Exec Corner: Defending a career in the Rock n' Roll business
With about two months left of classes, minus reading week and a couple trips and conferences, I feel the whole “real world” concept closing in fast. I'm sure there are lots of you feeling the same way.
I guess the plan for most is to find a career style job and start paying back the ridiculous amount of money you borrowed to be here. I wish it wasn't so, but unfortunately, at this juncture, all I have on my mind is money, or more specifically, the lack thereof.
Now this is nothing new, my family's never had much money, so by birthright, I don't have any either. So in that respect, same old same old I guess. But always the realist, about half of me is saying “everything will work out, it always does,” and the other half is left asking “how dude?”
After all, I'm stepping into a career in the music industry, which I'm pretty sure is about as volatile a career choice as you can imagine. And, what's even more risky is I want to be a performer. For those of you bandies out there, you know how hard it can be to get a gig, let alone a gig that pays, and even harder still, enough of them to pay, or even subsidize your rent. Now don't get me wrong, my band The Hoolie Snatch rocks-ass, and with a good team behind us, we could do some serious damage, but we're a young act, and don't have the reputation to make any real demands. The ground-up thing takes forever! Essentially, I'm preparing to discover the real meaning of the term “starving artist”.
Funny thing is, before I moved here from Ottawa two years ago, I was a bartender at a fine-dining casino, and was working hard as a drummer/manager in a kick-ass punk band. Now two years, and four OSAP appointments later, I'm just about done college, and it seems like my securest option is a bartending job and using my “free” time to push my new band. I'm used to people looking at me like a nut-case when they ask me what I'm doing when I graduate and I say “driving around the country in a van, sleeping on couches and eating and showering whenever I get lucky!” My family thinks I'm short sighted, they've told me so countless times. My engaged friend says I'm going to end up alone. My buddy from back home started his career in bio-pharmaceutical science last year, and recently nailed his MCATS (med school tests), is telling me I'm going to be poor forever. My guidance counsellors in high school said I'm in for a real disappointment in pursuing bands and music. Come to think of it, just about everybody I've ever explained my plans to try their best to discourage my “alternative” career choice. Scary thing is, they're probably right. I've read the books, I know how much luck there is involved in successful bands, and trust me I've never had much of that. There's a solid chance I will hit rock bottom in a few years and wonder why in hell I decided to drop it all for a stupid rock band.
Who knows, maybe I'll get into the smack and end up living on Young St wearing a leftover hoodie from the band's merchandise, drinking Scope out of a paper bag, singing my songs for change while I creep people out harping about how the greatest band in the world got a bum deal.
All I know for sure right now is that playing live music for a living is all I have in mind. I've been obsessed with this notion ever since I sang a solo with the NAC orchestra in Ottawa when I was eight-years-old. The only part about high school that I don't look upon with disdain is playing shows with my old band. And I've got a million and one song ideas that I have to get out of my brain and into iTunes, and I don't even care if anybody likes them! If I turn 50, and have to admit I never got a record deal (even a crappy one), or never toured Europe (even if it's just Poland or Lithuania or something), or simply never gave it a real fighting chance, I will certainly end up fat, divorced, drunk and bitterly angry.
So hey, as the next couple months quickly run out, I'm looking forward to, or at least getting mentally prepared for being poor, dirty and quite possibly homeless, as long as I've got time for the band.
Rock on.
I guess the plan for most is to find a career style job and start paying back the ridiculous amount of money you borrowed to be here. I wish it wasn't so, but unfortunately, at this juncture, all I have on my mind is money, or more specifically, the lack thereof.
Now this is nothing new, my family's never had much money, so by birthright, I don't have any either. So in that respect, same old same old I guess. But always the realist, about half of me is saying “everything will work out, it always does,” and the other half is left asking “how dude?”
After all, I'm stepping into a career in the music industry, which I'm pretty sure is about as volatile a career choice as you can imagine. And, what's even more risky is I want to be a performer. For those of you bandies out there, you know how hard it can be to get a gig, let alone a gig that pays, and even harder still, enough of them to pay, or even subsidize your rent. Now don't get me wrong, my band The Hoolie Snatch rocks-ass, and with a good team behind us, we could do some serious damage, but we're a young act, and don't have the reputation to make any real demands. The ground-up thing takes forever! Essentially, I'm preparing to discover the real meaning of the term “starving artist”.
Funny thing is, before I moved here from Ottawa two years ago, I was a bartender at a fine-dining casino, and was working hard as a drummer/manager in a kick-ass punk band. Now two years, and four OSAP appointments later, I'm just about done college, and it seems like my securest option is a bartending job and using my “free” time to push my new band. I'm used to people looking at me like a nut-case when they ask me what I'm doing when I graduate and I say “driving around the country in a van, sleeping on couches and eating and showering whenever I get lucky!” My family thinks I'm short sighted, they've told me so countless times. My engaged friend says I'm going to end up alone. My buddy from back home started his career in bio-pharmaceutical science last year, and recently nailed his MCATS (med school tests), is telling me I'm going to be poor forever. My guidance counsellors in high school said I'm in for a real disappointment in pursuing bands and music. Come to think of it, just about everybody I've ever explained my plans to try their best to discourage my “alternative” career choice. Scary thing is, they're probably right. I've read the books, I know how much luck there is involved in successful bands, and trust me I've never had much of that. There's a solid chance I will hit rock bottom in a few years and wonder why in hell I decided to drop it all for a stupid rock band.
Who knows, maybe I'll get into the smack and end up living on Young St wearing a leftover hoodie from the band's merchandise, drinking Scope out of a paper bag, singing my songs for change while I creep people out harping about how the greatest band in the world got a bum deal.
All I know for sure right now is that playing live music for a living is all I have in mind. I've been obsessed with this notion ever since I sang a solo with the NAC orchestra in Ottawa when I was eight-years-old. The only part about high school that I don't look upon with disdain is playing shows with my old band. And I've got a million and one song ideas that I have to get out of my brain and into iTunes, and I don't even care if anybody likes them! If I turn 50, and have to admit I never got a record deal (even a crappy one), or never toured Europe (even if it's just Poland or Lithuania or something), or simply never gave it a real fighting chance, I will certainly end up fat, divorced, drunk and bitterly angry.
So hey, as the next couple months quickly run out, I'm looking forward to, or at least getting mentally prepared for being poor, dirty and quite possibly homeless, as long as I've got time for the band.
Rock on.
