Songvo

Gear and players, from the people down the road

Songvo is where musicians rent each other's instruments and book each other for gigs. Not a classifieds board with a payment button bolted on: a marketplace built around the two things that actually decide whether a hire works, which are whether the gear is what it says it is and whether the person turns up.

Currently in development. Tell us what you need from it.

Three things it does

Rent gear nearby

A Rhodes for the weekend, a fridge for the one gig that needs one, a second kit so nobody drives across town at midnight. Day, week and month rates, set by whoever owns it.

Book a player

Deps, sessions, the sub you need by Friday. Filter by instrument, genre, how far they travel and how far along they are, then ask.

Ask the board

Short notice, short posts. Dep needed, looking for, offering, jam, open mic. It clears itself out, so what is on it is live.

Built around the awkward parts

Your address is not the listing
Gear shows as a circle on a map, never a door. The pickup address is released to one person, once a booking is confirmed, and not before.
Reliability is separate from your rating
Stars say how good you were. Reliability says whether you turned up. They are different questions and conflating them lets a brilliant no-show keep a five. It decays, too: a bad month does not follow you around forever.
Two photographs, minimum
One photo is the brochure shot. The second is where the dents are. A listing cannot go live without both, and the rule is enforced by the database rather than by the screen that happens to be in front of you.
The fee falls the more you work together
Twelve per cent to start, six after ten bookings with the same person. The discount only exists on Songvo, which is the honest way to earn a repeat pair staying rather than taking it off-platform.

Want in early?

We are building with a small number of players and gear owners before opening it up. If that is you, write to us and say what you play and where.

Get in touch