You could really drive yourself crazy watching the news right now. If it's not an endless bludgeoning with doom and gloom, it's a maddening and frustrating report after report of corruption, special interest politics and pork barrel spending while everyone agrees the entire world is in a deep financial crisis. I could easily go off on a rant about it all and most likely people on both traditional sides of the political spectrum would be annoyed with me because I see plenty of bad behavior, double standards and irresponsible treatment of the public trust to go around. So instead, I will try to make you look at things in a slightly more positive light. Ready? Here goes...
Art is not a victim of any of this. Sure, commerce is definitely affected, but even that is blown far out of proportion when it comes to the grassroots music community. It's not that we should all be happy without any money. It's that we weren't getting any of that money to start with right? Let me put it another way. There are less than 1000 artists on major labels worldwide. So even if all 1000 lost their deals and those deals weren't replaced, at most we'd add 1000 more to a sea of millions of artists who aren't making a living let alone a financial killing. And that would be okay. It wouldn't negatively affect the "art" part would it? It doesn't really cost any money at all to write and perform a song. That's the art. The rest is just business. The good news is that on the scale of most full or part time working musicians, the relative economy doesn't really impact your drive or willingness or ability to make art in the first place. At most, it may impede your starry eyed dream of "Rock Star" like excesses.
Well, of the "Rock Stars" I've been able to meet in my life, few of them really live in excess to start with. (Certainly not compared to the average Investment Banker or Politician for example). And since we know there aren't all that many to start with, it's less than a blip on a radar screen. We have over 52K members. If all 1000 major label artists were on our member list, that would mean there'd still be 52K of you on the outside looking in no matter who was in charge or how good the economy was. And that money wouldn't help you make better art anyway. And frankly, it's more than just a cliche that art more often comes from the not having than the having. It's true. But that still doesn't pay the bills right? Losing a job that is supporting you or your family is deadly serious. Sadly not many of you reading this are probably able to support a family entirely through music today without at least a second family income no matter how talented you are or how hard you work. That's a major problem in the grassroots music community even in a good economy.
Fortunately, there are still a lot of ways you can find real world human scale success. With a little more focus and self education to go along with your musical talent, you can probably replace lost music related income due to a bad economy. Networking becomes even more important than ever when things turn difficult. It's vitally important to be on people's radar screens when an extra gig or new opportunity comes up to make a few more bucks doing something music related. Thankfully, successful grassroots artists already know how to network right? (If you don't, visit our message boards and we'll start connecting you with others).
In some ways people are more interested than ever in affordable entertainment options when they are struggling in a bad economy. As an artist, you are well prepared to not only supply that entertainment, but to also keep their spirits up until times get better for all of us. The way that makes a real artist feel can't be damaged by a bad economy. Hang in there everyone!
Learn, Succeed, Thrive. We're All In This Together!
Just Plain Folks
Brian Austin Whitney