What's UP guys!!!
For those who don't know me, my name is Samantha and I'm an Americana / folk musician based in Nashville. I'm releasing my second album in May, and my goal is to raise money for an album release tour up the West Coast, starting in Nashville and hitting Austin, San Francisco, Folsom, Portland, Seattle, then heading over to Missoula, Montana to perform at Zootown Music Festival, and then trekking home to Nashville, hitting Salt Lake City and Boulder along the way.
Touring as a DIY artist is incredibly fun and fulfilling (the picture above is of me and my band in 2023...it's been a long road with my fellas), but it is also very expensive and that can make is pretty #discouraging. But we will prevail! Literally any dollar helps!!!
I received a grant from The Levitate Foundation to record my album, and that didn’t just “help fund” the project, there literally would not have been a project without Levitate. When we recorded the album, someone from the foundation came and interviewed me and produced a video of our time in the studio, and their promotional team is using it as a way to get more songwriters to apply for their program.
A breakdown of what the tour will cost:
Van rental for ~3 weeks: $2,500
Gas for ~6,000 miles: $2,100
Accommodation in 6 cities for 5 people for ~3 weeks: $2,800 (roughly $200 / night in cities where we have no friends with couches to crash on)
Per diem for the band: $2,300 ($25 / day for 4 band members for 23 days)
Flights for two band members who don’t live in Nashville: $700
In ear monitors personal amplifiers: $50
A breakdown of what the tour should make:
The deal with most of these venues is that the bands get a percentage of the money made in total. For example, in Seattle, we're playing at Barboza, and their deal is that artists get 60% of the revenue from the show, and the venue gets 40% (kind of steep, but sometimes venues will take a flat fee and also take a lower percentage, but Barboza is waiving the flat fee and just taking a percentage). Some venues will help fund the tour, others will leave us in the red, it’s hard to tell!