The financial stories of CHRIS COLE and artists After The Fall, Pray Naked and Rachel Friend

6. What is the lowest amount you've received?
"We do quite a lot of charity gigs where we don't get a fee."

7. Do you have your own PA?
"Yes, we've got our own PA and lights. We've built it up over the years. Recently, we totalled it up. We reckon we've spent £14.000 on it over the years."

8. What recordings have you made?
"Into The Light' for Big Feet Media in 1990 and an EP "Touching Glory' privately, which Kingsway distributed in 1994."

After The Fall

9. What did they cost you to make?
"The Big Feet album was through a play-now-pay-later deal. They reckoned that the total studio cost and cassette manufacture was £5.000. To be truthful there were HUGE behind-the-scenes problems - we went through three producers! When we'd paid them back £3,000 we stopped there. The EP cost £3,000 to record and manufacture."

10. How did you finance them?
"As I said, the Big Feet album was play-now-pay-later. The repayment came from selling about 400-450 cassettes at our gigs. The EP was financed by a loan of £2.400 from a sponsor plus an extra £500 from our church."

11. Have you recouped your money yet?
"No. We're repaying the loan in bits as we get money in from gigs."

12. Final comments:
"This ministry has brought many special memories. A 65 year old man who came to me with tears in his eyes after a gig told me his grandchildren had become Christians at our gig the night before and told me how he just 'knew it was all true". Or the prostitute who became a Christian with her boyfriend roadie-ing for us. Memories like that are worth more than a wall of "old discs."

Secular Scene
Launching out in music is a tough and potentially dispiriting business. Humping gear, dealing with malfunctioning equipment, getting little or no money, and arriving home shattered in the early hours of the morning may seem worthwhile when you get to gig to an enthusiastic throng. But it can be profoundly disillusioning when a tiny dribble of people bother to turn out to see you play. The apathy and lack of CCM interest in many British churches means that even well established CD-level artists sometimes find themselves playing to pathetically small turnouts. Bad organisation and poor or non-existent publicity are also epidemic in churches and Christian youth group circles.

Consequently, more and more bands (rather than soloists) are turning to the secular scene. Again, like the church and mission scene, the pubs and clubs circuit has advantages and disadvantages.

THE UPSIDE
1. There is a great throng of unsaved people, whether you consider them a mission field or not, who, potentially at least, will get to hear something of the message in your music.

2. It is possible to actually generate work simply by walking into pubs with the immortal words, "We're a local band and we want to play a gig."

3. Playing in the "real world" will give you kudos with those who struggle with the whole "cosy Christian subculture" thing.

4. Bands are judged on their musical ability so it's a healthier critical environment than the "clap because they're Christians" inverted unreality of some Church events.

THE DOWNSIDE
1. The starting point for bands, pubs and small clubs, is so ludicrously overcrowded for young "unknowns" that fees are pitifully low until a following for the band is acknowledged and rewarded.