Live Music: As If It Weren't Already Challenging Enough

Well as you mentioned its crazy expensive and it wont get any cheaper for sure especially up here in Quebec Canada
so not many artists or concerts of that scale going on :(
Fortunately for me i ahve seen and experienced many many concerts
My Son always tells me Dad its not fair you got to see so much shows ill never ever get to see
 
I missed a few key artists earrrrrrrly on but my list of artists I wish I had seen before I couldn't is in single digits. People in the 40-50+ range are super lucky to have been rock fans when they were.
 
I am currently involved in a Tribute Band Network management company that's trying to save live music in New Mexico and more specifically Albuquerque. There are still a decent amount of venues to play BUT most of them require that the bands pay them for the "privilege" to play their rat infested $hit holes. Some places will accept a 50% cut of the door if you want to charge a cover and some want upwards of 800 dollars for a 4 hr chunk to play there. In the past this kind of tactic always preyed on original bands, but we are starting to see it headed towards doing it to cover and Tribute acts also. One of the venue owners I talked to told me he loves renting to younger folks because they pay without negotiating or questioning and always bring a bunch of their friends. They basically put together 3-5 band shows (typically death metal played poorly) and each band member ponies up 50 bucks each or what not and to them it's well worth it.

Some will sell merch and make their money back or at least lessen the cost but most don't even have merch. I have some inside info of what it takes to host a band for a night at this venue and what the general take can be when everything is factored in and this one particular venue owner is raking it in at every show. He's got lights, rent and 2 people on staff that are both paid 10 bucks an hour each.

For me my conscience would force me to share the wealth on a given night some. If I net 5k on a night where 3 bands played I'd damn sure throw some cash at them at the end of the night. Depends on how things went but 10% of my take would not kill me or hurt me.
In the cover bands I am in we are lucky to pull in 350 for 4 people at most places. Sure we get the occasional 600 or so when we do some places but that's seasonal and few and far between.

A "gig day" for me consists of about 11 hours total of work when everything is factored in. There's loading in from the garage into the van, driving to venue, load out, set up, sound check, play for 3-4 hrs, break down, drive home, and unload. 75 Bucks for that is 6.82 an hour when all is said and done and thats not factoring in paying for my gas, food, and drinks at the venues that do not feed and water us. If I got down to the nitty gritty and factored that all in I'd guess it brings it down to about 4 bucks an hour pay for a gig.
The way I have to look at it is that 4 bucks an hour is better than no bucks an hour and way better than paying for everything. If I don't look at it that way, then I will be miserable and grumpy and not want to do it. I love playing live and love playing with other musicians and I am not doing this to try and make a living so it works out fine for me. Does it mean I don't try hard to get the most money out of a venue that I can? Of course not. I walk that thin line of pushing for more money without discouraging the venue to have us play there. When I chat with other bands about venue pay I am often told "oh we get less than that there". Whether everyone I talk to about it is lying I dunno but if I can get even 25 bucks more than they offer then I will.

Live music is indeed dying but it's mostly for people like me that play mostly music that is 30-40 years old. The audience for that who want to go out and see a live band has shrunk considerably. I am just doing my best to enjoy what time I have left doing it.
 
does anyone watch the youtube channel hate5six? one my faves.

kids all over the country getting rowdy, throwing down. i love it.
 
I am currently involved in a Tribute Band Network management company that's trying to save live music in New Mexico and more specifically Albuquerque. There are still a decent amount of venues to play BUT most of them require that the bands pay them for the "privilege" to play their rat infested $hit holes. Some places will accept a 50% cut of the door if you want to charge a cover and some want upwards of 800 dollars for a 4 hr chunk to play there. In the past this kind of tactic always preyed on original bands, but we are starting to see it headed towards doing it to cover and Tribute acts also. One of the venue owners I talked to told me he loves renting to younger folks because they pay without negotiating or questioning and always bring a bunch of their friends. They basically put together 3-5 band shows (typically death metal played poorly) and each band member ponies up 50 bucks each or what not and to them it's well worth it.

Some will sell merch and make their money back or at least lessen the cost but most don't even have merch. I have some inside info of what it takes to host a band for a night at this venue and what the general take can be when everything is factored in and this one particular venue owner is raking it in at every show. He's got lights, rent and 2 people on staff that are both paid 10 bucks an hour each.

For me my conscience would force me to share the wealth on a given night some. If I net 5k on a night where 3 bands played I'd damn sure throw some cash at them at the end of the night. Depends on how things went but 10% of my take would not kill me or hurt me.
In the cover bands I am in we are lucky to pull in 350 for 4 people at most places. Sure we get the occasional 600 or so when we do some places but that's seasonal and few and far between.

A "gig day" for me consists of about 11 hours total of work when everything is factored in. There's loading in from the garage into the van, driving to venue, load out, set up, sound check, play for 3-4 hrs, break down, drive home, and unload. 75 Bucks for that is 6.82 an hour when all is said and done and thats not factoring in paying for my gas, food, and drinks at the venues that do not feed and water us. If I got down to the nitty gritty and factored that all in I'd guess it brings it down to about 4 bucks an hour pay for a gig.
The way I have to look at it is that 4 bucks an hour is better than no bucks an hour and way better than paying for everything. If I don't look at it that way, then I will be miserable and grumpy and not want to do it. I love playing live and love playing with other musicians and I am not doing this to try and make a living so it works out fine for me. Does it mean I don't try hard to get the most money out of a venue that I can? Of course not. I walk that thin line of pushing for more money without discouraging the venue to have us play there. When I chat with other bands about venue pay I am often told "oh we get less than that there". Whether everyone I talk to about it is lying I dunno but if I can get even 25 bucks more than they offer then I will.

Live music is indeed dying but it's mostly for people like me that play mostly music that is 30-40 years old. The audience for that who want to go out and see a live band has shrunk considerably. I am just doing my best to enjoy what time I have left doing it.
There is so much about this post that angers me I can't even start. A tribute band is a tribute band for a reason and demands a price. I am SURE TF not putting in that much work to pay to play or walk away with $40 :wat :hmm

If a venue "can't afford to pay them"; that venue can take a flying f**king leap. Of course these a-holes like renting out to young bands with no other places to play beyond house shows that will blindly do whatever the venue wants without question. If I was in that game; I'd just stick to the house shows.
 
I am currently involved in a Tribute Band Network management company that's trying to save live music in New Mexico and more specifically Albuquerque. There are still a decent amount of venues to play BUT most of them require that the bands pay them for the "privilege" to play their rat infested $hit holes. Some places will accept a 50% cut of the door if you want to charge a cover and some want upwards of 800 dollars for a 4 hr chunk to play there. In the past this kind of tactic always preyed on original bands, but we are starting to see it headed towards doing it to cover and Tribute acts also. One of the venue owners I talked to told me he loves renting to younger folks because they pay without negotiating or questioning and always bring a bunch of their friends. They basically put together 3-5 band shows (typically death metal played poorly) and each band member ponies up 50 bucks each or what not and to them it's well worth it.

Some will sell merch and make their money back or at least lessen the cost but most don't even have merch. I have some inside info of what it takes to host a band for a night at this venue and what the general take can be when everything is factored in and this one particular venue owner is raking it in at every show. He's got lights, rent and 2 people on staff that are both paid 10 bucks an hour each.

For me my conscience would force me to share the wealth on a given night some. If I net 5k on a night where 3 bands played I'd damn sure throw some cash at them at the end of the night. Depends on how things went but 10% of my take would not kill me or hurt me.
In the cover bands I am in we are lucky to pull in 350 for 4 people at most places. Sure we get the occasional 600 or so when we do some places but that's seasonal and few and far between.

A "gig day" for me consists of about 11 hours total of work when everything is factored in. There's loading in from the garage into the van, driving to venue, load out, set up, sound check, play for 3-4 hrs, break down, drive home, and unload. 75 Bucks for that is 6.82 an hour when all is said and done and thats not factoring in paying for my gas, food, and drinks at the venues that do not feed and water us. If I got down to the nitty gritty and factored that all in I'd guess it brings it down to about 4 bucks an hour pay for a gig.
The way I have to look at it is that 4 bucks an hour is better than no bucks an hour and way better than paying for everything. If I don't look at it that way, then I will be miserable and grumpy and not want to do it. I love playing live and love playing with other musicians and I am not doing this to try and make a living so it works out fine for me. Does it mean I don't try hard to get the most money out of a venue that I can? Of course not. I walk that thin line of pushing for more money without discouraging the venue to have us play there. When I chat with other bands about venue pay I am often told "oh we get less than that there". Whether everyone I talk to about it is lying I dunno but if I can get even 25 bucks more than they offer then I will.

Live music is indeed dying but it's mostly for people like me that play mostly music that is 30-40 years old. The audience for that who want to go out and see a live band has shrunk considerably. I am just doing my best to enjoy what time I have left doing it.

Man, the pay to play stuff is what killed our scene down here, mixed with losing our rock radio. Thankfully, the new venues are not doing that. Two of the venues are already good to go with staging/lights, they are not charging a door fee yet because they’re still new and word is just getting out that there’s live music venues again. The other two venues are charging door fees and doing a 50/50 split with the venue taking 50% and whatever bands playing splitting the other 50%, but it’s all good for now because the venues are putting their 50% back into staging/lights/PA and there’s a level of trust between them and the bands/local show promoters that they’ll do the right thing when the time comes.

I’ve been distant buddies with one of the owners of a new place that’s doing the 50/50 split, this guy singlehandedly tried saving our live music scene from 2012-2016; he started a local radio station, started an internet radio station and was promoting the sh*t out of local shows without asking for a dime. He simply ran out of money and when our last live venue closed the doors he gave up. Now he’s got his own place and he’s trying to make it as awesome as possible.

That’s crazy in regards to the tribute bands. In all the circles I’m in, it’s generally stated that tribute/wedding bands are the only real money makers these days. I hope your neck of the woods wakes up before they suffer the same fate we did a few years back. It’s really endearing to see the people coming out to the local shows again and just being INTO it. In some ways, it feels better than it did in the 00’s because it’s like every band is getting fans right away because there’s been such a drought for so long. People are just stoked to have live music again. And it’s completely a mixed aged crowd. Sometimes I feel like the old dude at these shows because I look around and the people who are 21 look 15 to me.

Good luck, man!
 
in general, i think people view live music as a luxury and not a necessity. whenever that is the case, it's an expense they can live without. :(
 
Oh man, songwriters too! Yikes.

Wow, that is really disconcerting.

I have gotten so much enjoyment from music over my lifetime that to think technology is/has begun to taking away the ability for artists to make a living creating that music..., something is very wrong with that picture.

Or maybe it's just the inevitable progression of things, in a similar manner to how the invention of the tractor drove multitudes of family farmers out of business.

It's like technology has been an arc, in that the real old timers could barely even make a living before a method to transmit their music to a large audience was invented, then once a media was created, it gave way to artists making really good money, and then some even making an absolute killing. But now that trend seems to be reversing itself.

We must retain the arts. Used to be you could grind it out as a young person in a band, touring to generate a following, along with getting some radio airplay, and even though it's always been a bit of a gamble, there was a chance you could make it pay off at least to the point in which it generated a decent living for you. I'm not so sure even that's possible any more, from the looks of things. I sincerely hope I'm wrong.
 
At least over here, apart from some exceptions, there's pretty much no money anymore in music, regardless of what you're doing. Not even any kind of "functional" gigs (regardless whether it's sideman-stuff, cover bands, studio things, etc) aren't anything you could bet on anymore, especially as with all these jobs declining massively, at the same time the music offspring (is that really the proper word?) has gotten so plenty and so incredibly good that these days you can find around 20 more than just decent candidates for any kind of music related job whereas it was like 2-3 20 years ago. Heck, when I started playing theatre musicals around that time, I had a tough time to find a sub (even if I offered half of the shows) at all, today it'd take me 5 minutes on the phone to find 10 folks.

Personally, I'm just kind of surviving because I'm part of a rather old and sort of established network. But it's really just a matter of time when that won't help much anymore, either.
 


This was the show I was at!

IMG_1012.jpg
 
I’ve only ever gigged original music projects and can’t say I’ve noticed any changes in the last 20 years. A good night is maybe a couple hundred off the door, maybe a couple hundred in merch, and MAYBE a comp’d meal for the band by the venue.

My career pays my bills, my band is my passion project. We go out there knowing we probably aren’t going to tour the world or make millions. If I was doing the cover band thing or counting on the money…I’d be having a rough time.

I feel for those in the “gig economy” these days. Everywhere I look I see them being taken for a ride, all while I keep hearing some try to tout it as the way of the future. It looks bleak at best.
 



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It's almost like the Taylor Swifts are the Wal Marts of Music, while really cool and unique Mom and Pop
shops with some character and tradition are scraping the bottom of the barrel to just keep going. :idk
 
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More bad news. Sorry. :hugitout


goes to show that people know nothing about music, if Taylor Swift can top 1B then that means the mindless masses
Are to blame for the downfall of real music and talent, I think Rick Beato also said something along those lines

:pitchforks:cuss:pitchforks
 



View attachment 22198


It's almost like the Taylor Swifts are the Wal Marts of Music, while really cool and unique Mom and Pop
shops with some character and tradition are scraping the bottom of the barrel to just keep going. :idk
It's sickening, and it's fucking everywhere!

Even in my business, guys who have hardly any experience can go into a POS, cookie-cutter neighborhood of new homes..., pick a trade- roofing, siding, framing..., go in there and blast out house after house, and make 2-3x's as much (if not even more!) as a contractor with 40+ years of experience, who can remodel a home properly, and cover all the details correctly that will make things LAST, as opposed to those McMansions that will need major repairs w/i 5-10 years.

Not a perfect analogy, but it's similar.

Bar owners who hire a 1-man-band, using a looper/tracks, as opposed to hiring a good variety cover band, maybe not even to save money, but instead, just to be able to stay afloat.

And it's mostly driven by money.
 



View attachment 22198


It's almost like the Taylor Swifts are the Wal Marts of Music, while really cool and unique Mom and Pop
shops with some character and tradition are scraping the bottom of the barrel to just keep going. :idk

Well, the writings have been on the wall.
In fact they have been on the wall ever since the industrial revolution started - and yes, unfortunately this is directly related.

End stage capitalism is going to get spicy

Isn't it already?
 
Well, the writings have been on the wall.
In fact they have been on the wall ever since the industrial revolution started - and yes, unfortunately this is directly related.



Isn't it already?


I think were at a Frank's hot sauce right now. Pretty mild, slightly tangy. Plenty more scoval units to go before the real fun starts.
 
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