Cheshire wedding band entertainment hire HARD TO HANDLE
HARD TO HANDLE BAND are the refreshing alternative to tired old Cheshire wedding bands! We play killer indie, pop, rock and more at weddings throughout Cheshire and we also provide a live DJ service! More cost effective than the majority of other professional bands, our mix of music and infectious energy will create a full dance floor, all night!
Don’t get us wrong – we love all types of wedding bands Cheshire has to offer and all types of wedding music, but unfortunately some functions bands only seem to play the style of wedding entertainment songs they want to play, which is only ever going to please some of your guests.
We firmly believe that the best way to please ALL of your wedding guests is to play as wide a range of music as possible – including indie, soul, classic rock n roll, pop, funk and more. In other words, music from the 1960s to the modern charts. HARD TO HANDLE BAND are also a little different in that we encourage our Cheshire clients to choose the music they want us to play, so that when we get on stage, we’re playing the music you want to hear – it’s just like having your own personal Cheshire wedding band.
The HARD TO HANDLE function band service includes:
- Professional live wedding band
- 2 hours of rock, pop, indie, soul and more
- Massive 350 song playlist
- Requests performed by the band (including your first dance song)
- DJ sets during the bands’ breaks
- Sound system and lighting
- Wedding entertainment until the end of the night
- Dedicated management
- Contract for stress-free booking
- No agency fees
- Live wedding entertainment throughout the North West
- Full dancefloor
You can watch our videos, listen to our music on our website using the navigation menu at the top of this page, and don’t forget to watch our video reviews here. For more information, call us direct on 0796 433 5657. We look forward to hearing from you!
Three piece wedding band, big sound
Cheshire brides, grooms and other clients looking for talented musicians who find HARD TO HANDLE BAND tell us that we have a surprisingly big sound. We agree! We’re 100% live and don’t use cheesy backing tracks, but we are three professional talented, versatile and experienced wedding musicians and have performed hundreds of gigs together which means that we’re really tight.
When we first offered our services as a Cheshire wedding band, it became apparent to us that people often choose to hire a DJ for their wedding entertainment rather than a live wedding band because of a lack of space in the venue – once all your guests are seated, there may be only a small performance space available, a wedding band featuring four or more wedding musicians simply won’t be able to set up. But because we’re a three-piece wedding band and all of our equipment is compact and designed for smaller functions, there will be plenty of space for your guests to dance.
That’s something they will definitely want to do! All the music we play is instantly recognisable, non-cheesy, dance floor friendly and delivered in a high energy style, song after song. Two hours of classic and contemporary anthems performed by the band, and in addition, we’ll also provide you with a DJ who will play sets before, in between and after our live band sets to ensure that party atmosphere keeps going until the end of the night.
Where we play and what we do
There’s a long list of Cheshire wedding and function venues that we have performed at, but they include Heaton House Farm, Sandhole Oak Barn, Peckforton Castle, Trafford Hall, Combermere Abbey, Inglewood Manor, Grosvenor Pulford Hotel, Thornton Manor, Styal Lodge, Mere Court Hotel, Rookery Hall, Nunsmere Hall, Swettenham Arms, Mottram Hall, High Legh Golf Club, Chester Zoo, Nantwich Civic Hall, Mercure Chester the Chester Hilton and many more. In fact, we have probably performed at more venues than other Cheshire wedding bands.
We’re not gonna lie – clearly, on the surface, there are certain types of wedding bands Cheshire has to offer that we are a million miles away from in style and sound. The type of Cheshire bands we’re talking about range from the more traditional style of function bands or party bands, and what you might call bohemian folk bands. There’s a reason why these type of Cheshire wedding bands are advertising themselves as suitable for wedding receptions – the semi-acoustic folky style function bands are attempting to capitalise on the popularity of Mumford and Sons, which is absolutely fine (you’ll find two of their songs in our playlist), but much like tribute bands, which were popular at wedding receptions in the 1990s, as musical tastes change, certain bands for hire fall out of favour, and brides, grooms and other event planners will find other types of wedding bands a more attractive proposition for their special day.
The other type of Cheshire wedding bands, what you might call a party band style of wedding music, also came to prominence in the 1990s. They usually feature six or more members, often with a female vocalist out front and several other wedding musicians who are…er…somewhat anonymous.
Not all wedding bands in Cheshire are the same
Yes. We said it. Here’s the deal – if you want to be a musician, that’s great – stick to recording sessions. But if you want to be a live music performer in a Cheshire wedding band, you’re going to need to bring more to the table. You’ll need a big personality and lots of gigging performance to be able to get your audience onto the dance floor. Don’t just assume that if you play music that people like, they’ll want to dance. There’s so much more. As a wedding band, you have to relax people, get them to leave their inhibitions at the door and get them singing along, jumping around and generally enjoying themselves. This is something only the best Cheshire wedding bands can do.
This is what we do. As a wedding band Cheshire is one of our favourite regions to play in. In fact there’s just something about gigs in the North West that we love! With over 500 gigs under our collective belts, HARD TO HANDLE covers band will ensure that you and your guests have one of the best nights of your lives on the dance floor. Every song we play is instantly recognisable – we don’t feel the need to pad songs our with endless guitar solos like some Cheshire wedding bands do – and the songs sound like the originals, which is not something the acoustic duo folk style Cheshire wedding bands are able to replicate.
But first and foremost, we’re a live function band. We have a great live sound. We don’t use backing tracks. The bass guitar sounds low and meaty, you can feel the drums through your body, the guitar layers nice tight sounds over the top and because all three of us sing lead vocals, we can play a very broad mix of songs and create a very full wedding band sound.
How much should a wedding band cost?
As little as possible! Er, not quite, but it would be nice if you were able to find wedding entertainment that is both cost effective and, well, entertaining! Unfortunately, as many of the so-called best live wedding bands offer a bewildering sliding scale of charges, it can be difficult to ascertain an answer to how much a wedding band should cost. A lot of it depends on your tastes – if you are bling type of person who has 400 or more friends and wants to be featured in Cheshire Life magazine then you will probably be prepared to be taken to the cleaners spending several thousands on one of the best wedding bands that money can buy (by which we mean you will be overcharged for your live music).
Really, how much live bands cost depends on what they offer and what your requirements are. For example, you might be looking for live wedding music bands to perform at both your drunks reception and the evening, which means that you will be quoted more hiring live music for just the evening. So, the best advice is to work out what you want and talk to bands direct to get a spread of quotes to see exactly what service Cheshire wedding bands cover. Oh, and by the way, you shouldn’t have to pay extra for a band to learn your first dance song or other requests.
How do wedding timings work?
How you plan your wedding reception is up to you, but it makes sense to think about how to structure your evening. You can do this by talking to any of the best live wedding bands Cheshire has to offer, or simply by reading this! Unless you’re having a late wedding (and unless your best man, uncle, cousin and various family members want to get in on the act), it’s most likely that your wedding breakfast and speeches will have finished by 6pm or 6.30pm, after which the venue manager and staff will usher you and your guests into an ante-room in order to start turning the room around.
Unless you have hired a band to perform at your afternoon drinks reception to provide background music, this is traditionally the time when the band arrive to start setting up. Bear in mind though that staff will need to turn around the room before the band can begin set up, and as room turnaround can take anything up to an hour, you will need to factor this into when you would like live music to start.
It’s best to talk to your wedding band about this before you plan your evening as bands can take anything up to 90 minutes to set up, after which they will need to sound check and get changed.
On of the advantages of hiring HARD TO HANDLE for your live wedding entertainment is that we are a band and DJ service in one – that means just one set of equipment for both band and DJ, not only are we compact with no jostling for space between the band and DJ, leaving plenty of room for your guest to dance, but we are quick to set up – within approximately 30 minutes of having clear access to the performance area we can provide DJ music for your evening guests, which is great if you find that your drinks reception wedding breakfast and speeches have run late.
When your guests have arrived, we will announce the cake cutting then gather your guests to line the edge of the dance floor and then call you for your first dance. No need to worry what’s going to happen for the rest of the night – with our diverse repertoire of indie rock, modern pop we’ll provide non-stop entertainment all night long to get the party started getting that dance floor packed so you can get on with the important business of enjoying yourselves!
How do I hire wedding bands?
Let’s talk about choosing wedding bands in Cheshire based on reviews, or to be more specific, genuine reviews. Reviews of a live wedding bands can be a very important component in choosing which band is perfect for you. You may have seen bands perform live music at friends’ wedding receptions and decide you want a band that sounds little different for you big day, which is fine. Alternatively you may decide that instead of “reinventing the wheel”, you’d prefer to go down the tried and tested route of hiring one of the wedding bands in Cheshire who appear to be popular on google, which again is fine.
Given that unless you see a band perform for a friend who has held their wedding reception at a Cheshire wedding venue, you are unlikely to be able to see professional Cheshire wedding bands perform live*, as a bride and groom you have to rely on other methods to establish the quality of the band you’re looking at, which is why reviews are so important.
Unfortunately, there are reviews which are verified and genuine, and there are others which are not. Some of these reviews are easy to spot – they are overly gushing and wordy and aren’t accompanied by any information to make you think that they are genuine. In fact in recent years whole industry has sprung up based around service providers paying for fake reviews in order to make them seem viable, and yes, some of the reviews of live wedding bands in Cheshire you will have seen online will have been written by someone who is not a bride or groom and hasn’t used the band.
The best way to find wedding bands you can trust to provide a superb nights’ entertainment for your Cheshire wedding is to watch video reviews. You will find 60+ HARD TO HANDLE BAND video reviews on our Reviews page here. You’ll know they’re genuine because you can see us talking to the bride and groom on the night! As you’ll see, they love our mix of music and energy.
*It’s a question of £££ – bands who play live play in pubs and clubs on Friday and Saturday nights will be part of the community of amateur bands, not professional Cheshire wedding bands, and while some of them will be good, they may not be what you would call the perfect Cheshire wedding band.
As a wedding band the feedback we receive from brides, grooms and other party planners speaks for itself – we have a 5* rating on Google reviews, and there are plenty more wedding music reviews for you to read on both our Facebook page and website, including video reviews. We are equally at home performing at small intimate gatherings and large gala events, and our boundless energy means that every one of your guests will be entertained, all night long.
We also make sure that we adhere to any guidelines or requirements specified for Cheshire bands by your wedding venue, because we want to keep them happy, too! This might mean plugging into their sound system instead of using our own, or keeping our performance volume to an agreed level, something that dedicated wedding venues are requesting more and more. Overall, you can trust us to set up our equipment, and play great music, leaving you to get on with enjoying your celebrations with friends, family and loved ones. And that’s what you’re looking for in a Cheshire wedding band, isn’t it?
Check out our videos, music, news, reviews and more throughout our site.
Hire Hard to Handle band in Cheshire
Get in touch! For enquiries or just to find out more about Hard to Handle band, fill in the form below. We aim to respond within 24 hours. If you haven’t heard from us by then, we may not have received your enquiry so please call us direct on 0796 433 5657.