Wow it's already time for a new MyWeek in Music. Time flies when you're having fun!
There was only a little bit of Music that I made it to this week so I will talk about it in a moment. So I will talk about support for a few minutes. Now I know how many people actually subscribe to this little newsletter. And I know there a very large number of people who stop by to check out what I write. I know I have some kind of audience. So I am going to take this opportunity to talk to you out there about coming out to support some of these bands I talk about.
Now let me ask you a question. When you think of a performer/singer/musician, what do you think? If you are like most of us or like some of the people I talk to all the time. You have assumptions of what its like for a musician. Especially, if they are actually playing somewhere where you have to spend money to go into, or to buy coffee or alcohol. Or, you think of musicians as making tons of money and all they do is sit back after playing and watch the money roll in. But this is not the case. They are like anyone else. They have day jobs in order to make ends meet, at least most of them. Many are even worse off and have no real income at all. They are like the wandering minstrels of old. A little like the old axiom of the starving artist. Most of the time when you go to a bar or some coffee shop, these musicians don't get paid for their performances. Occasionally here and there they may get some money for a gig from being hired but usually a couple of hundred dollars has to be split between all the bands that played. All the band members, the sounds guy, the lighting guy, etc. By the end of the night some are lucky to get away with $20, if that much? Musicians also sell their songs via merchandise. Like CD's, T-shirts, other marketable junk basically to get their name out there to be known so they can have a chance to play for a larger audience. What many do not realize is how hard it is for the musician to produce this merchandise. Many have none because they just don't have the funds necessary to produce a CD. To pay for the studio, the engineer, the producer, the pressing and mastering of the CD's themselves. Yes it's a lot cheaper to do all this nowadays because of Indie labels and such but it is still too expensive for most musicians. And since most of them have to have the day job just to pay rent and bills, a lot of their extra cash if they have any is put into their equipment, maintenance and just paying to get heard. Yes most of these artists would love to make tons of money but really they just want to play music and have an audience play to, that audience is why they play. So when I occasionally say hey look some of these people up and go out and support them. Part of it is just to go out and listen to them. Show them you appreciate their music and their struggle. Music is the key to a lot of people's happiness. Not everyone likes art or TV or movies or reading. There are very few people in the world that doesn't listen to some form of music. And when you do go out and listen, throw some money into that tip jar, or guitar case. Or pick up some merchandise. When you tip you are tipping for the performance you hear, when you pick up CD's you are really taking a part of them home to enjoy over and over. It's well worth the money and half the time it's cheaper than buying it online or from a store. So you make a better deal, save money and help to support a musician in a small way. Support your local artist in whatever way you can and preserve a worldwide need for the human race to make music.
Okay off my soapbox. Like I said I didn't go out and see as much music this week as I would have liked. Most of the time I am as broke as anyone can get. Most of the stuff I go see doesn't have a cover charge but this week there are a lot of bigger venues going on that do charge and I just didn't have the money to go. But hopefully this can't last much longer. Last time I talked about the possibility of working at Portugalia in the form of a sound guy. But another was hired instead of me but I decided to negotiate for myself and now I am the back-ups backup. LOL. But I still got an opportunity to do sound at Portugalia for Chelsea Flor's and the Dreamstalker's. Which went pretty well for my first foray into doing sound. We had a couple of problems but they were not me, but problems with the equipment. I have been talking with other people about doing or learning sound but I won't mention who or what they are because whenever I get excited and talk about things before they happen then they tend to fall through. So I will refrain from jinxing myself for now. For the rest of the evening I went with Chelsea and her entourage while she played at other venues that night and got to hear some people doing open mike at O'Connells. I didn't catch all the names, but Brooklyn played with Doktor Dave Sawyer and of course Chelsea and the Dreamstalkers. They also had a couple of people who came up and played some blues that I really liked but I didn't catch their name because I really went out to be social this night and I wasn't paying as close attention as I usually do to the music. Next time I hear these guys I will find out more about them because they were too good to just be doing an open mike for mere practice playing in front of people. They were that good. Well that about wraps up the MyWeek this week. So I will try to do this once a week again unless some really great stuff happens and I feel like writing about it again. Well I'm Out!
Ciao
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