The topic? Flyering. Or rather, how much flyering sucks, to be more precise. I even had a great title already worked out: "Flyering - The Disease With a Name." It plays off of Betty Freidan to make an analogy for how flyering is like being downtrodden by a silent invisible menace.

The menace? The total dislike of passing out flyers. It's a great topic because alongside myself, the vast majority of people I know who have to flyer to promote their art hate it. H-A-T-E it. Yeah, the act of handing out flyers is so heinous that I had to throw in capital letters and spell it out to reiterate my point.

The blog I began to write on this topic had decent potential. I talked about how uncomfortable flyering is, I drew upon anecdotes from my youth where feelings of shame and being "dirty" were linked to having artistic passion. I talked about whether or not my teenage awkwardness manifested itself when it came to promoting my own music (oh yeah, I totally went there), and I talked about the odd relationship between not caring about receiving flyers yet dreading passing them out like its doomsday.

Sadly though, in writing the blog I just couldn't get it to translate the way I wanted without it sounding like either a really bad diary entry or a trying-too-hard Psych 101 paper. Point blank, the blog sucked. Badly. However, since I do think the topic is relevant and one a great many of us can relate to, I want to keep the dream alive. I'm doing the only thing that makes sense to me right now: I'm presenting a few of my thoughts in bullet form. It's a tried and true method, perhaps not redefining creative genius, but work with me here...I do this for you, the people.

* Those of us involved in music, film & art rely on flyering as a significant form of self-promotion. We need for you to know that we are performing or exhibiting, and what better way to get that message out there than with a carefully designed and lovingly crafted piece of colored paper? Yet within this very necessary PR tool is a cesspool of discomfort and awkwardness. Simply put, passing out flyers makes all the awkward, self-loathing periods of puberty feel like one's heyday of confidence and self-comfort. No, it's true. I don't know exactly what it is about the experience of passing out flyers for shows that is festooned with non-desirability; but what I do know is that the notion of walking up to absolute strangers and announcing intricate details of your genitalia seems not only easier, but somehow more desirable than approaching said strangers with a flyer for an upcoming show.

* Flyering is weird because, being in a band, flyers are a pretty effective method of promotion, but there's something so intrusive, so awkward, so forcefully extroverted about it. It's completely self-aggrandizing to interrupt strangers from their conversations, drinks, and/or thoughts to say nothing more than "Hey, my band's playing this/next [insert day of the week here], you should check it out. It's gonna be a cool show."  Plus, you can't help but wonder if after you've walked away from those whom you've just passed out flyers to, that the alarm bells are going off in their heads, warning, "Nerd Alert!" I think the relentless feelings of discomfort within this exchange stems from the notion that essentially what you are saying to people when you pass out a flyer is, "Hey, I have interests outside of work, sports, money & relationships, and consequently I use the medium of song through which to channel the tangential thought planes through which my mind traverses upon. Wanna watch? Here's a flyer." Aaawwwkwaaaard.....

* Having a disdain for passing out flyers seems nonsensical since receiving flyers really is a neutral, benign act. When I am the recipient of a flyer, I never accept the paper thinking, "Now there is someone who strays from the status quo and has a vested interest in counter-culture. By golly, godspeed to you, you defier of the mainstream!" Nor do I think, "Wow, if they could have found the right job they probably could have been more normal. Maybe they never learned to love..." Nope. My main thought is always, "Huh, neat flyer. I'd like to go to that show, I hope I don't flake out." And then the flyer finds a home either in my back pocket or my purse where it stays for quite some time.

* I really envy people who are not turned off or afraid of the self-aggrandizing aspects of flyering. Is it ego or self-absorption that allows people to be really confident when handing out flyers? Like this idea that, "Hey, I'm great. What I do is great. I think you'll be really stoked not only to know about this upcoming show, but to go to it as well." Or is it that people who are comfortable handing out flyers just don't have their heads up their asses? 

So there it is, the summation of my thoughts on flyering. I wanted to initiate a space where we could agree or disagree on whether or not flyering sucks, and basically just get some communication & story swapping going. We're trying to create a sense of community here at Wiretap, and so I really thought this would be a great way to maybe generate involvement in perspective sharing of sorts. I still don't feel as though I've brought the topic up – flyering, the disease with a name – as well as I would have liked to, but hey...it's a beginning.

If you have thoughts, opinions, and/or stories of shame or fame you'd like to share about flyering, please feel free to send me an email at This e-mail address is being protected from spam bots, you need JavaScript enabled to view it . It’d be really fun to make a new blog based on what you have to say.

[Jen Chochinov]