Last night when I was working on the ticket booth at a gig, a photographer on the door list walked past, saw someone getting their money out to hand to me, stopped her and said ‘Don’t pay, I’ll get someone to get you in.’ Mid-transaction. Right in front of me. Extremely poor form.
Like dude, it’s not even your gig, you have no right to stop people paying the musicians, the door guy, the sound engineer, the venue, just to show off that you know someone in some unsigned band and you wanna feel like a big-shot music industry guy.
Most of you reading this are musicians. That’s your money and you earned it, not just for that night’s gig but as compensation for the years, sometimes decades of learning, rehearsal, creativity, investment in gear. It really sucks when someone thinks so little about what they’re even there for (and they may even be paid by whichever band put them on their list) and screws with someone else’s right to be compensated for their hard work and creativity.
Don’t do this stuff. Musicians need their earnings protected now more than ever.