In the first of an occasional series by band members, John Holdenof Hoarsebox explains how he outsourced the boring side of music

BEING IN a band in Ireland can be very stressful. Correction. Being in a new, unsigned band in Ireland can be very stressful. There's more to it than writing songs, playing gigs and consuming porter. If you want to take it seriously, you need to spend a lot of time on the phone and networking to get good gigs and radio play for yourself.

So, if you have the same level of organisational skills as Hoarsebox (we once lost all our equipment for two weeks, only to find it in a hotel in Sligo), you'll appreciate the difficulty of trying to record something decent, release a single and then do a tour. If we'd done it on our own, we would have ended up touring the Faroe Islands to promote an album recorded on a cracker.

For all that stuff, a manager can come in really handy. We signed on the proverbial dotted line a year ago, and the management company has taken a lot of the boring stuff - booking gigs, bugging radio stations, fighting with hotel managers in Sligo - off our backs.

Of course, there are some issues to address before "sleeping with the enemy". First, you're inviting someone else in to your creative project, something that the band may have invested a lot of their own time and effort in.

So when a manager suggests you should change a chorus here or extend a verse there, it can be hard to swallow. Usually (if they know what's good for them), managers stay out of the creative process. However, the direction that the band takes becomes the manager's direction, not yours. The manager decides on the best route to take in terms of gigs, publicity and many other aspects of the band's future.

But let's be realistic here. How much direction does any musician really have? Unless they book you to play the Miss Ireland pageant on a Friday night and the Irish Nazi League Ball on Saturday, how different will their direction be from yours?

Secondly, how much do most musicians know about the "music business"? How in God's name do you get to play Electric Picnic? I remember one time a friend who works in the industry in London sent me a list of contact details for around 300 radio DJs, record labels and booking agents. I asked him what he wanted me to do with it. "Get calling," he said.

But I'm not in telesales - "Hi, I'm from a band called Hoarsebox. I e-mailed you 400 times and left 900 messages on your answering machine about our new single?" Nobody listens if you're not signed.

Which leads me to another, more curious advantage of having management. For some bizarre reason it is more impressive for booking agents and radio stations to be contacted by someone representing someone else. If you call up and say you're from a band and you're hoping to get a gig, they hang up. But if your management calls up and says the same thing, somehow you become a more credible outfit.

I suppose the logic is that if a "serious" business is willing to endorse you, then you must be good.

I'm not convinced. Somewhere along the line I missed that meeting. But that's precisely why having management is a good thing. You shouldn't have to go to those meetings. All you should be worrying about is where your next champagne fountain is going to come from.

Hoarsebox's debut EP, Cuckooland, is out now  www.myspace.com/hoarsebox