Playing in a Traveling Band

I'm glad to see some of the new British bands taking on ambitious North American tours. For far too long in the ‘80s and ‘90s, most Brit bands would try to break the U.S. market through records and videos. They'd do journalist tours--play New York, L.A., and maybe another place or two along one of the coasts so the people who might write about them could see them, but that's it. They failed to wander into the hinterland to make any appearances for the potential fans who might actually buy their music. And guess what? With very few exceptions, they failed to make major inroads onto the charts. I blame the Beatles.

I've heard a number of theories about why and how Beatlemania came about, but none of them has been entirely convincing. It didn't have to explode the way it did. Capital Records had turned them down more than once, and Vee-Jay, which released their first couple of singles, could barely get any action on them. The boys' first appearance on U.S. TV was a film clip shown on Jack Paar's show, which Paar broadcast as a joke–the attitude was very much, "Those crazy British kids will fall for anything." The publicity turned around, of course, and by the time the Moptops arrived on these shores for their live TV debut on Ed Sullivan, they'd already hit Number 1.

Although no one would claim that the Beatles' situation wasn't a special case, I think that they made it look too easy and that for years after, British musicians somehow believed they could similarly take the U.S. by storm. No, I don't think anybody would actually have made such a claim, but, at least according to the evidence of the limited North American marketing plans we've seen over the years, that certainly seems to have been the mindset. It makes a certain amount of sense. The British press and media are more centralized than their U.S. counterparts, and even though bands tour around Britain, the shorter distances make the whole process easier. A major North American tour is a huge undertaking of money, time, and energy, so if it's possible to sidestep it, performers by all means would certainly do so.

I don't know what has changed so that modern bands seem more willing to take on the tours, but my guess would be that someone was paying attention in April 2002 when, for the first time since the Beatles charted almost 40 years earlier, there were no British acts in Billboard's Hot 100. We could no longer take for granted that Brits would always be a part of the American music scene. Whether that's the reason or not, we've certainly seen a stronger British presence in the clubs and on the concert stages than had been obvious a few years ago. Although I wasn't keeping a scorecard and could have missed some visits, I know Franz Ferdinand played at least three shows in Chicago in 2003, each time in a larger venue. The Futureheads have recently scheduled their third Chicago show in seven or eight months. Kaiser Chiefs played here in March and have another show scheduled for the end of May (which doesn't include their announced Lollapalooza date). Bloc Party finished up a three-week U.S. tour last week, but they're back in for more (though they're not apparently hitting Chicago this time), at the end of next month.

More bands playing more shows. You can't much improve on that.