Rehearsal Space - The People That Run Them

OK, so you think it will be cool to hangout at the rehearsal space with a fellow musician whose running the place. I mean after all, who better to understand a musician than another musician right? Wrong! The last person you want to have running a rehearsal space is another musician. Why? because he neither has an interest in what happens to your gear when you leave it there overnight, he won't care whose walking in the front door or out with your stuff, he'll probably be half asleep in the office if he's there at all, you can be sure he won't sweep the floor, and he will be lacking the thing you need the most, good management skills and knowledge of business. But, he'll at least be your friend, and all the other band's friend, and offer to party with you in the hallway anytime you want.

Next comes the commercial building owner, the guy that slapped up some partitions and put a padlock on your door. This is the same guy that doesn't know how to handle these bands he just threw together in his building, and because he never bothered to tell the city about the change of use of his property, he is secretly operating without permits or proper zoning for what he is now doing. Because he is never there, he let's the bands do whatever they want and have a good time, until equipment starts turning up missing, the drinking and drugging gets out of hand, and the conditions turn squalid. Now he has to show up and deal with these characters, only problem is, he hasn't a clue as to how to do it, so he leaves the conditions to deteriorate even worse.

Next is the self storage place, that conveniently too was converted into some rehearsal space much the same way. Just like the commercial building owner, this placed suffered the same problem when secretly they started using the place to put people and bands in, when in reality, it's only zoned for storage, so the occupancy permits legally don't allow the bands to be there, and it is not properly setup to meet the safety, fire, and building codes to house that many people in the space properly. In much the same way, under the radar in the bands went, until the drinking and drugging, theft, and pandemonium ensued due to lack of supervision.

Here comes the fledgling underground musicians, who out of desperation and starvation, are offering you the chance to rent a small amount of space that they have cooked up in a completely illegitimate situation. That's right, these guys have a small fixed amount of space in a building somewhere, and you are invited to come rent the same limited space that everyone else is renting, usually one big room, all underground and off the radar. That's all fine until you discover there is no occupancy permit for what's going on there, and it's just a question of time until the city sends everyone packing.

Call to the plate the guy who has anything from a garage to a big house he has split up into spaces, trying to make a buck off the musician's when the economy goes south. He says it's OK to jam there, but in reality because it's zoned residential or sits right next to apartments and houses that are zoned that way, you're done for. He neither has the occupancy permits to legally allow the bands to use it for this, and he hasn't told the city anything about what he's doing. As the complaints come in, the city gets ready to put a lid on it.

One last effort by the fledgling musician, is to setup a PA, mics, a drum kit in a space, and offer you the wonderful opportunity to rent it out PA and all for $15 an hour. Only problem is, you already own all your own gear, and in ten hours you will have already dropped a half of months rent anywhere else.

For your own protection, make sure you read the blog post about the places that get shutdown and how they get shutdown, so you don't get caught in the fray.