I'm making a wild assumption, probably valid, that 99% of the people on this board are musicians or creative folks (writers, etc). And, seeing as how I'm getting old, and none of you seem like teenagers so you might have an opinion on this issue.

At what point does one reasonably have to say "Wow, I really suck, and this just isn't happening"?? Do you ever feel like, well, if I haven't done anything decent by this point, I'm never going to? So I might as well give it up before I turn into That Guy who's 45 and playing in a lame bar band?

I'm not trying to insult anyone on here if you are, in fact, in a band that is accomplishing whatever it is you want to accomplish. But assuming most of us are struggling, my question boils down to "At what point is discouragement appropriate?"

I understand the ethos of Staying Positive etc etc blah blah but I think that, empirically, there is some point at which being encouraging becomes being delusional. The knee-jerk reaction to this is probably something akin to "who cares if it makes you happy to do it" but it would be nice if there were some independent world court that could objectively tell us "You are failing because you don't appear to have any talent. Use your time more productively on something else."

When it stops being fun.

until then...







Faiz

this is catshit

artur rubinstein

i rest my case


-noah

G&T,
I want to first address what I think is a fallacious assumption of yours: that success in the music industry is inextricably linked to talent. Although, happily for us, some people do gain some measure of musical success thanks in large part to their talent, but I think to assume that all of those who attain musical success possess talent. I've seen enough bands in my hometown get popular due to their looks, onstage antics, or associations while they play what in my opinion is uninspired and uninspiring music, to know that not all those with musical success have actual musical ability. More so, it is an error to think that all of those with musical talent attain success. Again, I've known some people with buckets-full of talent whose bands have foundered, or who have just lost interest in playing after dozens of shows played in front of marginal LA crowds. The venn diagram for talent and success, then, doesn't have very much overlap.


That theory, of course, is posited on a very traditional notion of success. If, for example, one's measure of success is being able to still go out and play shows in his or her bar cover band at the age of forty-five, the venn diagram explicated above has very little utility.

I have certainly struggled with it a bit: when we play shows to fifteen people, it's natural for me, a person who has struggled with self-image issues, to immediately assume that the crowds aren't showing up because I suck. Well, as you noted, there is no world court to which one can go for a determination of his or her musical ability, so it may be that I suck and I just don't know it, but after the shows, when I listen to our recordings, or watch the videos, I think that I am damned good, and that the music my band makes is damned good, too.

So now I try to force myself to remember why I'm up there playing. Sure, to a certain extent it is for the theoretical adoration of the masses, but my primary reason for playing is just because I like to do it. My primary reason for playing is just because I like to do it. My primary reason for playing is just because I like to do it. It is my mantra, and when I focus on that mantra, instead of the sparse crowd, then every time I play, it feels like success, regardless of the size of the crowd, and every time I record something, it feels like a success, whether or not anybody else will pay for it.

Now, I know that this is starting to sound like the knee-jerk positivity response you foretold, and I guess that to some extent it is. But it contains within it an imoprtant caveat, that I think also exists as a sort of internal world talent court. Here it is: I'll stop playing when the mantra is no longer true. Simple!

Chin up, old man!
Josh

"You are failing because you don't appear to have any talent. Use your time more productively on something else."

That's what "they" would have told The Stooges, The Shaggs, The Velvet Underground, etc.

So I might as well give it up before I turn into That Guy who's 45 and playing in a lame bar band?

That Guy is probably having a good time and dosen't care what you or anybody else think.

Kerble wrote:

When it stops being fun.

Ding!

I see it more like - you get to a certain age/stage when it's too damn late to STOP.

And you have no option but to keep on going at it.

And I like it.

the keyboard player in my band is 55 years old. he has been in bands since the 60's. i asked him why he's still doing it he just says it's what he does. i can only hope that when i am his age i will still be in a band.

-e

elisha wiesner wrote:the keyboard player in my band...

this isn't The MVF you're talking about, is it? j/k