Hi everyone, I'm fairly new here and I'm absolutely loving to be part of this community and learn from John and other members of the Insider Circle!

I just wanted to share my story as it may be of help to those whom, like me, are starting out and struggling to build their lists and sell records. It may sound like a crazy idea (and to some extent it was), but with a band I toured with in 2013, we sold almost 10,000 CDs (Albums) at €20 each (about $22 now, $25-27 then) in six months!

How did we do it? BUSKING!

To give you the full picture:

This was a fully independent Australian band that had toured Europe 4/5 years in a row, in 2013 I was hired to play bass on their 6 months tour (May-October) all over western Europe. It was a 7-piece folk/pop outfit (vocals and guitar, keyboards, bass, drums, violin, viola, cello).

We had about 60 gigs in all kinds of venues and festivals, I don't know how much the band was getting at gigs, we were on a weekly wage as session players.

In the daytime we would travel from city to city, set up in the biggest square, and play the full set (about 20 songs) or longer if the crowd was responding well (and the police didn't stop us).

We had a merch table with shirts and CD’s (two different albums, as mentioned the price tag was €20 for one, €35 for both, the roadie would manage the payments). On a day when we got to play a full set we would sell between 50 and 150 CD’s! We also had a pad to take emails, and although I don’t know the exact numbers, pretty much every person that bought signed up to the mailing list, and even some who weren’t buying did. To put things into perspective, at gigs we would only sell 10-20 CDs on good days!!

I have to admit at the beginning of the tour I COULDN'T BELIEVE MY EYES! Was I really in 2013? Aren’t people not buying music anymore? Isn’t the industry dead?

It was very encouraging to see that people were still willing to buy music they liked, and to be totally blunt, that band wasn’t even so good! I heard stuff that's ten times better by artists on this site! 

I know that busking is something that most musicians (especially pros) would probably not be keen on, and I totally understand, it might not be a comfortable setting. 

A few extra points:

The band was big, and therefore drove quite a lot of attention. I think a lot of people would buy because of the “surprise factor” of seeing a 7-piece band playing in the street. It’s probably gonna be tougher if you do it solo or with a smaller line-up.

You need an extra man to look after the merchandise and handle payments while you play. 

If you busk in the day or the day before in the same town you’re playing in the evening, you can also promote your gig. We would usually see quite a few people we met on the street turning up at gigs.

Downsides of busking may be:

You can’t do it on a rainy or cold day, definitely not in the winter!

You might get stopped by the police due to noise complaints or local street-art rules

In Europe cities can be close to each other, it might be harder to make up petrol money in places like America or Australia. Also the same band toured the States once and found it a lot harder, the general attitude towards busking wasn’t good, but again, this band wasn’t such a big deal.

Parking your van in a city centre can be a nightmare!!

This is it, you do the maths! 10,000 CD’s X €15/20 = €150,000/200,000, plus what was made at gigs. And at least 10,000 new subscribers to their mailing list.

Obviously touring can be tremendously expensive, but John’s lesson from October 2013 covers that thoroughly (funny that it was released when my tour ended), and you might not wanna spend half a year playing in the street (I personally wouldn’t). But I thought I would share my story with you, it might be something new to try next time you’re on tour, or even if you aren’t, a way to grow your list and sell some albums!

Thanks for reading, looking forward to hearing your thoughts and if you have questions please ask 

Pat

PS this is the video diary of the tour: 

this is a collection of the WEIRDEST people we’ve met while busking, and yes, that’s my motorway dance at 0:43