Yesterday, Songkick and Andrew Bird announced the biggest crowdfunded tour ever. Twelve cities are pledging to bring an Andrew Bird concert to their town in South America, where Andrew has yet to play live to his fans, early next year. For an artist, at first blush, there are many exciting things about Detour - Songkick's recent experiments with fan-funded touring. Sure, you may get to tour in parts of the world you never dreamed of, fill in that extra tour date, play to bigger crowds, make more money. But it goes so much deeper than that. With Detour, we've embarked into a whole new realm of possibility that exists outside of the tried-and-true tour route.
In the last five years, we've seen the power of the Songkick that we've built up to be the second largest live music site in the world. We've helped millions of fans find out about the concerts of their favorite artists. It's more than the sum of its parts, though - attached to each ticket bought, there is a story. The man who proposed to his wife at your concert, the 12 year old girl who learned your song on guitar. These fans are passionate, emotional, and they desperately want to connect with you. Up until now, the fans and artist have co-existed in a barely touching Venn diagram, close for a fleeting moment in time, but still separate. Detour is a way to bring those two sides together, a place for the fan and artist to converge.
As an actively touring artist myself, those moments of connection are what stick with me and make all the other hard work worthwhile. It's not about how many shows we played, or even how many people were there. I don't remember how much merch was sold, or how big our guarantee was. What I do remember is the moment we finished our set and the audience carried on singing our song at the top of their lungs. I do remember fans from Germany and Spain flying to our London show because we weren't playing near their town. I do remember the room being so hushed after an encore that no one dared to clap first.
And THAT is the most exciting thing about Detour; that connection with the fan. As we've been running Detour experiments over the last year with the likes of Hot Chip, Tycho, and now Andrew Bird, what we've noticed most is the ineffable electricity a Detour concert has. You empowered your fans to help you, they rose to the challenge, and you, in turn, put that energy back into the live performance, connecting with them in a new and more direct way.
Detour is about finding your true fans, but also about releasing your fear. That fear of playing to an empty crowd, of flying halfway around the world only to have a tour flop. Of crooning your most intimate song to an audience loudly chatting to their friends. Detour has the potential to change that. All of a sudden, the world unfurls in a cornucopia of possibility, of infinite fandom and deeper connection.
This Detour is the scenic route. A departure from mindlessly re-hashing the same tour markets, a step towards reaching the fans that so desperately want to connect with you and your music. Our hope is that Detour will be a vehicle for that to happen.
Are you an artist interested in getting involved with Detour? Email me, Songkick's artist ambassador, at brooke[at]songkick.com. Keep an eye on Twitter at @songkickartists and @brookeparrott for Detour updates.