BigRedX

I think you probably meant to say "Playing covers in a group is an essential part of learning your craft." I'd been playing in originals bands for 10 years before I played a cover. The song in question taught me nothing about arrangements or form, in fact we altered the arrangement of the final verse to make it more interesting otherwise the song would have been an intro followed by 4 verses that only varied in the lyrics, each separated by 4 bars of identical instrumental. IMO it is perfectly possible to learn about songwriting, arrangement and form simply by listening. You don't need to actually play anything, and certainly not in a band. Besides many successful songs are those that break the conventions of the time regarding those attributes.

But for a lot of classical music the composer would be part of the original permanence, and if not it would have been written specifically for a particular performer or ensemble. It's only since the death of the composer(s) in question that music essentially becomes a cover.

It sounds like me that they were too interested in being musicians and not concentrating enough on the songwriting or the performance. IMO if you can't put on a performance there is no point in playing live irrespective of whether you use backing or not. That's hardly new. Unfortunately bands have been doing that for at least the last 60 years.

As someone who both writes and plays, the lucrative part is nearly always in the composition and not the playing. I have a back-catalogue of 45 years worth of songs, and although most of the songs that aren't being performed by my current band only earn a few pounds a year, it all adds up, and it only takes a couple of songs to become popular either from my band or someone deciding to do a cover and I could be set for the rest of life. I'm certainly not going to be scrabbling around for paying gigs in covers bands just so I can pay the bills, because that would kill any enthusiasm for performing music that I have. For me, income from writing a song is like buying a premium bond. I'm know that I'm very unlikely to win a big prize, but if I don't do it then my chances of "winning" are definitely zero. But each additional song is a very slight extra chance. And if by some miracle one of my songs does become successful, it doesn't affect my current musical activities. I can still continue to do what I want right now and not have to bow to the pressures of having another "hit".

I would like to be able to earn enough from writing, recording and performing music so that I could give up my day job and concentrate on it full time. The more time I have for music the better I think it will be. Currently I'm posting this in between laying out pages for a very boring magazine that will take me most of this week and pay the bills for the next month. I would not be doing this if I didn't have to.

But music has moved on and you haven't. Besides it's hardly new. I was working with bands using drum machines and backing tracks back in 1981. The Who used backing tapes in order to perform "Baba O'Riley" and "Won't Get Fooled Again" in the 70s. I bet no-one other than the Musician's Union complained about that. I would love to be able perform our songs without programmed backing but finding a drummer and synth player with the technical ability to do what we need is proving impossible. Also it would completely mess up the logistics of playing live. As I said in my original post we get the whole band plus all the instruments we need to play a gig into a single estate car. We can be set up and be ready to play in under 10 minutes from load in. We couldn't do any of those things with a drummer and second synth player.

Did the OP ask for a valuation? If so that's the offending part. Please repost your original question but don't ask what it is worth.

We have the facility to extend sections of our backing track should we want to. However we have yet to use it at an actual gig. Likewise when I have been in bands that were totally live we rarely changed the length or structure the songs on the fly, and if we did it was because someone had messed up and it was a chance for us all the catch up and get back in sync, not because we thought the song could do with being a bit longer. Currently my band is in the enviable position that we have more songs that we would like to play, and more importantly that our audience want to hear, than will fit in a typical sub-45 minute set, so we would much rather play another song than extend a couple of the others, and I think our audience would prefer that too.

Name bands have always charged support bands for tour slots, with a few notable exceptions. In the days when the tour was a loss-leader for album sales it helped keeps the losses down. Now that the live performance is the main source of income ofd most artists having a support band that pays is probably more important than ever for making the tour profitable.

Being successful at sport is almost always about being very good at it which is relatively easily quantifiable. Music on the other hand is nearly entirely subjective.

That sounds to me like you were insufficiently rehearsed and put your faith in the ability of people who weren't part of the band and intoxicated to be able control the music. You'd have had an equally disastrous outcome if any one of the musicians had been intoxicated. When any of the bands I've been in have used programmed or recorded backing we practice for every contingency we can think of. For the bands where the backing is just "icing" we have practiced playing the songs without it. For the others when something goes wrong in rehearsal we don't stop but play on and work out how to get out of the problem, such as the singer missing their cue or coming in early, so if it happens at a gig we'll get through it and only those in the audience who know the songs inside-out might notice that something went awry. We also control the backing from the stage and have the ability to do so without it being obvious to the audience.

That's assuming that all originals bands are equal as are the genres that they play. Maybe if you play undefined guitar-based pop/rock that is the case, but if you fit into an identifiable genre, especially one with an active scene there are plenty of gigs if you are halfway decent. I'd like to think that my current band are unbelievably awesome, but the reality is that there are plenty in the genre (goth/post-punk) that write more memorable songs that we do and have a better image, but we still manage to get plenty of gigs. We have multiple gigs booked every month between now and September and are in the enviable position where we can turn down offers that aren't appropriate or worthwhile from either a financial PoV or for putting us in front of a receptive audience who may not have seen us before. On top of that we made over £100 from Spotify plays alone last year and will probably triple that this year, which is good going when the average stream is a fraction of the cent... All of this happens because we work hard at promoting the band, and put on show when we do play. It's not difficult if you are organised and put in the required effort on top of your technical ability as a musician.

IME the only reason originals bands play for free is either because they have specifically decided to do so, or because they are too disorganised to ask for payment. Similarly there is no reason why bands playing charity and benefit events shouldn't be paid. One of the better paying gigs I did last year was a benefit. We would have done it fro free because we whole-heartedly support the cause but the organisers insisted on paying us and the other performers for putting in the time and effort to do it.

You've been rather coy about what sport(s) you have taken part in, which may make a difference to my opinion, but broadly if people are paying to see you perform as a musician or sports person then I think I would want paying. As a musician I've always been paid apart from those occasions where I have specifically agreed to provide my entertainment for free. The payment might not always have covered my costs directly, although when that happens the profit on the sales of merch normally make up the difference.

Most of the things that I have wanted to do with modular synths in the past can, these days, be replaced on any synth that allows MIDI CC assignment and tempo controlled synchronisation of the relevant parameters. Also IIRC Emerson had a roadie to repatch his modular Moog while he was slicking knives in the Hammond Organ.

Do people pay to watch you play sport? Does anyone other than the suppliers and manufacturers of the equipment and clothing that you use, make money out of your sporting activities?

These "complaints" mostly occurred in the 90s with a band that went through numerous line-ups some that included a drummer and others that didn't, and therefore I assumed that the people complaining were drummers angling for a job. Interestingly no-one ever complained about the keyboards being on the backing which applied at all the line-ups but one where we had to drop quite a few well-loved songs because the the synth player, despite being a considerably more accomplished player than me, was unable to recreate several of the keyboard parts to the standard that was required to make the songs sound decent. It's not been a problem with the current band because in the goth/post-punk genre some form of programmed or recorded backing is perfectly acceptable I come across more bands currently gigging with backing tracks than those who play completely live.

My band uses backing tracks. It enables us to get the whole band plus all our gear and merch in one car for travelling to gigs. It means we can fit in spaces on stage that more conventional bands wouldn't. We've picked up gigs at decent venues supporting much better known bands simply because of our smaller than usual stage footprint. Our backing replaces a drummer and a second synth player. While I know a couple of drummers with sufficient technical ability to replace the programmed drums neither are interested in playing our genre of music, and the synth parts are basically technical challenging but very repetitive or just the occasional sound effect/texture and are far better handled by a machine rather than a human being. Besides most bands I see using programmed or recorded backing have far more on the backing tracking than necessary. IMO even with backing tracks playing live is not about perfectly reproducing what is on the recording. I'm always paring down our backing to just what I think is essential for us to preform the song live. Most of the songs only have drums and very minimal second synth. I'm been in bands for almost 45 years now that have used some form of non-human element to play some of the parts. My standard response to anyone who complains about this is to ask them if they are interested in joining the band as a replacement for the tape/machine(s). Unsurprisingly I have yet to have someone take up my offer.

I thought he used 9, albeit in three switchable banks of three?

No DI output. That's strange. Both of the Originals ('83 and '85) I owned had DIs, although the '83 had the pre-amp replaced so the socket was no longer connected. Would make me wonder if it no longer had the filter pre-amp fitted which for me is one of the major attractions of this bass, along with the shape.

The rather confusing need to enable the "microphone" in order to be able to record external sources in Logic has been there a while, but it still caught me out when I upgraded from a 2010 MacPro to a Mac Studio. The Voice isolation mode appears to be a more recent development. BTW if you are on Facebook you should consider joining the excellent Apple Logic Pro Users Group.

All the bands I have seen in the last couple of years who use IEMs but whose guitarist(s) use amp-driven sustain and/or feedback as part of their sound have a SMALL amp somewhere on stage specifically for this purpose. It's placed so that it doesn't affect FoH but in a convenient location for its intended function. I've seen one placed with a 45° tilt-back at the front of the stage pointing directly at the guitarist.

IME semi-modular synths are always too much of a compromise. I had a Korg MS20 in the 80s which promised much more than it actually delivered. Many of the routings that modular users take for granted like being able to use the audio signal as a modulation source were unavailable, and TBH the patch pay while looking impressive could have been quite effectively replaced with a few switches. Similarly with the 2600. I was helping someone out on another forum with a patch routing and it was very quickly apparent that in order to do what they wanted another VCA and EG were required. And this was for a fairly simple patch that most non-modular synths could achieve on their own. Where The MS20 excelled was when you wanted to interface it with other equipment and when paired with the fully modular MS50, but IMO if you are going to do that you might as well build your own modular system from scratch, so you can concentrate on those modules that actually do what you want, and as long as you don't run out of Eurorack space, it's easy to add more VCAs/LFOs/EGs etc. as you find you need them. And if you don't find you need them you would have probably been able to make do with something non-modular.

But what about woodwind or brass transposing instruments? When they read a "C" do they think of it as "C" or whatever note their instrument actually makes?

I already do a creative job, graphic design, where much of the time I have little interest in what I am creating and my function is to produce what the client wants. If I really disagree with the creative direction that a project is going in, I will have one go at trying to persuade them my idea would be better, but ultimately the client is in charge and after that I'll take their money, shut up and do exactly as they ask. However when it comes to the music I want to play, I'm only interested in what I actually like. For me music is too important to be wasting time with songs I can't get 100% behind and I hope that the rest of the band feel the same. We are currently in the enviable position where we have more songs we really like than will fit in a typical 45 minute set.