If you haven't heard of RABBL so far, you will soon. It's a new social networking service where artists can crowdfund shows. Music fans are constantly coming at musicians asking when they are going to play their hometown next. The demand for an artist to play a certain venue may be there, but it's typically not much in the artist's control where they end up touring. RABBL puts things into both the musician's and the fans' hands. The artist first creates a potential show at a venue (a "rabbl"). Then fans "reserve" tickets. If there is enough demand from the fans for the artist to play that venue, it's booked and the show goes on! We spoke to Wade Lagrone, CEO and co-founder to get the details.
MT: Which artists have participated in Rabbl so far?
WHL: Hundreds of artists are using RABBL. Most recently, Clap Your Hands Say Yeah and Dan Tedesco played shows that they organized via RABBL.
MT: Can fans propose a show too, or just support it once an artist has?
WHL: Today, the person who creates a rabbl is the artist (or their manager, etc.). We have felt that it's really important for artists to be in close touch with and in control of their rabbls. Fans can influence an artist by asking them to create a rabbl for a certain city, which works a lot better than the usual thing, which is to pile onto an artist's Facebook page and post comments asking them to play somewhere. We are always looking at improving, though, so you may see some changes here from us over the next few months.
MT: Any preview into artists who plan to participate in the future?
WHL: We're actually working with both labels and promoters now, and there will be a fair bit of news on this front, though none we can announce yet. We've been particularly interested in working with acts who can use us in a variety of ways. RABBL is about a lot more than simply getting gigs!
MT: Sounds fun and fairly simple! Can you please clarify the final step "Fans on the list get in at the door without paying anything. We ask fans if the show happened. If they tell us yes, we send the ticket price money to the band."
WHL: One of the biggest differences between us and other crowdfunding-type services is that for us, whether the show happens or not really matters. When a rabbl meets its goal, we charge the fans and hold the money. Fans who were charged are put on a guest list at the door (and so just need to show ID to get in). The day after the show, we confirm with the fans (by email) whether the show happened, and we release the money at that point to the band.
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