Over the years, I have had the privilege of working with a number of fabulous promoters, publicists, agents, managers, and record labels. Most work with metal bands, with many willing to consider those at the grassroots level.
In the spirit of Noctis IV: Thrones of War Metal Festival and Conference, running Sept. 24 and 25 in Calgary, Alta., allow me to share these with you. What you do with this information is entirely up to you, but do feel free to comment at the end if we’ve missed any you think …

Before one of my very first live shows – that wasn’t a forced lesson-related recital – I diligently packed my gig case. Keyboard? Check. Stand? Check. Power cord? Check. Patch Cable? Check. Pedal? Check. When I got to the venue, I got my gear inside and helped unload the rest, and then set my stuff up on stage. When it came time for sound check, I was given a DI box to plug my keyboard into, which is pretty standard, but when I asked the sound guy where I was …

Relax and have fun. According to living metal legend Gene Hoglan, that’s the key to drumming. After all, “It’s not ‘rocket surgery;’ it’s just drums,” he exclaims.
“A lot of guys turn it into something really intense and difficult and not fun,” Hoglan states.
“When you’re all tensed up, that just makes it not fun, and you get this horrible struggling strained face on. That looks like you’re killing yourself, and that doesn’t look like fun. Unless you like looking like that,” he laughs. “I try to practice Occam’s Razor when it …

So you’ve decided you’re going to record your first demo, or maybe you’re going to go straight for the glory of an EP or full-length album. Whatever the case, the whole band has been practicing hard, working on every little detail in every song. You’ve even played some shows and had all your friends come out and get wasted with you at the end of the night saying, “Hey man, when do I get to hear this at home or in my car? You guys rule!”
You’ve had a couple engineers …

You have planned everything perfectly and promoted your show to the best of your ability: hung posters, handed out handbills, stormed the Internet, called and texted all your friends, practiced hard to play a killer gig. Five hours before the doors open, you arrive at the venue ablaze with the fire of a perfectly executed metal show.
Taking the time to help the manager move all the tables, you set the lights up meticulously so that no band or entertainment is left out, and arrange and perfect every detail to its finest …

Although we sometimes hate to admit it, being in a band is really no different than being the owner of a business. Whether you started jamming in your garage with a couple of friends for the sole purpose of having a good time or have plans to one day tour the globe, at the end of the day there is simply no denying that the success of your band depends on all the same things. Marketing, finance, accounting, and leadership all play important roles when it comes to being in …

You hear the buzzing of drunken voices cluttering the room and you start to get excited. You can literally smell the heavy metal in the air from the 200 sweating bodies that just moshed their asses off to the band before you. You see your band mates plugging in the last of their cables and you hear the last floor tom sound check fire off like a cannon. You walk on stage and grip the mic like it’s your last bottle of water in the desert. You look out into the crowd and …

These days, school and heavy metal are mixing in a variety of ways. Many musicians in our local Alberta bands are also pursuing a post secondary education, but getting a university degree or a college diploma is not an easy task in first place. Throw in the commitments of a band, and your workload seems to increase exponentially. Certain considerations will come up, such as choosing between your band and school. If that opportunity to tour say, Europe, comes up in the middle of a semester do you drop all …

When heading out on tour, one of the most important details to consider is also one of the least or last thought of. What the hell are we gonna eat?
For most bands, the first trip, even if just across the province, involves booking the gigs, finding “reliable” transportation, packing the gear and hoping you’ve got a place to sleep after the show. Food is often secondary. It’s also one of the biggest money mongers if you’re touring for more than a couple of days, and it seems the more you …

Ahhh, Christmas! It’s the time of year when kids of all ages dream of getting free stuff from friends and relatives alike. And if you have a musician on your list, they can be the hardest people to buy for. Let’s face it, most of us tend to be notoriously picky about our gear, and more often than not, we want the good stuff. Throw in the tendency of players of all shapes and sizes to suffer from GAS (Gear Acquisition Syndrome), and you have a difficult task ahead of …

If you are in a band, chances are you’ve at least thought about getting a manager, or an agent, or both. But what’s the difference between the two? What do they do? And for that matter, does your band really need either of them?
When the term agent is used in conjunction with the music business, it generally means a booking agent. As the name would imply, a booking agent’s job is to book shows for the artists he or she is representing. In doing so, they negotiate minimum payments, the …

To think of shredding conjures up images of famous guitarists like Ulrich Roth, Eddie Van Halen and Yngwie Malmsteen, just to name a very small few from the world stage.
Alberta has its very own league of shredders that shouldn’t be underestimated.
Joe Sikorski, guitarist for Calgary grindcore act Exit Strategy, has been known to shred things up a time or two.
“Cornflakes, guitars, paper, miscellaneous odds and ends, you know,” laughs Sikorski, who was also a member of Thorazine, Caveat and Blacksky.
But what about shred guitar?
“I can give the clinical definition, which …

One of the most unemphasized facts in the music business today is that it is, in fact, a business.
Sure, most bands and individual musicians start their musical journeys with fun and creativity and all that wonderful feel-good stuff at the core, but the reality is, if you’re really serious about taking your music to the next level, you have to start treating it like a business.
“A lot of bands don’t understand the business of it. They just think play some local shows and rock out and that’s all it takes, …

Summertime brings warm weather, and plenty of outdoor shows and festivals at which music fans can soak up some song and a little vitamin in the key of D. For musicians, it’s a great opportunity to expand your experience and fanbase, but it can also be a cause for frustration when it comes to sound and the vast expanse into which it can dissipate.
As I looked into the problems involved in mixing sound for outdoor venues (humidity, temperature, wind, etc.), I realized that in the vast majority of outdoor venues, …

Virtually every musician either has, or at least has had, aspirations to tour. Some have been inspired by the stories of the road to pursue a musical trek, while others, especially at the independent level, have been overwhelmed by the logistical nightmare planning a tour can be and ended up staying at home.
In reality, going on tour isn’t very difficult at all, especially these days. The once-daunting task of finding venues and similar bands in cities you’ve never visited has been eased greatly by online social networking sites, such as …

The sign in the window read “Space For Lease.” Bob Richardson was a bassist for a French-Canadian rock band at the time, and he and his band mates needed a place to jam, so they called the number and arranged to check it out.
“And the fellow that owned the building, he said, ‘Well sure, why not,’ and rented us the little space in the front,” Richardson says, pointing to a pool table just around the corner from Slaughterhouse Studios‘ front entrance.
By the mid ’90s, the building – which had once …

There’s nothing like stage etiquette to leave a lasting impression, and whether you’re the band that’s awesome to work with, or the band that gets bumped to the bottom of the “band’s to play shows with list,” is entirely up to you.
The unwritten rules, so to speak, of the relationship between bands is one of the most important aspects of live performance, regardless of the level you’re at.
“You want to make a statement and kick some ass, but there’s some politeness there. There’s some respect that you should have for …