Tech and roadie Gavin Downie describes his job as keeping the music machine ‘well oiled and rolling smoothly’.  In this QnA he tells some tales from the (well-travelled) road.

"There’s not much fame and fortune in our side of the business so don't expect your name in lights or people to even know what your name is."

"But if you build up a great relationship with the artist it can end up being like a family and then you get to add the travel to that and it's like travelling the world with your friends and putting on some shows as you go."

What do you do? Paint a picture of your typical day.

I tour with bands on the road or in Auckland looking after their onstage-production requirements, some shows it’s working as a guitar tech/bass tech/drum tech - looking after their guitars and back-line. Other times it may be stage manager for a big overseas artist like Joe Cocker or The Pretenders. Other times I may be a tour manager travelling with the band and making sure they get to where they need and everything rolls sweet along the way.

Why is your work an important part of the music industry?
 
As bands grow in popularity their production needs usually grow as they play bigger shows and more dates and they usually start to require people like myself to travel on the road (roadies) and maintain their gear night after night and keep the machine well oiled and rolling smoothly. Once you get to a large arena sized band the list of people on the road with them is extensive and covers all the day to day needs.

How and when did you get into it?

After being a musician in bands myself I just started helping out friends bands on shows and it just grew from there, word of mouth is a good thing or a nightmare. Luckily I seem to be on the good side of what people are saying so my work gets known and more bands approach me to work with them.

How has your role evolved since then?

I now have been helping bands with exactly what gear they buy or use to get the sounds they want. And through this search I have began to start up a custom amp building line with my good friend and ex Sommerset guitarist and Luger Boa axe man Ryan Thomas. We have been able to build top quality hand built amps for artists that demand the best and nothing less. Jason Kerrison from Opshop has one of our first amps as does Billy Gibbons from American iconic band ZZ Top.

I guess I have taken on some more production management roles now on some shows as well as I know all the behind the scenes stuff so I get hired to gather and co-ordinate the PA and back-line and lighting and misc stuff bands need when they fly in to do a show.

What advice would you give to others pursuing it as a career?

Get experience here then leave as fast as you can, get the hell out! Haha New Zealand is just too small, way too small. A long tour in this country is maybe 17-25 shows, whereas overseas a tour can take up to a year or it's a year full of constant tours within that. You'll struggle to get the work here and not a lot of bands can afford such luxuries as a guitar tech amongst sound guys and all the other people. If you wanna work a lot then you need to go find where the work is and sadly or not sadly that will mean Australia or more so, America or the UK and Europe.

What does a band/artist need to have sorted before approaching you?

A show, or a tour. Once a band has dates I can come in and work with the band to get their gear road ready and working for the time ahead. Some bands have all their gear working and ready and flight cased, other bands have the most broken down gear on taped up cases and amps that don't work. Those bands need the extra time before we leave town to fix and repair and get all the gear working.

What are the rewards and challenges of your job?
 
The rewards are doing a job you love doing each day. I get a great sense of achievement when I see a large crowd enjoying a show I've been a part of pulling together.

There’s not much fame and fortune in our side of the business so don't expect your name in lights or people to even know what your name is. But if you build up a great relationship with the artist it can end up being like a family and then you get to add the travel to that and its like travelling the world with your friends and putting on some shows as you go.

The days are long, sometimes up to 21 hour days and the work conditions can be extreme -5 Celsius in the snow up to 49 Celsius in the middle of an Arizona desert, put that on top of temperamental musicians that can be difficult to deal with some days and then add the reliability of guitars and amplifiers and pedals and you can have a hell of a bad day if they all plot against you. But you knuckle down and make things work and even bluff what you have to, to make the show go ahead.

You live in a weird juxtaposition of doing the exact same thing day in and day out. Setting up the same show. In the exact same order with everything in the exact same place on stage but in a different town in different climates maybe with different languages spoken. So outside of your world on that stage, the world can be majorly different day in and day out. It makes for an interesting work environment.

I have made some of my best friends through the industry here and all over the world and I guess my reward is getting to spend time touring with them and being pitted against all the above and coming out on top and living to tell the tale.

What are the current challenges and opportunities in the industry - NZ and international?

The major problem in NZ is it's so small. A band can't tour that much here as they run out of people to play too, so there’s not always a lot of work. Winter is especially tough here as no one likes to go outside, not bands or audiences, so if you don't head overseas for the season then it can be a struggle to pay the rent.

What’s your favourite project so far in your career?

I really loved touring the states, first with Steriogram then as Tour Manager and Tech for American punk rock legends Strung Out as we played on the main stage on the Vans Warped Tour in 2005.

I'm really loving this new tangent to my career now as we get this amplifier company off the ground and get our amps into the hands of players looking for killer tone and hand wired quality. Being able to have a direct line to the artists we love and we respect is cool and pays off for both of us.

Who do you work closely with?

Band wise I have been really busy with Opshop over the past few years and also bands like Elemeno p, Luger Boa, Dave Dobbyn. The list is pretty long but these are people that spring to mind.

Do you play music, or what are your musical influences?

I have spent my time on the road in my own bands from an alternative Hip Hop band called Colony to The Hallelujah Picassos and Future Stupid briefly and Auckland Ska band The Managers.

I still play guitar and dabble in other instruments. I guess my influences are pretty varied from harder edged rock and punk to really ambient stuff that I get into after my ears need a break from a loud tour. I don't think I have one style or genre I gravitate towards. Music is a relaxation thing these days, it's more for fun than any aspiration of making it big and touring the world. I tour the world as my day job so to speak so my music output is just for me and whoever I play it to.

These days with the magic of modern technology I have a complete studio at home and potter away recording stuff just for myself. Maybe one day I’ll show the world but for now its just fun to play all the guitars I've collected over the years. I may be in a band again who knows, I miss the band dichotomy, hanging with some friends and making music live is cool and that’s the thing I miss. But I don't miss the stress of trying to make it huge in a world that’s ever changing.

What’s the future of music? What’s the future of your role?

The future of music is already here I believe, the internet has brought the world closer together and a band from here can sell records to a kid sitting at home in Norway or the furtherest outposts of the world if they have an internet connection and that’s great.

Big record companies are no longer handing out millions of dollars to everyone and to be honest maybe they were a little late to the party on the digital age and they are paying the price now.

But more bands are touring and live music is still alive and well there isn't as many stadium acts but that’s good, some artists had grown a little too big. Acts like Brittany Spears with multi million dollar tours where she doesn't even sing and mimes to her songs? But more bands are playing in smaller venues and still selling CD's from their websites and iTunes and Bandcamp and off their own merch tables besides their t-shirts. Tours are still going on around the globe day after day and week after week. New Zealand has its busy summer and then its dead during winter but that’s just New Zealand, the rest of the world is touring non stop so its not all bad. People are still going out to see shows and keeping those good bands going and surviving.

Maybe there are less artists buying Gulf stream 3000 jets but at least there’s a lot of bands that don’t have to get day jobs yet. I'm just trying to not have to resort to that too..haha

What’s your big idea for 2011?

To spend as much time as I can with Ryan working and developing new amps and getting our amplifiers out into the hands of more and more people. I still wanna balance that with touring and guitar tech work for the bands I love to tour with. I'd be happy to keep paying rent and food on the table for my amazing wife and family, who don't mind me disappearing on the road a lot, and have some extra cash and time to put into projects I love. I guess I just want it all.