Progress Report Two

I travelled to Southampton to meet and interview an unsigned band called Posh Ellen yesterday. It was really fun to have a few beers and have a chat with them before they played their gig. They instantly came across as very self assured and confident, which I think can only be a positive trait if you want to make it in the industry. They seemed to genuinely believe they could ‘bring back rock and roll’ so I found it pretty easy to coax some good quotes out of them during the interview.

For all their bravado though, there were a few things that stuck out to me when I was watching them. The venue itself was pretty full but in the upstairs room, where they played their set, remained almost empty for a lot of their show, with only friends and family really watching a lot of it. There was a lady on the door charging a fiver entry, and I saw quite a few people decide not to stay and watch after being told they had to pay. The band told me themselves that they weren’t seeing any money from their performance last night, so the venue was effectively restricting them from playing to more people by charging so much. I know that on a student budget I certainly wouldn’t want to pay five pounds to see a band I’d never heard of before, but if I was able to watch them for free I would have enjoyed it. With the petrol money it took for them to get there, the band were effectively paying to play to a few friends and family. They didn’t seem to mind and told me they had an EP release coming up with hundreds of people attending, it will be interesting to see how that goes.

I’ve spent today editing down the interview and I think it went well. I’m still struggling to find my ‘expert’ interview, but hopefully that will sort itself out soon.