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Smoky bars vs. hate for job -- which is the more unthealthy?


jerrye

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Which is the more unhealthy, playing music 6 to 8 times a month in smoky bars, or working a hated day job 40 hours per week? I may have the opportunity to make my day job half time, to allow myself to take the gig described above. I would also explore other money-making avenues with the extra time.

Jerry

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Well the day job will make you depressed. And that can lead to low selfesteem and other problems(like low sex life ,alcohol and maybe even smoking :D).

The smoky bar will maybe be of some damage to your lungs but...i see no problem.

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When you're young, you should take more risks. Everything is unhealthy in some way, and in the end, no one gets out alive. There will be plenty of time as you age to settle into a routine and predictable life.

 

Besides, the culture is headed for a smoke-free public anyway. Most of the places around here are smoke free, and have to be if they serve food. Across the state line in Washington, any building open to the public has to be smoke free.

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Originally posted by jerrye

Which is the more unhealthy, playing music 6 to 8 times a month in smoky bars, or working a hated day job 40 hours per week? I may have the opportunity to make my day job half time, to allow myself to take the gig described above. I would also explore other money-making avenues with the extra time.

Jerry

 

Most people that say this end up as bums and get JUST as burned out on playing tired old covers to tired old crowds night after night. Make no mistake, music can be a boring JOB as well, especially when you are a human jukebox. Chances are, you would do much better to excel at your day job (pays for gear or whatever else you want) and leave the low paying, smoked filled, bar whore infested night job to someone that has no alternative. ;)

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I actually dig the smoke. But I very rarely play in those bars that the cover bands play in. Though I pretty much take any gig that comes my way if it is not already booked. However, I have been playing long enough and play well enough that I can to at least some degree pick and choose what kinds of bands I play with. I usually play where the real cool people hang out, not the posers and bar whores.

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I'd rather play smoky bars than live off the 9-5 crap. I work in a Cabinet shop in Fresno Cal. and man most of those people hate life and all the beauty that can be found in life:confused: , but at least in being in a band that can survive of playing is better than the job I got.I live and breath guitar and to me playing for a living is heaven:D

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Originally posted by jerrye

Which is the more unhealthy, playing music 6 to 8 times a month in smoky bars, or working a hated day job 40 hours per week? I may have the opportunity to make my day job half time, to allow myself to take the gig described above. I would also explore other money-making avenues with the extra time.

Jerry

 

 

Why not just find another job? One that you would enjoy.

 

The problem with gigging:

The pay really isn't all that good. Often, what you make is eaten up by what it cost you to make it....more or less.

 

Musicians and bands are notoriously flacky, and unreliable. That's one thing, when you're trying to get a good band together to have fun and make extra money. It's another thing when you were counting on that $200 from that gig to make your car payment.

 

The cost of living is going up. Musicians today -in general- make about what they were making 40 years ago.

 

Care about having insurance?

Most part-time jobs won't provide it, and gigging bands sure as hell won't.

 

I LOVE music and playing in bands, but I've been bitten in the ass far too many times in the past to ever go back to relying on gigging as a primary source of income.

 

My advice:

Quit the job you hate, find a job you'll like, and play your ass off when the working day is done. You'll be much more stable, and probably a lot happier in the long run.

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Well, yes. Anyone over age 28 trying to make music a living is going to have a hard go of it, as you enter the stage of life where you want more than just the bare necessities of life just so you can keep pointlessly gigging to no end for little money. It's one thing when you're 22, quite another at 32. If you want to own a home, raise kids, and have any kind of retirement you'll need more than 300 a week playing guitar.

 

The trouble is, there are few full time music gigs anymore. In the 60s, 70s and 80s, we could work clubs 6 nights a week, either at home with a house gig or a circuit, or on the road. Now, you're looking at weekends, and you're competing with kids who are willing to starve, sharing the stage with 4 bands a night trying to become stars, or with geezers with good jobs who play for fun, both of whom don't seem to think twice about going out and playing for little to nothing. One is willing to forgo money for future reward (which almost never comes) and the other doesn't need it, so they don't ask for it. No gig is going to pay you a living wage when bands are lined up for months to play for half or less. And with electronics, music in media is getting harder to do, as more is done with fewer people to keep costs down.

 

Bottom line, do it for as long as it's fun, but at the same time, get a degree or learn a good solid trade. Chances are overwhelmingly good that you're going to need it.

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Well this is a wierd thread. I work for the NYS Smokers quitline and I will can tell you what smoke will do to you and your gear. Before the state banned smoking in bars my gear used to come home reaking in smoke. My road cases from all these years later still smell like it. I do not miss that {censored} at all.

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Great subject.

 

I had the greatest gig in the world but it was seasonal: performing on the outdoor patio overlooking a river, at a Hooter's retaurant. Yachts on the river, babes on the yachts (in thongs), Hooter's girls all around. Fresh air, nice weather. Absoluelty the best gig I could EVER do. I said to myself at the time that it was going to be pure hell going back to playing inside of a smoky bar after the summer was over.

 

Well, the end of the summer came and I was right, it was pure hell going back inside of a smoky bar. I quit gigging for THREE YEARS because of it.

 

So I guess I 'lived' the answer to your question. I opted for the day job.

 

(And it's amazing how that carpet-like covering on speaker cabinets and on equipment cases absorbs and holds the rauncy reek stench of smoke. I won't buy equipment covered with carpet-like outsides anymore for that specific reason.)

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As a totally burned out medical transcriptionist, I can say that a day job you abhor is definitely unhealthy. The stress caused by doing something you hate can cause any number of health problems. And add in carpal tunnel syndrome, which affects my guitar playing. But I keep at it because my family needs a place to live and food to eat.

 

Some of the excellent responses above point out the perils of trying to "play for a living" in today's world. It just ain't the same as it was in the 60's and 70's...except for the pay.

 

But, weird as it seems, in a couple weeks I am "jumping from the bathtub into the ocean." Leaving my little podunk town for the big city to focus on music. Sure, I'll have to get a day job. And no, I don't expect to be a huge musical force in a large city. I only expect many more opportunities to play out and perhaps one or two that could be considered career-potential...latching on to a really good established band. But I'm totally prepared for the existence I have known for the past 30 years...work a day job, gig when you can, try to have fun in both.

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Washington state just passed it's smoke free bar law and I couldn't be happier about it. So far the owners I've talked to say that business has been up because of it. And it's so very nice to come home and smell decent and have your gear smell good enough to bring it in the house.

As far as making a living playing music, I think it can be done but not in the traditional ways. A friend of mine makes a living at it traveling the country doing house concerts, says he makes about 35K a year. I'm going to try it soon. Why not, I'm not makng that much working for a living.....

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Trust me it will keep going. Were I work part-time is at a University and it is going smoke free. That means at all of our locations the 17,000 people they employ cannot smoke anywhere. They are taking the designated areas away even now. Smoke does a lot of damage to gear. If your ead up on it there are 4000 chemicles in the smoke. Zinc, Nickle, Aresenic and a whole slew of others.

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Originally posted by Outkaster

Trust me it will keep going. Were I work part-time is at a University and it is going smoke free. That means at all of our locations the 17,000 people they employ cannot smoke anywhere. They are taking the designated areas away even now. Smoke does a lot of damage to gear. If your ead up on it there are 4000 chemicles in the smoke. Zinc, Nickle, Aresenic and a whole slew of others.

 

 

Bah. It gives your amp and guitar that vintage vibe!:D;)

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Originally posted by Blackwatch



And your voice that husky quality.....

 

 

And kill you at the same time. CA announced yesteday that second hand smoke will be a toxi substance they have to do something about. It was in a memo we got yesterday. I was kidding about the Hammond thing but it is not good for you gear.

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