5 little facts about musicians.

Why hello there,

I suppose this is my first ‘proper’ blog post, doesn’t that give you a warm tingly feeling inside? You’re reading a part of history, you’re welcome.

I thought I would start by dispelling a lot of myths about singer songwriters, and musicians in general which have been created by films, the media, and that phrase ‘overnight success’, that’s bollocks.

1. We don’t get all the girls.
This is probably the oldest stereotype in the book, and unless there is just something inherently unattractive about my performances, I find it to be almost 100% bullshit.
Let’s create a situation for any ladies reading;
You are sat in a bar with your friends. A guy walks up to you with sweat dripping down his face, making his hair look like something a cat spat up in the process. This guy proceeds to sing Enrique Iglesias’ Hero to you with an undeniably good voice. Would the power of his beautiful voice be enough to make you look past the sweaty mess which is the rest of his person? The answer is most likely no, if the answer is yes, then by all means, give me a call.

Also, I can't speak from a girls point of view here, because of my distinct lack of a vagina and breasts.

2. We don’t appreciate being payed with beer.

Okay, don’t get me wrong, I love a nice pint just as much (if not more) than the next guy, but you wouldn’t see this as acceptable in any other profession. Let’s say you’re a car salesman (or woman) and you sell a shit load of motors one month, you would expect a decent paycheque right? You would not be happy if your boss said something like “You’re fine with being payed with a few bottles right?”. No, you would stand up and say “SHUT YOUR SHIT!”, admittedly maybe not in those exact words but you see my point. Any bar owners/landlords out there thinking it’s okay to pay musicians with alcohol, have a word with yourself, give your head a wobble and give them a decent amount of pay, it’s not   easy work. Which brings me nicely onto my next point.

3. For a lot of us, this IS our real job.

If I had a quid for every time I heard someone say “You should get a proper job” I would ironically never have to work again. Just because you see musicians on the telly making millions from touring, or putting out a new album every couple of years, doesn’t mean we all live like that. For the vast majority of us, it’s playing gigs every weekend for 2 hours a night, plus set up and pack down times, plus driving time, plus time spent booking gigs, plus time spent preparing our set lists and practicing them to perfection. I could go on but I’m sure you get it. Let’s take me for example; I make on average about £120 per covers gig which consists of two 45 minute sets either side of a 15 minute break. I know this sounds brilliant, but first consider this; £20 can be taken off straight away for petrol money, sometimes more depending on the distance. Also there is occasionally money to be subtracted to go to a promoter, which is normally about 20% (if you’re lucky and find a promoter who won’t rob you blind). Now, like I said I play two 45 minute sets with a 15 minute break, then let’s add on 30 minutes to set up/take down all of my PA system, an average hour and a half driving for the whole night, and also however much time is spent booking the gig. This works out around 4-5 hours, which gives me about £20 an hour (if we aren’t counting all of the time spent learning a setlist and keeping it up to date, also any extra playing time for an encore). Still sounds good right? But you have to remember this isn’t a consistent paycheque, gigs come and go when they please, I can often go weeks without a gig and make no money.
So I know on the surface it seems like easy work, but it’s very tiring, and yes we do it for our love of music, but we also do it for our love of food, shelter, and others things which require money. I’m extremely fortunate in that I have my dad to help me out with booking gigs and things such as that, but a lot of musicians don’t have that kind of support, so the next time you think about telling one of us to get a proper job, think about all of the work that goes into what we do.

Wow, that one got quite wordy...

4. We don’t all want to go on the bloody X Factor.
I must get this at every gig I play. Someone will come up to me and say something like “You’re really good, you should try for the X Factor.” or “Have you ever thought of going on Britain’s Got Talent?”. Now I’d be a liar if I were to say I hadn’t considered it, and I actually went as far as to audition for a TV talent show on Sky one called Must be the music, however I didn’t get past the first audition stage. I really do think everybody interested in a career in music should at least consider this route, it isn’t for everybody, but there are people it will work for, and you would be a fool to overlook it by sitting up on your high horse and saying it’s destroying the music industry. I must admit, this isn’t the route for me, I tried it once and it didn’t feel natural even when I was sat in the waiting room. But if it is something you want to do, go ahead and do it, it’s your life. Just don’t come up to me in a pub and tell me to do it, because I WILL tell you to shut up.

5. There is no quick route to success.

Myspace. Youtube. X Factor. The media have pushed the idea that people have become overnight successes using these things. With the possible exception of The X Factor, this is pretty much complete rubbish. I have been on myspace and youtube for years now and I get little to no interest in my songs/videos. I would love to know how people get millions of video hits, but the most I seem to manage is a couple thousand if I’m extremely lucky. Most of the time I barely hit 100. It’s a common misjudgement when people say the internet has made it easier for musicians, or any other form of artist to be recognised. Unless you’re gimmicky like Justin Bieber for being so young, (I may post a seperate blog about this little div at some point.) you don’t really have much of a chance. In my opinion it has made it a lot harder, there are now millions of other people to compete with, and people are very set in their ways a lot of the time. For instance, if someone finds a band they like on youtube, they may keep listening to that band for quite a while, making it more difficult for other artists to even get a look in. This is just my opinion and I’m sure some people will disagree, and I would love to hear all of your opinions on this.

So yeah, that’s all for now, I may add a couple more to this list at some point, but for now I’ll leave it at five. I have an obsession with multiples of five, so if I got to 7 or 8, I would probably have to get ride of any above 5, just thought you should know.

I’ll be back soon to deliver more ramblings to your interwebs.

Gan canny.

Stephen.