Adaptation in the Contemporary Music Climate

[John Miner]

Hi everyone,

I am brand new to this forum, but not to progressive rock etc.
I won't get into my past here... contributions to the genre or lack of.. but do have some legitimate questions (I hope) about moving
a new project forward within the context of today's changing musical or cultural landscape.

I am going to make the assumption that this forum has a significant number of members who are musicians of prog, fusion or complex rock players..... who are actively releasing new music, gigging, playing live on some kind of regular basis etc...

That being said, I have noticed a significant decline in the number of prog bands, fusion bands or complex rock bands gigging around my local area. (I am in the San Francisco Bay Area). The cost and expense of touring seems prohibitive for most. There appears to be a trending away from physical product... CD's etc.. and this makes it harder for bands to pick up some extra money at live gigs. Spotify, which I don't know a lot about.. I am not a member, but most musicians I know are either on it.. or making their music available there for "exposure". From what I understand, it doesn't pay well unless you are getting hundreds of thousands of downloads etc.

Most music venues I am talking too... are asking for links to our social media sites... and are predominately booking cover bands. The bigger theaters are focusing on tribute bands. Some original acts are getting booked, but not many in prog or fusion unless they are known from the past with one original member leftover from their major label heyday.

Radio play is basically a thing of the past. Our local radio station... that we have been on several times, might draw 5 or 10 people to a show in a local spot if we are lucky.

There are a few very good rock, folk, reggae, funk, blues bands around this local scene, but none seem to draw more than 20 or 30 people to a show. They are all saying the same thing... basically. It's hard times. These are genres that are more popular and accessible than most prog bands.

I'm only here to be objective, not trying to throw shade.... but it seems that having a few videos on youtube, instagram and a facebook page isn't enough to get things going in and of itself.

So I propose starting a thread here about how to survive and prosper, to adapt and keep relevant in today's music scene as a prog or fusion live player.

Thoughts? Suggestions? Advice from those getting it done?

[veteranof1000psychicwars]

Hi John, if you are new to Progressive Ears you might not have seen there is a page called "Artist's Forum", which is populated with musicians discussing topics exactly like this. Check it out!

[John Miner]

Hi John, if you are new to Progressive Ears you might not have seen there is a page called "Artist's Forum", which is populated with musicians discussing topics exactly like this. Check it out!

Thanks, I found the thread and posted there. Not many people over there though. Really just looking to communicate with musicians or bands that are actively playing live, trying to get gigs etc.. and thinktank on that a bit.

[John Miner]

Just curious, are there any actively gigging musicians playing prog or fusion on these boards?
I opened a thread in the artists forum, but no responses.

[Sputnik]

Just curious, are there any actively gigging musicians playing prog or fusion on these boards?
I opened a thread in the artists forum, but no responses.

I saw your thread. I'm an actively gigging musician and I have played Prog Rock in the past and am currently in a Jethro Tull tribute band, as well as a Latin jazz band that strays into Fusion territory (mostly early RtF stuff).

I didn't respond to your thread because I don't think there are any easy answers. Gigging in almost any style has become difficult. The number of venues has shrunk, and many venues expect the band to do all the work getting an audience, providing little in terms of promotion. Most venues are also incredibly unprofessional in their treatment of artists. Many never even respond to inquiries and just say "use our website," which is typically out of date and obviously unattended. Pay is lousy, and we recently got completely stiffed for missing a minimum ticket sale number by literally $20. There are exceptions to the rule, but for the most part the process of securing decently paying gigs is horrific, and the more off the beaten track your music is, the harder it becomes.

When Eccentric Orbit was gig-worthy, our best gigs (with the exception of Prog Day) came through connections with the New England Art Rock Society. I think through the "Prog community," you at least had a fighting chance of getting enough audience for a show, though even that was marginal. There were a couple of clubs that became the epicenter of NewEARS performances, and thus, at least some semblance of a local "scene" was developed. The problems are that the audience is very fragmented - people into the poppier styles don't patronize more complex/dissonant styles, and vice versa - lesser known artists simply didn't draw well, and that occasional shows were not quite enough to sustain the scene.

Still, I think creating a local scene through an affinity group is a very good way to reach people, and helps a lot with promotion. They key is execution, which is harder, but conceptually I think that is a reasonable avenue to pursue. Start local, then move to a regional level then maybe try some areas farther afield. That's a tried and true model, and if you really want to be a gigging band, you have to play regular gigs, and it's not practical to start with some kind of national tour.

Sadly, the bottom line is that the bands that get the gigs are playing music that people know and want to hear, primarily as an accompaniment to dancing. Playing Prog and Fusion, especially original stuff that really pushes the envelope, is a hard sell in clubs oriented toward this type of listening. You either have to build your audience to a point they can pack a place, find a venue that's willing to work with you on promotion to a sub-section of the market, or you have to build your own venue (rent a room or play at a party that is subsidized by a person or group that really wants to hear this kind of music).

None of this is easy, and in fact, at a certain point, I surrendered and went back to classic rock. As it turns out, it was just as hard to get gigs as a classic rock band as a Prog band, assuming you don't want to just recapitulate the local classic rock radio station playlist. My next group was a more acoustic-oriented band, and we played mostly breweries, which was great because they have a built-in audience, and are actually quite open to a wide range of music, including originals, as long as it's largely an accompaniment to their good time of drinking, eating, and talking. Not an especially great environment for Prog Rock.

It sucks, but from my perspective and experience, there it is.

Bill

[John Miner]

I saw your thread. I'm an actively gigging musician and I have played Prog Rock in the past and am currently in a Jethro Tull tribute band, as well as a Latin jazz band that strays into Fusion territory (mostly early RtF stuff).

I didn't respond to your thread because I don't think there are any easy answers. Gigging in almost any style has become difficult. The number of venues has shrunk, and many venues expect the band to do all the work getting an audience, providing little in terms of promotion. Most venues are also incredibly unprofessional in their treatment of artists. Many never even respond to inquiries and just say "use our website," which is typically out of date and obviously unattended. Pay is lousy, and we recently got completely stiffed for missing a minimum ticket sale number by literally $20. There are exceptions to the rule, but for the most part the process of securing decently paying gigs is horrific, and the more off the beaten track your music is, the harder it becomes.

When Eccentric Orbit was gig-worthy, our best gigs (with the exception of Prog Day) came through connections with the New England Art Rock Society. I think through the "Prog community," you at least had a fighting chance of getting enough audience for a show, though even that was marginal. There were a couple of clubs that became the epicenter of NewEARS performances, and thus, at least some semblance of a local "scene" was developed. The problems are that the audience is very fragmented - people into the poppier styles don't patronize more complex/dissonant styles, and vice versa - lesser known artists simply didn't draw well, and that occasional shows were not quite enough to sustain the scene.

Still, I think creating a local scene through an affinity group is a very good way to reach people, and helps a lot with promotion. They key is execution, which is harder, but conceptually I think that is a reasonable avenue to pursue. Start local, then move to a regional level then maybe try some areas farther afield. That's a tried and true model, and if you really want to be a gigging band, you have to play regular gigs, and it's not practical to start with some kind of national tour.

Sadly, the bottom line is that the bands that get the gigs are playing music that people know and want to hear, primarily as an accompaniment to dancing. Playing Prog and Fusion, especially original stuff that really pushes the envelope, is a hard sell in clubs oriented toward this type of listening. You either have to build your audience to a point they can pack a place, find a venue that's willing to work with you on promotion to a sub-section of the market, or you have to build your own venue (rent a room or play at a party that is subsidized by a person or group that really wants to hear this kind of music).

None of this is easy, and in fact, at a certain point, I surrendered and went back to classic rock. As it turns out, it was just as hard to get gigs as a classic rock band as a Prog band, assuming you don't want to just recapitulate the local classic rock radio station playlist. My next group was a more acoustic-oriented band, and we played mostly breweries, which was great because they have a built-in audience, and are actually quite open to a wide range of music, including originals, as long as it's largely an accompaniment to their good time of drinking, eating, and talking. Not an especially great environment for Prog Rock.

It sucks, but from my perspective and experience, there it is.

Bill

Thanks Bill, very interesting and insightful.
This seems like it should be an important thread, but not sure if it's appropriate to continue it here.
The viewers seem to be here, not in the artist forum.

[Sputnik]

Thanks Bill, very interesting and insightful.
This seems like it should be an important thread, but not sure if it's appropriate to continue it here.
The viewers seem to be here, not in the artist forum.

A lot of people just look at "new posts" which combines all the forums into one feed, so I'm not sure it matters that much exactly where it is. It is primarily an artist issue, but I think non-artists might have suggestions from what they've seen bands do that worked, so I agree that it could be considered a broader topic.

It doesn't appear that the mods shut this thread down, or moved it, so what I'd suggest is picking where you want the discussion to happen and delete the other thread. If the mods want to move it, let them do so.

Bill

[moecurlythanu]

This isn't the first time these questions have been asked on PE. I recall a member from a western state (Cali?) trying to have a brainstorm session around the subject of gigging/touring/viability.

[Brad 2 the Bone]

Most venues are also incredibly unprofessional in their treatment of artists. Many never even respond to inquiries [...]

This goes both ways, of course, and in my brief experience with booking shows there have been many artists who would never bother to respond to offers, not even with a simple "Thanks, but no thanks" reply.

I've also had artists initially accept offers to play (and in one case even accept a 25% down payment on their fee) and then subsequently completely ghost me.

[Sputnik]

This goes both ways, of course, and in my brief experience with booking shows there have been many artists who would never bother to respond to offers, not even with a simple "Thanks, but no thanks" reply.

I've also had artists initially accept offers to play (and in one case even accept a 25% down payment on their fee) and then subsequently completely ghost me.

Yeah, that's equally bad. Honestly, the live music business is pretty much a rat's nest all around. There are absolutely exceptions, but my baseline expectations are very low.

I do feel things have gotten worse over my time involved in music. Back in the 80s, you could actually get people on the phone, have a discussion, drop off a promo pack that actually got a listen, and eventually get an answer from a club about a gig, even if it wasn't the answer you were hoping for. It's astronomically harder to do that now. Even booking agencies are hard to contact, even for a band that is a proven money maker. I'm not sure why this is the case. Technology makes it easier to communicate, but it seems that it's just gotten harder and clubs hide behind online forms and email addresses that never get answered. Without question, flaky bands and artists make things even worse, but the vast majority of clubs we've contacted over the past year or so have simply never responded, even with a "thanks but no thanks."

The exception to that is where we know someone who knows the booking agent for the club, so it becomes game of "who you know." It just makes a hard situation even harder. I'd love to see it from the perspective of the clubs, but my sense is the majority are poorly managed in the extreme. Even the ones who are responsive and who treat artists fairly well seem like a chaotic mess to me, worse than working in a hospital. The others, I balk at looking under the hood.

Bill

[battema]

Yeah, that's equally bad. Honestly, the live music business is pretty much a rat's nest all around. There are absolutely exceptions, but my baseline expectations are very low.

One of the practices that I particularly disliked was with a certain venue in the area that would book 3-4 openers for an act, and then require all of them to sell a minimum of X tickets themselves. It tended to create a competitive situation where bands would try and hit the fan forums and social media fastest to get the sales ahead of the others. And of course, if you didn't sell that number of tickets, you were on the hook to pay the difference. I don't miss playing at those venues.

[gearHed289]

Messrs Miner and Sputnik have described the current situation pretty accurately. I'm fortunate to live in a major metro area (Chicago) that has an enthusiastic prog crowd, and it's still very difficult. Definitely have to team up with the right other band(s) to create a show that will work. My band Nomadic Horizon plays all originals with maybe 1-2 choice covers (Crimson, Bowie...) We've done some successful shows with tributes to Steve Vai and Porcupine Tree. We've also done a few with another original heavy prog band, the Cyberiam that went very well. There's a massive cover band scene here that I was a part of heavily for about 8 years, and our drummer has played with just about everyone in town, so we have some name recognition that helps when we go out and do the original stuff. I don't have any ideas on how to fix things, I'm just throwing ideas and experiences of my own concerning drawing a crowd.

[battema]

The only musician I've personally known who supported themselves fully with their music was in around a dozen tribute bands, along with some original stuff. And arguably the most well-attended non-festival gig my band has done, was opening for an Italian band doing a Genesis tribute show.

[veteranof1000psychicwars]

The only musician I've personally known who supported themselves fully with their music was in around a dozen tribute bands, along with some original stuff. And arguably the most well-attended non-festival gig my band has done, was opening for an Italian band doing a Genesis tribute show.

I'm good friends with keyboardist Andy Qunta who played with Icehouse (co-wrote Crazy), Steve Harley, Hazel O'Connor, and others, and also co-wrote John Farnham's megahit You're The Voice. He has been based in LA for several years and even with that musical pedigree he plays in two tribute bands to make a living.

[John Miner]

We have a pretty steady gig each month playing at the local art walk. There are usually one or two other bands... sometimes three. It's a non paying gig, but it keeps us on point for playing live. The audience is more artist, hippie scene, deadheads etc.. and we are playing some kind of jazz rock fusion, mostly in odd meters. Guitar, Bass, Drums, Saxophone. We get most all of our gigs from gigging. After we play or during a break, people often come up to us and ask if we would be interested in playing anything from a festival, to a club, to a backyard party or we get the "you should play over at ___________" Then I try to get a contact name and call the club and tell them I was referred by one of their patrons.

I have never actually cold called a venue asking about gigging there. It is something I think I should be doing. I have a VERY good band right now, and I feel
like I need to get us into some better gigs. We I get a paid gig, I try to get $100 to each player, so $400 books us. Because we are a little more on the jazz side than the rock side, we can adapt to small venues, eateries etc. I am the guitarist and my focus is on this band, but the other three guys play in other bands (boring bands) They are in this band for the artistic side, and they can really open up and play, improvise etc. I give them all free reign to do what they want, but they are all good enough or mature enough to allow space for the others. We try to keep it about the music and not a typical jazz fusion chops fest. I think that bores people, and one of the reasons I believe jazz has been on the decline over the decades.

What I am trying to do with this band is create original basic skeletons, based mostly upon bass lines in odd meters, and then groove them. I have the drummer swinging a bit over the time signatures, but still staying very groove oriented and making sure the audience can at least feel where "one" is. The bass lines are pretty proggy, very melodically driven. The sax player and I kinda work in and around that. We probably spend an equal amount of time between dropping out completely, one of us.. not playing at all, either of us, or playing together. Sometimes a call and response thing. So in that way it's very jazz based, but not really traditional. We are jazz enough that we can be booked and promoted as "jazz" but we do move into rock at times to keep the energy level higher than a lot of jazz groups would.

I say and describe this because it is a deliberate strategy. By being able to be marketed as "jazz" we can kinda ride the coat tails of that genre. Jazz people will show up to see what we are about. The "fusion" moniker attracts a small crowd and a few deadheads. The musicianship is good enough to gain the respect of most of the other bands we gig with. We had a band that opened for us last month that was a mere stones throw from "Motorhead". They
actually liked us enough to stick around for our entire 2 hour set and were very complimentary of what we were doing. We have been headlining the 4th of July festival the last two years and again this year as well as a big art parade with thousands of people in the holiday season. These gigs came from being seen at a very small art walk gig within the same community. We also had an offer to do soundtrack work for a film company that is a possibility. That offer came from a gig where someone saw us live.

Now the problems:
Keeping a band together. Our original bassist moved to Seattle. Great young player, but this band did not have the pull to keep him from moving.
Then our drummer died 6 months later. A huge blow to us, but we were very fortunate to pick up top shelf drummer who was playing in a prog band with our new bassist. So I have the rhythm section of a very good prog band. The sax player, we found on Craiglist and loves 70's style fusion bands.

Another problem is the social media issue. We don't much of a presence. I'll use my own facebook page to post upcoming gigs we are going to play. We have a promo video up on youtube that samples 7 or our songs in 4 minutes. I basically stopped trying to sell music after everything went "download" Most folks don't even have CD players and pressing vinyl is very expensive and again, most folks don't have a vinyl set up... let alone a proper one.

I feel like we are better just supporting our local scene. Trying to go out on a tour, I just don't have the connections to do that. I can't imagine trying to book a tour for us when even getting quality local gigs has become a task.

On the social media side, I really don't know what venues are looking for. Thousands of views of your videos? Thousands of subscribers? Likes? I did a show at a theater years ago that was taped, and it got nearly 20K views on youtube, but I can't recall that it ever led to a gig for us.

Just some thoughts...

[Sputnik]

^^^
Your description of this band is very similar to what we're trying to do with the Latin jazz band I'm in called Nectar (we recycled the name ). The band is comprised of a classical guitarist, who plays in Spanish/Portuguese styles, a female singer, a drummer who uses a hybrid kit with lots of Latin percussion, and me on fretless bass. We do some jazz standards - into which I'd throw the Fusion stuff like "Spain" and "500 Miles High," some well known pop songs that we give a "Latin" feel, and some traditional Caribbean music. With a largely acoustic lineup, we're versatile to play smaller venues, but can crank it up when needed.

We have a little video trailer if anyone is interested in checking it out: https://nectaracoustic.com/listen

We are just starting out, and at the moment we are playing some very low or no paying gigs, but those have led to other connections where the pay is decent. Not being a super loud rock band gives us a ton of versatility. We can play restaurants, breweries, coffee houses, and smaller artsy clubs, as well as outdoor street festivals. Our next gig is literally at a chocolate shop, and we'll get a $50 coupon for chocolate... but it's great exposure. Gigs like this seem similar to your "art walk" gig, basically a loss leader to open up other opportunities.

You absolutely DO need to follow up on your leads, which include cold calls to venues. With every bone in my body, I hate to say this, but we're fortunate we have a woman in the band. Clubs respond far more quickly and favorably to females, and so far, she has landed all our gigs, even for venues that other band members have approached. My wife was in Eccentric Orbit and Brave Pursuit, and she did all the booking. It really helps. If you have willing woman in your life who canbreak the ice with these places, I recommend it, even though it plays into an abhorrent sexist stereotype.

The Nectar music is fun to play, but I don't really consider this playing "Prog" or "Fusion." If anything, it's what I'd call "stealth Prog," my euphemism for playing more interesting music in venues where less challenging music typically rules. This is really the best route to take if you want to sustain the band with paying gigs, but it requires its own kind of compromises. It's not like playing real 70s influenced Prog or Fusion, and a lot of the rock elements are of necessity toned way down. The plus side is that you generally play in venues with an endemic audience and aren't dependent on your own mailing list to pack a place.

So, in some ways I consider this among the best answers to your basic question about playing interesting music and getting paid, but in other ways, I sort of consider it capitulation, because you're not really playing Prog or Fusion. It may just come down to a question of how far away from your musical heart you're willing to go to have a paying audience.

Bill

[SteveSly]

We have a pretty steady gig each month playing at the local art walk. There are usually one or two other bands... sometimes three. It's a non paying gig, but it keeps us on point for playing live. The audience is more artist, hippie scene, deadheads etc.. and we are playing some kind of jazz rock fusion, mostly in odd meters. Guitar, Bass, Drums, Saxophone. We get most all of our gigs from gigging. After we play or during a break, people often come up to us and ask if we would be interested in playing anything from a festival, to a club, to a backyard party or we get the "you should play over at ___________" Then I try to get a contact name and call the club and tell them I was referred by one of their patrons.
s...

Just curious, do you take tips and make any money from them? I am not a musician myself, but am friends with quite a few local musicians. I have a friend who plays in a jazz / big band type group and a woman who sings in a country / pop band. Both gig in Southwest Michigan a lot and have steady followings. They both do a mix of covers and original material. Both always put a big tip bucket at the front of the stage and often end up with hundreds of dollars by the end of the night. In the jazz band’s case, they usually make more in tips than what they are paid by the venue. Curious how other bands look at tips?

[battema]

Just curious, do you take tips and make any money from them? I am not a musician myself, but am friends with quite a few local musicians. I have a friend who plays in a jazz / big band type group and a woman who sings in a country / pop band. Both gig in Southwest Michigan a lot and have steady followings. They both do a mix of covers and original material. Both always put a big tip bucket at the front of the stage and often end up with hundreds of dollars by the end of the night. In the jazz band’s case, they usually make more in tips than what they are paid by the venue. Curious how other bands look at tips?

Speaking for myself, it has varied. Some bands I've been in were all about that, and any bucks were bucks in their book. One band preferred to be paid in drinks at the bar

I personally feel it's unnecessary; if the show has a cover, then I feel everyone has already paid what was considered a fair compensation for the performance. If they really want to offer more, I'm more than happy to send them to a merch stand

But I don't play to live, and I have a strong desire to be a soft seller. It comes from my own experiences as a fan, where I would approach an artist and suddenly find myself pressed to buy all sorts of stuff to the point where I felt uncomfortable trying to walk away, IMHO a very hard sell that always turned me off. To me, a tip bucket is too close to that sort of thing.

[moecurlythanu]

Just curious, do you take tips and make any money from them? I am not a musician myself, but am friends with quite a few local musicians. I have a friend who plays in a jazz / big band type group and a woman who sings in a country / pop band. Both gig in Southwest Michigan a lot and have steady followings. They both do a mix of covers and original material. Both always put a big tip bucket at the front of the stage and often end up with hundreds of dollars by the end of the night. In the jazz band’s case, they usually make more in tips than what they are paid by the venue. Curious how other bands look at tips?

The Jam Band they had at the HOMES Brewing anniversary in Ann Arbor this past weekend had a tip jar. They even passed it around near the end of the 3rd set. It looked like they did pretty well with it. I threw them a 10, as we paid no admission. I assume the brewery also compensated them. Their merch table got little traffic, but from where I sat, it looked like stickers and doo-dads, no actual music for sale.

[Dana5140]

I am not a working musician, but have spent time around some very good ones. I have two observations that might be a bit off-kilter but I hope they pertain:

1. Many years ago, I helped put on a show with the Roscoe Mitchell quintet. In it were Spencer Barefield, who has gone on to better acclaim, and the pianist Gary Schunk. For 3 nights they played Roscoe's very out-there music. Seven months later I got married, and we hired a band to play at the wedding. The pianist was Gary Schunk. I spoke to him that night, and asked how he got to play with a wedding band (oh, naive me!), and of course, his answer was he was a musician and this is how he made his living. So, even playing with one of the world's most important jazz musicians was insufficient to really allow him to follow his muse.

2. Even in a world-class band like Magma, most of the musicians have to find work outside the band to make their living. Magma does not play a lot of gigs, so people like Caroline Indjein work in other bands (in her case, at least 3 other bands), Laura Guaratto has an outside band, Theirry Eliaz leads his own combo, Silvie and Herve have acapella groups, Rudy Blas plays gigs with his brother, etc. Stella manages the band, and I am never sure what Isabelle does outside the band she has been in for more than 25 years. Even most of them cannot make it on their gigs alone.

[SteveSly]

Speaking for myself, it has varied. Some bands I've been in were all about that, and any bucks were bucks in their book. One band preferred to be paid in drinks at the bar

I personally feel it's unnecessary; if the show has a cover, then I feel everyone has already paid what was considered a fair compensation for the performance. If they really want to offer more, I'm more than happy to send them to a merch stand

.

I have no idea what the jazz band makes, but I am good friends with the country girl’s father who is also her manager. He and I have talked a lot about her career. She is quite in demand in Southwest Michigan / Northern Indiana / Ohio / Florida and charges a significant amount for her performances. She sometimes performs with a trio and sometimes with a full band. Full band performances charge more. On top of her guarantee, she also does tips and has a merch table. They do really well with the tips and just look at it as a bonus. All that being said, she is not a full-time musician as she is a dental hygienist as her full-time gig. She put out an album when she was a teenager with Mark Farner from Grand Funk as her producer and members of Bob Seeger’s Silver Bullet Band playing on it. The album sold modestly. Just before Covid hit she had a plan to move to Nashville and try to make the big time, but that ended up not happening, so she is back to just gigging in this area.

[John Miner]

^^^
Your description of this band is very similar to what we're trying to do with the Latin jazz band I'm in called Nectar (we recycled the name ). The band is comprised of a classical guitarist, who plays in Spanish/Portuguese styles, a female singer, a drummer who uses a hybrid kit with lots of Latin percussion, and me on fretless bass. We do some jazz standards - into which I'd throw the Fusion stuff like "Spain" and "500 Miles High," some well known pop songs that we give a "Latin" feel, and some traditional Caribbean music. With a largely acoustic lineup, we're versatile to play smaller venues, but can crank it up when needed.

We have a little video trailer if anyone is interested in checking it out: https://nectaracoustic.com/listen

We are just starting out, and at the moment we are playing some very low or no paying gigs, but those have led to other connections where the pay is decent. Not being a super loud rock band gives us a ton of versatility. We can play restaurants, breweries, coffee houses, and smaller artsy clubs, as well as outdoor street festivals. Our next gig is literally at a chocolate shop, and we'll get a $50 coupon for chocolate... but it's great exposure. Gigs like this seem similar to your "art walk" gig, basically a loss leader to open up other opportunities.

You absolutely DO need to follow up on your leads, which include cold calls to venues. With every bone in my body, I hate to say this, but we're fortunate we have a woman in the band. Clubs respond far more quickly and favorably to females, and so far, she has landed all our gigs, even for venues that other band members have approached. My wife was in Eccentric Orbit and Brave Pursuit, and she did all the booking. It really helps. If you have willing woman in your life who canbreak the ice with these places, I recommend it, even though it plays into an abhorrent sexist stereotype.

The Nectar music is fun to play, but I don't really consider this playing "Prog" or "Fusion." If anything, it's what I'd call "stealth Prog," my euphemism for playing more interesting music in venues where less challenging music typically rules. This is really the best route to take if you want to sustain the band with paying gigs, but it requires its own kind of compromises. It's not like playing real 70s influenced Prog or Fusion, and a lot of the rock elements are of necessity toned way down. The plus side is that you generally play in venues with an endemic audience and aren't dependent on your own mailing list to pack a place.

So, in some ways I consider this among the best answers to your basic question about playing interesting music and getting paid, but in other ways, I sort of consider it capitulation, because you're not really playing Prog or Fusion. It may just come down to a question of how far away from your musical heart you're willing to go to have a paying audience.

Bill

Thanks for the reply Bill. It's important that we share our stories and learn from one another. We are in very difficult times on so many levels, but I just can't go there in my head. I still believe that people will connect with more eclectic interesting music if they are given the chance to listen to it. Our response from audiences has been VERY positive, but not as much from club promoters etc. They feel like we are too "out there" but when given a chance, they come around and like it. We are headlining the big 4th of July Festival for the 3rd straight year. The promoter "gets it" and it a strong promoter of the arts. I argue that while weird art is often celebrated, weird music is not as much. I find that very hypocritical actually. People will get googled eyed at someone's bizarre abstract art opening. All the movers and shakers.. even the mayor shows up. But if we play music in 13/8... it's too weird, too abstract. I am fighting this stigma by having our drummer mark the "1" and then try to groove the meter into something palatable. Two bars of 4 then a bar of 5.. but really accenting the two bars of 4 to drive it seems to be working. We had a group of hippie girls out dancing to an 11/8 song we did recently. Like the girl in your band, I think the element of having a saxophone player gives us a bit or credibility that other bands don't have. It's very old school, it's identified within "jazz", and gives the music a sophisticated aesthetic that can get the attention of the wine and cheese crowd. Another thing I do as guitarist is really do my best to stay out of everyone's way. A lot of times I just don't play. I've even set down my guitar and walked over to the bar to get a drink.. while the other guys play. I ask the drummer to drop out at times as well. Because we are in instrumental band, we really have to keep the music dynamic and interesting, and the set list extremely varied. I do some bluegrass style guitar with slide that catches attention of country folks, and we even have a reggae tune we do instrumentally that is perfect to do after a complex prog tune that might have a few folks nodding off.

I like your word "stealth"!

[John Miner]

We picked up a decent paying gig in a popular restaurant today. Their booking agent was complimentary of our youtube page that has a sampling of our music (7 songs across 4 minutes of viewing). So that seemed like a good strategy. We edited down the songs into less than one minute clips and used just photos of the band playing various venues from open air fairs, theaters, festivals, clubs etc that we have performed at over the last couple years.

It's very hard to get a good recording of the music "live" and get a good video production at the same time. For us, the music is most important, and the visual seems better to focus on good "stills" rather than using the typical iphone video that doesn't sound good because it's not properly recorded. We've never done a restaurant gig before, so that will be interesting for us. A little victory, as small as it is.

[Gravedigger]

Can you provide a link to your YouTube page?

[moecurlythanu]

We picked up a decent paying gig in a popular restaurant today. Their booking agent was complimentary of our youtube page that has a sampling of our music (7 songs across 4 minutes of viewing). So that seemed like a good strategy. We edited down the songs into less than one minute clips and used just photos of the band playing various venues from open air fairs, theaters, festivals, clubs etc that we have performed at over the last couple years.

It's very hard to get a good recording of the music "live" and get a good video production at the same time. For us, the music is most important, and the visual seems better to focus on good "stills" rather than using the typical iphone video that doesn't sound good because it's not properly recorded. We've never done a restaurant gig before, so that will be interesting for us. A little victory, as small as it is.

I've seen shows at a supper club. It's weird, for me, and I can only guess how it must be for the performer.