Timmy V of the Lillingtons launches promoter blacklist site

Contributed by an Anonymous Source. Posted by aubin on Saturday, December 6, 2008 at 5:00 PM (EST)

Tim O'Hara (aka Timmy V.) of The Lillingtons has created a new website in in order to help educate and protect people in the entertainment industry. On January 1st, Tim will launch badpromoter.com. The site will feature a database of promoters and will encourage bands and performers to submit information on bad promoters to help others avoid them in the future.

Tim notes that this isn't a permanent list and if a promoter makes an effort to resolve the issue, they will be able to have their name removed from the list.

You can find some more details in a EXPN/ESPN feature here.

Bands in this story

The Lillingtons

Red Scare (52 comments)

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Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not respon sible for them in any way. Seriously.

el_matt (December 6, 2008)

That's a really cool idea.

And the Lillingtons are awesome. I've listened to Death By Television an unhealthy amount of time

JayTee (December 8, 2008)

"I saw the ape-man, he was having a bad day, because Neil Armstrong, took his banana away."

This is the single stupidest line I've ever heard in any song. Therefore, it's absolutely without question, the best!

MilesQToast (December 6, 2008)

I'd like to submit Don King.

eDWeiRD (December 6, 2008)

You may want to submit him, but you'll end up just submitting to him instead.

Brett-NOLA (December 6, 2008)

"Warped Tour manager outed on blacklist site."

- future Punknews.org headline.

BigSnuff (December 6, 2008)

This is a really cool idea.

Grantino (December 6, 2008)

fucking brilliant idea! hopefully it will contain a database of good promoters as well.

MattRamone (December 6, 2008)

Jaxx, straight up.

canaandrumzz (December 7, 2008)

When was the last time anyone from the org was interested at a show at Jaxx though? Let the metalheads figure it out themselves.

joemomma420666 (December 6, 2008)

i listened to death by television for the first time ever yesterday. its out of this world .

HumanUnkind (December 6, 2008)

Iiiiiiiiiiiiiii've got murder on my miiiiiiiiiiiiind

Dudley_Shale (December 6, 2008)

Hahaha.

I should collect royalties.

JedPNW (December 6, 2008)

This is a really really good way of getting sued!!
You need to talk to a lawyer before coming up with an idea like this

MattRamone (December 6, 2008)

I don't think it would be if it were user-submitted content.

niveK82 (December 6, 2008)

They just need a good Terms of Service page to cover their ass.

SloaneDaley (December 6, 2008)

I assume it would be like rateryourprofessor and the like.

hvmyselfabear (December 6, 2008)

What site? It doesn't exist it's just a godaddy page.

Dudley_Shale (December 6, 2008)

Does it at least have that hot broad?

niveK82 (December 6, 2008)

"On January 1st, Tim will launch badpromoter.com"

TheMike (December 6, 2008)

Good idea in theory, but this will be abused by people who just don't like promoters (as people, not as promoters), and by rival promoters, etc.

givemeamuseumandillfillit (December 6, 2008)

Did anyone read the article? It was basically talking about that if you expect to play clubs but instead are put on in basements or vfw's then you should put the promotor on the list and that there are going to be a scale from 1-5.

Fuck the scale, this website is going to be such a flamewar, only people with a 4 or 5 douche-rating should be posted. I mean, there's alot of good guys that i'm sure would get a 3 on the scale because of the band reporting it and them not really knowing what the tour manager was up to.

Bottomline: Only list really shady guys people shouldn't touch with a 60 foot pole and make sure that it's the person who booked the show and are 100% about the specifics who are filing the report.

ChokingVictim (December 6, 2008)

as a promoter, i kind of agree.

a band that's bitter with anything will do this as a revenge tool...i've gone head to head with bands before, but had nothing to do with my "treatment" of them (basically, small punk bands thinking they're rock stars and demanding things they aren't gonna get)...they could get on here and say i'm a shitty promoter because they're pissed they didn't get free drinks, though by most standards i'm probably pretty good (i promote like hell and don't ever take any money from the door)

i don't know, despite its good intentions i could see more bad than good coming from this.

the_cobra (December 6, 2008)

he definitely should put promoters who do "pay to play" shows under the guise of "you need to sell 50 tickets".

RedScare (December 7, 2008)

I'm not sure if I have a problem with this. Local bands always talk about how they bring so many people to shows and how they should get on good bills because of their draw, so if they truly will bring a ton of fans/friends, it shouldn't be a concern for the band that has to sell tickets. It also bears mentioning that the tickets that a band sells to their friends are usually discounted, so their friends get in cheaper too.

If I ran a club I would probably do this. It insures that people will be in attendance for the touring bands that come through.

Cox_Attack (December 7, 2008)

I respect your point but please look at it from the bands point of view(and this is coming from someone who has been in many bands and has promoted a show or 10).

The thing with pay to play is that well quite frankly it's very degrading. Whoring your band out is not a fun thing and it puts more pressure on the band to sell tickets. It creates a lot of unwanted tension and I personally never play these type of shows(and haven't since high school) nor would I ever book a show like this.

The job of the promoter is to promote the show. If the promoter doesn't think he's going to be able to make his money back or doesn't have enough faith in the lineup he chose then he is quite simply not a good promoter. I loss money on shows before. Yeah it sucks, but it happens. It's sort of a gamble. Selling tickets to a local show I think is absurd. I'd really only consider doing it for a very big show and even then the headliner better kick ass.

RedScare (December 7, 2008)

I can appreciate that. A promoter should do their job to get the word out, but a band should also fulfill their part of the bargain and get the amount of people to the show that they claim they can. Bands always say, "Oh yeah, we'll get at least 50 people out to the show" Well, if that's the case they shouldn't have a problem selling 20 tickets in advance. If a local band is decent and they do their part to get people out to the show, they can prove it to other bands and the other promoters that have value. Usually bands that successfully sell a buncha tickets to their friends aren't asked to do it again and are usually kept in mind for other shows.

Encouraging your friends to come out to punk shows helps out the scene and touring bands. I don't see anything wrong with asking a band to sell 20 advance tickets at $5 and giving them $100 back for their efforts and giving $100 to the touring headliner.

ChokingVictim (December 7, 2008)

i've never done a show where pre-sale tickets were even made, so maybe i'm not in the right place to speak but...

i think for the most part it's shitty. unless some band is begging the promoter to be on a certain show, i think it's kinda dumb to ASK a band to play your show (presumably in hopes they will increase turnout), but then require they sell tickets.

if a band that wants to be on the show that the promoter has no interest in is asking, it's a way of the band "proving" themselves, but i think if it's the kind of show where the promoter has to find local support for draw, they are in no position to be demanding ticket sales.

Cox_Attack (December 7, 2008)

If pay to play was usually like that, I'd have no problem. 20 isn't too much, any local band could do that and thats a lot of money to get back for selling tickets. Usually I was lucky if my band walked away with 100 dollars after selling 50. I do agree that bands usually like to hype themselves out and say they can bring X amount of people and that X is usually greater than how many they actually bring. I can totally see that from the promoters point of view.

Another pro to pay to play is that newer bands that have just formed can get on a show as long as they promise this amount of ticket sells. Outside of that though, most of the time its some coke head guy who doesn't give a shit about music telling people to sell 100 tickets for 10 bucks a pop and maybe you'll get 100-200 dollars out of that. That is completely absurd to me and I think does more damage to the music scene than good.

Dudley_Shale (December 6, 2008)

"Do You Wanna Know" is the best song of 2008.

MattRamone (December 6, 2008)

I think you forgot about a little ditty called "I Kissed a Girl."

Dudley_Shale (December 6, 2008)

Swing Ya Rag was much more complex.

MattRamone (December 6, 2008)

Also you neglect the subtle, restrained genius and masterful use of metaphors in Lolipop.

BarleyPat (December 6, 2008)

By far the year's best.

dev (December 6, 2008)

"You Oughta Know" is the best song of 1995.

skankin_in_the_pit (December 6, 2008)

"Uncontrollable Urge" is the best song of 1978.

BarleyPat (December 6, 2008)

Ya know, I HATED Love Love, Kiss Kiss the first couple times I heard it. Now, it's one of my favorites on the album.

Fuzzy (justin) (December 6, 2008)

"Burned in the House" is the best song the Trio's recorded since the HWM split and it didn't even make it onto the new album!

Bowen (December 7, 2008)

Way to not know the correct name of a song you supposedly love so much.

Fuzzy (justin) (December 7, 2008)

Typos invalidate opinions.

allfornot (December 7, 2008)

This.

Bowen (December 8, 2008)

That's not a typo. That's you using the sometimes-referred-to-but-wrong title of the song.

supertomato (December 6, 2008)

best idea of the month!

thedopamines (December 6, 2008)

What's a promotoer?

RedScare (December 7, 2008)

I dunno how I feel about this being somehow affiliated with Red Scare.

I bet Timmy has good intentions, but this is just going to be a sounding board for bitter start-up bands to slander people in their hometown scene. Some band is not gonna get the show they want and they're gonna use this to get back at them. There are plenty of shifty people doing shows, but most agents and bands know who they are and stay away from them.

Not to overly-defend promoters, but it's only fair for them to get together and start a website called unknownbandthatgotashowandwerecompletepricks.com

wearestillalive (December 7, 2008)

I read the article - you send in your experiences and the site moderators decide on whether to post it up and choose a rating, and contact the actual promoter about it to. So it looks like it's gonna be heavily moderated, and there'll be a back and forth between the promotors and the site that should hopefully keep any abuse to the minimum. So it could work out pretty well.

HOISTDATRAG (December 7, 2008)

how about they start goodpromoter.com, and list the names of really dependable promoters? The way it is makes it too easy to have promoters names up there who maybe made a mistake or just aren't liked based on character with bands. I've done a lot of touring, and it'd be much easier to put the names of good promoters up rather than bad, because there are so many bad promoters

Lmnndtlgrph (December 7, 2008)

because people are way more likely to go out of their way to write up about a terrible experience they had then to write about a great experience they had.

even if people did write up shit about good promoters, it'd be short and simple, "everything was awesome! this guy rules!" whereas all the shit about bad promoters would be like pages long, with bulleted points and flow charts.

minorkaty (katy) (December 8, 2008)

Agreed, that would be so much more helpful.

...But sadly, most people are pessimists.

Apeman_On_The_Moon (December 7, 2008)

As the Apeman on the Moon, I applaud Tim for this move. I'll wear my Lillingtons shirt with pride tommorrow.

Lmnndtlgrph (December 7, 2008)

this is a dumb fucking idea.

if you're pissed when you show up and find out that you're playing a house show:

you're an idiot.

if your band has too huge of a draw to play house shows -then you're probably successful enough that you're not booking your own tours, and what the fuck are you paying a booking agent for if they're not even looking into the "venues" that they book you to play.

if your band doesn't have too huge of a draw to play house shows -then get stoked! you're playing a fucking house show. what the fuck is wrong with that?

bands need to take care of their own shit. who books a tour by getting in touch with promoters? for every bad house show i've played, i've played shitty shows at venues. for every good show at a venue i've played, i've played ten good house shows. if you're booking a tour, talk to the good bands that live in that town -talk to the kids that live in that town that are into the same shit that you're into. and most importantly, if you're a whiny fuckin' baby -DON'T GO ON TOUR. chances are that no one wants to see your shitty band anyway.

Lmnndtlgrph (December 7, 2008)

whoops...

last paragraph, first line "played *ten shitty..."

vocalyouth (December 8, 2008)

I'd rather play a packed house show than an empty club. I've done a lot of both.

I would also say that as a promoter, sometimes shit happens that is out of your control and a show has to be moved or a time needs to be changed and it's not your fault.

I hate punk bands who have no draw whatsoever and show up expecting a ton of money and/or bands that are total divas about sound. Just make the best out of whatever the situation is and play already.