In 2008, Bernie Madoff single-handedly toppled the American economy. Not really, but it's no news to anybody that the economy IS in shambles. Average Americans are scrimping and saving on everything, and many of us who were fine in the 90's (can we just PLEASE have Clinton back?) are struggling to make ends meet.
But to look at the cost of being a musician, you wouldn't know it. Businesses everywhere are trying to adapt to the market, lowering prices or creating bargains to help people who can't afford to spend all sorts of money.
Musicians are practically the definition of "everyday American" (except we get laid more.) We are most of the time just normal people with a passion and a dream, and we work our asses off, toiling day after day in hopes that one day we'll reach that (American) dream of selling a bazillion records and playing Wembley or something (is that what the kids are into these days?) So why hasn't the industry we serve adapted to this crisis?
I'm not just going to take the easy way out and bitch about the price of instruments. A 50 watt Marshall practice amp should not cost 400 dollars under any circumstances, nor should it be impossible to find a good guitar for less than $500. But this all has to do with the "Rockstar" mentality of being loaded, having expensive shit, being Bono, etc., and it's unlikely to change.
This being a blog about the local scene, that's what I want to talk about. Now, I would love to be able to go out to shows every other night and get a real tatse of the talent (or lack thereof) in Chicago. But everywhere you go, door prices are a minimum of $8. Added to the facts that none of these fucking places are close to anywhere, so I have to drive (the price of gas...sigh...) and the even more ridiculous prices of food and drinks (one place was selling pizza slices for, I shit you not, $16) this is simply too much money. Sure, I could take the train (still almost five dollars roundtrip) and not buy any food or drinks, but what the hell kind of night out is that? Especially faced with the looming probability that the band(s) you are going to see just won't be any good?
This goes for all of the clubs that force bands to sell presale tickets and then gives them some sort of embarassing 'cut' of the money, a figure which in my experience is usually about 1/8th. Try selling even $8 presale tickets to your friends and family to go see your crappy band on a Wednesday evening and you'll hear an almost unanimous chorus of "Sorry, I'll show up, but I don't have any cash on me!" Of course, few of them do show up, and even though the club says that they'll also give you a cut of the draw that didn't buy presale tickets, all they need to do is hand you a fiver at the end of the day and say that's your payment, because they know one thing very well: "What the fuck are you gonna do about it?"
Merchandise is another big problem. When making T-Shirts for my band, I was given a rate of 7 dollars a shirt, and that was at a discount because the shirtmaker is a family friend. So, 100 shirts became $700, and if I hope to make any sort of meaningful profit these things are going to have to go for a MINIMUM of $10 a pop, which is way too much to spend on a local band's T-Shirt, unless you're a huge fan. We tried selling them for 15, and in a few months, we'd sold approximately zero shirts. After lowering the price to 10, we've sold about 6 shirts.
Also, bands, whatever happened to giving out music samples for free? Too many times have I been somewhat interested in listening to a band I've seen, but when I ask them for a CD, I get a gruff reply of "ten dollars." Or however much they're selling it for. Generally, it's not even a professional CD, but something that they burned and then stuck a label on. What, you guys can't make little two-song samplers and give them out for free at your shows? Somebody interested in listening to your music should be payment enough.
Since we've been active (for less than a year), my band has shelled out...let's count!
$1200 for our rehearsal space (and counting!)
$700 for T-Shirts
$400 for equipment that we didn't already own ourselves
$100 for general promotion (Ads, flyers, etc.)
And another $200 for misc. crap (earplugs, batteries, gas to get to and from practice, gigs, etc.--this adds up!)
So, all told, that's about $2600 in little under a year, for what I'm going to call the bare necessities of being in a band. We've probably made about $200 back in gigs, tips, and merch sales. That's horseshit.
There are BS justifications for all of these, so don't expect any of them to go away as long as people remain greedy, so...well, I guess some things never change.
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