There was this band in Sacramento who booked my first band Shovelfist on a show and told me not to book anything else within two weeks of that show. I informed them we already had a show booked within two weeks of that show so they dropped us off the bill. At first I was pissed, that show was gonna be sick and then had an AHA! moment.
We were having trouble getting people out to all our shows because we were playing too many shows.
When a band is first starting out with shows, you just want to play every night of the week. You want everyone in your scene to hear your shit so you can start to gain a crowd.
That's fine when you're starting out, but when you've been playing out for like 7 months or so you need to back off.
Once you have a following, once your fans have heard your set twenty times, its time to book shows less often.
At that point you want to offer your fans quality shows maybe once a month, instead of the same kind of shows every weekend. If you play every weekend why should they come out THIS weekend?
Work on new songs, think up unique marketing ideas to draw more people out to your fewer amount of shows.
This is also the time to head out to other cities or towns nearby to expand your fan-base. Make sure you network or trade with good bands in those areas that will help you find good clubs to play. Nobody likes paying $200 in gas, $150 for a hotel to play for the eight people in the other bands on that show at some shit bar in BFE.
So yeah, play less shows in your hometown and more people will come out, unless your band sucks and then I really can't help you.
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