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Be nice to your crew?
Someone suggested that we put up a piece about the above on the site so here goes…
I’ve been on both sides – I’ve been in a band and been a tour manager, sound engineer and come to that I’ve even been a backline tech and lighting director too. I’ve seen road hardened veterans have nervous breakdowns before festivals in Portugal and have seen them sent home to their mums on the train because they couldn’t face flying anymore. I’ve seen an overpaid sound engineer have a tantrum and storm off at soundcheck at Hammersmith Apollo because the band wanted to rehearse a new song and he wanted to go back to the pub.
These guys by the way were all treated really ‘nicely’! ...............
It’s also the case and I know a bit of a generalisation that crew like to have something to moan and whinge about and will moan and whinge no matter how they are treated so - well heck – “we might as well give them something to complain about”.
They knew what the job was like before they started. On tour all the normal decisions are made for them, someone comes and wakes them up in the morning, cooks their meals, gives them pocket money (pds), tells them when to go to bed and doesn’t tell them off too much when they are naughty and stay up too late.
Someone will get them a new passport when they lose it drunk at some airport, will generally bail them out if they are arrested and if they are together enough someone will do their washing and if they are really together the wardrobe person will do their ironing too.
All that’s required in return is that they do a sometimes admittedly hard job with long hours but it’s not like defusing roadside bombs in Kabul or making Nike trainers in some hell hole in Manilla. So we think that, as in most cases in life, if you are nice to people they will be nice back. If, however, you take the piss, either as employer or crew, it will come back to bite you on the bum.
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