Karaoke Forums

I've never hosted a night before and plan on doing this twice a month.  I'm not sure it would work weekly.  Maybe eventually.   I figure trying it twice a month is a good way to dip my toe in.  We'll see!

Gee, you're kidding, could have never guessed it from your ideas of what makes for a good karaoke show  LOL  LMAO

My fiancee wanted to try and do karaoke and his idea was to have "Metal Karaoke" only. I tried to explain to him it is hard enough to build a crowd let alone limit your crowd to only people who sang metal songs. He just didn't understand. I think he took it personal that I didn't like his idea.

We aren't trying to discourage you. Some things you just learn from experience. A couple times a month may work and give your crowd something different to look foward to.  :hi5:

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While I haven't hosted a karaoke night, I've rounded up well-known singers around town for a live karaoke night, hosted trivia nights, telethons and other themed cover benefits that have involved dozens of bands around town.  I'm friends with every press person in town and have a Myspace page with over 2000 people who love the variety of the nights I put on.  I also just got a national karaoke webpage wanting to do a feature on me.  I doubt that most KJ's host their first night with as much of a built-in crowd as I have.  Poor little rookie.

Can it keep a crowd?  Maybe!  We'll see.  The 1200 songs I have so far appeal to every kind of singer while successful live band karaoke or indie karaoke nights I've seen are more narrowly focused and have been able to keep going.  I'm enjoying you laughing at me for messing with conventional karaoke.  The reason I have people telling me they're excited about my night is because so many people are tired of the same ol' thing.  Most of you seem fine with that format and that's fine. I'll offer people something a little different.  Definitely more sarcastic so it won't be for everyone.

Thanks for the advice.  Seriously!  I definitely don't want to limit it to one kind of music but apparently, having a night free from Nickelback and new country is a godsend for a lot of people around here.  No offense taken by the constructive criticisms.  The more condescending/purist stuff is way more entertaining, though!

I'm the first to admit that I'm new enough to karaoke to not know what works and what doesn't but with the format I'm using I think a lot of the usual rules are out the window.  Should be interesting!

I guess I am in a pretty similar boat as to the target group.

My target audience is mainly indie. In fact the KJ I replaced advertized it as "Indie Rock Karaoke", and since I am one of 5 shows in town doing karaoke on thursday nights It does pay to specialize.

With indie rock you need to really cater to your regulars. It is a huge genre and all too often someone's favorite song may be one you dont know or have barely heard of.

Another "problem" if that is the case is a lot of your indie rock singers have mixed taste. I know one who does a lot of "The Cure" but also some country. Another is a lot of Smiths, but mixes in Frank Sinatra.

The person I replaced had about 500 vocal removed songs and about 2500 commercial karaoke songs. About half of his commercial songs were "indie".

While I have gone out and purchased about 5000 songs, probably only about 1500 qualify as "indie". The problem with true indie songs is that they are often a lot harder to find once you have scratched the surface and gotten the easy ones. All too often a band may only have 1-2 songs ever made as karaoke if that. The more popular ones may have 5 or 6 but they may be made by 4 different companies and are therefore a bit hard to get them all.  

While I have only done about a dozen vocal removal songs, they get sung (and I have only been doing KJ for 2 months). The main limit is the time involved to do the vocal removal. Hopefully I will have a bunch of free time during the holidays.

That said my crowds have been in the 20-50 person range. Sure I would want a few more, but it takes time to build up a following.

My main advice is to dream big, make a good attempt at it, learn what does not work, takes too much time or money, and reajust to more realistic expectations. While my shows have in general all gone well, it takes some time to learn how to do it right. My greatest regret is that I hyped my first show a lot and had more than my share of technical difficulties that time. Nothing major but it was less than 100% pro. Now that I am comfortable doing a much better job and have most of the kinks worked out of my system. I now have to convince the people that saw my first show that I can do a much better production.

When it comes down to indie rock, you are generally going for music purists. They do pay a lot more attention to sound quality than your average drunken karaoke singer. Generally they will respect and applaud a well done version of any obscure song even if it is not too indie. On the other hand they seem to have little tollerance of a poorly done version of a popular song. The problem is that to attract the "hipster" crowd you have to be creative. I think that the main starting point is to have a bar that already is largely occupied with regulars of your target audience.

As for attracting the audience you have to prove that you have something more than the crook who downloaded (illegally) 100,000 songs and probably has all of the same indie rock songs you have purchased.

I have been thinking along with a regular or two about making special theme nights where one or two artists are featured Ie The Cure or Smiths, Bowie or Blondie etc. The rule would be for one hour (11-12) all of the songs have to be by that artist or pair of artists. This is my curent Idea and I plan on doing it once a month.  

By being too selective the previous KJ would have bad nights with crowds in the 5-6 person range. That just does not work. Build a group of regulars first, then try to weed out the inappropriate music and retain and grow regulars who like the music you want. It will take time, and I suspect it may be more difficult if you plan to do it only 2 times a month. 2 Times a month may work if it is on a weekend, but building a group of regulars on weekdays is hard if you are being too selective.

To the OP.  I agree with whoever said your idea is good but the pay thing is probably not going to work.  

I see where you are coming from, though, having to sit through hearing "I will always love youoooooooo" and other slow songs all night.  I'm arguably the worst singer there is, but when I get up and sing Jerry Lee Lewis "Rockin my life away", I'll get the biggest applause of the night because A) I put everything into it, and B) no one ever hears that song.  Its like a welcome oasis in the desert, much like your more indie music idea.  And hats off to you for having Joy Division on your list!

Good luck, aye!

Wow, that's a lot of really helpful advice.  Thanks!  Would this happen to be Citizen Indie Rock Karaoke?  I only found 3 indierock karaoke nights so far and one of them was in Georgia.  The others were in Austin which inspired one to start in Philadelphia.  

I understand what you mean about people who like Smiths, Cure, Frank AND country.  I've got it all even if it's just a few songs by each.  

I TOTALLY know your fears about the first show not going well.  I had a record number of technical problems at a wedding a few weeks ago so I want to troubleshoot as much as I can before I start.  Doing it at a club that caters to an indie crowd AND has a PA is a huge plus.  There's an elevated DJ booth and projector I can use too.  I could've done it at any number of places but it really made more sense to do it at a club that already draws the crowd I want.  Unfortunately, the only semi-regular night I could get is Sundays, which could be the worst night of the week with early morning Monday risings.  

Funny enough, to get people to stay later, I was going to do a nightly midnight contest too!  I figured I could make 'em all start with M so the first 2 will be Midnight Morrissey and the 2nd will be Midnight Metal with Midnight Madonna, Manchester, McCartney, Mamas, Serious Moonlight (I accidentally bought 2 of the same Bowie cd-g) etc to follow.  I was going to have 3 singers at midnight do whatever featured artist.  I figure you can sing up early for those 3 spots and if anyone else wants to sing earlier they can.  Midnight's late for a Sunday, even for hipsters so we'll see if I stick with it.

Cheers to Crazy Drunk singer who likes Jerry Lee AND Joy Division!

Go for it.

You already have the crowd. Try and get a 1hr slot on a good night and see where it lead to.

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I just found out I'll be doing the backroom at the best indierock club in town when a popular Smiths coverband plays there.  Plus I'm shaking at the thought of maybe doing karaoke in beteween acts at a local altrock station's Xmas show at a big arena....and jinxing it by posting about it here! They've done fun stuff like that before at their shows and it'd be great to have folks from the bands take part (Queens of the Stone Age & more)

Wow, it will be intersting to hear how that turns out. I can't see it lasting long (most places anyhow)

I know if I ever went to a place and couldn't find a song and someone said "oh, we don't have that song, it was voted out".... it would be my last visit there.
(most of my fav songs would probably be voted out)  LMAO

I do agree there are a BUNCH of songs that get overdone... but to never hear them sang at karaoke- ever again- would kinda be a bummer, IMO.
.

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The arena thing didn't pan out sadly but the Smiths coverband's 2 night stand at the coolest club in San Diego is now gonna have me do 90 minutes of karaoke on the same stage both nights. That should be fun.  Don't think I've ever heard of karaoke as an opening band (actually once I saw some radio contest winners do it at a Weird Al show).

 :no:  LMAO

We could come up with a universal KJ list of most over done, most boring and most never should be played songs.  

Every time someone wants to sing a song from the dreaded list, we could charge a hefty (if you insist on singing it) performance fee.  Maybe we could use it to tip the KJ and buy drinks for the bar for having to submit to the torture.  LMAO

"Picture" is very over-played. I would also ban "P.C." Ya'll know what that is.

Um, I hate to say this, but no I don't.  "Paradise City"?  That's all I can think of.   (I did think of "The Pussycat Song"--"p.c." = "(@$%&#!) cat"?, but the initials for the TITLE would be "T.P.S.", not "P.C.")  And I've heard kj's complain about "Paradise by the Dashboard Light", but that doesn't have a C in the title.  So pleeeeeeease tell me what song title "P.C." is, 'cause I'm a little slow on the uptake here...

Yes, I do agree that "Picture" has been waaaaay oversung.  However, I did hear a really funny version of it last week at a karaoke place --the male half of the duo made several spoken remarks in between the lines of the song.  The girl would sing, "I can't look at you while I'm lyyyyyying...next to hiiiiim..." and he would say  something like, "_Who_ are you lying next to???"

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Depending on who asks me to sing with him, I will throw in "...while I'm lying ON TOP of him."  Oh, that's bad isn't it.

k

you know, I can't find ONE post that kameragurl's made that's entirely positive!

The song Kameragurl is probably referring to is "P#ssy Control" by Prince.

"Picture" - Kid Rock/Sheryl Crow has faded considerably in popularity but it is STILL done now and then.  I remember being at a show back when this was popular and it was sung THREE times in an hour one night.

Well lets us know how it pans out for you it will be interesting to see if you can keep the same type of crowd coming back week after week.