Who's still not paying featured readers?!!
Who's still booking poets and not paying them? I mean, really, are there organizers out there who think features are coming in from out-of-town to perform for free? Without even an explanation? This is actually happening?! Really
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That said, if I solicit a show and send a link to my website, which has MP3's and videos and enough of a bio to let an organizer know that I've been doing this shit for a few years, and they can't guarantee me enough cash to break even on gas and tolls for the trip, then I won't do the show. Been there, done that, felt used.
Your poetry earns your cash, not your odometer. True that, but I've driven two hours for a crowd of three. And one of those three was the organizer, who couldn't afford to buy my CD, but wanted to sell me her chapbook. There was no hat. The girl working the counter took pity on me and gave me a sandwich so I wouldn't be hungry on the ride home. Any venue can have a bad night, but it shouldn't be the poet with a thousand miles of road under his shoes who suffers for it.
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It's tough to get a gig at my place becuase we don't feature often, so when we do, it has to be someone we really think our audience will dig. It's worked into an interesting dynamic for us lately, in that we now have become sort of a place to go.
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The only acceptable substitute for no cash is physical gratification.
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Unless they having something else to offer, that's pretty wack.
I'll use Palo Alto as an example cus Lee already mentioned it. We didn't get paid a lot for the show but they:
A) picked us up from the airport- saved us $20
B) put us up for the night- saved us $80
C) cooked ridiculously good food- saved us $40
D) let us watch Shaun of the Dead- priceless
Not every slam has to pay crazy money but they should make it worth your while.
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( not to mention a wicked set!!)
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There's a poetry night in our area where the hat pass has gone steadily downhill over the years. It was never high, but it's really plummeted in recent years.
I have always liked the venue and they like me, but I find that it's just not worth it to me to head out that way and do a night of poetry for eight bucks and no merch sales. The reading's essentially degenerated into a social circle for the locals, and that's been reflected in the hat pass, as they don't value an outside feature all that much. This is compounded by a lack of respect from the host, who (the last time I was there, and it was with Faro) talked throughout our set with a friend, and because they were in the front row, I could see it was about comparing notes about jewelry thye'd made.
No real extra point -- just an affirmation of how paying a feature is a measure of the importance of the feature to the reading.
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