Great adventure - Tour

This is a plan for a month-long continental tour with my band. This is unrealistic
right now but a dream that might be fulfilled in some years time.

Budget
First off, we’ll need a vehicle. A minibus-like spacey van with relatively high mileage
that can hold our instruments and other gear, road-supplies and a crew of 5-7 people. Ideally, at
the time that this tour would be possible, we are no longer an independant band but signed to a
record label. The record label would cover some expenses like a booking agent, a tour manager
and possibly photographer and places to sleep along the way though sleeping in our vehicle
probably will be the case most nights. With the car of course comes gas, a lot of gas. We’ll be
driving an estimate of 300 miles a day so with the average gas price this month and assuming a
van of our size will run about 16 MPG, we’d be paying about $50 a day in gas.
Food is an important part of the budget. It is crucial to maintain a healthy diet as a touring
band so taco bell and mcdonalds won’t do every day. Likely, groceries would make up 50-70%
of our food and the rest would be sorts of fast-food and snacks. I’m a fairly good cook and would
happily be in charge of a nutritious healthy dinner. Even though we will probably all be of legal
age by then, there’s no room in the budget for beer so on that .
Emergency savings are a must. A long tour like this is risky and problems - small as well
as severe - are sure to arise. If we break down on the road, someone breaks an arm, our gear
stops working and so on, then we have to be able to pay that without cutting the budget for food
as an example. I imagine a good $500-$1000 for emergency use.
Earning a wage of about $13 an hour with averagely 10 hours a week, we can each save
up about $70 a month after paying our expenses. Totalling to $280 a month.

Budget Handout

Expense Daily cost Total

Van rental $36.74 $1,102.20
Gas $49.34 $1,480.20
Food $80.00 $2,400.00
Miscellaneous $15.00 $450.00
Emergency/Unpredictables $1,000.00
Total $6,432.40
If we save up $280 a month, it will take 1 year and 9 months to save up for the
tour. Realistically we should probably put aside 2 years for it.
Culture
With the tour spanding through Canada, the US and Mexico, we get the chance to really
experience the North-American continent and all the different cultures that it has to offer. As
musicians it’s gonna be extremely interesting to see what different parts of the country will think
of our music and learn a lot more about the scene there. We one time played a show in San
Francisco and even just the difference between San Diego and San Francisco is so extremely
noticeable and obvious that going out of state and out of country is gonna be super interesting.

I’d love to see Canada in wintertime. I have always heard a lot of good stuff about Canada,
e.g. from my bandmate Artie who lived there for about a year when he was eleven years old. He
lived in Toronto, one of the two places in Canada we plan on playing, and is hoping to visit there
soon. He would be keen to show us around and take us to a hockey rink to try to play. Also, I am
getting better at French and would really like to try my luck with Canadian French which sounds
a whole lot different than traditional French.
I’m excited to experience the Northern West-coast of the US like Portland and Seattle. I have
a predilection for going North and a love for frigid landscapes with forests and not all this dessert
that I’m used to in Southern California.
I don’t know how fun the Midwest is gonna be, to be honest. I don’t hold any prejudice toward
the Midwest I just have mostly heard of not so exciting things going on there. I do wanna
experience the music scene there and I know some bands that come from that area that I
absolutely love.
We wanna play a show or two south of the border too. Like Canada, I have never been to
Mexico and I feel like I need to try and go there since I live so close to the border. I want to
experience real authentic Mexican food which I doubt you could call Rubio’s or Taco Bell.

Though the music is definitely the purpose of this tour, the cultural aspect is what will keep us
excited about the tour and not just have it be a strenuous month-long task. “Exploring” all of
North-America is something few people get to really experience and I’d consider myself honored
to do so.

Rationale

Going on a tour like this is something I and everyone in the band have been dreaming of ever
since we played our first show. There is nothing, to me, like the adrenaline kick it gives to play
something you have made and perfected yourself in front of a crowd of dozens and dozens of
people who are into it. It was a dream for me to be a “rock-star” since I was a young kid but I
was always kind of to terms with the fact that such a dream isn’t reality and even if I wanted to
play in a band like that, I would never find other people who wanted to do that. That issue has
been solved now and I have a group of great musicians - and just wonderful people - that have
become my family more than my friends.
 A tour like this is the way to go if you wanna really spread the word about your music and
gain a bigger crowd that is not just concentrated in one “little” city like San Diego. Exposure is
key if you want to be successful in the music business.
Everything about being a touring band seems attractive to me, even the unattractive parts of it
- sleeping in a cramped space, sharing a bathroom with the same four guys that you’re forced to
spend every day with anyway, showering whenever possible which can be like once or twice a
week, the stress, the exhaustion. I want to experience waking up in a new city every day,
breathing new air. I like the thought of being “homeless” in the sense that we aren’t bound to one
part of the world every day.
In all of its clicheness I believe that exploring and learning and trying new stuff every single
day is more or less the only purpose we can give to life. As soon as we get stuck in a routine,
even one we might think we are “comfortable” with, and we decide to live the rest of our lives
this way, then we are already dead. Don’t ever think you know everything about anything. You
don’t know a fraction about what the world really is, you don’t know what It’s like most places
in your own town and you hardly know anything about yourself either. You just know that you’re
here and that you exist and that, as an initial is enough. You owe it to the world to find out more.
That’s what the tour would do for me. Give me real-life education on what this part of the world
really looks and feels like. I won’t know a fraction of what there is to know but I will know more
and I will love learning it.