   Dear Fan,  I am in a (fairly) young band. We've been playing
gigs for about a year and a half now, and naturally we think
we're pretty good. What we'd like to do is get out of our home
city to play some shows elsewhere, in the hopes of attracting a
few more fans. As we're in Ireland, there also aren't that many
places to choose from, so we'd probably like to play some shows
around the UK as well. What's the best way to go about arranging
a few shows (or a tour) outside of our local area? Should we
just buddy up with a slightly bigger band and wait to secure an
opening slot for them on a minor tour of theirs, or get off our
asses, book several venues we'd like to play in, and get from
each one to the next, without too much worry over the size of
audience we'd be playing to (as we'd be playing in places where
people have most likely never heard of us, and therefore don't
care about seeing us)?    The crucial thing for early tours
especially is to assume that everyone you deal with is not doing
their job. Thi