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Mongoose
At the age of 62, most of my club playing days are in the past. However, I still play a couple of times a month in the metro Atlanta area with a few different bands.
Talk with most any local musician now, and they will tell you that the live music scene is nowhere near what it used to be.
Here in Atlanta, you can get fairly decent playing gigs if you get 20 miles or more out of the city. Unfortunately, for guys my age, playing clubs starting at 10:30 pm and playing until 3:00 am are not as practical anymore, even if you do get $50 a man.
Clubs in town are almost always "put out your tip jar, we'll give you a pizza," and that's about it.
I see the club owners side of things, too. Band comes in with just a couple of "band buddies" and girlfriends, play way too loud for the room, clearing out most of the regulars. Very few people there now to buy food and beer (which is why the club is there in the first place).
But, my band in Boston in 1979 got $50 a man for an entire night of work. What was the cost of a pair of drumsticks, or gallon of gas, or loaf of bread, in 1979? You are lucky to get even that nowadays.
Part of this is that those of us over 60 grew up in a time when there were only three channels you could get on your black and white rabbit ears TV, no smartphones, video games, etc. It was the days when you would actually sit down and listen to an album with the lyrics and cover art in front of you. A live band playing somewhere, even in a friend's garage, was a celebration, all of the kids flocked to it like it was an "event."
I feel your pain about live music. I get so tired of "yeah, we used to have bands, but now it's just a DJ, or karaoke," etc. But, to the overall public these days, it's just not that important anymore.
It's both funny and sad to me these days to see people in a club with a band playing live. They are 100% tuned in to their individual smartphones, occasionally glancing up at one of the seven TVs in the place, each with a different game or show. Not only not paying attention to the band, but also ignoring everyone else sitting with them at their table, unless, of course, they run across something funny on their phone to share with someone for about 15 seconds, and then it's back to the phone.
We now want baseball games to go "faster," because we are so bombarded with stimuli all day long, we get bored with what is happening on the field unless a rabid wolverine runs out and bites the shortstop. Which, by the way, 98% of the stadium crowd would miss, because they would be watching the latest viral video on their phones.
Bottom line, I play live music now mostly just for fun, and, sometimes, it is.
But, it's just a different technological time now.
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TeaAtThree
Nowadays, my live shows tend more towards jazz. I love the quality of the musicianship and the fact that the sound is nearly always perfect.
T@3