Just saw this now & thought I'd chime in,
Eons ago I had a stint as a hired hand in a band back in the 'good old days' which was on Polydor in the USA & got to witness all kinds of Major label World machinations as a fly on the wall - made me make a mental note to do things as an indie/DIY if I'd ever release my own music.
Some years later a prospective label A&R person who wanted me to remix an entire album because he thought the hihat level was too low, cemented the deal.
So I commenced DIY in '95, set up deals in Europe, Asia, USA etc. Had, in retrospect a few lucky breaks with timing & zeitgeist. It was ok when the discs flew out the door by the truckload & I was getting paid. I thought it would never end!
Then it got a lot less fun when the record biz collapse began to take place & much of my energy it seemed went into coordination, administration, shipping & receiving etc. For a dwindling return. That combined with the Kafkaesque iron clog of the Dutch State & tax office constantly stomping me into oblivion with absurd pressures like trying to make one man music guy operating an 'official' business submit a yearly business administration done to the same standard and guidelines of say Philips or KLM.
One day I realized that 1 part music equaled 2-3 parts unsavory office serf work for me & I began to associate, in a Pavlovian way, what I previously loved (music) with something highly unpleasant.
A cautionary tale!
Fwiw - the upkeep & maintenance on studio stuff, while sometimes inconvenient, didn't overwhelm me too much as I felt it ultimately helped me to become a better engineer & understand what was under the chassis of the boxes with knobs & coloured lights.
| compasspnt wrote on Fri, 27 August 2010 18:21 |
| bob ebeling wrote on Fri, 27 August 2010 11:47 |
I really wonder how much further I would have made it as an artist, which was at one time my sole aspiration. As equipment entered the picture to get the art made, even in 1992, buying a 16 track for 5 grand, the stress of being a studio operator started to directly take away this free and always writing guy and turn him into an always thinking about money and gear guy.
There was a direct effect where gear, in my case, wrecked (erased?, slowly turned away?) an artist. Now, that was my choice and there have been hundreds of great things that have come from going the gear way, but could I have been that great artist who today would be sitting in Scotland, drinking a Guinness and scribbling lyric ideas on napkins while trying not to let those 4 girls in the corner recognize who I am?
I think if I had to do it all again, I might not have ever bought that 16 track in 1992 and rather put all that time and effort into rehearsing a band, writing songs, and spending more time in Jamaica...but who's to say?
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This is an EXTREMELY important point.
There is something in the "creative spirit mindset" that does NOT like the intrusion of business ideals.
That's one reason a good band manager is so important. Sometimes there is one band member who can take on the basic responsibilities (often the bass player for some reason?), but so so many musicians just plain do not want to do "the business thing."
This is yet another reason that the music business today, wherein a band or single artist is almost expected to write the songs,
book the gigs, handle the merch, collect the money, record the demos (or worse, MASTERS) in their own house on their own recording system, drive their own van, load their own gear, design their own album cover, market themselves extensively, call David Letterman's booker, etc....is causing a DEARTH of truly creative flow.
And the WORST thing, I have seen it several times, is when a band or artist decides to "put in their own high end studio." Can it work...yes, it might. Will it work? Likely it will diminish the creative juices as the focus is diverted towards day to day business ideals.
Yes, on the other hand is the fact that in today's "artistically democratic" world, there are more chances to record oneself, more opportunities to go worldwide, than ever.
But where is the Golden Mean?
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