Tour crew don't think in calendar days. When you're loading out at 2 AM after a show, "tonight" still means the show that just ended — even though the calendar says it's the next day. When you set a 5 AM lobby call, "tomorrow morning" doesn't shift at midnight.
BandBrain matches this by treating 4 AM (venue local time) as the rollover between tour days.
The rule
For any relative term ("today", "tonight", "tomorrow", "yesterday"):
| Local time at the venue | Tour-effective today is... |
|---|---|
| 4 AM through 11:59 PM | the calendar date |
| Midnight through 3:59 AM | YESTERDAY's calendar date |
Example: it's 1 AM in Seattle on June 2. The agent treats "today/tonight" as June 1. "Tomorrow" is June 2. The calendar rollover at midnight doesn't move the tour day until 4 AM.
Why 4 AM
Empirically — past 4 AM, crew has slept or is about to. Before 4 AM, they're still in load-out / hotel-arrival / set-the-alarm mode. The 4 AM boundary catches the natural circadian flip.
Where this applies
- The agent's
find_todaytool always resolves "today" / "tonight" / "tomorrow" using the tour-day rule, not the calendar literal add_guest,set_day_fact,remove_guestall respect this — "add John to tonight's list" at 2 AM adds to yesterday's calendar date- SMS replies are composed with this rule baked in
When it doesn't apply
Specific dates ("June 5", "next Friday") use the literal calendar interpretation. The tour-day rule only kicks in for relative terms.
Whose "local time"?
Everything — "today", "tonight", "this month", and every time BandBrain mentions — is in the band's local time, worked out in this order:
- The show city's timezone for that day. If you use Master Tour, its per-day timezone is used as-is; otherwise BandBrain reads it from the day's city (US states, including split-zone cities like El Paso, Canadian provinces, and major international cities).
- Off and travel days use where the band sleeps or lands that night: the hotel address, then a flight or travel destination.
- Nothing on file for that day? The nearest show day's timezone (the last city you played, or the next one if it's closer).
- Between tours, wherever the band last played, or the next show if there's none before.
- Eastern Time, only for a band with no tour days on file at all.
There's no "home timezone" setting: band members live all over, so the band is wherever the tour is.
So a band in Los Angeles at 9 PM on October 31 is still in October, even though it's already November in New York.
Every time names its zone
Every time BandBrain gives you comes with its timezone, like "doors 5:30 PM CDT" or "load-in 1:00 PM MDT". It's the zone of the city where it happens.
For scheduled comms automations using tour_day timezone, the rule fires in the venue's local time on the firing day. So a 6 AM daily fires at 6 AM local in whatever city you're in. See Tour-day timezone for automations.
How to check it
Text BandBrain "what's today?" and the agent will respond with both the calendar date and the tour-effective day so you can sanity-check the interpretation.