From: owner-ammf-digest@smoe.org (alt.music.moxy-fruvous digest) To: ammf-digest@smoe.org Subject: alt.music.moxy-fruvous digest V4 #438 Reply-To: ammf@fruvous.com Sender: owner-ammf-digest@smoe.org Errors-To: owner-ammf-digest@smoe.org Precedence: bulk alt.music.moxy-fruvous digest Wednesday, November 1 2000 Volume 04 : Number 438 Today's Subjects: ----------------- [FAQ] alt.music.moxy-fruvous Frequently Asked Questions list (1/4) [Chad ] [FAQ] alt.music.moxy-fruvous Frequently Asked Questions list (4/4) [Chad ] ---------------------------------------------------------------------- Date: Wed, 01 Nov 2000 14:14:13 -0500 From: Chad Maloney Subject: [FAQ] alt.music.moxy-fruvous Frequently Asked Questions list (1/4) [Begin part 1/4] Frequently Asked Questions (FAQ) Questions, suggestions, and submissions to: ammf-faq@fruvous.com FAQ last updated: 05-SEP-2000 Question marked by a '*' denote content changes in this version of the FAQ. Questions marked by the '*' have been modified significantly enough to make it known, so that people familiar with the previous FAQ need only browse the '*' marks to get updated information. Questions in this FAQ: Section: FAQ Facts 1) What is the alt.music.moxy-fruvous FAQ? 2) Why do some people call it the Fruvous FAQ? 3) Who maintains the FAQ? 4) How can I make suggestions/corrections to the FAQ? 5) Where can I get the FAQ? Section: Fruvous Internet Resources 1) Is there an official web page? 2) Is there an IRC Channel? 3) Is there a newsgroup? 4) What is ammf@fruvous.com? 5) I'm getting a lot of bounce messages from ammf@fruvous.com. What should I do? 6) My server's newsfeed is horrible. What can I do? 7) How do I unsubscribe from the Mail<-->News gateway? 8) I don't want to unsubscribe, but I'm going away for a week. Can I ask the Mail<-->News gateway to not send me mail for a bit? 9) alt.music.moxy-fruvous is too high traffic, but I still want to read it. Is there anything I can do? 10) Is there an archive of alt.music.moxy-fruvous? 11) What is alt.fan.moxy.fruvous? 12) What is the "newsgroup pin"? 13) Do the band members read the newsgroup? 14)* Are there any major fan web pages? 15) What happened to Josh Cragun's and Bill Bowen's web pages? 16) What's an umlaut? How do I make one? 17) I don't seem to be getting any posts from the Mail<-->News Gateway. What should I do? 18) I'm sending email through the Mail<-->News Gateway, but people who use news to read the group don't see it. Why? 19) Where is the charter for alt.music.moxy-fruvous? Section: Basic Moxy Fruvous Information 1) Who is Moxy Fruvous? 2) What does "Moxy Fruvous" mean? 3) What is a Fruhead? How can I become a Fruhead? 4) What is the "Fruhead Card"? 5) What is the "Frumiles Card"? 6) My Frumiles Card expires at the "end of the millennium." Is that December 31st, 1999, or 2000? 7) Where is the band currently touring? 8) Why has the band toured more in the United States than in Canada lately? 9) Why does the band frequently play at restricted venues that don't allow underage people in? 10) There seems to be frequent mention of taping at Fruvous shows and trading of these tapes. What's the band's policy on that? 11) Is there any connection between Moxy Fruvous and the soft drink Moxie? 12) I ordered my merchandise four weeks ago from Fruvous and I haven't received it yet. What gives? 13) What's the best thing I can do to help support the band? 14) What's the story behind "The Troc"? What happened? Section: Mike, Murray, Jian, and Dave 1) On stage, who is who? 2) Why is Jian's name written as Jean in liner notes and older articles? 3) How do you pronounce Jian Ghomeshi? 4) Is Dave gay? bisexual? How about Murray? Jian? Mike? Section: The Albums 1) What albums does Moxy Fruvous have out? 2) Why aren't all the albums in stores? Where are they available? 3) What if I can't get any of the albums at stores? 4) Does the band ever put out singles? 5) Does the band ever make videos? 6) Is there any connection between _You Will Go to the Moon_ and the children's book of the same name? 7) What is the Indie Cassette I keep hearing about? 8) Where can I get the Indie Cassette? Section: Songs and Lyrics 1) Where can I get a copy of "Green Eggs and Ham"? 2) Where can I find the lyrics to "Johnny Saucep'n," "Your New Boyfriend," etc? 3) Where can I get translations of the French songs? 4) Where can I find tabulature for Fruvous songs? 5) Where can I find vocal sheet music for Fruvous songs? 6) Where can I find sound files of Fruvous songs? 7) Which band member wrote which songs? Do they collaborate? 8) What's the song that they perform with the refrain, "Hey little bird, fly away home"? 9) Is it a female voice or Mike's voice during the intro to the studio version of "Green Eggs and Ham"? 10) Who says "Swing it" on the studio version of "Gotta Get a Message to You"? 11) Is the "Lowest Highest Point" really in Delaware? 12) In "King of Spain," the King plays crokinole. What IS crokinole? 13) What songs that Moxy Fruvous regularly performs are actually covers? 14) In "River Valley," they mention Dippers, Grits, and Tories. What are those? 15)* In "Minnie the Moocher," are any of the lyrics the same at every performance? Section: Fruvous Characters 1) Who is Larry Boniface Clebdon? Who is Barry? 2) Who is Lazlo? 3) What's a Laika? 4) Who is Dusty Fosterbourd? 5) Who is Grandpa Fruvous? 6) Who is Lou? 7) Who is Marion Fruvous? 8) Who is the Naive Young Chap? 9) Who is Jared (the wild boy)? Section: Fruvous-Related Links and Information 1) What other bands might a fan of Fruvous be interested in? Credits Appendices: Appendix A - An explanation of why age restricted venues exist and bands play at them Appendix B - alt.music.moxy-fruvous newsgroup definitions and etiquette suggestions Appendix C - Common acronyms seen in alt.music.moxy-fruvous Section: FAQ Facts 1) What is the alt.music.moxy-fruvous FAQ? The alt.music.moxy-fruvous FAQ (a.m.m-f FAQ, or just the FAQ from here on out) is a frequently asked questions list that is a resource for newcomers and old timers of the internet NNTP newsgroup alt.music.moxy-fruvous. It is intended to answer many of the commonly recurring questions that are posed to the newsgroup so that the members there are not continually answering the same questions. Note that the a.m.m-f FAQ is not gospel. It is fan maintained. Sources are cited where they are known and every attempt has been made to give information in as neutral a way as possible. But the maintainer is only human (and at this time at least, a quite opinionated human at that), and at times some inkling of their opinions may seep in. Feel free to complain if you disagree. 2) Why do some people call it the Fruvous FAQ? The a.m.m-f FAQ does contain some good general Fruvous information that does not relate directly to the newsgroup. Any fan may find the information here useful, even if they do not have the time or desire to read the newsgroup. Also, "Fruvous FAQ" is much easier to say and type than "alt.music.moxy-fruvous FAQ" or "a.m.m-f FAQ." 3) Who maintains the FAQ? The original maintainer of the FAQ was Colleen Campbell. She researched, wrote up, and maintained the FAQ from its birth until August of 1999. Her work on the FAQ is very much appreciated, and the Fruvous community owes her a debt for her hard work. The second and current maintainer of the FAQ is Chad Maloney. Chad has been a Fruvous fan since July 1997 and posts frequently (if not very frequently) to a.m.m-f. He can be reached at Chad@fruvous.com and gladly accepts any and all email. 4) How can I make suggestions/corrections to the FAQ? Your input to this FAQ is very valuable. If there's something you disagree with, that you want said in a different way, or that you want added to or removed from the FAQ, please email the current FAQ maintainer. They should happily talk with you about your addition and give you feedback on the request. The email address ammf-faq@fruvous.com is setup for the current FAQ maintainer. Please do NOT post your FAQ input to a.m.m-f. The FAQ maintainer needs to keep a record of all requests so that they are processed accordingly. Due to problems with newsfeeds, every post to a.m.m-f may not make it to the maintainer. Please DO email the FAQ maintainer at ammf-faq@fruvous.com. 5) Where can I get the FAQ? The a.m.m-f FAQ is available in a couple of different ways. It is posted monthly to the newsgroup alt.music.moxy-fruvous. It is also available on the web at http://www.fruvous.com/news/faq.html. You can also request the FAQ from the ammf-faq autoresponder. To do this, simply send an email to ammf-faq-request@fruvous.com and the FAQ, split into sizeable chunks, will automatically be emailed to you. Finally, you can request that the FAQ be emailed to you by emailing ammf-faq@fruvous.com and requesting the latest version of the FAQ. The FAQ maintainer will forward you the FAQ when they get the email. Section: Fruvous Internet Resources 1) Is there an official web page? Yes, there is. http://www.fruvous.com (Fruvous Dot Com or FDC) is the official Moxy Fruvous web page and an amazing resource for Moxy Fruvous fans. The site is one of the best band websites around and contains an up-to-date tour itinerary, song lyrics, articles, guitar tab, and show reviews. Reviews posted to alt.music.moxy-fruvous usually make their way onto the site or they can be emailed to webmaster@fruvous.com. The site is maintained by Chris O'Malley and any questions about it should be sent to him at webmaster@fruvous.com. Moxy Fruvous Corp also has registered the domain moxyfruvous.com for future use. 2) Is there an IRC Channel? Yes, there is probably more than one. The one that many a.m.m-f denizens frequent is #MoxyFruvous on the Undernet. More information about that channel is available on FDC at http://www.fruvous.com/irc.html. You can probably find Moxy Fruvous channels on EFNet and DALnet as well under various names. 3) Is there a newsgroup? Yes, there is. alt.music.moxy-fruvous (for which this FAQ is written) is the Usenet group for discussion of Moxy Fruvous. For a simple etiquette guide to alt.music.moxy-fruvous, see Appendix B of this FAQ. To access the newsgroup using NNTP, choose your favorite newsreader (like TIN, Netscape Messenger, Outlook, etc) and look in the alt.music hierarchy for moxy-fruvous. You also need a news provider. If you are in school, you may have to request that alt.music.moxy-fruvous be added to your school's news server. You can also use a free NNTP service like Deja.com to read the newsgroup or there are several great news service providers that are available for relatively little money. NewsGuy, for example, works extremely well for some people ( http://www.newsguy.com ) and is very inexpensive. AOL has their own newsserver and the newsgroup is available there. To get to it, go to the keyword "newsgroups", then "add newsgroup." Search the alt.music hierarchy for alt.music.moxy-fruvous and then subscribe. Note that NNTP and the graph of newsservers is not wholly reliable. Sometimes posts may be lost or come in out of order. Deja.com is usually very complete, as is NewsGuy. See question #6 for some alternatives to using a bad newsserver. 4) What is ammf@fruvous.com? ammf@fruvous.com is the email address of the Mail<-->News Gateway. Sending email to ammf@fruvous.com will post the contents of the email to the newsgroup with the subject provided. This is how the Mail--->News half of the gateway works, so that when you reply to a message sent by the gateway, it goes to the newsgroup. The Mail<-->News gateway provides a way to receive the contents of the alt.music.moxy-fruvous newsgroup without using an NNTP newsreader. Instead, once you subscribe, each posting to the newsgroup is emailed to you directly. Note that there is still an NNTP server behind the Mail<-->News gateway, so there may be posts out of order or left out, like when using another NNTP server. The contents of the list are also available in digest form. See question #9 for more information. For more information about the Mail<-->News Gateway, see http://www.fruvous.com/other.html 5) I'm getting a lot of bounce messages from ammf@fruvous.com. What should I do? If you aren't subscribed to the Mail<-->News gateway, something is really wrong. If you are subscribed to the Mail<-->News Gateway, then probably someone else is having mail problems and is bouncing mail to the list. Please send an email to owner-ammf@fruvous.com regarding the problem and they will work it out. Forward the bounce there and they will fix the problem as promptly as possible. 6) My server's newsfeed is horrible. What can I do? You have a couple of choices. You could pay for a better NNTP service from a company like NewsGuy ( http://www.newsguy.com ). If you have patience, you can use a free NNTP service that has a good newsfeed like Deja.com. The interface to Deja is a little awkward, but it does work. The web site http://www.fruhead.com has a web interface into a.m.m-f available as well. Finally, you can subscribe to the Mail<-->News gateway which is already hooked up to a good newsfeed. To subscribe to the Mail<-->Gateway (which will email you everything posted to alt.music.moxy-fruvous and allow you to email ammf@fruvous.com to post to the newsgroup), see http://www.fruvous.com/other.html. It has information on the Mail<-->News Gateway. Note that the web interface on FHDC uses the Mail<-->News Gateway for its newsfeed. 7) How do I unsubscribe from the Mail<-->News gateway? To unsubscribe from the Mail<-->News gateway, you need to unsubscribe from the mailing list ammf@fruvous.com. If you are unsubscribing from the address that is subscribed to the list, you simply need to send an email to ammf-request@fruvous.com with the single word "unsubscribe" in the body of the message. Otherwise, you're request will need to be authorized manually. You can email owner-ammf@fruvous.com for help with that process. If you are subscribed to the digest version, send your email to ammf-digest-request@fruvous.com following the instructions above. Please don't include your .sig in messages to the ammf-request address as it may mess up the automatic processor. See http://www.fruvous.com/other.html for more Mail<-->News gateway information. 8) I don't want to unsubscribe, but I'm going away for a week. Can I ask the Mail<-->News gateway to not send me mail for a bit? Nope. Sorry. The mailing list software behind the Mail<-->News gateway is Majordomo, which doesn't allow you to remain subscribed, while temporarily shutting off distribution of mailing list messages to your email address. To do this, you'll have to unsubscribe then resubscribe when you return. 9) alt.music.moxy-fruvous is too high traffic, but I still want to read it. Is there anything I can do? The best thing to do is to subscribe to the Mail<-->News gateway in digest form. In digest form, you will receive one large email containing a number of posts to the newsgroup instead of each one individually. You can then read the one message, instead of individually reading the 40 messages contained in it. To do this, email ammf-request@fruvous.com with the message body containing "subscribe ammf-digest". 10) Is there an archive of alt.music.moxy-fruvous? There are two easily available archives of the newsgroup. The first is provided by the Mail<-->News gateway, which archives all digests it sends. They are available for download at http://www.smoe.org/lists/ammf but you can't search or easily navigate through the digests. Deja.com archives a great portion of Usenet for your use. It provides robust searching of newsgroup articles back to 1996. 11) What is alt.fan.moxy.fruvous? alt.fan.moxy.fruvous is the old Moxy Fruvous newsgroup. People now use alt.music.moxy-fruvous for discussion of the band Moxy Fruvous. The newsgroup in the alt.fan hierarchy is no longer used because it was not petitioned properly in alt.config before the "add group" message was given to NNTP servers. Because of this, the alt.fan group is not available in many places. The alt.music group was (eventually) properly setup and should be available on a wider range of servers. An attempt was made to remove the alt.fan group from Usenet, but this isn't really feasible because NNTP servers aren't organized at all. Most posts to alt.fan.moxy.fruvous get immediate replies from kind fans referring them to alt.music.moxy-fruvous. 12) What is the "newsgroup pin"? alt.music.moxy-fruvous is a pretty cohesive fan group and many of us have developed a taste for meeting up with each other at Fruvous shows. To identify each other, the newsgroup came up with the a.m.m-f pin, originally distributed by Vicky Brasseur to those who sent her an SASE. There are a limited number of fans still using these old buttons, but Vicky is no longer distributing them. If you are at a show, look for Fruheads wearing a 2" white pin with black lettering, "alt.music.moxy-fruvous" on the top, "have modem - will travel" on the bottom, with the "Barry" creature (from the back of _The B Album_) in the center in full color. An image of the a.m.m-f pin (or ng pin) is available on FDC at http://www.fruvous.com/miscpics/frupin.gif The newsgroup pin seems to be in less use than it was during '97. Many of the newsgroup regulars became very familiar with each other in that period and identification pins became rather extraneous. There are a lot of new a.m.m-f'ers out there, though, and it would probably help us all meet each other if we kept the pin in common use. In August of 1999, Chad Maloney ( Chad@fruvous.com ) had a new batch of the old buttons reprinted. He has information on how to get an ng pin available. See http://www.fruhead.com/users/Chad/ammf-pin.html for more information about getting a button. 13) Do the band members read the newsgroup? Jian has admitted in front of fans that he does skim the newsgroup occasionally. It's also been said that Murray and Mike have seen the newsgroup before. Even though members of the band occasionally see the newsgroup, the newsgroup is not for communication with the band members. Many, many people read the newsgroup to discuss Moxy Fruvous, and the last thing they want is people posting personal messages to Murray, for example. There are much better ways to communicate personally with the band than to use the public newsgroup. Please remember that the newsgroup is a public forum and what you write may be seen by any number of people, including band members. 14)* Are there any major fan web pages? FDC has a links page for many fan pages in its "Moxy Online" section available at http://www.fruvous.com/other.html. http://www.fruhead.com is a fan web page and resource for Fruheads kept up by Josh Woodward. It provides many great functions like sending messages to other fans (Frumessages) and trip planning/coordination. You do have to be a member to use some functions, but membership is free. Also, FHDC has a "Fruhead Links" section with Fruvous-related links on it. Most of the band members also have fan run sites dedicated to them: - - http://www.WayToGoMurray.com is a Murray Foster fan site - - http://www.GordsGold.com is a Mike Ford fan site - - http://www.MyPoorGeneration.com is a David Matheson fan site - - http://www.GoJian.com is a Jian Ghomeshi fan site (and of course there's http://www.JianKillsCats.com for details of one of Jian's oddest proclivities) 15) What happened to Josh Cragun's and Bill Bowen's web pages? Bill Bowen's page called the "Fruvous Supplement" lost web space quite a while ago. He has since allowed Chris O'Malley to include his web page on FDC. Josh Cragun's, which was originally the "official" Fruvous homepage, but hadn't been updated in over a year, disappeared from the web awhile ago. The "jcragun" account was removed from the server, possibly because Josh is no longer at school. Chris has, however, moved some of the articles, lyrics, and other tidbits from those pages to FDC with the permission of their previous owners. 16) What's an umlaut? How do I make one? An umlaut is the technical name for the two dots that are above the "u" in Moxy Fruvous in all the band's printed materials. In other languages, things like umlauts modify the pronounciation of a specific letter. For example, the u-umlaut in German sounds like a ue, and is sometimes written that way in electronic media where no umlaut is available. How to make an umlaut on your computer depends on the computer you use and the character set it is configured for. On most Windows PCs, the ascii code 129 is used for the lowercase u-umlaut. To make it, hold down the ALT-key and, using the numeric keypad on the far right of your keyboard, type 129 then release the ALT-key. The result should be a lowercase u-umlaut that will be visible for people using Windows. But, for some people using a different character set usually on UNIX, what you just made will show up as junk. It is this character set difference that keeps this FAQ from using umlauts for Fruvous and that causes many people to not use them in IRC or on the newsgroup. Not everyone sees it as an umlaut. Normally, when someone sees a word that is Fr^vous for example, they realize what it says, but it's usually best to stick to Fruvous without the umlaut if you want it to look decent on all computers. 17) I don't seem to be getting any posts from the Mail<-->News Gateway. What should I do? Don't panic. a.m.m-f gets a lot of traffic and you probably notice when something is awry with some part of the Mail<-->News Gateway. There are a couple steps in the process that could be the problem and any diagnosis you can do on your own will benefit both you and others. The first thing to check is your email account. Do you have an email quota that you are violating because of too much mail? If you are in violation of your quota, your ISP may be automatically bouncing new messages addressed to you back to the sender. Are you getting other email alright? If so, there's probably nothing wrong with your mail account. Your ISP can probably help you figure out if you are having problems with your email service. The Mail<-->News Gateway works by taking mail from an NNTP newsserver it uses and forwarding it to a majordomo mailing list. There are a couple places where this whole process can be gummed up. The newsserver the Mail<-->Gateway uses may be having problems, there could be space problems on the machine that manages the majordomo list, or any of myriad of other problems. The proper thing to do when you've determined the problem isn't your email is to send an email to owner-ammf@fruvous.com and explain your problems. They will help you as soon as they can. Please don't send "I'm not getting any posts" messages to the newsgroup. The correct and direct way to get the problem fixed is to alert owner-ammf@fruvous.com of the problem. 18) I'm sending email through the Mail<-->News Gateway, but people who use news to read the group don't see it. Why? To send posts to the newsgroup through the Mail<-->News Gateway, you have to send email to ammf@fruvous.com. This is the correct address and the only address that will post your message to the newsgroup. The Mail<-->News Gateway is currently housed by smoe.org and ammf@smoe.org is a valid email address, but is NOT the address of the Mail<-->News Gateway. Mail sent to this address will be distributed only to those people who subscribe to the gateway. People who use NNTP news services or Deja won't see the post. The solution is to use ammf@fruvous.com, which will automatically submit a NNTP news post for you that will then be distributed to Deja and other NNTP news service providers, including the Mail<-->News Gateway itself. 19) Where is the charter for alt.music.moxy-fruvous? In technical newsgroup geek terms, there was quite an excitement over the registration of alt.music.moxy-fruvous before everything settled down. With an already existing (yet badly named and half-heartedly propaged) newsgroup for the discussion of the band, it took a few tries to get alt.music.moxy-fruvous added to the Usenet hierarchy and news spools around the world. You can see some remnants of this and also the newsgroup charter as written by Jason Reiser at: ftp://ftp.isc.org/pub/usenet/control/alt/alt.music.moxy-fruvous.Z Note that the newsgroup charter is not kept up to date. This FAQ is kept up to date and should be a great resource for up-to-date information about the newsgroup and the band. The charter is available for posterity however for all internet history buffs and curiosity-driven fans alike. [End part 1/4] ------------------------------ Date: Wed, 01 Nov 2000 14:14:19 -0500 From: Chad Maloney Subject: [FAQ] alt.music.moxy-fruvous Frequently Asked Questions list (4/4) [Begin part 4/4] Credits: Many thanks go out to Colleen Campbell, creator and initial maintainer of the alt.music.moxy-fruvous FAQ. Without her, this whole thing would never have been started. A ton of thanks to Jude Coombe for all her help over the years posting helpful official information to the newsgroup. Official involvement in alt.music.moxy-fruvous is really appreciated as it helps keep the denizens in line. Also, another myriad of "thank you"'s and "huzzahs" to Chris O'Malley, keeper of Fruvous Dot Com ( http://www.fruvous.com ) and all around excellent fellow. Thanks to Chris for having a space for the FAQ on FDC and updating it there for me. Thanks to Gordon Elgart for the information provided in Song and Lyrics Question #11. Thanks to Chris "Moz" Moesel for scanning in the Trivial Pursuit card for Fruvous Dot Com. Thanks to Rodney Elin for the information provided in Fruvous Characters Question #3. Thanks to Joe Navratil for sending the post that is archived in Appendix A and starting the acronym listing that has become Appendix C. Also thanks for contributing back info for Basic Info question #10. Thanks to Lori Martin for the AOL info from Fruvous Internet Resources question #3. Thanks to Jason Reiser for setting up the FAQ autoresponder and posting about the a.m.m-f charter (and posting the actual charter itself way back when!). Thanks to Jeff Dallien for sending me the lyrics and info for "Jared (the wild boy)" before I got my hands on "C". Thanks to A.J. LoCicero and Sara for the Canadian political information for Song and Lyrics question #14. Helpful proofreaders without whom this FAQ would be full of "teh"s, usage of past tense instead of present tense, and other miscellaneous badness: Vika Zafrin, Jennifer Cenicola, Amanda Potter, Ken Perschke, Mary Krause, Jennifer Schlosser, Liza Q. Wirtz, Traci Poli, Jason Reiser, Andi Andrzejewski, Lori Martin, Melanie Barbarito, and Paul Mischler. Appendices Appendix A - An explanation of why age restricted venues exist and bands play at them This post was sent to the FAQ by Joe Navratil. He saved it off Footprints, a mailing list for Veritcal Horizon (VH), and it is reprinted here with permission. It has been cleaned up with regards to capitalization, spelling, and formatting. Content has not been changed. Subject: [footprints] age, clubs, and economics Date: Sun, 25 Jul 1999 13:53:21 -0400 From: Will Foy To: footprints@onelist.com From: Will Foy I know everyone's sick of this, but it's a frustrating thing for those who are under (and we were ALL underage at some point), so I wanted to say a few words about this. A warning: this is sorta long, but I want to kinda walk people through the steps of why. It doesn't make age restrictions feel any better, but it explains the why's. I'm going to be writing using my own personal experiences, some of which talking with promoters, club owners, bands, club staff, and my own fraternity's risk management position, which deals with some of the exact same laws and modes of thought. Your mileage may vary on some of the things I'm going to discuss, but by and large, these are industry norms. So, you're starting up a club. Cool deal! It's something I've entertained for a while myself, and may well do one day. You're a big music fan, and don't wanna rave club or something silly like that, so you go out, you book about 2 months worth of bands to play in advance. You, as your own promoter, want people to come out and see these bands that you enjoy as a fan, and pay you for the privilege of coming into your club to see them. This is called a cover charge, and we've all paid one probably at some point. You also want to make it affordable so the college kids (you did put your club in a college town didn't you?) can come and see them too! You make your default ticket price $5, which is reasonable, and it also works nice for the numbers. So, as you're building your club, you have the local fire marshall come out, inspect the club (you have to do this), and rate your capacity. He says you can hold 500 people in your new club. So, an interesting thing here... at your default rate, you can make only 2500 from the door. Keep that number in mind. Now, when you signed up the bands with their booking agents (people like PGA, who handles R.E.M., (e:), Sting, boatloads of other people, Red Light, Creative artists, and many times, the bands themselves), you signed a contract. This contract has LOTS of stuff in it, including for the moment, a couple of statements about fees for performance, etc. Most bands have a hybrid style contract. They'll get an amount that must be paid, period. This is called a guarantee. That amount ranges based on how well known the band is in that area, how much they have made and expect to make at repeat performances, and all kinds of other factors. It's made through negotiation. Let's say that you book a band, the Smokin' Mirrors, who aren't known real well in your area, and they ask for a $500 guarantee. That's reasonable you think, so you sign that part of the contract. Typically, bands will also ask for a percentage of the door take. This percentage may vary by club. Jack Straw's for example, does 100% of the door. Ziggy's does 80-band/20-club in most cases. Before you get to 80/20, you have to meet the guarantee, so it's usually 100% of the door upto the guarantee, then 80% of the rest. So, let's say you booked on a good night, lots of people came out, and you sold 250 tickets. That's 250 x 5 = 750. So, the band gets their 500 from the guarantee + 80% of 250, which is 200. They get 700 of that 750. Hmmm, you had a half-full club, which is pretty good most nights for an unknown band, and you make out with only 50 bucks. Hmmm... file that one away. Let's say that you booked them on a wednesday night, and it's midterms week at the Local University. So, you get 75 people. That's 75 x 5 = 375. You actually LOST 125 bucks, b/c you had to pay the rest of that $500 guarantee out of pocket. Most businesses I know of don't exist to lose money. Casinos might give out millions or even billions, but casinos aren't built on your winnings. They're built on the losses of countless people. Likewise, clubs don't exist just as music museums, they exist to make money. So, here are some choices facing a club owner: 1) Raise ALL ticket prices: aside from probably driving some people out the market, you do get the effect of raising your marginal rate, which makes you some more money, but is the increase in your marginal ticket price going to offset the downshift in demand? For tickets? Probably not, especially for MOST of the smaller, lesser known acts. Think people like the Disco Biscuits, Owsley, and VH early on in their career. VH loves to talk about how the first time they played Ziggy's there were 25 people there, and now they routinely sell out hours before the show (and sometimes days). They didn't get to that point overnight, as we all know, but it has some implications for club economics. Not the least of which is that currently, you could charge 10-15 for a VH ticket, but you couldn't do that when only 25 people show up. Doesn't work well. 2) So, using that example, you only raise ticket prices on BIG shows, hoping to raise your profit on BIG shows where you sell out the club's capacity, to offset the losses of lesser attended shows. Good idea, but a lot of the time, if a band knows it's going to sell the place out, it's going to raise the amount they want guaranteed. I don't think VH would be too happy with a $500 guarantee at a place they've sold out every time they've played for close to 2 years now. So, remembering that 2500 max figure, you HAVE to raise your ticket prices to cover the increase in guarantee in many cases. I.E. if after a few years of playing your club, the Smokin' Mirrors are doing well every night they play, they're going to ask for say, $2500 guaranteed. This is not astronomical by any stretch for a guarantee. So, you HAVE to sell out to make money at $5 a head. So, you raise the price to $10. that way, anything over halffull and you make a few bucks. 3) You could lower your prices, hoping to drive up demand for tickets. This may work for really really unknown bands to bring people who wouldn't pay 5 bucks, but would pay 3. You might make more, but there's no guaranty that people who wouldn't pay 5 bucks would pay at all, for an unknown band. These are the people who know two songs by artists we've loved for years. I'll use EMB (and I love EMB as band and people, just good folks) as an example. There are people who have seen them for years, dating back to their old drummer, pre-larry on guitar, pre-band even. These people know all the songs, probably trade tapes, etc. (they're like US!!!!), then there are those who know "Solitude", "I'll Be" and maybe "I Could Not Ask for More" and sing those till their throats pop, and that's it. Fine, they're fans too. That's ok. But they barely come out for bands they do know from radio play. Do you honestly think they'll come out for a band they've never heard of, ever, much less on radio? Tickets at 3 bucks or 5 bucks doesn't much matter. This strategy sometimes works, but you have to pick your spots. 4) You could "tax" merchandise sales. Bands hate this, but some venues do take a small chunk out of the merch sales, maybe 5 or 10 %. But, merch sales compared to tickets for MOST shows (not all), are probably going to be much less. You might make a few bucks here, but it's not worth the good will of the band to push this marginal club tax rate higher and higher to make more $ for the club. Not a good idea. A band I won't mention (not VH) RAILED against a college that had this in their contract for playing. They took 15% from merch sales, and the band hated it. raised all kinds of cain trying to fight it, but in the end, their management signed the contract, and it was binding. No choice. I doubt they'll play that college again, which is sad. You as a club owner, want them to WANT to come back and play, so this is a bad idea. 5) You could sell something else. Ah-ha!!! Here's a place where you can make some more money, and probably won't have anything in the contract you have to fork over to the band. Great! Now what'cha gonna sell? You could sell club t-shirts, yeah! That's it. Oh wait, if Joe and Jane Clubhopper buy a t-shirt a piece, they probly won't buy another one next week when they come to see another band at your club. What else could you sell? Hmmm, I got it! Let's make it a smoothie bar! You'll sell great fruit and vegetable shake concoctions. Only trouble is no one can stand the noise those damn blenders make. Hmmm. How about beer!? People will buy it over and over again, each time they come, and popping a top or twisting a cap is pretty quiet relative to the 110 dB's the PA is cranking out. Not to mention less costly and less messy as far as cleanup in the bar area. Now, here's where we get into some interesting business decisions. Ok, so you as a business have your standard liability insurance (your local Gap has liability insurance incase someone falls, breaks a hip and sues. Businesses have to have this to function and be licensed) doesn't cover sales of alcohol, b/c it's legally and liability wise risky. At least that's what their bean counters and actuaries tell them. So, if you wanna sell alcohol they tell you, you have to pay them much more in insurance fees. So there is an additional cost to even trying to generate more revenue. Likewise, if your primary audience is 21+, it's not a problem. But if you're in a college town, you're going to have some people 20- who wanna come too. Therein lies another problem: in most states (and this does vary from state to state, due to state insurance laws), if you have 20-'ers in your club, the marginal insurance rate can go up for those businesses. So they'll charge you EVEN MORE for the 18-20 year olds, and even more still for the 17-'ers, if they're even permitted to go inside the club. So, there are some ways around this increase in costs: 1) don't allow 20-'ers in 2) don't allow 17-'ers in 3) charge more for underagers (this is VERY common) 4) don't sell alcohol None of those options is great, and now you get a flavor for what's coming up for club owners. But, there's another wrinkle that makes this even more difficult. Your capacity, was what, 500 people? Given that everyone counts the same whether they're 50 or 5 years old, the more underagers in your club, the less product you are likely to sell, since you can't sell to those under 21. Thus, if you have a show in which you're going to have a bunch of teenagers, your bar is probably going to sell less beer, b/c they can't buy it. But moreover, they take the slot of an of-ager. Lemme repeat that. Every ticket you sell to someone under 21, takes a ticket away (potentially in a sellout of the show) from a 21+ person. Thus, from an economic, and not emotional sense, it's pretty easy to see why a club might be less willing to do shows for 20-'ers. In the case of a non-sellout show, it makes little difference, but if the show sells out, it's bad for business for underagers to be in the house. Jack Straw's for YEARS was a 21+ only club. At the age of 20, swearing away my firstborn, swearing on the honor code of my school (which at davidson, a violation can get you suspended for a semester, or kicked out. Happens not a lot, but when violations happen, it's A Bad Thing.), etc. It took Steve Van Dam and Randy Reed (lead guitarist and manager) of Everything to get me in that night. I had the club owner watching me like a hawk all night. We're now friends, and I think in that night, showed him that 18+ might not be a bad idea. However, it took some doing. I was allowed in, but if I tried to bring a friend with me, forget it. It was hassle city again. There are some ways around the loss of revenue from underagers. You can sell tickets at a higher price, which is very common. You can also have stuff other than alcohol to sell. Ziggy's now sells cokes and bottled spring water. This is helpful in the summer for everyone, b/c it's really damn hot in there sometimes without people, much less 800 or so writhing bodies dancing singing, and filling the club with hot air. These help some, but not a ton. That said, it's not easy, and ideally everyone would be able to attend, but it's sometimes legally difficult too. B/c most clubs don't sell food, they don't qualify as restaurants, which are subject to different alcohol control laws. For instance, any of us could probably walk into an olive garden (used b/c it's ubiquitous), sit down, and have a meal, enjoy a band or whatever if they had one. But, they sell food. in the eyes of The Man, they are very different from your local bar/club (Mama Kin's, Ziggy's, Alley Katz, the Bayou -rock in peace -, and The Muse , etc, etc, etc), which is subject to strict control, Alcohol Law Enforcement raids, stings, and repeated visits. They also have different laws period about control. In many states, alcohol must be kept in a separate area from where underagers may go. I.E. if you're 25, and having a beer, you can't be in the main part of the venue, but in a cardon'ed off area where only of agers can go. This makes some venues say, nope, we're not doing that, no 20-'ers then. It offends the people who are of age, and who pay their ticket prices too, and would drive them away from that venue. Also in many states, if the club sells liquor, people under 18 aren't allowed in, period. In NC, if the club sells liquor, you must be a member of the club, or a guest of a member to purchase it, and it must be kept in a separate area. Thus, Ziggy's created a membership program, for $5 lifetime membership, for which you get a monthly calendar, and a card, as well as access to the liquor bar, pool tables, and much cleaner bathrooms. it sucks mightily, but it's the law. Violation could mean shutting down the club, which would not be preferable to restrictions. Now, there are people you could blame as a fan, but the club owner isn't probably one of them. They're people who may not make a ton of money. They own a club, b/c they probably really love music, and while they make a profit, they're not turning into millionaires any time soon. keep in mind, they have to pay for power, insurance, water, facilities like bathrooms and repairs to items damaged by people who come in, plus, paying for sound, lighting, heating and cooling, etc, etc, etc... how does that get paid for? Cover charge, and bar. It's not a good thing for those of you who are underage, but the club owner isn't the guy you wanna blame. Blame your state lawmakers. Blame the federal restriction on alcohol to 21, if the state wants federal highway funds. Blame idiots who drink and drive when they could wait 5 minutes and call a cab, which brought the ire of MADD, SADD, and lawmakers to raise the drinking age. Blame the boneheads who are underage and try to drink. I heartily discourage you from buying fakes. Why? B/c it ends up hurting clubs, b/c if they get busted by ALE, b/c of you, their insurance goes up, they may have to close, etc. Not A Good Thing. Cabeesh? Instead, here are some ideas: 1) Lobby the band to force the club to do all ages shows. If the band, like VH, is well known, the club may cave. This happens. It takes some doing, but it happens. Jack Straw's was 21+, but was forced to be 16+ (not quite all ages), for a Jump, Little Children show, b/c they made it part of the contract, and wouldn't play without it. Email VH and other bands you love, to voice that you're 16 or 14, and you'd go to see them, even paying extra, to go to see them in your area, if they'd make the club do all ages. I'd bet they'll listen and try to make it happen. don't be mad if they can't. It may not be legally possible. It sucks. 2) Lobby your government to repeal 21+ alcohol laws, at least as they pertain to music clubs. Write your house rep, write your senators, write to your state house and senate people, write to the governor, and keep at it. You might not be 18, but if you can voice your opinion, it makes it well known that your vote for or against them hangs in the balance. 3) Lobby the club to do all ages shows, or 18+ for those shows. Suggest that you pay more to balance their costs. It might work. I lobbied Chandler at Jack Straw's for this, even after I was 21, so that people I knew could come to shows. 4) Beg and plead with the club staff. It sometimes works. Keep at it. Don't be angry, or violent, or hassle them. Be polite. It's your best weapon in this scenario. 5) Call the band ahead, and don't ask to be on the guest list (b/c they'll still check id), but ask them to put some sort of "responsible underager list" at the door. They might do it. Most of all, when you're out, and underage, be responsible. Don't drink. It's what started this mess for clubs and 18-20 year olds in the first place. If you wanna drink, do it somewhere else. I personally think it's no crime for an 18 year old who can be drafted, to drink a frosty cold beer. In fact, I think that laws should be corrected so that like my old roomie from Cyprus could, drink at 12 (basically old enough to see over the bar), and drive at 18 or 21. That would be vastly preferable. It's easier to take care of a body than it is to take care of a car and a body. Please whatever you do, don't drink and drive. Again, this is what made stupid inane, unfriendly laws happen. Take a cab, have a designated driver, get a ride with a friend. Your car will be fine, get it the next morning (just make sure you put your Club on the steering column) friends, take the keys. Club owners bend the rules sometimes, so being responsible will encourage that type of thing more often. Do I sound like an old fuddy duddy? Perhaps, but this is after close to 7 years of club experience, working the door, doing merch, hanging out with bartenders at far too late an hour, talking with owners, etc. They know what they're doing. Does it suck? You bet. Try some of the stuff I wrote above. It may make a difference. Appendix B - alt.music.moxy-fruvous Newsgroup Definitions and Etiquette Suggestions Contained herein are some general Usenet tips, suggestions, definitions, and recommendations that are tailored to alt.music.moxy-fruvous. Please read this section and bear in mind its contents when reading or posting to the newsgroup. There are many many newsgroup subscribers who get posts in various different ways and each person has their own likes and dislikes. alt.music.moxy-fruvous DOs and DON'Ts DO read the newsgroup for a week or two before posting. It helps you get a feel for the atmosphere, what people like to read and what they don't like to read and just generally gets you acclimated to your audience. DO read the FAQ. If it answers your questions, maybe you don't need to ask it again to the whole newsgroup just to get the same answer. DON'T post in all capital letters. On a.m.m-f this is considered shouting and is very rude. Use capitalized words sparingly and when you mean to stress something. DON'T POST IN ALL CAPITALS. DO quote a bit of the post you are responding to when replying so that people reading your reply get the context of your reply. Usenet can get some messages out of order, so your message needs to be self contained or some people may not get your point. DON'T quote the entire contents of the message you are replying to. Snip out the irrelevant parts and just quote what is necessary to get the idea of what you are replying to. Many people don't like to wade through 30 lines of quoting to get to 3 lines of response. DON'T leave the entire contents of the article you are replying to at the bottom of your post. Many people read the newsgroup in digest format and this makes the digest very hard to read. DON'T bring up the band members' personal lives. It is NOT an appropriate subject for the newsgroup. DON'T post to the entire newsgroup when a direct email to a specific newsgroup member would be more appropriate. If you want to get a band member a message, the newsgroup is NOT the place to post your message. DO use the "OT:" heading to mark Off-Topic subjects. Some people don't like to read non-Fruvous-related posts and just want album discussions, show reviews, tour dates, and the like. Using "OT:" in your headers marks off-topic posts so people can skip if they like. DO change the subject line if the thread has veered off to a different subject. Someone may not enjoy the original subject, but where you veer it off to may be something they'd like to read. Many people choose which posts to read by the subject, so make the subject fit the body of your post. DO respect the other people in the newsgroup. There are people behind the text you are reading. Flaming someone publicly on the newsgroup is not a good thing. DON'T reply to troll posts. A troll in Usenet is defined as a person who makes an inflammatory post with no intent of starting meaningful conversation. The troll will usually sit back and watch the replies swarm in, including personal flame mail. This is exactly what the troll wants, so don't encourage them by giving it to them. Just let it be. DO limit the number of lines in your signature. An .sig over 5 lines is consider excessive by standard Usenet etiquette. Some people pay for bandwidth. While having a 20 line signature at the end of each of your posts may seem like a good way of expressing who you are, it also is a waste of downloading for people who won't even read it. DON'T post binaries to the group. Binaries include pictures, soundfiles, etc. alt.music.moxy-fruvous is not a binaries group and many people do not want bandwidth hogging binaries to automatically come to them when they are trying to read the newsgroup. DON'T post with mime encryption or as HTML. Yes, you can be more fancy with HTML posts, but many people do not use HTML enabled newsreaders or email programs. They see your post as a lot of weird junk and probably won't bother reading it. DON'T post "me too" messages. Please DO participate in threads and add your ideas, opinions, and knowledge to the group discussion, but simply replying with a "me too" after someone's post (no matter how good it was) is an old Usenet faux pas and is frowned on by many people. If you want to agree with someone, please take the time to add some of your personal flavor to the message. It is hoped that the above list helps you get acclimated to the newsgroup more quickly and prevents you from looking foolish in some people's eyes with your first post. You don't have to have FDC memorized top to bottom to be a part of the newsgroup, but please try and follow some simple etiquette when posting and you will find the newsgroup a great resource for Fruvous information of all types. Appendix C - Common acronyms seen in alt.music.moxy-fruvous Fruvous fans are really a bunch of hippies and geeks, and with that many geeks you know there are gonna be acronyms from here to eternity. Here's a list of common abbreviations and acronyms seen on a.m.m-f. If you have any additions, please email ammf-faq@fruvous.com. Songs - ----- BJ "BJ Don't Cry" (from _Bargainville_) B&B "Bed & Breakfast" (from _Wood_) GE&H, GE+H "Green Eggs & Ham" (from the indie tape) GMIA "The Greatest Man In America" (from _The B Album_) GWS "The Gulf War Song" (from _Bargainville_) ID, ID4 "Independence Day" (from _Thornhill_) ILMB "I Love My Boss" (from _The B Album_) ITC "It's Too Cold" (from _Wood_) IWHO "I Will Hold On" (from _Thornhill_) KITA "Kick In The Ass" (from _You Will Go To The Moon_) KoS, KOS "King Of Spain" (from _Bargainville_) MBLABOA "My Baby Love A Bunch Of Authors" (from _Bargainville_) Michy "Michigan Militia" (from _You Will Go To The Moon_) MPG "My Poor Generation" (from _Thornhill_) PTT "The Present Tense Tureen" (from _Wood_) YCBTC "You Can't Be Too Careful" (From _Thornhill_) YNB "Your New Boyfriend" (from _You Will Go To The Moon_) YWGTTM The title track from _You Will Go To The Moon_ Usenet - ------ AFAIK As far as I know afmf alt.fan.moxy.fruvous, the evil stillborn twin of ammf ammf alt.music.moxy-fruvous BTW By the way FAQ Frequently asked questions list. FS For sale (usually used in subject lines) FWIW For what it's worth FYI For your information IM[NS]HO In my (not so) humble opinion. Sometimes the 'H' is left out LOL Laughing out loud NG Newsgroup. In this case, ammf. OT Off-Topic. Not to be confused with On-Topic, which doesn't have an acronym ROFL Rolling on the floor laughing RTF Read the FAQ * TIA Thanks in advance YMMV Your mileage may vary Groups - ------ AW Arrogant Worms BFF,BF5 Ben Folds Five BFF Bela Fleck and the Flecktones BNL Barenaked Ladies EFO Eddie From Ohio GBS Great Big Sea JBE Jim's Big Ego TMBG They Might Be Giants Venues - ------ BL The Bottom Line, in New York City IH The Iron Horse, in Northampton (NoHo), MA IP Irving Plaza, in New York City Lee's Lee's Palace, in Toronto, ON * MM MuchMusic, a music television channel produced in Canada * MMM Muchmore Music, a spin-off of MuchMusic that plays non-mainstream videos NoHo Northampton, MA, usually used as shorthand for the Iron Horse Ramshead The Rams Head Tavern, in Annapolis, MD TLA The Theatre of the Living Arts, a great venue in downtown Philadelphia Tralf The Tralfamadore Cafe in downtown Buffalo Troc The Trocadero in Philly Fruvous Miscellania - ------------------- Bville _Bargainville_, the first album FDC Fruvous Dot Com, or http://www.fruvous.com FHDC Fruhead Dot Com, or http://www.fruhead.com FRFF Falcon Ridge Folk Festival, in Hillsdale NY F&FFC Fruvous & Friends For Choice, the pretty annual Fruvous benefit for the Ontario Coalition of Abortion Clinics LBC Larry Boniface Clebdon, the.. er, thing on the cover of _Bargainville_ LN _Live Noise_, the fourth full-length album and only live release MF Moxy Fruvous, Murray Foster, or Mike Ford. MFHQ Moxy Fruvous Headquarters in Toronto ON NYE New Years Eve TO Toronto, Ontario WTG, WTGM, WTGD Way To Go, Way To Go Murray, Way To Go Dave YWGTTM _You Will Go To The Moon_, the third full-length album [End part 4/4] ------------------------------ End of alt.music.moxy-fruvous digest V4 #438 ********************************************