Every bad show day has a moment where someone says “nobody told us.” The load-in door was on the other side of the building. The merch split was 25%, not 20%. The guest list cap was 10, not 20. Almost all of it could have been caught a week earlier, in the advance.
Advancing a show means confirming every operational detail with the promoter and venue before you arrive. It is unglamorous work, and it is the single best predictor of a calm day. This is the checklist we use, roughly in the order we chase it.
When to start
Start two to three weeks out for club and theater shows, earlier for festivals and anything with fly dates. Send the first advance as soon as the show is confirmed, then chase what is missing at ten days and again at three. The goal is that nothing on the list below is still a question the week of the show.
1. The schedule
- Load-in time, and whether there is a hard earliest access time
- Soundcheck order and length for every act on the bill
- Doors, set times, changeover length and curfew — plus what happens if you run over
- Load-out window and any noise or neighbor restrictions
2. Getting in
- Exact load-in address (often not the box office address) and the door to use
- Bus and trailer parking: where, how many spaces, overnight allowed, shore power available
- Stairs, lifts or a push distance — this decides how long load-in really takes
- Local crew or loaders: how many, when they start, and who pays
3. Production
- Stage dimensions, house PA and lighting spec, and what the house engineer provides
- Your input list and stage plot — confirm they were received and can be met
- Power: available circuits and distance from stage
- Backline: what is provided, what you are bringing, what is shared with other acts
4. Hospitality and the room
- Dressing rooms: how many, showers, whether they lock
- Catering or buyout amount, meal times, and dietary needs for the whole party
- Wi-Fi network and password, towels, water on stage
- Hotel, if the promoter is providing it: name, address, check-in time and the name the rooms are under
5. Guest list, merch and money
These three cause the most arguments at the end of the night, so get them in writing.
- Guest list: the cap, the deadline for names, and how the box office wants it delivered
- Merch: the venue’s split on soft and hard goods, who sells, where the table goes, and whether card readers work in the room
- Settlement: the deal as the promoter understands it, ticket price and capacity, any expenses they will deduct, and who settles with whom, when
6. People to call on the day
Get a mobile number, not an office line, for the promoter rep, the production manager, the house engineer and whoever handles settlement. Put them on the day sheet. When the bus is lost at 9 a.m. or the truck is blocked at 5 p.m., this is the list that saves you.
Turning the advance into the day sheet
An advance only helps if its answers reach the people who need them. Everything you confirmed — times, addresses, parking, contacts — belongs on the day sheet the whole touring party reads the night before.
That hand-off is what we built Mighty Tour around. You send the promoter a secure link to fill in their side of the advance, with no account to create; the answers stay with the show, and the day sheet is built from the same record and shared with the band and crew as a PDF, by email or by link. If you want to try it on your next run, you can start free.