Book a Live Band

What to look for when you hire a live band:  If you've been searching for 'Kent Bands' of 'Wedding Bands Kent' or 'Bands to Hire Kent', the chances are you will have come across a vast number bands and agencies offering their services. It can certainly be overwhelming. We're glad you've found The RockPins!

Hiring Live Music for your wedding - Do's and Don't's!I was asked to put together a few 'do's' and 'do not's' for an article in a wedding magazine, so I thought I'd post it on here too. Hope it is helpful!

Do book your wedding entertainment in good time to avoid disappointment. When  booking a live band; if a band is good and your wedding is in high season (April to September) it is likely the good bands will be booked well in advance, especially for Saturday weddings.

Do book bands directly if you can. You might have to search pages 2 to 5 on the search engine for the likes of 'Kent Bands' , 'Bands to Hire Kent' , or 'Wedding Bands Kent' (as most bands do not have the resources to compete with agencies for search engine placement), but it might be worth it. You avoid paying agency fees and you get to form a relationship with the people who are actually going to be turning up to your wedding and entertaining you and your guests.
Do not insist on choosing the whole live set for the night to suit you and your fiance. If the band are worth their salt, they will have a very good idea of what works and what doesn't and how to entertain a broad range of ages / tastes. By all means, pick your favorites, but let the experts do the rest. And keep your guests in mind when choosing! 

Do not take audio demos of a band as proof of what they'll sound like live. So many times people hear a band on a website thinking it sounds fantastic (and it probably does!) But when they hear them live they are often disappointed. The problem is, bands can spend hours in a recording studio, ironing out mistakes, tweaking tuning issues and laying down multi-tracks to give them a much fuller sound. Either make sure you can listen to a live recording (eg a video) or get along and see them live before booking.

Do make sure the band you are booking is the band you are going to get on the night. There are 'bands' out there who will be playing 3 or 4 weddings in one night. How? They are session musicians thrown together by a management company / agency promoting them as one band through a band website. You might be lucky and get the band with members who have played together a lot. But you also might get the one with a guitarist who's never met the rest of the band before! It can work, but its often a compromised performance. 

Do not take the agencies' word for it that a band is great, unless they have some pretty good proof. It is often the case that agencies recommending bands to perform at the most important day of your lives have never seen the whites of the eyes of the people they are trying to sell to you. Make sure you get along to see the band perform and check that these are the guys who will be turning up to your wedding.

Do not book a DJ until you have asked your band if they can provide DJ / recorded music. If the band are good, they should be turning up with excellent sound equipment and some dance floor lighting anyway. You can even ask to plug your Ipod / laptop into their PA and then you get exactly the music you want!