Double Lunch's 'band hotel' among resources for the music industry

Emily Bachynski was sick of uncomfortable touring life after 10 years with her band Bad Buddy, so she decided to open a "band hotel."

"Sometimes the only time alone you get on tour is in the bathroom, so to have this space that I've wanted to be a hub for artists for my entire career, I just value it so highly," she told Taproot. "I think that other artists do, too."

She ought to know: Bachynski hosted the Vancouver band Concrete Vehicles (formerly known as Computer) when the group performed at the lineup announcement party for the Purple City Music Festival on May 22. She and the company she works with, Double Lunch, provided private space, basic groceries, and dignity that independent touring musicians have chronically lacked.

Her "huge house" is located near the University of Alberta in Windsor Park, making it easy to get to and from venues in Old Strathcona and downtown Edmonton, with or without cramming your bandmates into a tour van.

"There's a bed in a room with a door that closes," she said, a big improvement over shared hotel rooms or the floor of someone's house. "There is agency … You don't have to all be doing something as a group, because you only have this one method of transportation. You're trapped together so often."

Bachynski's home also includes space to record music and video, as well as to jam and rehearse. It's part of the next chapter for Double Lunch as it develops music industry resources to supplement its existing promotional services for live music, said creator Craig Martell.

"We don't want to grow as a show promoter (in particular)," he told Taproot. "We don't want to be doing 10 shows a month. We want to be doing only the things we think are very cool, only things that we do well, only things that are in our wheelhouse. And then beyond that, we all have so much expertise in varying sides of the music industry. How do we make something happen?"

Martell officially joined forces with Bachynski, Mike Wilson, Raine Radtke, and Zach Hofer just this year. They have since launched an Edmonton music listings page, a Canada-wide list of music festivals, and a directory of grant resources for artists and industry members. Double Lunch also amplifies Trickle Down Music, a directory of tips on everything from getting your music on campus radio to registering songs with SOCAN. (Trickle Down Music is led by Shawn Petsche, with whom this reporter used to work at Sled Island Music and Arts Festival.)

"I feel like when you start to take your music seriously, and you build a band, it very quickly becomes a small business," Bachynski said. "To learn how to keep track of your accounting, how to book a tour, how to pay people, what things cost … a lot of people feel like if they share these trade secrets that it's going to become too competitive."

Many resources for musicians, show promoters, venue owners, and other pros are already out there, but sometimes they're behind doors that take some elbow grease to open. For instance, when Martell operated the scrappy Wunderbar as a music venue from 2010 to 2015, he stumbled when a booking agent first asked him for an offer sheet (that is, a formal proposal for payment terms for a live performer).

"Totally, totally, totally, I know what that is," he recalled bluffing. Martell then reached out to a promoter friend for help and learned how industry knowledge about things like offer sheets is passed inefficiently from one person to the next, rather than being centralized. "It's this great spreadsheet that it would have taken me forever to create, and now I have it because he gave it to me. Then I find out that his is just a slightly edited version given to him when he started promoting, which is a slightly edited version (another promoter gave him). It turns out all the promoters in town are kind of sharing a secret handshake."

In terms of getting paid, the Double Lunch folks are not starting with themselves — "What's money?" Bachynski quipped. But the team has faith that what it's doing will pay off.

"Between grants, between community donations, and between sponsorships, we're confident that we can make this a financially viable endeavor," Martell said. "We also believe that if that's not possible, we're going to keep doing what we do in one form or another. It'll just change."

He said people have already inquired about sponsoring the music listings page and licensing its backend functionality. Plus, people have asked how they can donate, so Double Lunch accepts one-off donations and has launched a Patreon.

"(Crowdfunding is) going to help us keep doing cool stuff, and it then helps us curate better, because right now, we can't guarantee a band any money," he said. "If we had a little bit of a bankroll, we could put on cooler events and bigger events and more fun things."

Crowdfunding makes sense for the people who make and support indie music, he said, because whopper patrons often direct their arts philanthropy elsewhere. "If you're a rich motherfucker who gives back to the arts, you're not giving money to (Philip Muz) at The Aviary, right?" Martell said. "You're giving money to something a little more hoity-toity and highfalutin."

The Patreon could also address a problem for live music that Martell is personally experiencing: When many people take on a mortgage, have kids, and simply calm down due to age, they don't go out as regularly and don't spend the same on much-needed bar sales as they did in their 20s, he said. "Any adversity to me going to a show, I will try not to overcome it," he half-joked.

Crowdfunding provides an alternative to standing through a five-band bill on a Monday night for people who still want to see the local music scene thrive. And as people age, they often have more money than they did in their 20s.

"With a lot of adults, we're not rich, but if it was up to me and I could throw 30 bucks at somebody to keep the thing moving, I would do it," Martell said. "So that'll be our appeal — a PBS-style appeal to people."

The revenue could also offset the expense of hosting bands at the hotel/creative space, for which Double Lunch takes a nominal fee compared to hotel prices.

Double Lunch is also interested in gathering and disseminating more resources like the grant list, Bachynski said. For instance, a directory of the nation's college radio stations that includes who to talk to and how to get in touch could go a long way.

In the imminent future, Double Lunch's shows include B.A. Johnston at The Buckingham on June 17, and Fiver with Faith Healer at CKUA on Sept. 4.