THIS is the way to succeed in music now...

[GlennGalen]

I think to succeed today you must be able to do TWO things:

 

1. Be able to provide a live performance that always MOVES people emotionally so much that they go out and tell five friends after they first see your show.

 

2. Be able to improvise and make each show significantly different, but always satisfying.

 

Such an experience cannot be digitally reproduced. You have to be there to experience what TONIGHT'S SHOW will bring.

 

You sell that experience.

 

Just like they did 100 years ago before Edison invented the phonograph.

 

It cannot be reproduced digitally and traded across the Internet.

 

The rare songwriter/performer/band who can pull this off will do well financially.

[MarkofCainband]

So like the jam band scene?

 

I really like that idea, though, there is extensive bootlegging and tape trading, and with the internet it's even more. When I started getting obsessed with the Dead, I had almost every show on a summer tour they did on mp3. Just sayin...

 

Also, I think the very best bands ALWAYS have done this. Hell, even some of the "ok" ones seem to do that in my experience. Though I assume that is much different in the pop world.

[GlennGalen]

 

So like the jam band scene? I really like that idea, though, there is extensive bootlegging and tape trading, and with the internet it's even more. When I started getting obsessed with the Dead, I had almost every show on a summer tour they did on mp3. Just sayin...

 

 

Yes, just like the jam band scene, essentially.

 

They didn't make their money from the recordings; they made it from the individual show ticket sales.

 

The key is that people will keep returning to the show because they know it will be something good, satisfying, and a bit new and different from the last show they saw.

 

But they must be sure the next show will be not be completely different. People have to be able to predict that they will hear the same type and quality of music that they enjoyed the first time.

[flatfinger]

 

: 1. Be able to provide a live performance that always MOVES people emotionally so much that they go out and tell five friends after they first see your show. 2. Be able to improvise and make each show significantly different , but always satisfying. ........ will do well financially.

 

 

 

So basically one needs to have a seriously low overhead the then, NO real gear to have to transport!! Basically a guitar slung over the back ?? A RV so as to not incur hotel charges ?? Nothing to embelish the show , just you and your guitar . No lights , no crew ... Just coffee house to coffee house??

 

 

Are you on tour all year long ??

 

 

Perhaps you could share your stratigies with this artist .......http://www.bbc.co.uk/news/10220002

[TieDyedDevil]

As much as I personally find that model to be attractive, I'm kind of glad I don't have to make a living in music.

 

Read Phil Lesh's biography for some insight into the human costs of being constantly on tour. He doesn't paint a pretty picture.

[GlennGalen]

 

 

 

 

Hey flatfinger,

 

I've enjoyed reading your posts as well as a number of others who regularly post their thoughts about the current challenges in the music business.

 

I am only stating what I think is the only thing that will work today. Because anything digital and desirable will be traded freely almost instantly. And Spotify pays almost nothing for streaming. Look up Lady Gaga's laughably low revenues from her millions of streamed tracks.

 

Speaking of Imogene Heap's troubles with mounting a large production on tour. Well, the size of the show you can profitably do all depends on how many people regularly show up, right?

 

Again, I am only offering my analysis after avidly studying and reading about the changes in the music business for the past several years.

 

Many aspiring musicians will read what I said here and say "well, doing that is incredibly difficult". I agree. It is. Just look at the kind of "living" most bands are making today.

 

I can't support myself right now by my music alone, either.

 

But I think I know why, and what the path forward is..if I want to do it.

[Dancebass]

Improvising is for beatniks or deadheads. Starvation isn't THAT bad!

[flatfinger]

We are truly in undiscovered territory now . Historians are going to spend lots of time examining and trying to define the events that are unfolding .

 

All you can do is just enjoy making music......and of course , absolutely ,positively have a contingency plan ( or multiple ones !!)

[daddymack]

if it were really that simple, one could hand a chimpanzee a guitar and charge admission...

I do agree that the performance element will be crucial to any artists making a living, but if you ignore the real key, which is material that works on every level, then no matter how entertaining a show you put on, it won't make any difference in the long run.

[GlennGalen]

Daddymack,

 

You think it's "chimpanzee simple" to write and perform songs that audience members find so emotionally satisfying that, after the show, they are so excited that they each tell five friends about it?

 

I think you just overlooked Step 1: "Be able to provide a live performance that always MOVES people emotionally so much that they go out and tell five friends after they first see your show."

[sventvkg]

I'm making music and doing all music related activities that I do and only doing those. Between gigging, songwriting, session work, demo production, CD production I will make a living. If I went back on the road I could make a good living and I may end up over in Europe for a couple months again next year. We'll see. I'm not sweating the state of the music industry. It will all reach some sort of homeostasis again.

[sventvkg]

 

I think to succeed today you must be able to do TWO things: 1. Be able to provide a live performance that always MOVES people emotionally so much that they go out and tell five friends after they first see your show. 2. Be able to improvise and make each show significantly different , but always satisfying. Such an experience cannot be digitally reproduced. You have to be there to experience what TONIGHT'S SHOW will bring . You sell that experience . Just like they did 100 years ago before Edison invented the phonograph. It cannot be reproduced digitally and traded across the Internet. The rare songwriter/performer who can pull this off will do well financially.

 

 

I agree to an extent but there are exceptions. For instance, Steve Earle doesn't need to do anything but stand on stage or sit on stage with his guitar and sing. In the end all the other stuff is just icing if the songs are great. All of your time should be spent making the best music you can. Only after you have done that do you even have to start thinking about the other {censored}. That's the truth that 99.999999% of musicians don't' want to hear. The key is to BE EXCELLENT. Hopefully that's what we all strive for.

[honeyiscool]

Everybody's music's different, though. You surely can't apply your jam band model to all different kinds of music.

[Poker99]

 

I think to succeed today you must be able to do TWO things: 1. Be able to provide a live performance that always MOVES people emotionally so much that they go out and tell five friends after they first see your show. 2. Be able to improvise and make each show significantly different , but always satisfying. Such an experience cannot be digitally reproduced. You have to be there to experience what TONIGHT'S SHOW will bring . You sell that experience . Just like they did 100 years ago before Edison invented the phonograph. It cannot be reproduced digitally and traded across the Internet. The rare songwriter/performer who can pull this off will do well financially.

 

 

Could you name me 5 successful bands that do this right now, and their success depended on this?

[GlennGalen]

 

Everybody's music's different, though. You surely can't apply your jam band model to all different kinds of music.

 

 

Although it is similar to the jam band model, I wasn't pushing that "to the letter".

 

The main thing is that each show should deliver something new. Give the songs a slightly different treatment. People want variety to keep them coming back.

[BlueStrat]

 

Daddymack, I think you just overlooked Step 1: "Be able to provide a live performance that always MOVES people emotionally so much that they go out and tell five friends after they first see your show."

 

 

 

Well, no offense, but that's a bit like saying "HOW TO MAKE A MILLION BUCKS: First, get lots and lots of money, close to a million, and then invest it".

[GlennGalen]

 

Well, no offense, but that's a bit like saying "HOW TO MAKE A MILLION BUCKS: First, get lots and lots of money, close to a million, and then invest it".

 

 

 

Pat,

 

I understand what you're saying. The "million dollars" = a body of work, and an inventive musical ability, that people get really excited about.

 

And that's really hard to come by.

 

But I can't see how anything less will make for a sustainable performance career that pays a living wage any more. People have so much access to music. It takes more to get them to come out and pay attention and spend money on tickets.

 

There are lots of good insights on other threads. The masses today are satisfied with simplistic music. And computerized recording studios let almost anyone make simplistic music that the masses eat like potato chips.

 

There is an avalanche of it out there. New "stars" are popular for six months...and then somebody else comes along. The Flavor of the Week on YouTube. Bands become famous fast and fall fast as well. The "cycle" is getting shorter and shorter", I read.

 

I can't see any way to make a sustainable living as a performer of popular music than the two things I started the thread with.

[GlennGalen]

Could you name me 5 successful bands that do this right now, and their success depended on this?

 

Not off the top of my head. I am not an encyclopedic reference on the entire current live music scene by any means, though.

 

But I strongly suspect that all bands that are making a living and seem to have real longevity on the circuit are doing those two things I described.

 

I don't see how they can do it selling CDs and playing "me, too" music that is identical to what is available for free everywhere as a file share.

[SchroedingerCat]

This is an interesting thread, but I think there are a few other ways to look at this particular problem...having emotionally captivating music and a scintillating live show certainly helps, but let us not put all of the extremely complex eggs of the current music industry into one tiny basket...

 

Yes, music pirating sucks for performers and up and coming artists, but no, it doesn't mean that all artists of the future HAVE to depend on touring. Movies, porn and textbooks are all pirated at an alarming rate as well, but somehow I don't see Leonardio Dicaprio coming to a theatre near you to perform a live version of "Inception." There are ways to prevent this need, and my hope is eventually one of the brilliant computer scientists of the world will come up with a pervasively complex encryption process to make such hacking a major pain in the manberries...although that may be a bit of a reach it is technologically possible...perhaps we should all plea with Mark Zuckerberg to get on that, he likes good music, right?

 

Another approach is to do what the Foo Fighters have done with their newest release: Tweet the crapola out of the whole process, "leak," some sneak previews and send their fan-base (or at the very least, this guy) into a frenzy just waiting for the release. Just like excessive, well done promotion on a stinker of a movie (see last summer's Predators), well done promotion on a new album WILL entice more people to buy than steal...or at least that's my take.

 

Lastly, convincing major record labels to actually produce new music worth buying would probably start the sway back into a stable economy. The music of the 2000's (essentially the last half of my life) has been one large disappointment after another. I'm forced to buy music from bands from the 60's - 90's because all of the music made in my socially-conscious life has been substandard. They all use the same motifs, written in similar keys and and similar tunings; the lyrics are are trite and meaningless, and the production quality is typically equivalent to that of a polished, fossilized dino turd (it is all WAY overcompressed [think about it ]). If I didn't grow up listening to older rock groups, I would have never developed the appreciation for music I have now, and I imagine the majority of today's youth has only listened to the crap they've been fed, giving them little to no incentive to spend any cash on it.

 

Sorry for the novel, guys, this thread just kinda sent me into resonance and I couldn't stop...

[richardmac]

My Personal List of Inconvenient Truths:

 

• Encryption won't work. There's no point in hoping for improved encryption to take us back to the 80's.

• Every single generation thinks the music from the next generation is terrible. It isn't, you're just old. (So am I.)

• You can't make a living if your music is mediocre, and the majority of unknown musicians make mediocre music.

• No one is illegally downloading your music because they're never heard of you.

• If you do the math for what a band would need to make on the road to make a decent living, it's scary.

• Solo artists who can scale their show up or down based on budget have the best shot at making a living.

• There are still plenty of people who are willing to pay for music, but the majority of them are older folks.

• Television does not pay as much money as you think.

• The money is in writing, not "being the bass player."

• To make ends meet you need a great live show, and most artists do not have a great live show.

• The compact disc is going to be around a lot longer than some people think.

• Not only does your music have to be great, it also probably has to break new ground in some way.

• Selling merch doesn't work unless you already have a huge fan base.

• Today's musicians spend too much time doing things other than music.

• You CAN record a great CD for nothing on a home computer IF the person doing the recording is really good.

• Your best opportunity to sell a CD is at a gig.

 

I don't think improvising is that big a deal - you can just rotate songs in and out of the set list. But having a killer show, yeah, that is critical. One of the strangest things about the new music biz is that the people most likely to buy music are the people least likely to go to a gig, yet it's the best place to sell music. We are living in odd times.

 

As far as Imogen Heap is concerned... I think people who are telling her to scale back her show are missing the point - she's trying to do something special and unique on the stage, which is exactly what you need to be doing right now. Bad example, but back in the day when KISS was big, they turned down some gigs because the stage wasn't big enough at the venue to accommodate their whole show. They could have scaled back their gear and been fine, but they would have had to compromise the show and they didn't want to. Imogen is an example of an artist doing work right now that I think is as good as anything I listened to in the 80's or 90's. I really love her work.

 

I think the real way to succeed is to have a damn good plan, and there's not just one. Interesting thread, interesting ideas.

[SchroedingerCat]

 

My Personal List of Inconvenient Truths: • Every single generation thinks the music from the next generation is terrible. It isn't, you're just old. (So am I.) .

 

 

...I just think the music of my generation is terrible...I've yet to turn 20. hahaha

[GlennGalen]

Richard,

 

Good points.

 

I was mainly addressing how to get paid reasonable money for your music in an age where anything digital is pirated and passed around, and has lost it's value, particularly with those under age 35 or so.

 

I agree about the CD. It will be around as long as cars have CD players and people who enjoy music have daily commutes in their cars. And as long as the living room stereo does not have an Internet connection.

 

After those two things are no longer true, the CD will fade very, very quickly.

[BlueStrat]

 

Pat, I understand what you're saying. The "million dollars" = a body of work, and an inventive musical ability, that people get really excited about. And that's really hard to come by. But I can't see how anything less will make for a sustainable performance career that pays a living wage any more. People have so much access to music. It takes more to get them to come out and pay attention and spend money on tickets. There are lots of good insights on other threads. The masses today are satisfied with simplistic music. And computerized recording studios let almost anyone make simplistic music that the masses eat like potato chips. There is an avalanche of it out there. New "stars" are popular for six months...and then somebody else comes along. The Flavor of the Week on YouTube. Bands become famous fast and fall fast as well. The "cycle" is getting shorter and shorter", I read. I can't see any way to make a sustainable living as a performer of popular music than the two things I started the thread with.

 

 

Oh, I completely agree with you. It's just that getting the great show and the killer music together is the hard part, and not everyone can do it. In fact, most can't, and I think it has ever been thus. If anyone can't do those two things in this climate we live in, they better get used to playing locally for not a lot of dough.

[GlennGalen]

 

Oh, I completely agree with you. It's just that getting the great show and the killer music together is the hard part, and not everyone can do it. In fact, most can't, and I think it has ever been thus. If anyone can't do those two things in this climate we live in, they better get used to playing locally for not a lot of dough.

 

 

I totally agree. And I think fewer can do it now than they could back when you couldn't use a computer to automatically make musical sounds and rhythm.

[Cliftonb]

Wow. I think I just realized how different my perception of the current music landscape is from most musicians. I will say, however, that the whole "Music is terrible now" sorts aren't doing a damn thing to raise the bar any.