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What do you think about paying cover?

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By Stephanie De Pasquale | Wednesday, July 2, 2008 11:17 AM CDT | () comments

I talked this week with a Quad-City bar owner who wants to bring into his establishment bands that are mainstream and known well enough so a sufficient number of people will come out to see them play and allow him to make enough money to pay the band, his staff and then a little more without having to charge cover.

His thoughts were that when local bands play in town, 30 of their friends show up, pay the cover charge and then anyone else who might have come to the bar that night is driven away because they won’t pay $3 to sit, drink and listen to a band they’ve never heard of.

While in college, I rarely went to a place that charged cover, even though I had much less concern then than I do now as far as how much money I was spending versus saving.

Now I’m more likely to pay cover as long as I’ve at least heard some sample songs on MySpace, but I still won’t go somewhere with cover more than once a week, not because I don’t want to see shows, but rather for budgetary reasons.

What do you think about paying cover? Obviously, the band has to get paid somehow, and if it’s music you like and support, then $5 or so doesn’t seem too bad. But what if you just like a certain bar and a band you don’t know happens to be there? Would you pay the cover or go somewhere else?

Stephanie De Pasquale can be contacted at (563) 333-2639 or sdepasquale@qctimes.com.