Monuments made €850 (about $907) in merch at a recent show in Milan, Italy, but lost 47% of it thanks to venue merch cuts. Monuments ended their night with €484,22 (about $516.72) in their hand, which is a hard to look at considering what they started with.
GHØSTKID and Friend Or Enemy guitarist Chris Canterbury commented on the post as well, saying his band "had the EXACT SAME situation in Milan 2 weeks ago. In the end, we said 'fuck it,' closed the merch and sold our merch at the trailer outside. This shit has to end. Seriously."
Electronic-metal artist Carpenter Brut also chimed in, adding "Yes, this is going too far. I think we will either stop selling merchandise or only play in tax free venues."
Merch cuts have been a pretty hot topic in the metal world lately, and for good reason – touring is expensive as hell and this isn't helping.
Dark Funeral guitarist Lord Ahriman recently said that "venues will slowly kill the live scene with their outragious merch cut," while Bad Omens has made their feelings abundantly clear, saying they "don't want to give you 20% of the merchandise we design, pay for, manage, set up, carry, and sell ourselves" just because a venue gave them a small space to sell from.
Architects drummer Dan Searle also jumped into the fray recently, saying "Hey bands when are we gonna go on strike and get rid of these insane venue merch cuts? Or maybe we don’t play until we get a cut of the bar? Can we just get this done ASAP please?"
And for international artists coming into the US, things might be getting worse soon! The Department of Homeland Security (DHS) is looking to jack up the cost of touring visas over 200% potentially soon, pretty much barring any smaller band from entering the country.
So yeah, the world of touring – it fucking sucks right now.
