Hot As A Pepper Party Band with the Habanero Horns
We are starting to book weddings, festivals and corporate events in 2023. We have only just begun, but it would be a great idea for you to get with us ASAP to lock in any show dates you might want in the Greenville, Anderson, Spartanburg (Upstate) or the surrounding area.
Hot As A Pepper Party Band hopes to focus more on events in 2023 than the previous two years due to the unfortunate events that took place! We’re certainly ready to get back on track and provide fun, upbeat and danceable music for YOUR soiree!
We can bring a more casual show, with as few as four members for a more intimate experience, or we can bring the typical 5 piece for a more powerful performance.
When we couple our 5 piece band with the Habanero Horns, that is when things get exciting!
Whether you want a more classic vibe with old school rock, disco, motown, beach and R&B, or want to mix it up with modern top 40 and pop songs, we’ve got what you want!
We will learn your special first dance songs if we have not already played them for other weddings or events. We can custom fit a performance to meld with your theme too!
Our festival events are family friendly, and filled with great variety!
Let’s party like it’s 1999, or 2023 either one!
Call 864-979-1224 or use our CONTACT FORM for more information!
Hire a party band in Greenville, Upstate South Carolina or the surrounding area!
It’s easy, just use our Contact Form or call us and we will discuss your event, your needs and desires!
Hot As A Pepper Party Band has performed over 450 shows since 2012 and we’re ready to play for you!
Whether it’s a wedding, class reunion, corporate event, holiday gathering, grand opening, or just a back yard pool party, we can handle it.
We also do Greek events, festivals and fundraisers!
No matter if you want a more intimate configuration with as few a 3 or 4 musicians or the full band with the Habanero Horns, we can custom tailor the gig to fit your needs.
Hot as a pepper has done shows that were based around a theme before, but it’s been a while, so we are itching to get something fun going again. If you are planning a party or event where you believe a theme would be go over well, or you have a theme based event and you need the music, let’s talk!
Here’s some ideas:
Disco – Everyone gets to channel John Travolta in Saturday Night Fever. With tunes from Kool & The Gang, KC & The Sunshine Band, Earth, Wind and Fire, Donna Summer, Bee Gees, Commodores, The Tramps, etc.
Funk – Let’s get funky, nothing but the funk. James Brown, Parlament, Rick James, Gap Band, even some Bruno Mars.
80’s – We’ll get you going with The Fixx, Bon Jovi, Guns & Roses, Rolling Stones, Hall & Oates, Ramones.
70’s – How about a show based around Aerosmith, Doobie Brothers, ZZ Top, Steve Miller Band, Even some Skynyrd?
60’s – We’ve done this show for a large event and it went over super! Temptations, McCoys, GFR, Van Morrison, Steppenwolf, CCR, Stones, Turtles, Beatles, Kinks, Beach Boys, Zombies. From mellow to harder rock.
Beach, lake or shag party – A whole show you can chill to or shag to. By the pool, ocean, lake, or at your venue.
Our specialty is performing Variety Dance & Party Shows, however, with such a large repertoire, Hot As A Pepper can heavily weight any show we do towards a specific decade or genre.
With enough planning, we can create a show that specifically meets your needs. Custom tailored for you.
We can perform an entire album or every hit song from a particular artist. Imagine a night of a Stevie Wonder’s awesome music, or maybe the entire Steve Miller Band’s Greatest Hits!
We’re available for your function, whether it is a festival, wedding, corporate event, birthday, anniversary, graduation, or a block party… Or for your venue such as a bar, club or restaurant.
Just about any occasion or location is enhanced by live music!
Use our contact form or give us a call at 864.979.1224 if you want to plan the most awesome event ever! We’re not tied to Greenville SC or the Upstate with a chain, we can cover your event anywhere in the Southeast, or even the world. If you’ve got the money honey, we’ve got the time!
Some find themselves experiencing a bit of sticker shock when a band tells them the cost of the event will be $3000, when a DJ quoted them $800.
So why IS it so costly to hire a band or musician for your event? This is a long one, grab a drink.
Equipment Investment:
A band not only has to invest in the same speakers and amps (or larger) that a DJ might use for the audience to hear their show, but they also have to invest into a monitor system which is what the band uses to hear themselves. The band also has to invest into a mixing console with more inputs, instruments and instrument stage amplifiers. This could mean while a DJ has as little as a couple thousand dollars invested, a band might have $50,000 or more on their stage!
Also, a DJ might have some dance floor lights, while a band may have some dance floor lighting and stage lighting to illuminate the members so you can see them.
Personnel:
A DJ has a clear advantage here. Having less equipment means that it could be a one-man-show. He/she could be setup and ready to go in as little as 15 minutes!
A band may have to arrive 2 to 2.5 hours before the show in order to get setup, get a proper sound check, and then get changed and ready to perform. However, that’s not really the start of the labor involved. The band will have to load all that gear into their vehicles, a trailer/van/bus, and drive to the location. Then at the end of the night, they may remain at the venue for up to an hour tearing down and loading out their gear, then driving it to where it is kept.
Let’s examine a typical show. Band meets at 2pm and loads up gear, drives to the venue for a 4pm load-in. They then setup their gear and get a sound check and changed into show clothes for a 7pm performance. The performance lasts from 7pm to 10pm, and the band tears down and leaves by 11pm, and finally unloads at their studio or storage location and heads for home by 1am. That’s an 11 hour day. BUT WAIT! That’s not all, that’s 11 hours times how ever many band members and staff that are involved. In the case of Hot As A Pepper, that would be 6 to 9 people. or up to NINETY-NINE MAN HOURS.
A band usually has sound and lighting techs which make them sound or look their best, so they can concentrate on playing their best. That adds to the number of people involved, and the man hours of labor.
A musician in a band might have an 11 hour day for your 3 hour event!
Add to that a few scenarios such as when the band MUST SET UP by 1pm for a 6pm show because the photos are being taken at the venue, or there is a cocktail reception before the band plays. This could add many hours to the entire band’s investment in time. They cannot setup and leave their gear, nor can they do anything else to make money while their gear is tied up at that venue.
Before your show, it is likely that you requested several special songs, let’s assume 3 songs that the band doesn’t normally play. A musician might learn their part for 3 songs in as little as an hour, while more complicated songs might take several hours. Then the band must come together and rehearse them as one unit. Let’s assume 2 hours to learn them, and 2 hours to rehearse with the band, times 7…. 28 additional hours invested.
Let’s take the numbers from above, where the band invested 99 hours into a show, change the setup time to 2pm so the band can be out of the way by 5pm to allow for a cocktail and dinner hour, which adds 18 more man hours, then add the 28 man hours to learn special songs. If my math is correct, that is 145 man hours.
At the minimum wage that people are pushing for of $15/hr, that would be $2175 in pure labor!
Each musician invests into their gear and clothing, and a huge investment is made in learning their craft, which might take years. The songs they play took hundreds of hours to work up, again, times however many musicians are performing them.
A band has to have rehearsal space, which may cost them monthly.
A band may be losing 20% or more to a booking agency, right off the top.
A band may have to buy additional insurance, and for a whole lot more than a DJ.
There are meals involved during the day, and guitar strings, sax reeds and batteries for various devices.
Some bands are fortunate enough to have a van and a trailer, where all people ride in one vehicle, while others might use their personal vehicles, meaning even more investment in gas and maintenance.
So just how much do the band members make? Yeah, that’s a lot less than you might think!
Taking a $3000 wedding event which was booked through an agency as an example, we immediately lose 20%. Then we take out expenses for fuel or vehicle needs, assuming a trailer rental, and gas of $100 and let’s assume the client pays with a credit card, and we lose 3% additional (90 bucks). That’s 2210 left. If we have a single sound person, we might give them $200, which means only $2010 remains.
For this example, the band will have 7 members, and they each get an equal cut, in addition to the sound system getting an equal cut, so they can maintain it… $2010 divided by 8 is $251.25.
Each member shows invests 12 hours into prep, driving, playing, loading, etc.
That looks like each member gets $21/hr! Not bad. No no, wait…. What about taxes? If they are reporting this income, they might lose 30% in taxes, taking it down to 14.70/hr.
And yet they invested money into lunch, and maybe Waffle House afterwards (maybe dinner if that wasn’t included in the rider for the event), fuel in their personal vehicle, strings/sticks/reeds/batteries. That could run into the 25 dollar range or more.
Pay – taxes – expenses could look more like $12.50 an hour or less. Maybe much less, especially if something goes horribly wrong, like a shirt getting ripped, or a damaged instrument.
The next time you think bands are getting rich and that their rates are outrageous, consider some of the above and you might understand that you are likely getting one heck of a great deal when a music group performs for you.
Try calling in a handful of plumbers, computer techs or HVAC techs to work for you for half the day, and compare that bill with a band!
If you would like a quote for Hot As A Pepper live music entertainment, let us know! We would be happy to play your wedding reception, high school reunion, wedding anniversary party, corporate event, festival or venue! Use our CONTACT FORM and we will get back to you quickly. Or feel free to give us a call at 864.979.1224.
While Hot As A Pepper is primarily known as a variety band, covering a wide range of genres such as Rock, Beach, Disco, Funk, R&B, Motown, Soul, Country and more, we are also capable of doing shows that are heavily weighted towards a specific genre.
Thanks to a huge and ever growing repertoire, and a crew of talented professionals who have been playing music most of their lives, this is an easy task for us.
Here are a few themed shows we have done so far:
70s themed Gala – We were booked to play music mostly from the 70s, with a few requests that took us back to the 60s, and early 80s, but kept it mostly in the 70s across several styles, mostly dance. This was an all-out event where many people looked the part by wearing clothing from the 1970s.
Shag / Beach / Dance Fraternity & Sorority Parties – These kids today, like some older music and we are happy to give it to them. While not a “beach band”, we can play 2 hours of shag worthy music and it’s made the people very happy! We have been involved in several of these events for Clemson Greek organizations.
Rock Shows – We have done several events that were mostly rock, from classic rock to southern rock. These have ranged from biker type events to a wedding. They usually request a country song or two at these, and these events are more casual.
Dance Events – These are usually a combination of Disco, Funk, Beach, Pop and Rock, and is what we specialize in. A variety of songs carefully picked to make your booty wiggle. Festivals, Wedding Receptions, Parties, Fundraisers. You name it, we’ve played this type of music for many occasions.
60s show coming up? We have been talking with an organization that wants a 1960s themed show, with ONLY songs from the 60s. After carefully looking at our current song list, it’s easy to see that we have no problem covering two and a half hours of music without adding anything new, however, if you know us, we WILL add several songs for that event.
Yes, Hot As A Pepper really is the “Swiss Army Knife of Bands”, as one person described us. We can do most anything for you, so let us know what you have in mind and we can talk about it! Welll, maybe not Polka, Folk, or Death Metal, however, one of the places we have played a couple times has inquired about us playing a Country themed event.
Looking to do an event that is 60s, 70s, 80s, 90s, rock, disco, funk, dance, shag themed? We would love the opportunity.
Let’s talk about booking Hot As A Pepper for your wedding, reunion, festival, or other special event! We cover Greenville, Spartanburg, Clemson, Seneca, Anderson, Simpsonville and anywhere within a few hours of the Upstate of South Carolina!
Hot As A Pepper enjoyed playing for the Upstate organization “InDwellings” last month! Let’s talk about why…
First of all, InDwellings has a goal to provide housing to those with special needs so that they can experience a HOME environment, not just a HOUSE. This is important because as you may be aware, our area has a large number of people who this will impact! These homes which InDwellings hopes to provide will not be some type of institutional dwelling, it will be a home filled with love. With the smell of baking cookies. Please read more about them on their website to get the latest and to make a contribution.
Back to the bash…. To help achieve their goal, they held an event called “Back to the Bash”, which was a 70s themed gala at the Thornblade Country Club here in Greenville. Hot As A Pepper was booked because we can provide several hours worth of music from just about any style or decade. For this event, we played a huge selection of music that was mostly from the 70s, peppered with a few from the late 60s and even one or two from the early 80s. Rock, Beach, Motown, Disco, Country, nothing was safe from us!
The gala coincided with the acquisition of InDwelling’s first house! It was a real celebration for sure! But it got exciting….
Delvin Choice who competed on “The Voice” was in the house, and him and our emcee, the multi-talented Michael Codgill joined our band on stage for an impromptu rendition of the James Brown classic, “I Got You (I Feel Good)”.
Here’s a clip from that….
This was a fundraiser, so Jake Ohlinger, with Ohlinger Auctions was in charge of auctioning off some outstanding items, such as an African Safari, and food packages, etc… That was a huge success, as I believe every item was sold!
Jake was so kind as to write the band this note:
Good Afternoon John & Hot As A Pepper,
Great Job! First Rate! Enjoyable! Job Well Done!
I want you and your band members to know that the InDwellings Organization was very pleased with your performance for the “Back to the Bash : Destination 1970’s” at Thornblade Club the evening of October 28th. You delivered great music and blended well with the group.
InDwellings and I wish you and your group continued success and fun in you business of entertainment and in your careers as musicians.
Sincerely and I look forward to working with you again.
Jake
Jake Ohlinger, BAS
Auctioneer
Ohlinger Auctions, LLC
200 Del Norte Road
Greenville, SC 29615 2jake@ohlinger.com
It’s exactly that kind of appreciation that makes our “job” worthwhile! Thanks Jake for believing in us!
If you have an upcoming event where you need fun music entertainment, won’t you please consider Hot As A Pepper? What can we do for you?
1960s, 1970s, 1980s, 1990s themed event? CHECK!
A disco or funk event? CHECK!
Variety – covering several decades and styles? CHECK!
This makes us perfect for your high school or college reunion, your big fundraiser, wedding anniversary or wedding reception.
We play all around The Upstate (Greenville, Anderson, Spartanburg, Seneca, Clemson, Simpsonville) and down to Columbia, Charleston, Myrtle Beach, Savannah, also Atlanta, Knoxville, Charlotte, Asheville and beyond!
Let’s talk about how we can work together! CONTACT US…
Hot As A Pepper had a blast at the first Simpsonville Bacon Labor Day Festival on September 1, 2014.
It was a scorching hot day, yet the crowds were quite pleasing and the number of cars entered in the car show were higher than one would expect.
Hot As A Pepper had worked up a song to play for a special person, Donna Hughey, who was going to front the band and sing it, but due to the heat and her health, it didn’t happen. Hopefully we will get another chance in the future. You see, Donna only has six months to live. You can find out more about her story HERE.
Here’s one of the tunes we enjoyed playing, the classic rock song, “Magic Carpet Ride”.
If you would like fun and family friendly entertainment for your festival, fair, corporate event or any other occasion, please let us know! You can use this form to reach out to us HERE.
We play within a few hours driving range of Greenville, SC. Including Atlanta GA, Asheville NC, Knoxville TN, Columbia SC, Charleston SC, Augusta GA, Myrtle Beach SC, Savannah GA, etc.
Our horn section, “The Habanero Horns”, made their public debut last Friday to a few thousand of our closest friends at Greenville’s Main Street Friday show.
Ed Wimberly and Ryan Kouvolo did a bang up job and we have had people complimenting them for days!
If you would like to book Hot As A Pepper for your corporate event, or a wedding, or maybe your high school reunion, we can plug in the horns for just a little extra and they will take it to another level!
Here’s our favorite song from the Main Street gig:
Hot As A Pepper is ready, willing and able to book your shindig! Let’s talk about that…
Hot As A Pepper is filling up the calendar for 2014 and all that is missing is your corporate event, festival or party!
If you are in the planning stages (or know anyone who is) for your event and booking entertainment is one of the tasks that you dread, don’t worry, we’ve got this!
Hot As A Pepper can bring a professional live band to your event and we can handle all the entertainment details from the music, to the audio, to the lighting, and even to the stage if so required.
Whether you are booking for a small party of 50 people, or an outdoor festival of 5000, we’re ready to go!
Our music is upbeat and covers a wide variety of styles from classic to current rock, to beach, disco, funk and even country. With our very large song list, we can switch gears on the fly and play music that moves your people.
Laid back or high energy, casual or formal – we’re the music group for you! Check out our Electronic Press Kit (EPK) and you will see a video that demonstrates a few different styles.
Want to book us? Please call 864-979-1224 or use our CONTACT FORM for more information.
Do you love dancing? I mean, do you REALLY love dancing?
Here’s someone who loves dancing:
If you love dancing as much as this young man, then please consider Hot As A Pepper for your next function! There’s nothing we like better than providing the groove for you to get down to!
We cover many styles of music in a show, most of the songs are familiar and perfect for you to dance to, whether it is a shag or a slow dance, and maybe even a line dance.
At our last gig, we had an actual Hell’s Angel member busting a move most of the night with us! If we can get big burly bikers up dancing, we can move your feet too!
Call us today and book a party, corporate event, wedding, or hire us for your venue because we play bars and clubs too! We mostly play the Upstate because we are Greenville, SC based, but we will travel to you if the gig is right!
864-979-1224 or use the booking info contact link above!
