I think Gringo has hit it pretty much on the head there. All of Germany, and the big (and some not so big) cities of France, Italy and Spain all worth visiting for bands.
As a promoter in London its probably worth pointing out WHY bands don't get paid as much here in the UK. The main reasons are 1) general attendence levels are lower here than in mainland Europe, and 2) lots of venues organise shows themselves in Europe rather than promoters, and they usually have bigger budgets to work with can afford to lose money if a night is quiet.
Also...
1) London is a huge city and takes time to travel around. People often wanna go to shows but don't cos it will take them 3 hours to get there and back on tubes and buses. It doesn't sound a lot, but it takes it toll.
2) in London theres lots of venues AND lots of promoters. Its not unusual for me to do our regular garage night and then find out later 2 promoters I've never heard of have suddenly decided garage punk is their new love and have organised their own party the same night. so we all suffer.
Having said that I and others do put on garage bands and have 200-500 showing up. But in general we work with below 100, causing headaches with money...Many bands know this, but many also don't.