About
What We Do
Our aim is to provide a platform for singer-songwriters to get their songs heard, try out new songs with a sympathetic audience, or make their first tentative steps to performing in public.
While we do have regular performers, we do not want to create a clique, so we take care to ensure everyone gets a fair chance to get heard – hence our rather involved booking policy below.
When, Where, How
Out of the Bedroom runs every Thursday night in the sub-sub-basement bar of The Tron, in Hunter Square in Edinburgh (map opens in new window). We start at 8pm and finish at 11pm. If you want to play, best to arrive by 7pm though. We ask audiences not to chat during the performances – if you want to catch up with friends you can do it during the break or nip upstairs to the main bar.
There’s at least one short break, to allow for chat, buying of drinks, and selling of raffle tickets.Yes, you too could be the lucky winner of a mystery prize from the Silver Bag of Dreams (TM).
There’s no admission charge but you can support OOTB by buying a raffle ticket during the break. The raffle is drawn at some point towards the later part of the evening, and prizes are, well, quirky.
For Performers
The performers’ slots are for 3 songs, for which we allow 15 minutes’ time (this includes the time to set up and take down each performer, and for applause, song introductions, etc).This may be shortened at the discretion of Out of the Bedroom depending on the number of acts who want to perform.
Two acoustic guitars are always available for you, or you can use your own. There’s also a keyboard, but let us know at the start of the evening that you need it.
But it doesn’t end there! We try to review every performance, if we’re able – you can read the reviews on this site or receive them each week by email. There’s usually nothing snide in our reviews – we’ve been criticised for being too positive at times, but the aim is to encourage songwriters and help them develop. Reviews are written with this in mind.
OOTB Booking Policy
First bookable slot is at 8pm, and the last slot is at 10.45pm.
You need to arrive well before 8pm (i advise 7pm) to put your name on the list which may or may not exist by the time you arrive. This is a list of performers in the order which they arrived in.
When the compere for the night arrives, s/he will make a new list, with all the times of available slots on it, and will offer slots to people in the order in which they got their names on the first list.
Allocation of the slots will go, on a first come first served basis within each group, to those who:
- didn’t play the previous week (the ” A list”)
- did play the previous week (the ” B list”)
If all slots are filled, we start maintaining a squashee list. This means that if we happen to run ahead of time, then “squashees” can play one song only. The squashees generally wait until just before the break and end of the night respectively to see if they can play, as only then can we gauge if we have made up time. As before, squashees are selected on a first come first-served order.
Being placed on the squashee list does not guarantee an opportunity to play.
The fairly disorganised practice of “pre-booking” slots won’t be continued either, as we’ve had too many people not turn up. Similarly, we won’t be allowing anyone to “book by proxy” (i.e. get someone else to book for them) either, for the same reason.
OOTB may use its discretion to occasionally pre-book artists (for example we often have a half-hour feature slot), and also to decide if someone should be on the “A” list or “B” list.
Essentially though, we’re trying to encourage a fair rotation of artists each week, in a transparent manner.
If you have any comments about the OOTB booking policy, please feel free to let us know.