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Following up from our last post we’re looking at 5 essential questions you should ask your wedding band before booking. These questions will help you get a better idea of what to expect from your band and hopefully narrow down your options in order to find the perfect fit for your big day! I mean, hopefully, it’s us, but we like to give out good advice for everyone!
How far do you travel and are there any travel costs involved?
It’s important to establish this as wedding bands are based all over the place, and you might find the perfect group for your wedding only to find out they’re based across the other side of the country! Most professional bands, however, should be more than happy to work out travel and accommodation costs and arrangements when providing you with a quote.
2. Do you have PLI (Public Liability Insurance) and PAT (Portable Appliance Testing) certificates?
Again this should be a given for most professional bands- PLI, or Public Liability Insurance, ensures that you are covered in the unlikely event that an accident occurs with yourselves or one of your guests, and is usually a requirement for bands performing at most venues. PAT certificates means that the band’s equipment is safe for public use and makes sure that nothing is accidentally going to catch fire in the middle of a set! Both of these certificates are usually required by your venue and your wedding coordinator may ask for up-to-date copies for their own records.
3. Can you work with a sound limiter or noise restrictions?
We’ve covered this subject in more detail in previous posts, but some venues have noise limitations in place- meaning that your band can’t be too loud or the venue will be in trouble, or they may have more strict measures, such as a sound limiter. Sound limiters can be a headache for many bands who aren’t prepared to deal with them, as they cut the power from the band’s equipment if the noise goes beyond a certain threshold. It’s important to find out this before booking as it can be a make or break point for certain bands.
Not us though- we’ve had plenty of experience dealing with big scary noise limiters, and we’ve got several procedures in place to deal with them- an electric drum kit, so we can but a reign on the volume of the drummer, a complete lack of amps on stage, meaning that we can’t get the guitar or bass to AC/DC concert volumes, and in-ear monitors, meaning we can be as loud as we like in our headphones and control the volume out front accordingly!
4. What options do you have in between your sets?
This is a key one- establishing what your band does in between their live sets is really important- you don’t want to end up booking a band that only provides live music and nothing else when they’re not on stage- meaning the dancefloor is empty and awkward whenever the band takes a break. Professional bands (such as ourselves!) should offer a free iPad playlist service, meaning that there’s party music being played whenever they’re not on stage, and some might even offer options like a manned DJ service, meaning there’s a band member on stage to take care of you and your guests’ requests throughout the night. More information on our services here.
5. Can you play our first dance?
We talked about the importance of this in the last blog, and we can’t stress this one enough. A band can have the highest quality promo material on their website, that they’ve spent ages in the studio perfecting and paid loads of money out for their videos, but they could sound nothing like that in a live environment, and that’s not something you want to be finding out on your wedding day. We know live dates are not a thing at the minute, but when restrictions ease see if they have any live dates planned, or at the very least a livestream!
We hope this little blog proves useful and provides you with some useful starting points to ask your wedding band! If you have any questions for us, please don’t hesitate to say hello, we’re always happy to help!