People only want to see the headliner.

Live music is now an event, not a culture. Sure, there are outliers, fans who need to go to the show constantly, keep up on developing acts, but that’s not most of the public. People have favorites and they want to see them and no one else. They don’t want their time wasted, in a world with so many distractions, where nobody has enough of it. It’s a constant balancing act, weighing what is worth your time and devotion, your attention, and if you need to sit through something new that is not going to float your boat, you’d rather do something else.

Of course there are exceptions. If an act is handpicked by the headliner, knowing they’ll appeal to their audience, this can vault the opener to further success. Most notably with Taylor Swift and Ed Sheeran, although he had a career before. And Gracie Abrams…who sings similarly confessional songs.

But most acts can’t deliver this imprimatur to their opener. They’re better off just doing an evening with. That’s what people want, MORE!

And they’re willing to pay for it.

Sure, concert ticket prices are high, but people are lining up to pay, substantial sums. Don’t look at the business through the lens of the past, going to club shows, arena shows of your favorites, that’s not how people view concerts these days. They’re not fans of live music, they’re fans of this specific act.

As for building and climbing your way up the ladder… Now a hit or two can garner arena sales the first time out. If for no other reason than if you hit, you can reach a substantial number of people easily via the internet. People want to hear the hit. They want to be of the moment. They want to be able to brag they were there. Shoot selfies and post them. Going to see an act that nobody knows about? Where’s the fun in that? Today’s life is all about obscurity, almost everything languishes without attention. But if you can gain notice, build momentum, the throngs will come out to see you.

For a while anyway, not forever, not in arenas, not at these prices. To continue to sell that many tickets you have to maintain a bond with the audience, usually via more hits, but this bond can be maintained via social media and other ways on the internet.

So if you’re starting out, it’s a conundrum. Careers are built on the road, but there’s nowhere to play, nowhere people are paying attention. Which is why you must kill each and every time out. You don’t know who is in the audience who might spread the word.

Also, festivals are now auditions for careers. Used to be an appearance was good for your résumé, but didn’t grow your audience. But now, audience members do scout for new talent at festivals. Once again, it’s the imprimatur of the promoter. If the promoter bothered to pick this act out of the plethora available, there must be a reason. People love gatekeepers, when they don’t hate them. Talent hates when it is squeezed out of potential opportunities, but fans want gatekeepers to make sense of the world for them. Radio specialized in this, but ironically, most of the acts who break from festivals are not the beneficiaries of radio airplay, they’re too outside, until they’re not. Radio comes last. It’s a live business. And despite all the hoopla about playlisting, discovery doesn’t happen on Spotify, et al, but elsewhere on the net, on TikTok and via word of mouth.

So…

What are the odds your opening slot is going to deliver fans?

Pretty damn low. If for no other reason than most people won’t even show up for your performance, and will talk throughout it if they’re in attendance. Better to build your own audience and headline your own shows, so people who really care will come, and if you’re that good, your audience will grow, even though arenas might be far away. Arenas are for acts in the Spotify Top 50 and legacies who broke in the old system, before the internet came along and blew the game apart.

And those who made it in the old system are known by many more and can maybe sell stadiums, whether it be Coldplay, Journey or the classic classic rockers. It’s hard to reach that many people today. But not impossible, look at Morgan Wallen, then again, his music is known by fewer than those in the pre-internet heyday.

The price of the ticket is irrelevant if people want to go. Kind of like Hermès, or Rolex, or BMW and Mercedes. These are luxury goods, that’s what shows are today. Rare and exalted. If you want to go, you must pony up. And scarcity rules. The act goes on tour infrequently and may not come back to your market for years. And even if it does, that illustrates demand is so heavy that it will be hard to get a ticket!

People don’t complain about the price they pay for luxury goods, so acts should not be wary of charging what the ticket is really worth and doing their best to eliminate the bots and secondary market. Those complaining about high prices…are paying them anyway or weren’t going to go to begin with. You can’t be swayed by blowback from the few.

Remember when Netflix said it was going to flip the script to streaming? There was such an uproar that the company said it would stay in the DVD by mail business. But have you rented a DVD recently? Even played one? Even own a DVD player? Steve Jobs got rid of legacy ports. Apple killed the headphone jack. Each and every time people complained, but nobody does so anymore.

So if you’re looking for a leg up by chaining yourself to a hit act, trying to use their audience to grow your own… Those days are in the rearview mirror. You’ve got to deliver your own attention, grow your own audience.

As for multi-act shows… Those are about value, that’s a different business, think of it like a mini-festival, people might be willing to experience an act they’re not in love with, but rarely one they don’t know. The acts playing stadium shows must all have an audience, if they’re brand new or relatively unknown, it’s a fool’s errand.

Discovery rarely happens live. It happens elsewhere, on social media, via personal interaction.

And people only want to pay to see the biggest, most successful acts. There’s those and everybody else.

Ironically, there’s more live music than ever before. Oftentimes via free or soft ticket shows. So, journeymen/women can make a living playing music, but they have never been further away from the big time.

We live in a world of winners and losers. And people only want to pay attention to the winners. This is not only in music, but in every sphere of life, where all the information and access is at everybody’s fingertips.

To be a winner you’ve got to be able to self-start. Maybe a label can pour gasoline on your career, but to sustain you need much more. Music that speaks to an audience, a bond with your fans. And, once again, as hard as it is to break through, it’s even harder to sustain. Because there are new acts every day and an abundance of diversions. And even if you lower the price people won’t come, concerts are not price sensitive, either people want to come or they do not.

And if they do, their wallet is open. They’ll pay and they’ll even go to multiple shows, like the Backstreet Boys at the Sphere or Harry Styles at MSG. Wealthy people might go once for bragging rights, but the return attendees are regular people, schoolteachers, working for a living, they need to be in the building to see their favorite acts just that much.

That’s the passion you’ve got to inspire.

Or else…

You need to get another job.

NO COMPLAINING

The only people who want to hear it are…other complainers. There’s a whole ecosystem of people convinced that the system is stacked against them, who are constantly complaining online how unfair the game is. The truth is they are not good enough and/or unwilling to work hard enough. As for the 10,000 hour rule… It’s not just 10,000 hours, it’s 10,000 hours of HARD PRACTICE! Jerry Seinfeld intentionally sought out tough rooms to hone his act. Furthermore, he performed his initial five minute monologue for “The Tonight Show” in excess of a hundred times prior to taking Johnny Carson’s stage. Most people are not willing to do the hard work, the rewards go to those who do.

SINGING

If you have a substandard voice get someone else to sing your songs unless you are the best lyricist of all time, in the league of Bob Dylan. Why start out hamstrung? A great voice used to be a criterion for a record deal, never mind success, back in the pre-internet era. But now that anybody can play, everybody believes they deserve success, even though they don’t have the chops.

WRITING

Not only does it give you a leg up, it’s where all the money is. Focus on your songwriting more than your playing unless you’re planning on being a studio or backup musician.

CHARACTER

However, if your voice has a unique timbre, if you can deliver a song in a unique way…some people can get away without writing their own material. Don’t equate this with having a good voice. Rod Stewart could never win a TV competition show, but his raspy delivery is unique and credible, at least in his heyday in the seventies. Sure Rod wrote, but he also sang others’ songs…he’s the one who rescued Cat Stevens’s “The First Cut Is the Deepest” from the dustbin. Ditto Joe Cocker. Who else could have even conceived of his rendition of “With a Little Help from My Friends”?

AUTHENTICITY/CREDIBILITY

You have to be perceived as real, you have to live your true identity 24/7, because there are cameras everywhere and they’re out to get you. People live to expose the faux pas and contradictions of performers online. So don’t fake it unless that’s your identity. If you’re a part of the machine, singing songs written by committee, no one cares if you’re authentic, you may be marketable, but at the core there’s no there there. People are looking for something to latch on to, they want to identify. The old days of putting people on a throne and idolizing them no longer works in a world where everybody with a keyboard believes they’re a deserving star. You need to reflect people’s truth back upon them. You have to articulate it in a way that they can feel but not put into words. You want to foster belief, not brain dead fealty.

NO

You have to be able to say no. Never forget, your handlers, those surrounding you, are percentage partners. If you do the endorsement deal, the commercial, the private gig, they make money, so they’re rarely going to tell you not to. Have a backbone, adhere to your beliefs. If it doesn’t feel good, don’t do it. If it’s going to compromise your identity, don’t do it. You’re building an image, which must be bulletproof. It’s those who stay true to themselves who have the longest careers.

DON’T BE LIKE ANYBODY ELSE

Just like the Kinks song. Music pushes the envelope, makes a difference in society, when it surprises people, delivers what they cannot even conceive of. We don’t need a new jam band just like the last jam band. And we certainly don’t need another pop singer just like the last one. If you’re not unique, we don’t need you. Your influences must come from outside the game. If all you’re doing is studying the charts and the grosses you’re missing out on life and will have nothing to say.

DO THE OPPOSITE

Just like George in the aforementioned “Seinfeld.” Get no tattoos. You’ll be asked about this in every interview. How come you’re not like everybody else? Everybody else has tattoos, why don’t you? Ditto on long hair. You’ve got to make people question, you’ve got to make people think.

DON’T BE AFRAID TO BE RETRO

We call it going back to basics. You don’t need no stinkin’ 808. You can have more than one chord in a song. You can make a record that is not stacked with sounds from top to bottom. Think of it this way… Can people sing your song a cappella, i.e. with no accompaniment? That’s right, sans the trappings, does your song stand alone, both in changes and lyrics? And never forget the basic building blocks. The magic of a bridge. Starting with the chorus. These tricks NEVER go out of style.

YOU DON’T NEED A MAJOR LABEL

Now, more than ever, that’s about commerce, not art. That’s for pop stars who will garner success via publicity and radio and TV, the traditional game. The majors want it easy, which delivers the lowest common denominator, and they want it fast, which allows for no artist development.

SPOTIFY IS NOT EVERYTHING

You may look at the Spotify numbers for an act and see they’re anemic and think the act is not happening. But then you see how many tickets they’re selling and it doesn’t add up. These acts’ success lies elsewhere. Look for unique YouTube videos, or a social media presence on TikTok or Instagram Reels. A hit on TikTok will bond the fan to the artist more than a hit on Spotify. Spotify is where a fan goes LAST! (Not to rag on Spotify, it dwarfs its competitors in consumption, and therefore it’s a stand-in for the on-demand streaming outlets, i.e. DSPs.) Don’t be demoralized if your Spotify numbers are bad, as long as you’re a success somewhere else.

YOU’RE COMPETING AGAINST NO ONE

This is not the old days, with a limited number of slots. It all comes down to you. You need to make headway and grow. It is not a zero sum game. And chances are you can be big and a huge slice of the public has never heard of you, never mind your music. This is the case for just about everybody, it’s just that those who appear to have broad traction have better publicity, but publicity has never meant less. Getting someone to listen to new music is nearly impossible. Word of mouth is the best way to grow. But that assumes you have a track that entrances people in ten seconds, OR TEN MINUTES! You can’t have it both ways. If you want the public to take your extended opuses seriously, just make extended cuts and be known for that. But if that is not your game, make it instantly palatable and memorable. This is reality, don’t shoot the messenger.

CREATE, CREATE, CREATE

The main issue is notice, not stiff material. Stiff sinks like a stone and disappears. Rather than try and polish a turd, like the majors, bringing in outside writers, remixing a track to death, write it, cut it, post it and repeat. No one can create an 11 every time out. And your only way to increase your number of 11s is to come up to bat more. Be uninhibited, start and finish, don’t second guess yourself, what feels like mediocre today people might like tomorrow. But, when you create an 11 you’ll know, and so will everybody else. If you think you created an 11 and no one else reacts…you didn’t create an 11.

IT’S A LONG GAME

If you’re not in it for years, consider yourself a hobbyist. Sure, the odds of success are low, but those who do break through and sustain have been at it for eons. There’s too much in the pipeline, it’s so hard to gain notice. And the longer you’re in it, the more you learn and the better you get.

MYSTERY IS HISTORY

Everybody posts online, everybody knows who everybody else is, and you should too. Consider social media part of your art. If you’re just posting clips, you’re doing it wrong. Be creative about it and do it YOURSELF! It must come straight from the heart.

SKILL

Conception beats execution every day of the week. Meaning the idea is more important than your ability to play your instrument, to get the production exactly right. Of course you have to have rudimentary skills, but you do not have to be a virtuoso on your instrument to create a great record.

CHANNEL

The best material comes fast, seemingly out of nowhere, you’re channeling it, not thinking about it. Sure, you can sit in a room and try to eke out a song, but the best material is almost always that which comes in a flash, a burst of creativity. And when you have this moment, write it down/record it INSTANTLY! Because the mood you’re in is as important as the idea.

WE’RE LOOKING FOR GREAT

And we want to tell everybody about it when we find it. But it’s so rare. This is your job, to be so unique, so special, so deserving of attention that we’ve got to tell everybody we know about you.

All you need to know is his wife Katie didn’t vote, because she was afraid if she registered her address would be made public and…

As it is, she and Stephen are already living on a military base, to ensure their safety. And if that doesn’t tell you all you need to know…

Isn’t this how it always plays out? The rich/elite separate themselves from the hoi polloi to ensure their theoretical invulnerability. From Versailles to Beverly Park… They fly private, they vacation at resorts you’ve never heard of and…

They’re doing it all on your money. It’s the everyday consumer who keeps the wheels of commerce humming.

So how much power does the public have?

Right now people are fired up. I’ve been living a long time and I’ve never seen anything like this. And all those ancient debates about the red and blue not being able to have a conversation, sit at the same table…those days are through.

Of course there are dyed-in-the-wool bonkers believers on the fringes of both parties. But what we learned on Tuesday is we’re more alike than different. It’s finally safe to invite everybody for Thanksgiving. Because one thing we can all agree on is…

We’re PISSED!

You’re supposed to keep the public quiet, their attention diverted, the last thing you want is focus. But Trump demanded it with his antics. Whether it be shooting people in the street or building his ballroom and even more just getting rich. 90% of voters listed corruption as one of their main complaints, why they voted blue. We haven’t all been on the same page since…

I don’t know when.

And now Trump is sticking it in our eye, by appointing the architect of the policies hated by the public. An outsider from his days in high school. We don’t need the class president, or the captain of the football team, but we do need someone who knows how to get along.

As for Trump himself… He seems to be taking a page from Putin’s playbook. Act like dissent doesn’t matter, and go behind the scenes to enforce your vision.

Now historically in America, at least in modern times, you could get away with your bad behavior, by saying everybody else was doing it. Even worse is drinking from the trough because the rich/elite give you access. What America did on Tuesday, and needs to do more, is say NO!

That’s the essence of morality, the essence of character.

And that’s the only thing that will save us.

Netanyahu would not be saying the election was stolen if Trump didn’t lay the groundwork in 2020. Ditto Bolsonaro.

I’m not saying I’m approving of a mob mentality, but this is something different, the people are mad as hell and they’re not going to take it anymore. Funny how they made that movie back in the seventies and now it’s the public on the bleeding edge as opposed to the film business, which notoriously plays it safe.

But people are hungry for edgy. This is how music lost its power. It became about the brand, grosses and… The most revered acts of all time were not necessarily the ones who hoovered up the most money.

So you’ve got to say no to those checks being offered. For your own benefit. You can’t be above the public, but right down in the pit with people.

This is what the Millers are trying to escape.

But that ship sailed over a decade ago. In today’s world everybody has a voice and everybody is equal. You’re grist for the mill. If you’re too big for your britches, if you’re a lyin’, stinkin’, scumbag, the minions are going to go wild on you online.

Everything we were told was true has been flipped. That the oligarchs dictated and…

Funny how all those companies left California for Texas, what now? Did you see the mayor of Houston just decoupled from ICE? If the police stop undocumented people, they’re not going to alert ICE.

Give the guy credit for adjusting. Unlike Agent Orange.

This is why you play the game, because you never know how it will turn out. No one expected a victory this big, no one expected the country to be this pissed.

So now…

We all want to return to business as usual, stop focusing on Washington, D.C., but before that happens…

We’ve got work to do.

Or as the Stones would say…WE’VE GOT THE TURD ON THE RUN!

Tune in Saturday November 7th to Faction Talk, channel 137, at 4 PM East, 1 PM West.

If you miss the episode, you can hear it on demand on the SiriusXM app. Search: Lefsetz