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Succeeding In Music (The Lefsetz Letter) An interesting read for those who like opinions on how the sausage is made. 1. Why Why do you want to be a successful musician? A. Money There are a lot easier ways to get rich than playing music. You’re better off writing an app, or finishing college and entering the banking sector. If you’re playing music to get rich, you’re a chump. Or else you have no other advantages, no other skills. And the odds of success if this is true are incredibly long. It’s like being poor and uneducated and desiring to be a professional athlete. B. Fame Used to be, music was a good route to fame. But now it’s not incredibly difficult to get on a reality TV series and many people featured on TMZ or Radar have no talent at all. Paris Hilton perfected this paradigm and the Kardashian sisters have refined it. If your only desire is to be known by everybody else, it’s a full time job leaving little time for practicing and there are easier outlets to media than playing music. C. Talent Society is rife with talented people who have not been successful in their chosen fields. Because success is about more than talent. It’s about hard work and perseverance. D. Creative outlet You’ve got so many ideas inside that you need to express. You’ve got a belief that other members of the public will resonate. That they’ll feel the same way or look to you for instruction. This is a good reason to become a musician. But this outlook is worthless without musical skill and hard work and perseverance. E. A desire to prove something Maybe to your parents or schoolmates, that you’re not a loser. This has got little to do with music, but tons to do with motivation. And motivation is key to making it. 2. Outlets A. Television This is where those with vocal talent and good looks go to seek fame. Possibly a little money, but fame primarily. It’s anathema to artists, a gold mine to those who don’t know what artistry is. If you go on television many will know your name, it’s the easiest way to reach a lot of people quickly. If you win, or come close to it, businessmen will put money behind your career and try to profit off of it, which will hopefully make you more famous, but may not make you a hell of a lot more rich. Television breeds instant ubiquity. And almost nothing which is instantly ubiquitous lasts. Which is why that guy Screech from "Saved By The Bell" is broke and we had a rush of TV stars holding up 7-11’s.
TV makes music look small. To truly succeed long term, music must look big. Dave Matthews Band and U2 lose their charisma on television, but they appear giant in person. It’s one thing to utilize television as the cherry on top, to take an already established career to bigger heights. But if you start on television, your career will probably be brief. Just like all those acts who made it via MTV videos. We’re used to an endless smorgasbord on television. We remember the names, but we don’t want to see them. percolate for years before it hits the tipping point. It might never hit the tipping point. It hits the tipping point primarily because its fans spread the word. TV contests are only about voices. Major labels are only about Top Forty music. They’re not about true artistic greatness, certainly if it doesn’t sound just like everything else. though you practice all day long. Because we’re interested in something elusive, from the outside, a perspective that might be in our hearts but that we are unwilling to live. Can you risk playing original music instead of covers? Can you risk sounding like nothing else? And can you be so interesting, so good that people start following you anyway? "Ya see, we're not interested in what you know...but what you are willing to learn. C'mon y'all." | |
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Response from Sandra St. Victor. =-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=-=
Subject: Re: Succeeding In Music
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Music for adventurous listeners
"Ya see, we're not interested in what you know...but what you are willing to learn. C'mon y'all." | |
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Interesting. Thanks, tA. | |
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While I generally agree with Lefsetz's point of view that musicians should care about making music more than making money, his email rants about how to succeed in business (I subscribe too!) sound like the voice of a bitter old man who's angry at these kids on his lawn.
Among the acts I can think of who "made it via MTV videos" are Duran Duran, the Cure, Nirvana, Guns N Roses, and the guy we're all here to talk about. Even Pearl Jam, who refused to make videos after their first album, were made famous by their videos - famous enough to make demands about what they would and wouldn't do.
That is the WORST advice I have ever heard for a young, green, right-minded band headed into the professional arena. "Just trust everyone who's interested in you!!"
It's not like the 80s hardcore scene anymore, where you're booking gigs with teenagers whose dad is in the Elks Lodge, and he thinks he can get the Elks Hall for the night and hopefully the cops won't shut it down. And that's the only way to make a show happen, to go out on a wing and a prayer.
My touring band got stiffed by little clubs with nice people running them MORE than we did at the big pro pads, because the pro pads know their reputation is on the line and if they stiff some little band for $300 they may not get the next big show from that agent. The little clubs just, well, the nice people would sometimes literally START CRYING when we went to settle up. I'm sure they had nice intentions. But damn it if we're busting our asses for $300 a night and paying $200 in gas and motel 6, and then we don't it get it a couple nights in a row, we need to start reading the HELP WANTED signs if we're ever gonna make it back to LA!
Just because YOU are "about artistry" don't take the leap that everyone interested in you has the same commitment. Even if they do... Artists are notoriously bad at managing their own personal affairs. Have SOME sense of professionalism if you are even approaching a pro situation.
Ah yes, the good old days of the great record men, and unicorns. Men who BELIEVED in artisty! Men like David Geffen, one of the greatest old-school record men of all, who sued Neil Young for not sounding enough like himself after three albums in a row failed to turn to gold. Men like Saul Zaentz, proprietor of Fantasy Records, who sued John Fogerty for sounding TOO MUCH like himself. Men like Clive Davis, the living legend, pillar of the community, who threw Kelly Clarkson under the bus when she failed to bend far enough over. Never mind all that - THEY BELIEVED!!!!
Yeah OK, to some extent labels like Warner Bros hung in there for their chosen acts' first three or four releases until they caught fire, or kept em on even if they never did catch fire. I'm glad there were outlets for people like Capt Beefheart and Ry Cooder in the major label 70s scene. And to some extent, FM rock radio used to be less stringent about its playlist than it is now, where the stations advertise "you know EVERY SONG WE PLAY.")
But that ended in the 70s. I'm not aware of too many acts since then who have made it to a 3rd record on a major without big time buzz.
His rants are interesting on once in a while but man is he in unicorn land! But I have to remember this is a guy who wrote an extensive post about a touring revue starring Michael McDonald, Boz Scaggs and Donald Fagen doing old R&B covers and described it as "the future of music."
Anyway thanks for posting, that got me good & worked up! | |
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You're most welcome.
Music for adventurous listeners "Ya see, we're not interested in what you know...but what you are willing to learn. C'mon y'all." | |
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You're welcome...I think.
Yeah, he's an opinionated guy to say the least. But you take what you can use and leave the rest.
Some of the folks that respond to his posts are quite surprising.
Music for adventurous listeners "Ya see, we're not interested in what you know...but what you are willing to learn. C'mon y'all." | |
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