Karaoke Forums

Kelley, I own the bar and run my own karaoke (We rocked BIG TIME Saturday night) It is the bar owners responsibility to pay the fees. It makes little sense to pay you more so he can then have you pay it. Probably a tax situation if he wants to do it that way.

Exweed is correct in that there are "others" that want their share also. This upset me to no end also. The game and jukebox supplier (OK Novelty) were already paying fees for their music and games, but they wanted more for the karaoke venue!

Just to let you in on a little secret though. You've got BMI, ASCAP and SEASAC. I've only paid BMI so far...none of the other has called or notified me so its cool so far. Loose lips sink ships. I display the BMI license on my karaoke booth plainly visible, so if there's any infiltrators, they sense that I'm legal right away, unless they are from ASCAP or SEASAC...of which there's has been no problem so far.

Like was mentioned in an above post, the fees are based in part upon the
occupancy...they've got me rated for 300...that's crap! If 300 people could fit in my bar they would have to be nut to butt. Have the owner review the occupancy figure and he can call city hall to dispute it if necessary. They even want more if there's dancing going on?!?! I said "no" on that question and promptly bought dance lights and controollers.      Rarely do people dance here, but they did Saturday.

My wifes (manager) initial reaction was to have the KJ help pay for the license also, Naturally they refused. I can empathise with your owner there, but that was before I bought my system and did my thing. I had big $$ invested when they started calling, so I sucked it up and paid BMI ($400).  :madgo:   There is a 10% deduction on the fee if its paid in one lump sum.

To sum it up, the owner should pay. I can understand his point, bars are a NIGHTMARE to run sometimes. All the fees and costs involved and then people insist on "Specials" and entertainment weekly. The dishonest bartenders and walkouts are business killers! I would seriously be looking for another place if he keeps insisting. It seems as though he's squeezing in the wrong areas, if he does'nt see the Karaoke value maybe its time to dry the swamp. Don't burn the bridge, keep the contact, he may come to his senses.

Good Luck,

                                                                         bigjim

So we went in early tonight to sit & have a meeting with the mgr & told him no we wouldnt pay the fees even if he wanted to give us the extra $ to do it,( too much BS involved IMO)  FINALLY me & hubby are on the same page about it, so we went in & told him that & actually had it all in black & white ( the #'s) & showed him how crazy stuuupid it was to pay us more (about 2500$/YR) so we could turn around & pay our half of the 750$( and honestly if it were anything else other than ascap or bmi or someone like that Id take his $ & think to myself thats the price ya pay for bein "stuck on stupid" )  .. I think he FINALLY got it after he came back from the power trip hes been on for the past two weeks that either way HE would be paying it DUHHH Dufass !! Why oh why do they have to be soo crazy sometimes ?? Oh well like I said I THINK he finally got it, I guess we'll know next week if he starts it up again & it would be at that point I will throw in the towel & say SEE YA ! Thank you all who helped me thru all this  :hug:

On a lighter note we picked up another weekly gig ! YAY !!! A little further to drive but YAY !! Just in time for Christmas shopping !!

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Kelley
Star Sounds Karaoke & Mobile Recording Studio


[shadow=black][scroll]You have to respect your audience. Without them, you're essentially standing alone, singing to yourself....KD Lang[/scroll][/shadow]

Keith's right.  I learned all of that studying for my bar mitzvah.

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FlipSide Karaoke
Scott