Apparently…..it isn’t a job

[mrtcat]

At the time when I left school, becoming a musician seemed a complete impossibility. I was a fairly average bass player who seriously lacked self confidence. My mother was pretty unpleasant and criticised me at pretty much every opportunity and that just made me less confident.

 

After uni I took a rubbish job just to keep her off my back. After 2 years I was so sick of it that I jacked it in and followed my then girlfriend out to Greece where she had found a job with one of the big tour operators for the summer. She hated her job and we fell out so she left for home. I took her job, which i had been helping her with anyway and stayed for the rest of the summer. I loved it and at the end of the summer I was offered promotion and winter work in ski resorts which turned into full time year round work eventually working as a snowboard instructor in Europe and then the USA. I did it for 11 years and saw the world, meeting my wife along the way. By this point my confidence was sky high and, when we returned to the UK in 2008, I quickly picked up music again.

 

I now earn half of my income from music and set up my own pest control business that allows me to make up the rest of my income whilst being flexible enough to gig multiple times a week.

 

I couldn't care less whether anyone thinks music is a valid form of income. It works well for me and my family and I'm happy. I know plenty of people with "proper" jobs who can't honestly say they are happy.

[dmccombe7]

36 minutes ago, tegs07 said:

By route of average wage vs house prices and the difficulties faced by musicians I believe. One of the drawbacks of living in a country that has a core belief that house price inflation is sacrosanct and should be celebrated and promoted at all costs is that eventually wages can’t keep up with house prices.

 

I grew up on an estate built for railway workers and their families. It was largely council, then became largely privately owned. Fast forward to 2022 and you would need a combined house-hold income of around £80K a year to live in an ex-council house. 

I doubt if there are that many railway workers or full time musicians living there now.

We have more people with mortgages nowadays than ever before so either house buying is easier now than it used to be or wages are higher altho most families nowadays have 2 adults working which is a big change from when i was young and your Mum was busy looking after the house and us kids.

Ahhhhh happy days. 😀

 

 

[dmccombe7]

51 minutes ago, tegs07 said:

 

 

Edit: In response to the confused emoji I have found as areas become gentrified much of the creative elements move out as the well heeled move in. The place I grew up in was a dump but the local music scene was excellent.

In response i hit the wrong emoji......👍

[tegs07]

Just now, dmccombe7 said:

In response i hit the wrong emoji......👍

I do that when I put the wrong glasses on  🧐

[dmccombe7]

49 minutes ago, mrtcat said:

At the time when I left school, becoming a musician seemed a complete impossibility. I was a fairly average bass player who seriously lacked self confidence. My mother was pretty unpleasant and criticised me at pretty much every opportunity and that just made me less confident.

 

After uni I took a rubbish job just to keep her off my back. After 2 years I was so sick of it that I jacked it in and followed my then girlfriend out to Greece where she had found a job with one of the big tour operators for the summer. She hated her job and we fell out so she left for home. I took her job, which i had been helping her with anyway and stayed for the rest of the summer. I loved it and at the end of the summer I was offered promotion and winter work in ski resorts which turned into full time year round work eventually working as a snowboard instructor in Europe and then the USA. I did it for 11 years and saw the world, meeting my wife along the way. By this point my confidence was sky high and, when we returned to the UK in 2008, I quickly picked up music again.

 

I now earn half of my income from music and set up my own pest control business that allows me to make up the rest of my income whilst being flexible enough to gig multiple times a week.

 

I couldn't care less whether anyone thinks music is a valid form of income. It works well for me and my family and I'm happy. I know plenty of people with "proper" jobs who can't honestly say they are happy.

Nice one. I like to hear stories of people that followed their dream and it worked for them. Unfortunately its quite rare IME.

I was happy at work in 90's when i was doing my Instrument Engineering job looking after analysis kit for the electronics industry gas supplies.

I really enjoyed going to work back then but jobs changed and the further up the tree i went the more stressed i got. Hindsight is a wonderful thing and if only. Unfortunately companies wnated multi-skilled engineers and specific engineers were forced into production jobs while still doing maintenance work. 

Dave

[Tim2291]

1 hour ago, mrtcat said:

At the time when I left school, becoming a musician seemed a complete impossibility. I was a fairly average bass player who seriously lacked self confidence. My mother was pretty unpleasant and criticised me at pretty much every opportunity and that just made me less confident.

 

After uni I took a rubbish job just to keep her off my back. After 2 years I was so sick of it that I jacked it in and followed my then girlfriend out to Greece where she had found a job with one of the big tour operators for the summer. She hated her job and we fell out so she left for home. I took her job, which i had been helping her with anyway and stayed for the rest of the summer. I loved it and at the end of the summer I was offered promotion and winter work in ski resorts which turned into full time year round work eventually working as a snowboard instructor in Europe and then the USA. I did it for 11 years and saw the world, meeting my wife along the way. By this point my confidence was sky high and, when we returned to the UK in 2008, I quickly picked up music again.

 

I now earn half of my income from music and set up my own pest control business that allows me to make up the rest of my income whilst being flexible enough to gig multiple times a week.

 

I couldn't care less whether anyone thinks music is a valid form of income. It works well for me and my family and I'm happy. I know plenty of people with "proper" jobs who can't honestly say they are happy.

I am pushing to try and get my income from music to be more than it is currently, I'd love to have a 50/50 split as you have but do lack the confidence a lot of the time! Something I am working on, after 20 years of playing, including tours and numerous high end wedding bands (have to keep reminding myself of these to keep confident), I feel I am finally getting somewhere. My biggest issue currently is that the band I am in has some awesome people in it that I wouldn't want to lose, but they do not have similar aspirations to me!

[Woodinblack]

3 hours ago, tegs07 said:

Edit: In response to the confused emoji I have found as areas become gentrified much of the creative elements move out as the well heeled move in. The place I grew up in was a dump but the local music scene was excellent.

 

Agreed - you get 'cool' neighbourhoods where people want to live, but in doing so price out the sort of people that made it a cool neighbourhood, so these things move around.

[nilorius]

Pro - is always a good cash.

Edited October 13, 2022 by nilorius

[Nicko]

1 hour ago, nilorius said:

Pro - is always a good cash.

Surely being a "pro" musician is like being any other person selling their time for a service.  The amount of money you get depends on what services you provide and how many hours you can provide on each.   

 

There are multinational megastars, internationally renowned session musicians, jobbing session musicians,  busy function bands, touring tribute bands, cruise ship staff , struggling originals bands etc.  And then there's and the bloke that plays 4 pub gigs a month runs a couple of open mic sessions and teaches kids how to play  three evenings a week just to keep afloat.

 

Most of the pro musicians I've know have been the latter.  I've known a few ex pros who made a bit of cash from originals bands and now have conventional careers and one guy who played sessions but now runs a music shop.

[Tim2291]

3 minutes ago, Nicko said:

Surely being a "pro" musician is like being any other person selling their time for a service.  The amount of money you get depends on what services you provide and how many hours you can provide on each.   

 

There are multinational megastars, internationally renowned session musicians, jobbing session musicians,  busy function bands, touring tribute bands, cruise ship staff , struggling originals bands etc.  And then there's and the bloke that plays 4 pub gigs a month runs a couple of open mic sessions and teaches kids how to play  three evenings a week just to keep afloat.

 

Most of the pro musicians I've know have been the latter.  I've known a few ex pros who made a bit of cash from originals bands and now have conventional careers and one guy who played sessions but now runs a music shop.

It would be amazing if being a musician was like any other person selling their time and it should be 100%. You wouldn't expect a building tradesman to turn up and work for "exposure" or even £50 and lets be honest, most gigging musicians who are trying to earn a living spent a lot longer practicing their trade than a builder does (not many builders start their craft before their 10th birthday)! Sadly a lot of the people hiring musicians are opportunistic snakes that want to exploit them for their own gain! It drives me insane when I see local bands accepting unpaid gigs, this takes the income away from those who rely on it!

[nilorius]

5 minutes ago, Tim2291 said:

It would be amazing if being a musician was like any other person selling their time and it should be 100%. You wouldn't expect a building tradesman to turn up and work for "exposure" or even £50 and lets be honest, most gigging musicians who are trying to earn a living spent a lot longer practicing their trade than a builder does (not many builders start their craft before their 10th birthday)! Sadly a lot of the people hiring musicians are opportunistic snakes that want to exploit them for their own gain! It drives me insane when I see local bands accepting unpaid gigs, this takes the income away from those who rely on it!

How can you match a pro builder with a pro musician !! And yes - they are selling their time, because when they become pro, they don't need to think about genres which they will play tomorow and after tomorow. They do it, because they like to play and people who likes to hear them a lot, pays them what they deserve.

[Tim2291]

3 minutes ago, nilorius said:

How can you match a pro builder with a pro musician !! And yes - they are selling their time, because when they become pro, they don't need to think about genres which they will play tomorow and after tomorow. They do it, because they like to play and people who likes to hear them a lot, pays them what they deserve.

Pro musicians are essentially tradespeople, their trade is playing music, we aren't talking international megastars here, we are talking normal people who are hired by others to play for them, be it a wedding band, a session or a teacher. These people work at their trade and deserve fair pay. Most musicians do need to think about what genre they are playing the next day, session people get called in for anything at a moments notice, the people playing on musicals can go from a rock tune to jazz in the space of 5 minutes. Pro musicians aren't just the world famous guys or the people trying to make it as one of them, it is the people supporting their family using the tool they have worked at for many years. 

 

Are you suggesting that session musicians, cruise ship musicians, function bands, teachers etc are not professionals? They are directly comparable to builders. 

[nilorius]

3 minutes ago, Tim2291 said:

Pro musicians are essentially tradespeople, their trade is playing music, we aren't talking international megastars here, we are talking normal people who are hired by others to play for them, be it a wedding band, a session or a teacher. These people work at their trade and deserve fair pay. Most musicians do need to think about what genre they are playing the next day, session people get called in for anything at a moments notice, the people playing on musicals can go from a rock tune to jazz in the space of 5 minutes. Pro musicians aren't just the world famous guys or the people trying to make it as one of them, it is the people supporting their family using the tool they have worked at for many years. 

 

Are you suggesting that session musicians, cruise ship musicians, function bands, teachers etc are not professionals? They are directly comparable to builders. 

Yes You are right - not all rockstars are pro level musicians, but there are a lot of them who are the biggest pros also.

[tegs07]

1 hour ago, Tim2291 said:

Sadly a lot of the people hiring musicians are opportunistic snakes that want to exploit them for their own gain! It drives me insane when I see local bands accepting unpaid gigs, this takes the income away from those who rely on it!

There have been a few discussions of this nature on BC sometimes a little heated. I only played live a couple of times in my teens and each time was for free. The fact was myself and the band I was in were not good enough to get paid. A few local pubs used to let bands play mid week. The best of the bunch got to play Saturday nights and got paid. Nothing massive but they had a good crowd.

 

Several individuals from the best local bands went on to make a living playing music. Some were part time covers/function band/teaching/other sidelines. A couple even made some reasonable cash as solo artists and still earn good money solely from music a couple of decades down the road.

We are talking a handful out of scores of people over several years that went on to make a living purely doing what they loved meaning full time with no other job to make ends meet.

 

If I were to play live again, which would be nice I doubt if I would get paid beyond beer and petrol money.

If I were to go to a Bristol venue like the Thekla or Fleece it would be to see bands I have bought tickets for as I seek them out when they play locally. 

I wouldn’t pay to see local bands I have never heard of. I have in the past, usually because a mate was in one of the bands on the bill. It was generally pretty cheap and rarely anything I would repeat. That’s the dilemma really.

 

Are the venues opportunist snake exploiters or just caught in the same catch 22?

Edited October 13, 2022 by tegs07

[mikel]

40 minutes ago, Tim2291 said:

It would be amazing if being a musician was like any other person selling their time and it should be 100%. You wouldn't expect a building tradesman to turn up and work for "exposure" or even £50 and lets be honest, most gigging musicians who are trying to earn a living spent a lot longer practicing their trade than a builder does (not many builders start their craft before their 10th birthday)! Sadly a lot of the people hiring musicians are opportunistic snakes that want to exploit them for their own gain! It drives me insane when I see local bands accepting unpaid gigs, this takes the income away from those who rely on it!

You employ a trades person because you need something building, installing or fixing, and you pay accordingly. Listening to music is mostly done for pleasure, and a decision to spend disposable income. If you only had the money for one you would get your property put right, every time. Apples and Oranges really. 

[msb]

We don’t have a high density population , few of the major tours come down this way , we’re way off in a corner of the continent. We do have an unusual number of bars for the population. 
So we don’t have many local musicians living here making big incomes , most are at best around sustenance levels. But we do have a lot of players. 
Most are working musicians rather than rock stars.

[BigRedX]

If you do anything "creative" and want to be able to make a living out of it, then unless you are very lucky, you will need to supply what your customers/clients want. Music is no different.

 

I earn my living in a another creative area doing print graphics, and because I want to get paid, I will produce whatever my clients ask for. If I really think that they are wrong I will have one attempt at trying to gently persuade them to go for what I consider to be a better option. However, ultimately I'm not precious about it, and if they are determined then I will give them exactly what they ask for and take their money with a smile and a thank you.

 

If you can do that as a musician, then all power to you. I can't. I find that music is too important for me to produce something I don't believe completely in. I've had a go at it and didn't enjoy it enough for the money I was getting be a suitable substitute. That's just me.

Edited October 13, 2022 by BigRedX

[dmccombe7]

I once played for free drinks at my local on a Sat afternoon. 

That was a huge mistake for the owner and he freely admitted it at the end of the night as we were buying rounds for mates too.

I remember him telling us it cost him over £300 for our free booze.

He never did that again and it was always a fixed fee of £100-£150 back in 80's. He was a great pub owner and oddly enough i'm back in that very pub next week Sat night for a good bit more money now tho.

Happy days 

Dave

[dmccombe7]

Bands have always just been a hobby to me. I've always had a good job with a pretty decent salary and walking away from a great salary for a hobby never made any sense to me.

I never wanted playing bass to be a job as i was always worried i'd get fed up with it. Again that's just me. The mates i knew back in 70's only one made a decent go of it out of about 5 or 6 mates in bands. He went on to sing with Rainbow and i'm guessing made a decent living from it. 

Others gave up well paid jobs and after 1-5 yrs were back in pub bands and doing a mediocre paid day job. Perhaps they were happy with that choice of at least trying to make a success of it. I never really asked them.

I simply dont have that kind of commitment to bands. I'm enjoying it far more now than i ever did but i dont have the day job holding me back.

Dave

[Tim2291]

16 hours ago, tegs07 said:

There have been a few discussions of this nature on BC sometimes a little heated. I only played live a couple of times in my teens and each time was for free. The fact was myself and the band I was in were not good enough to get paid. A few local pubs used to let bands play mid week. The best of the bunch got to play Saturday nights and got paid. Nothing massive but they had a good crowd.

 

Several individuals from the best local bands went on to make a living playing music. Some were part time covers/function band/teaching/other sidelines. A couple even made some reasonable cash as solo artists and still earn good money solely from music a couple of decades down the road.

We are talking a handful out of scores of people over several years that went on to make a living purely doing what they loved meaning full time with no other job to make ends meet.

 

If I were to play live again, which would be nice I doubt if I would get paid beyond beer and petrol money.

If I were to go to a Bristol venue like the Thekla or Fleece it would be to see bands I have bought tickets for as I seek them out when they play locally. 

I wouldn’t pay to see local bands I have never heard of. I have in the past, usually because a mate was in one of the bands on the bill. It was generally pretty cheap and rarely anything I would repeat. That’s the dilemma really.

 

Are the venues opportunist snake exploiters or just caught in the same catch 22?

 

And herein lies the issue the OP of this has highlighted. Musicians are arguing that musicians shouldn't be paid for their work and are therefore devaluing their own craft... almost suggesting that it isn't a real job.

 

My comments aren't necessarily to do with originals bands, covers band regularly get asked to pay for free as well. I've been asked to do weddings, parties etc for free in the past, I politely declined.

 

My overwhelming experience when I was playing originals on tour was that promoters will do anything to not pay the bands. We played sold out shows, 250+ people paying to get in then buying drinks at the bar and have been told that they can't afford to pay the bands... clearly not true. That was the common theme throughout most of the UK. If an originals band is struggling to get known, then they need to evaluate why, like any business, if nobody is buying their music then like any product, it needs to be changed for the market. 

[Tim2291]

13 hours ago, BigRedX said:

If you do anything "creative" and want to be able to make a living out of it, then unless you are very lucky, you will need to supply what your customers/clients want. Music is no different.

 

I earn my living in a another creative area doing print graphics, and because I want to get paid, I will produce whatever my clients ask for. If I really think that they are wrong I will have one attempt at trying to gently persuade them to go for what I consider to be a better option. However, ultimately I'm not precious about it, and if they are determined then I will give them exactly what they ask for and take their money with a smile and a thank you.

 

If you can do that as a musician, then all power to you. I can't. I find that music is too important for me to produce something I don't believe completely in. I've had a go at it and didn't enjoy it enough for the money I was getting be a suitable substitute. That's just me.

Totally agree with you, to earn money in ANY industry you have to provide what the customer wants. 

[Tim2291]

13 hours ago, dmccombe7 said:

I once played for free drinks at my local on a Sat afternoon. 

That was a huge mistake for the owner and he freely admitted it at the end of the night as we were buying rounds for mates too.

I remember him telling us it cost him over £300 for our free booze.

He never did that again and it was always a fixed fee of £100-£150 back in 80's. He was a great pub owner and oddly enough i'm back in that very pub next week Sat night for a good bit more money now tho.

Happy days 

Dave

We once got told by a guy we stayed with whilst on tour to help ourselves to his wine cellar... he regretted that pretty quickly... the worst culprit was his son who was the tour manager 😆

[tegs07]

13 minutes ago, Tim2291 said:

 

And herein lies the issue the OP of this has highlighted. Musicians are arguing that musicians shouldn't be paid for their work and are therefore devaluing their own craft... almost suggesting that it isn't a real job.

 

My comments aren't necessarily to do with originals bands, covers band regularly get asked to pay for free as well. I've been asked to do weddings, parties etc for free in the past, I politely declined.

 

My overwhelming experience when I was playing originals on tour was that promoters will do anything to not pay the bands. We played sold out shows, 250+ people paying to get in then buying drinks at the bar and have been told that they can't afford to pay the bands... clearly not true. That was the common theme throughout most of the UK. If an originals band is struggling to get known, then they need to evaluate why, like any business, if nobody is buying their music then like any product, it needs to be changed for the market. 

Sounds like you have honed your craft, found your sound and found an audience so will get paid and find venues that will pay you as you will bring in an audience. For every band or artist that can do that there are many more that can’t. They may be able to do so given time and opportunity. 

 

I hope you can see the dilemma both for a venue owner and a musician starting out.

 

One thing I would note is when I was a teenager nobody I know formed a band with the aim of making money. They did it for kicks and hopefully to get the girls/boys.

 

In time a few got pretty good and learned their craft enough to make a living. Playing their instrument well was only a small part of that learning curve.

Edited October 14, 2022 by tegs07

[EBS_freak]

Screw asking musicians to play for a decent money. It's nothing but a hobby.

 

What I want to know is, despite all these "hobbyist" gardeners, why can't I find anybody to sort out my back lawn.

 

Raging.

[EBS_freak]

(PS you can add that to you arsenal when you point out that you bet the bar staff aren't working for free...)