van can make even the best of friends turn on each other pretty quickly. Minor problems that are easy to brush off at a hometown show suddenly become compounded into disasters on the road. A couple of back-to-back poorly attended shows, having to dip into your own pocket for gas money, dealing with a shady promoter all seem to cause far more stress to a band when on tour. Instead of lining up 30 straight dates of stress filled shows, plan several days off to get away from your band mates for a spell. Go see a movie, be a tourist, catch up on sleep, do something other than being a musician for a day, forget about the stresses of being on the road – it will make your experience on tour much more enjoyable.
Whether you’re taking a day off to catch up on a bit of sleep or using the time to make your next show better, planning off days is a perfect way to make sure your band’s next tour isn’t its last.
