Polar Bear Gig: Aimed for Younger/Teenagers (review, evaluation and problem-solving)

 Polar Bear Gig: 21/05/26

Review and Analysis

This is the third and final gig of my project and this was in front of a much younger crowd than the previous two. At the start of this project, I had the ambition to perform in 3 generations of crowd: young, adult and older and now I can say I have successfully achieved that. The whole point of this gig for me was to perform in front of a younger crowd and observe how they react to the music being played. However, another key aspect of this gig was that it was my first time organising a gig which helps me upskill my event management skills.

So this gig went incredibly I think, whether that was because this was the most active crowd of the three that I have played in front of, or how my own skills have developed overtime for this big gig at the end of my project. I played this gig with 2 bands (Slate and My Suede Shoes) each with 30 minute sets, giving me an hour of runtime. My Suede Shoes is the priority for me to talk about in terms of audience engagement and reaction due to their set tailoring much more to the Polar Bear than the set with Slate. We also repeated a few songs from The Alex with Slate so most of that will end up being me talking about the same stuff, though I will still talk about a few highlights and things I noticed while being up there with Slate.

What I noticed

This was a very similar crowd to The Alex in terms of size, with this being only a little bit bigger which was quite surprising to me as one is a pub and the other is a grassroots music venue. The key thing that stood out to me with the audience was that they were the most active out of the 3 crowds I played in front of: they were dancing, singing, started a moshpit for another band and were also incredibly social with one another. Nobody was on their own during the gig in the audience, they always brought a friend which links to my interview with Nathan for my research: "I'll go if my friend is going". With a gig for a younger crowd, the key promotion would be word of mouth more than anything: when one person notices it and thinks the gig looks interesting, they will start telling a friend who may tell another friend and the cycle continues. I also follow this mentality as a younger person: the only gigs I will go to at a music venue like The Polar Bear are ones that my friends will also go to (for example when I went to see Thunder Hammer for my research). The way this audience reacted to the music was in a much more active way than the previous 2, nobody was sat still, they were either moving their hands or singing, chanting or dancing. Furthermore, this audience was the most fun to get a reaction out of, they were a lot louder than the ones at The Alex in particular (as I expected the Folk Club to be more relaxed and chilled out) and were also very supportive, uncaring about mistakes (which was similar to The Alex).

The key thing I have noticed about performing in all 3 gigs is that the audience come for a good time, if you present yourself in a manner that makes the gig enjoyable, if you create a good setlist and just make the environment good to be around then that makes a successful gig regardless on mistakes or the gig sounding bad. An example of this from The Polar Bear was with My Suede Shoes playing Re-Do which was initially scrapped from the set as we had no time to learn it, but Nathan had told me on the stage to. just completely improvise and make a drumbeat. It was by no means accurate or even sounding good but the audience didn't care since they were already having a good time. All of this makes nerves for a gig a lot easier as performing is more about presentation than how it actually sounds.

Preparation for the gig: What problems arose? How did I work around them? How did I approach this gig?

Preparation

This gig took quite a lot more preparation than the others as this was focused on rehearsals as well as event management which was my first time approaching this side of music. To tackle the event management, we held weekly meetings as a class to talk about promotion of the gig, equipment, set order and just how to handle the gig in general to attract a decent audience. One of the most important things we did was create a social media for our classes production company: Jazzcatz Productions.

Most of the traction for this gig was definitely from social media and word of mouth. On the social media, we promoted through trendy topics, showing off the charismatic side of the people taking part in the gig and through clips of the bands themselves playing. We also split each member of the class into different roles: Tech team, marketing team, hospitality team and an A&R team. I was part of A&R so it was my role to communicate with the bands, give suggestions, watch rehearsals and have a say in how the running order will go for the night. This gig has given me a booster to my skills in event management which is another crucial side of the music industry, I now have a much better idea on how to go about promoting and putting on a gig to make the environment as enjoyable as possible for the audience. If it wasn't for how we had prepared for this gig, the atmosphere would not have been anywhere near as good which would mean the worst parts of the performance would stand out more as the audience wouldn't have been enjoying themselves as much as they did.

With rehearsals, preparation was much more simple though difficult to balance having 2 bands. I rehearsed a lot more with My Suede Shoes than with Slate as they had a completely new set of songs for me to learn while Slate mostly reused songs from The Alex, having only 2 new songs (one of which I already knew from previous performances). The members of Slate also wanted to spend more time on their project which gave me the chance to rehearse with My Suede Shoes. I focused on My Suede Shoes and rehearsed with Slate when the chance was there. It resulted in both sets sounding very strong regardless so I think I balanced it very well.

Problems Faced: How were they tackled?

Similar to the Folk Club, this was a very well organised and problem-free gig. The only problems that showed up for me were very minor and easy fixes. I would say the biggest problem that arose was communication between each team in the events management side of this gig which resulted in plenty of mistakes in the poster, different types of the same poster being released and wrong bands being announced, some bands dropping out without anyone knowing. This also resulted in confusion from potential goers to the gig and gave us a lack of ticket sales (the week before the gig we had only sold 13 tickets). We had to address this in the meeting which allowed us to print out and put the correct poster all over the college, push the marketing a lot more and make sure everyone in the class was in sync and knew what they were doing. This changed the sales from 13 tickets to 50 sold online which was a huge difference, then even more after that.

Some minor problems that came to me from a drummer standpoint was balancing 2 band rehearsals at once which I had mentioned in the section above. There were a couple slight timing problems with Slate which I had to fix by adding that extra beat, and my sticks had been accidentally taken before I came on with My Suede Shoes which caused a slight delay to my gig. There wasn't much of a method to tackle this, I just needed to chase the band prior and take my sticks back.

The only problems that arose for this gig was related to the event management side as it was all of our first times attempting to host and manage a big event like that so we expected teething issues. Communication was the biggest problem which we had resolved through talking it through and addressing it in the meetings, giving ourselves a clear idea on our roles.

So how did the gig unfold? + Evaluation

This gig went very similarly to The Alex with how it wasn't perfect at all in how it sounded but the atmosphere and presentation were that good that sound just didn't matter to anyone. Some clips from My Suede Shoes and Slate were not at their best whatsoever but the audience still absolutely adored every second of both sets. Artists and performers are there to entertain so as long as the audience are entertained, you can say you have done a good job performing. 

If I were to critique myself musically, timing is such a big problem in Slate and one I would really like to get down when we play future sets this summer but that does come with plenty of time and practice. There were moments where Alfie went off time and even moments where I felt myself going off time in particular songs. There are just times in that band where I feel we are disconnected so I think we all need to take time as a band and work on everything and completely polish the band. With My Suede Shoes, that band was most likely a one off, and from videos it doesn't sound perfect whatsoever but it was still entertaining and really fun as a whole.

This gig has given me plenty of new skills to work with for future projects such as event management, my own drumming for different genres and improv skills for My Suede Shoes which I think is an important skill to have for being a session musician.

Highlights

This gig had so many highlights from both bands I had played that the best way to sum up the highlights is through a list of videos from crowd engagement, to moshpits and to moments of absolute enjoyment, the whole gig was incredible. Videos is another point that will be mentioned in my conclusion as well.

Conclusion

I got a lot of useful information for this gig. As seen in the videos, the younger audience love getting the chance to dance, sing, rave, mosh, chant, the list goes on. Unlike a pub gig where the crowd like well known classics or a folk club/retirement home where the crowd will want soft, acoustic singalongs, at a venue like this in front of a young crowd like this, you can get away with playing anything and as long as the crowd can sing, dance and get up close you have won them. They seem to be the scariest and most judgemental to play in front of but it is the complete opposite as we made mistakes and they didn't care, they got the chance to sing and dance which is a win for them and a win for us as performers being able to entertain them. This crowd take the chance to go to a gig to have some fun with friends or support any friends they know on stage so unlike a pub, they have come for the music and the whole show, not just for a drink and chat while a band are playing in the background. They took in the music, started a moshpit, chanted the whole way through each song and had a great time regardless of it sounding good or not and that is how younger people connect to music being played in front of them.

This was my final gig of the project and with this, I can now give a direct comparison on how each generation saw, reacted and connected to the music in front of them and to my surprise, each of them were unique in their own way:

The younger crowd come to these gigs and watch a local band because they want a night out, they have come with the intention to watch a good show while also socialising with people in the venue and even the bands. If you present yourself in a laid-back, enjoyable manner then the audience will absolutely adore it, despite the song and despite the sound. They also have a habit of recording videos and taking photos more than the other 2 generations, they seem to like making memories that will stay with them and they can look back on. Some of this was noticed by from the younger crowd who also came to The Alex.

The adult 'pub' crowd is a very 50/50, some of them did not come for the music and came for a drink and catchup with some friends, we were merely background music to them. The other half of that crowd enjoyed the music being played in front of them, whether that was sitting or standing, they would silently enjoy the music, maybe tap their feet and sing to the well known songs. This adult crowd are more picky with the song choice than the younger ones so if I would want engagement, I would need to choose crowd pleasers. However, the mentality they share with the younger crowd is presentation. As long as the band or artist present themselves in a way that is entertaining, then they will have a good time despite the sound, they're just a bit more picky with song choice than the younger crowd.

The older crowd like a story, they like a song that they can actually connect with and singalong to. The songs typically played in front of an elderly crowd are songs they grew up with and feel a connection to in that regard from the tough period they grew up in. They are supportive and enjoy the music more than the presentation though they didn't judge mistakes openly and didn't heckle.

In a way, this project has made me feel a lot more confident in mistakes as most of the crowd will not care and that has been proven by playing in front of  a crowd of roughly every generation alive and they have been nothing but supportive of the music and presentation of the music as a whole.