Confirm and prepare the date

A band took a Nottingham date on a voice note. "Yeah, you're on, 12 July." On 12 July, the poster taped to the door listed four bands instead of two. They opened at 7.30 to the bar staff and the other musicians, 25 minutes instead of 40, and the door got split four ways after the sound. Nobody had lied. The promoter had added two mates the week before, and there was no written sentence anywhere saying "two bands, 40 minutes". This chapter is that sentence, and the nine others.

A yes is an intention. A date is a yes plus something written that both sides have accepted. Between the two, gigs go missing every year over daft misunderstandings: a soundcheck time heard differently, a fee "we said was after sound", a third band appearing on the poster. Nobody lies. Nobody wrote it down.

The evening the deal and the terms are agreed, you send an email that sums it all up in ten numbered lines and ends with a simple ask: "if that's all right with you, an ok back is all I need". Not a contract, no legal phrasing. Ten lines that get read in forty seconds at 2pm.

With a funded venue, an arts centre or a festival, this email comes before a contract they write. Read the whole thing, especially the cancellation clauses, and ask your questions before you sign. With a pub or a small club, the email and the "ok" are the agreement. The payoff is immediate: whatever the venue corrects in its reply, you don't find out at 7.05pm on the night.

Priya didn't look for a template. She went back through Dave's messages, in the order he'd said things, and numbered them. Where she had nothing written down (merch, parking behind the venue), she wrote what she assumed, so Dave would correct rather than guess.

Next day, 2.12pm, Dave replies:

ok to all except load-in, 5 not 6, headliner's kit in first. And it's Jen on the door with the clicker, not the bar. Parking: back alley off Pollard Street, drop and move, nothing before 5.

Three corrections in two lines. None of them serious. All of them would have made for a slightly bent evening: a band turning up half an hour late for an engineer in a hurry, bar staff who don't know what clicker you mean, a van on the pavement at 4pm.

Read the Nottingham version again. The recap wouldn't have stopped the promoter adding two bands. It would have given the band a sentence to say on arrival: "we had two bands, 40 minutes in writing; how do we sort this?"

The first tech spec Priya sent Dave ran to three pages, copied from a band that tours 500-cap rooms: twelve wedges on four mixes, a monitor engineer, thirty-two channels. The Foundry Tap has two wedges and a sixteen-channel desk. Dave wasn't impressed, he was worried, and he rang.

Priya sent back one page: two vocals, one guitar, bass on a DI, drums on four mics, two wedges "vocals and a bit of guitar", a stage plan drawn by hand, and at the bottom the hospitality rider (water on stage, somewhere to put coats, a hot meal for three if there's one going). Dave: "Right, that I can do."

Two versions are plenty: a full one for properly equipped rooms, a cut-down one for pubs, both built on the complete example linked below. Send the right one at least three weeks out, name the rider at point 5 of the recap, and ask the engineer to confirm they've read it. A tech spec is a shopping list for someone else.

Ten cards, two or three fields each. The email writes itself as you type and ends with the line that gets a reply. Empty cards stay flagged: you can copy anyway, but you know what's missing.

The venue puts the date in its listings; you bring your crowd. Neither fills the room alone. The calendar gets decided at line 7 of the recap, and it starts earlier than you'd think.

If the date is more than eight weeks out, the joint announcement goes up the moment you confirm: the event created by the promoter with you as co-host, artwork in the format they use, tickets on sale if there's an advance. Otherwise, six to eight weeks before.

Four weeks is too late for anyone selling tickets: at D-21, a club with zero presales starts thinking about pulling the show, and you'd rather know before they do.

Then, two weeks out, something that makes people want to come (a live clip, the bill introduced), shared on both sides, and a line to the community radio station and the BBC Introducing show for your region with a sentence about the venue. One week out, a reminder and named invitations. The day before, stage times.

The named invitations are where the next date gets made. One or two promoters from your list, within an hour's drive: "we're on at Dave's on the 23rd, it'd be good to see you there". Whether they come or not, they know a room near them has taken a punt on you.

The rest fits in a list you tick off, from confirmation to the night before. It exists so that no box depends on your memory on a rehearsal night.

At D-7, a short email to the venue, the only one you'll send between now and the date:

Hi Dave, all good our end: load-in 5, on at 8. On the night it's me on 07…, and Dee on 07… if I'm driving. See you Thursday.

If something changes (someone's ill, the van's died, a double booking), you say so the moment you know, by phone then by email, with a solution if you have one: a dep, a new date, a band you'd recommend. A cancellation announced early and cleanly leaves the relationship intact, and often gets you a rescheduled date.

If it's the venue that cancels, whatever's in writing says what happens; with a pub, ask at least for the costs you've already paid out.

It's all written, accepted, posted. The venue knows what time you arrive, the engineer knows how many wedges to set up, and two promoters nearby know you're playing down the road from them. All that's left is to play. And, before that, a detour that isn't only for bands living near a ferry port.