TimR

QED.

I joined 3 bands through JMB. The first I'm still in. The third has stopped due to availability but is definitely a restart prospect when the guys get some time. The second had disaster written all over it from the initial contact. He messaged me. I declined about 3 times. Then one afternoon he catches me out of the blue and asks if I fancied meeting for a jam. I was free so met up. The music was good, he seemed to know what he wanted, despite the initial contact. We then had a few weeks of good rehearsals and then it descended into chaos with random musicians turning up each week. My first gut feelings were correct. He's not actually told me I'm not in the band but he messaged me the other week asking if I knew any venues that were looking for bands. Just strange...

This is Pimlico's law. The longer a discussion goes on about musicians' pay, sooner or later someone will bring plumbers into the chat. It's like Godwins law but with different kinds of tanks.

Many a word spoken in jest.

Did they use music stands?

It is a bit rose tinted. There was a lot of absolute rubbish in the 80s. I endured it. The 90s and 00s wasn't much better. But with the huge amounts of material, some good tunes do come through. It's a good point about not having producers giving music a sense check. Everyone should have a second pair of ears listen to their music for criticism. Saves a lot of playing gigs and wondering why no one is coming to see your band - and thinking it's your social media at fault. 🤣

So if you won a guitar by spending 10% of what it was worth. And then sold it for 50% of list price, you have a tidy profit plus easily another 10% to spend on more tickets. The odds of winning are very high for a pretty good return. That could easily explain why the same names are coming up.

Audiences are easily pleased. If they can tap their feet, or jump up and down they're happy. Bonus points for a chorus they can sing along to the second time it's played if they don't know it already.

Something that others may have realised but has just been highlighted to me. Goods are travelling backwards and forwards multiple times during processesing, manufacture and assembly, between Mexico/US and Canada/US. This is going to be adding multiple lots of 25% each time a part crosses the border. Unless I'm missing something. Raw aluminium into the US. Processed aluminum back to Canada and made into a component. Component back to US. Component assembled into engine/gearbox and sent back to Canada. Engine in to car and sent back to the US. Just an example, probably just one of many.

Playing originals in a group is an essential part of learning your craft. It's evidenced by a load of originals bands who just don't understand either how arrangements work, nor what form is. You can tell who has studied those aspects and who hasn't.

Wonder what mood he will be in when he wakes up this morning. Will he concentrate on Putin and forget to postpone the Tarrifs in time for Wednesday? Because if he doesn't delay the Tarifs again that's going to be the real start of problems.

I actually had someone tell me similar at the end of a gig once. "The bass line to XXX doesn't go like that." My reply: "Well it did tonight mate."

It's down to execution. I saw a band on Saturday night. The guitarist wasn't that great a guitarist and was also playing keys and triggering sequences and samples. He wasn't a great keys player either. It was originals. The singer was getting visibly frustrated that the audience weren't engaging. But to be honest they should have lost all the fancy extra production and concentrated on a simpler guitar part. Whatever vision the band had in their heads wasn't coming across. Plus the drummer had a massive kit and was playing all the drums all at the same time. The whole thing was just a noise. It was originals. And again the traditional hook, and form of verse and chorus were absent.

Agree with everything you've written. And, if they fall victim to the sunk cost fallacy, they'll borrow and/or throw in more savings. Especially if they're tied into a longer contract. Our local has seen 3 sets of wealthy people bankrupted. Why no one has taken out a class action or got together on this, I don't know, it seems incredibly shadey business practices. I had a friend who took a pub contract to a business advisor before signing it, and was told on no uncertain terms not to agree to anything and to walk away. Add in small village mentality where newcomers are distrusted and if your face doesn't fit they won't patronise your business, it's mental.

People are being fed music that has more production done to it to make it sound good than the quality of music it contains.