For artists

The Guild books roughly two shows a month, plus the Showcase and After Dark. Every artist on every bill is paid. This page sets out exactly what is on offer and exactly what is expected, so that nothing important is discovered on the day.

What the Guild provides

A fee. A guarantee between $500 and $1,500 depending on the room, the slot and the draw. Agreed in writing before the show is announced. It does not change if the turnout is poor and it is not contingent on ticket sales.
The venue. Booked, paid for and negotiated by the Guild. You are not renting a room or splitting a door with anybody.
Production. Professional sound with an engineer who has your input list before load-in, lighting, and a shared backline where the bill needs one to keep changeovers short.
Promotion. Design, listings, social, the Guild newsletter, member presale and press outreach. Your name and your links, not just the series branding.
Photography and video. A stills photographer for the night and multi-camera capture of your set, edited and mixed afterwards. You receive the images and the footage.
An audience. Guild members attend free and attend regularly, so a Guild show starts with a base of people in the room before any public ticket is sold.
Ticketing. Run by the Guild — sales, the door, the guest list and the counting. You do not sell tickets and you are not asked to.
Settlement. One contract, one payer, a stated payment date. No chasing.

What the artist provides

The performance. The set length agreed, at the time agreed, having turned up at the load-in time agreed. If something goes wrong, the Guild would rather know at two in the afternoon than at seven.
Promotion. Announce the show to your own audience and share the material when it goes out. This is a genuine obligation, not a courtesy — an artist who does not tell anybody they are playing has taken a fee for a room the Guild filled alone.
Content rights, as agreed. The right for the Guild to use the photographs and the live footage from your set to promote the Guild — the series, the venue, the membership and future shows. That licence is specific, written down, and the whole of what is taken.
The practical details on time: input list, stage plot, backline needs, personnel names, and anything the venue must know in advance.

You keep your music

The Guild does not take ownership, publishing, a share, an option or a right of first refusal in your songs or your recordings. It is not a label, a management company or an agency, and it does not become one because you played its show.

You also keep the footage of your set and may use it however you like — press kit, socials, label pitches, sync submissions, your own channel, monetised or not. Nothing is published by the Guild without you seeing it first.

How to be considered

Send, in one message through the contact page: who you are and where you are based, your genre in plain words, lineup size, two or three links including live footage if it exists, an honest typical draw in Austin, the last three rooms you played, and your fee range.

Honesty about the draw matters more than the number. A booking built on an inflated figure produces a half-empty room, a disappointed venue and an artist who does not get asked back — over a number that nobody needed to be impressed by in the first place.

Membership is not a condition

You do not have to be a Guild member to be booked or to be paid. Membership changes two things: it gives you the bench, the network and free admission to everything, and it makes you eligible for the Showcase, which is members-only by design. Plenty of artists play Guild Live having never joined, and they are paid identically.

Genre nights

Shows are themed — acoustic, rock, Americana, blues, experimental — rather than assembled at random, because a bill with no through-line empties the room between sets. When you write in, say which of those you sit closest to. If the answer is none of them, say that instead; the experimental nights exist for exactly that reason.