"Want to Be a Rock Star? You’ll Need $100,000"

Remember that band in the bubble? Their name was..?

I can’t remember.

But I do recall them e-mailing me that this was a breakthrough opportunity, getting on a TV show, and now they could reach so many more people!

But it turned out those who cared to pay attention had contempt for them.

I’m not sure if you’re following this "Time" magazine fracas. Wherein a young band complained that they spent $100k trying to make it and…

My inbox is on fire about this! Not only with personal diatribes, but links to articles on Gawker, the A.V. Club…

You see in one fell swoop, this act made a laughingstock of itself. It believed if it just played the old game, got a moment in the sun in old media, it’d shine.

But no one reads "Time" anymore, certainly not anyone who’d be interested in this band.

But just like someone plucked Rebecca Black out of obscurity to make fun of her, this stuff is all findable online and the rabble-rousers go NUCLEAR! Punching holes in all of their arguments. Suddenly, you’ve attained a stain you just can’t get rid of. The stink stays with you forever.

This is the Lana Del Rey story.

We want you to pay your dues, we want you to be good, we want you to EARN IT! Play above your station too early and you’re gonna be excoriated.

Kind of like Alabama Shakes. What offended me was the tsunami of hype. I reacted, they weren’t THAT good! That’s why if you’ve truly got it, you’ve got to tread lightly, you’ve got to say no to the machine.

Which, to a great degree, Alabama Shakes is doing. They just played the Troubadour, not SNL. If Alabama Shakes was all over radio and TV their core would abandon them, because they’re not that great, they’re a developing act. Could be great, but it’s too soon to tell. It’s kind of like baseball, they sign these pitchers out of high school, BUT THEY DON’T IMMEDIATELY PUT THEM IN THE GAME! They send them down to the minors, for seasoning.

And it used to be you had no choice. You couldn’t be massive in a day.

But then MTV changed all that. And there was so much money involved the executives stole the music from the talent, put their own cardboard puppets in front. That’s the story of Backstreet Boys and ‘N Sync, along with countless others.

Alabama Shakes could have done this same thing. Gotten the producer du jour to write and record a record with them. It’s just that that game pays many fewer dividends these days. Even if you do make it, you have less impact and make less money.

Which is why a plethora of twentysomethings are taking the opposite route. They’re not looking to sell out, they’re woodshedding, playing to the fans who care as opposed to the media which does not.

Yes, there’s a shadow conversation, but in reality it’s the MAIN CONVERSATION! Amongst like-minded people online. That’s the game you want to penetrate, not the here today, gone tomorrow media gimmick of yesteryear.

1. If you think backstage was lavish back in the pre-Internet heyday, you were never there. Maybe in New York and L.A., but rarely there either. Just a ton of cold cuts, potato chips and beer on ice. As for who was there? A ton of hangers-on, who believed if they could just be close to the icons, they’d be cool.

2. Training. Irrelevant of whether you need music and voice lessons, complaining about the price is like me bitching how much it cost to go to college and law school. At today’s price, my college is $200k for four years. Add three years of law school on top of that and this guy is bitching about fifteen years of piano and guitar lessons for 30k? (And oh yeah, I had those too!)

3. Rehearsal. We all need an office. And if you’ve got no money, make it in your home. And if that’s too noisy, move where it’s cheap and you’ve got some space, like back to Maine. You don’t have to live in the metropolis anymore to make it. The Internet is everywhere.

3. Gear. As everyone online is saying, you spent $500 to move a piano? How’s the gas mileage on that Lamborghini? Either get an electronic keyboard or buy something used or rent. Don’t put the lifestyle in front of the success.

4. E-mail blasts. You wasted a grand. I ignore that stuff, and so does everybody else. We get hipped to quality and success by our network, we hate self-promoters/hypesters.

I could go on and on but you not only get the point, you know the story as well or better than I do.

It’s a long way to the top if you wanna rock and roll.

And you don’t make it by complaining, you make it by knocking them dead. And you can do that on a Japanese guitar as well as a Les Paul. Talent is much more important than equipment. These guys are just being ripped off by an old system which is trying not to die. They’re being bitten by hucksters the same way you get ripped off on the street by the guys playing three card monte.

Laughable.

P.S. If you’re so damn great, why do you have only 98 Twitter followers?

"No One Tell These Rich Kids They’re Wasting $100,000 Trying to Be Indie Rock Stars"

"Band claims it costs $100,000 to make it in indie rock, finally rendering the term ‘indie rock’ meaningless"

Best e-mail I got about this:

From: Christian Ruzich
Subject: "Indie Rock"

Bob,

I’m sure you’ve seen this: "Want to Be a Rock Star? You’ll Need $100,000"

As well as the AV Club response:
"Band claims it costs $100,000 to make it in indie rock, finally rendering the term ‘indie rock’ meaningless"

My friends and I were discussing it today, and the one of us who is actually in a band (Inspector Owl, check them out) had a lot of interesting stuff to say, and I thought you’d like to see it. Stuff from the article in quotes, with Corey’s thoughts afterward:

"Training. Our folks shelled out for 15 years of piano and guitar lessons (times two of us!). These days, we’re spending $250 to $500 a month on voice lessons. Cost to date: $30,000."

Voice lessons? WTF? I took two years of guitar lessons, when I could figure songs out faster than my teacher I quit and started teaching myself. That is horse shit, especially in the age of the internet and YouTube. Go on YouTube and learn a few chords. Who is teaching them how to sing? For $250 to $500 a month it better be Jeff Fucking Buckley reincarnated.

"Rehearsal: We rent a space in Brooklyn for $50 per three-hour session. Cost to date: $3,000."

It’s called your parents’ fucking basement. Use it, it is free. Morons.

"Gear. Our family has invested in dozens of musical instruments and other gear (pianos, guitars, drum sets, keyboards, mandolins, PA systems, amplifiers…). And, oh yeah, it cost more than $500 to move a piano down three flights of stairs and then up to Maine (a story for another time). Cost to date: $25,000."

You moved a piano? Are you stupid? Get a keyboard.

"Recording. Our recent single,â•©Summer, cost more than $1,000 to record – even though we did much of the recording and mixing ourselves. We’ve set aside another $5,000 for our forthcoming EP. Again, we’ll save money by doing much of the work in Harper’s home studio. Cost to date: $6,000."

This is actually reasonable. I will give them this.

"Performing. For gigs here in New York, we hire taxis to lug our keyboards, stands, guitars,basses, amplifiers and drums to and from the venue. Whatever cash we earn beyond that usually goes to our current drummer. And expenses soar when we hit the road. Cost to date: $1,000."

DON’T LIVE IN NY. FUCK!

"Promotion: Once you have music out, you need to promote it. We pay a guy to send email blasts to databases of hip music blogs. Postcards, demo CDs and other materials are also essential. Cost to date: $1,000."

Hire a real publicist, not some guy who sends out email blasts… this should actually cost a bit more. $750 a month for a publicist.

"Lost wages. The two of us each put about 20 hours a week into band-related work. Abner (still in school) could easily make $10 an hour working at a bar on weekends. Harper (a freelance writer) has to turn down writing assignments worth around $400 a week. Cost to date: $25,000."

Horse shit. You can do your freelance writing work while being in a band and playing shows. I have a friend who toured, has 3 kids and is a freelance graphic designer, which is harder to do on the road than write. These guys are BABIES.

"Living in New York City. Our cousin Abby lives in Atlanta in a house – a house! – with a couple of friends. They pay a third of what we pay for our combined living spaces. New York is absurdly expensive – but the band’s future demands that we live here rather than, say, our hometown in Maine. All told, we estimate that decision costs us an extra $1000 a month. Cost to date: $18,000."

DON’T LIVE IN NEW YORK. FUCK! And if you do, live in squalor on a crappy mattress in a shitty ass apartment with like 9 other artists or musicians in fucking Flatbush.

Honestly, move out of your house, move home, practice there. Get a van, go on the road 250 days a year, sleep on floors, eat cheap groceries you buy, make your own sandwiches, stop taking lessons and learn how to think out of the box, and stop worrying about being a rock star and just play music because you love it.

Idiots.

One more, from Steven Weiss:

Here’s the thing. In that little video you posted, you can clearly see that no one is in the audience at the Highline Ballroom, and that line you show outside the Mercury Lounge is for the dance club next door. That line is always there, and its never for the Mercury Lounge. Hiring a publicist to do email blasts does not get you fans. It doesn’t get music blogs to like you. In fact, it might have the exact opposite effect. You think people can’t identify a faceless email blast?

http://bit.ly/xPTA9z

(Note: PEOPLE CAN TELL! The concept you can fool everybody has fallen by the wayside in the Internet era.)

Just because someone yells, that doesn’t mean you should listen.

Netflix gained 610,000 subscribers in the U.S. last quarter. The company is just shy of its all time high, it’s now got 24.4 million subscribers, it had 24.59 million at its peak.

In other words, the only thing Reed Hastings did wrong was react to the outcry. He should have shut up and gone on his merry way. But America’s become a nation of apologists. If you do something one person doesn’t like you’ve got to crucify yourself, sacrifice your backbone to appease the rabble-rouser. When oftentimes if you just doubled-down on your message, if you chose to react at all, you’d have won.

Reed Hastings was trying to push his customers into the future, as opposed to the content industries who are all about holding users back in the past. And it turns out he’s right. 21.7 million people have Netflix’s streaming service, whereas only 11.2 million have the DVD by mail service.

And Netflix has no plans to advertise the DVD by mail business. It’s a losing proposition, the costs are high, people are burning out on discs and the movie and TV producers are putting so many restrictions on availability that the consumer is dazed and confused…and pissed. How many months do I have to wait after the DVD has been released to get it on Netflix? And exactly why? So you can preserve an old model while the statistics tell us streaming has won the war?

Don’t change course based on the vocal minority. They’ve got a voice online and the mainstream media loves a fight, hell, that’s what the Republican nomination process is all about. They don’t care who wins, just as long as it gets ratings.

Reed Hastings got in trouble for telling the truth. That people want streaming and DVD by mail costs too much and those who want to use it have to pay for it.

Americans abhor sacrifice. You can’t take my job! Even if it’s making buggy whips, I can’t go down a notch in lifestyle! Meanwhile, the public embraces a better system and the whole business changes.

If only there were a Reed Hastings in the music business. A visionary delivering what the public wants with enough cash to stand up and compete with the usual suspect content providers.

Steve Jobs made inroads, but track sales were never the way out of the economic mess.

The Spotify guys have come up with streaming for music and they’ve been excoriated. Explain to me again why people love Netflix and hate Spotify? Sure, Spotify’s free at first, but Netflix gives a month free too! That’s how you sell anything new and addictive in this world, via a free trial.

In other words, the entire Netflix brouhaha was a waste of time. There was no problem. Just a vocal minority pissed that they have to pay more for what costs more.

But the stock was hammered, plummeting from $300 to below $100.

But it’s regained 30% of its value since.

The public is not as backwards as you think. The public loves new technology. Hell, it’s hard to be a dummy and pirate. You triumph by giving people what they want before they know they want it. That’s what Netflix streaming was. Just a side benefit that turned into the main course.

The same thing is going to happen in music. MP3s are going to give way to streaming. The public, contrary to the prognosticators, will want it.

Don’t listen to the screaming meemees. They’re self-interested and ignorant. Jump into the future and wait for the people to come to you.

I got an e-mail from a guy listening to this band saying he becomes so enraptured he misses his freeway exit.

And the imagery and the fact that this guy had no business involvement, he was just a fan, made me check it out.

And this stuff is always bad. Amateurs who’ve got no idea where the bar resides, and that they’re on the wrong side of it.

And the first thing I notice is the woman is fat and the band is old. And in the major label world, those are two no-nos, impossibilities.

But then they started to play, and gosh darn, THEY COULD!

The guitarist locked into a great acoustic sound, the vocals were better than CSN normally do live ,and then the brunette put her fiddle to her chin and the whole band was ROCKING!

So I go to the band’s website. Whereupon I find they’ve got one gig booked. And they’ve been at it for years.

In the old days, they would have given up.

If they hadn’t signed to a major label first. That’s the way it used to be, you were on the right side of the bar and got your chance or you slid into oblivion.

And if you got a deal, we all knew who you were, there was enough of an information network, fewer than 5,000 albums were released a year, and if you were lucky someone bought your record, played it for others or you received the holy grail, radio play, we were all addicted, if you got on FM, you sold.

And don’t think this sound is so outside that radio would never play it. There was this band Seatrain. Their first album on A&M stiffed, but the second one, on Capitol, got a lot of traction, with "13 Questions" and "Song Of Job". And, at the time, they had the most played cover of Lowell George’s "Willin’" (which they titled "I’m Willin’"). There was a plethora of acoustic music on FM radio, everything from British stuff like Fairport Convention to U.S. acts like Hot Tuna.

But today, if you’re lucky, you can hear this music on a non-comm station.

Is it because no one likes this music?

No, it’s because of radio consolidation. And the major labels only sign what’s on the radio, that’s where the most money is, and the public is the worse for it, musical diversity is out the window.

This is the game SOPA and all the anti-piracy efforts are trying to perpetuate.

Not that being Miles From Dayton is lucrative. Being good is not good enough. You’ve got to hang in there for years, you’ve got to get lucky. It’s easier to fantasize things would be better on a major label, if P2P piracy was eliminated.

But a major label would never sign Miles To Dayton.

And without YouTube and other Net tools, the band would go unheard by most, there would be absolutely no chance for the act to grow. But a guy I’ve never met e-mailed me about a band located on Long Island and on the west coast, three thousand miles away, I checked it out and liked it, and I’m telling YOU!

And once upon a time, this could be the band’s big break.

But I’m not that powerful. Today no one is.

It’s just another brick laid down on the road to wherever they’re going, which may be nowhere, but watch this video, they seem to be having a blast playing music, AND AIN’T THAT WHAT IT’S ALL ABOUT?

And the other half of the equation is the listening. I’ve got multiple invites to go to gigs tomorrow night, I’ve said no to all, the acts have even got major label deals, but if someone told me Miles To Dayton was in town, I’d be THERE!

Because their music touched me, I was energized by it.

Not that I thought the new album, which I listened to on Rhapsody, which was unavailable on Spotify, was so fantastic it could convert nonbelievers, but because I’m a fan of music, especially that made by real people with talent, who perform not for the money, but the pure JOY!

So, in this Internet era, we lose something. But we gain advantages too. In the old days, Miles To Dayton might get signed, the label would invest in them, all interested parties would be aware of them. In the new days they can make their music, distribute it, and fans can find it. But the odds of getting rich, giving up their day jobs? Piss-poor. But at least they can do it, because there’s no label in creation that’d take a flyer on band who can sing and play…which is old and performs folk rock.

But I like it.

And I’m not the only one.

Miles To Dayton "Pass It On"

Studio version

Miles To Dayton website

There’s a belief that if we just quashed piracy, eliminated all free access to music, coffers would fill once again, musicians would be rich and we’d enter a new golden age.

But that’s hogwash.

1. Music competes.

With not only video games and movies and TV, but the Net and everything on it. People have a limited amount of time and money, who says they’re going to spend it on music?

2. Ubiquity is dead.

Once upon a time, the three TV networks commanded 90% of the viewing audience. Now the five reach twenty-odd percent, the rest is split amongst a zillion cable channels. So if you believe if we eliminate piracy suddenly albums are going to sell ten million again, you’re dreaming.

3. Not all piracy is a substitute for purchase.

Read this article:

How Copyright Cons Congress

The numbers being thrown around are fictitious.

4. Piracy might be the downside of the Internet, but there are many upsides, direct contact with the fan and the ability to expose new people to your wares, and all of this can be done FOR FREE! We’re building a new ecosystem, because the change in infrastructure demands it. Piracy is just one part of the picture.

5. The way out is to license the piracy, find ways for people to pay. Been noticing all the ads on YouTube lately? That’s how they do it, they entice you for free and then you end up subscribing. Kind of like cable, the price never goes down, only up, but until there were web alternatives, subscriptions only went UP! Free streaming services are about getting people hooked on legitimate, legal systems and then converting them to paying customers once they’re obsessed. You might like Spotify on the desktop, but you can’t use it on your mobile unless you pay.

6. Information Is Beautiful

If one more ignoramus emails me this chart I’m gonna explode. Do you believe everything you read in the newspaper? Did the American government blow up the Twin Towers? Are you one of those people who only cottons to information that supports their cause?

Read this e-mail:

"I work for an indie label with a direct deal with Spotify. With all the articles lately about how Spotify is bad for the artists I did some calculations on the royalty reports we get and it turns out for the US premium subscribers it pays out MORE than Rhapsody or former Napster. About 50% more. Yes the free tiers are in the hundredths to thousands of a penny but if a consumer is that cheap then they probably aren’t downloading from iTunes.

Also my new favorite artist I have listened to the one track that hooked me over 100 times. Which at a premium subscription is more Net than a download of one track.

Please withhold my name/email due to privacy concerns in the off chance you use it."

Bingo! It’s about converting people to become premium subscribers. And if this happens, there’s plenty of revenue. Just don’t assume it’ll all go to a handful of artists who’ll be as rich as in pre-Internet days and realize we’ve shifted into a LISTENERSHIP model. Doesn’t matter if someone bought it, it’s if they USED IT! Isn’t that a much fairer way?

7. You bought the damn Les Paul and Marshall, don’t complain that there’s no one paying to record you. If you can afford the aforementioned equipment, you can buy some software (you already own the computer!) and make your own damn record. As for promotion… Those acts the majors hype don’t last and they release ever fewer of them. They’re heading straight for the cliff, you want to hitch yourself to their wagon?

8. The Internet has made scalping ubiquitous.

Yes, ticket prices have gone up because there’s a marketplace to buy them. No Internet, no StubHub. And you might say that the acts don’t get any of this revenue, but some do! They scalp their own tickets or employ I Love All Access. Furthermore, all the data possibilities are why promoters can afford to overpay acts/give them all of the ticket revenue.

9. Legacy acts

They may be complaining that they’ve got no recorded music revenue, but the Net is keeping them alive. Sure, there’s some radio airplay, but without easy availability/access to their music online would all those classic rock acts be moving as many tickets? NO!

10. Eradicate piracy and it’s going to be that much harder to break an act. We go back to the winner take all system. People will only buy what they hear/are exposed to, which will in many cases be the tripe that is foisted upon us by the major labels, the Top Forty fodder. It’ll be all beat-infused crap all the time, because people won’t be able to trade free music amongst themselves.

I’M NOT SAYING MUSIC SHOULD BE FREE!

Do you think you’re paying when you watch sports on ESPN? YOU ARE! Approximately five bucks a month, whether you watch it or not. The key is to make music listening feel free, even if it’s not. We’re on that road, but too many musicians want to kill it, because it’s a nascent business. It’s like killing the iPod because it didn’t work on Windows and there was no iTunes Store. It’s like doubling down on Kodak because you don’t own a digital camera and who’d want to shoot pictures each and every day other than a professional?

We finally have the tool for success, the way out, streaming services, but you want to kill them. You’d probably eat a cookie today rather than forgo it and have twenty tomorrow.

Killing piracy kills the music business. It cuts down on listener experimentation and innovation. Who’s gonna make something that radio won’t play if there’s no free listening and sharing online?

Just because the new world doesn’t look like the old world, don’t dismiss it. Sure, a bunch of people may have lost their jobs at the label, but a bunch more gigs were developed in tech. And now so many bands need a webmaster. What did that guy do previously? Certainly not work at the computer-averse label.

We cannot go back to the past. However much you might have loved the pre-Internet era. So can we all agree to march forward and say yes instead of no, admit that certain behaviors cannot be eliminated and therefore must be corralled to our benefit?