Living the life of a rock star

[ter1413]

Originally Posted by Manton

Isn't the simple answer that you may be a rocker, but you are not a star?

Spot on. You band is probably shittttte! When you get good....you get good trim!

 

[Joe Cool]

Hello Cleveland?

Behold the life of a working (note I did not even say professional) musician.

 

[acidboy]

btw, OP should reflect on the tragedies of some bands in rock history and learn from them. cases in point:

 

[CharlieAngel]

I find it amusing that this was pretty much a tongue-in-cheek look at the life of the "real" musician and any questions posed within were, well, rhetorical, but the responses are fun.

 

[origenesprit]

Originally Posted by CharlieAngel

I find it amusing that this was pretty much a tongue-in-cheek look at the life of the "real" musician and any questions posed within were, well, rhetorical, but the responses are fun.

Meh, my band isn't even touring and we still manage to get the odd groupie here and there. I think you're doing something wrong. All the other points seem spot on though.

 

[CharlieAngel]

Originally Posted by origenesprit

Meh, my band isn't even touring and we still manage to get the odd groupie here and there. I think you're doing something wrong. All the other points seem spot on though.
True enough. Here and there is one thing (I've gotten my share locally), but the way you hear some folks tell it, musicians are always knee deep in the taaaang, bleeding from a nostril and constantly evading the police and ex-girlfriends. Or something.

 

[edmorel]

What real rock band does your band cover?

 

[Alter]

Originally Posted by MetroStyles

Lol pretty funny stuff. You should talk to Alter, he was a rocker for a few years way back when.

Except for the lizard crawling over his head, I could have written that myself...around 20 years ago.

Good luck, Charlieangel. Keep working at it and hope for a few lucky breaks, you may make it to rock star someday. If not, it is true that you will be grateful for the memories. Then again, what the hell is wrong with you guys that you can't get laid in 6 weeks on tour? Even I was able to pull groupies, and I was the drummer!

 

[unicornwarrior]

our band gets plenty of ladies, but that has to do more with the fact we just happen to know lots of girls individually...being in college really helps for pulling crowds to your shows.



there is nothing really glamorous about the early stages of trying to "make it" though.

 

[Warrengardner]

Good on ya! Keep it up. I quit going to stadium spectacles years ago-love the club scene. Saw the Fleshtones from back home in a little venue here in Italy slampacked with @ 1200 dancing sweating beautiful italian babes- god knows how many they got- Ooh I was a teenage zombie, indeed.
Guess things have changed since the "Last Waltz." Loved it when Robbie Robertson is telling Scorcese about deciding to go pro musician while speaking with his uncle- a jazz musician. Robbie remembers his uncle's advice: "Son, as a musician you'll never have much money(wrong in his case), but you'll get more snatch than Frank Sinatra."

 

[milosz]

Originally Posted by SField

Also, I don't know what artists you're referring to re: album sales because album sales have almost NEVER been a viable source of revenue even for the biggest artists on a major label. Rock stars got rich because of extensive touring and merchandising. Album sales are the reason 99% of famous rappers are almost broke or quickly on their way to being broke. Albums don't make artists money unless you're on Koch or something like it, in which case you probably aren't selling that many albums anyway.
(emphasis mine)

This is not exactly true. Album sales, radio play and the attendant royalties were a huge source of income for 'rock stars' for a long, long time. Green Day sold something like 8 million copies of Dookie in the US alone - a comparably large album fifteen years later (American Idiot) didn't even go platinum. Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Bush, etc. - all the big rock acts of the early-mid '90s made set-you-for-life money.
Hootie and the ******* Blowfish sold like 14 million in the first year their album was out - even at $1/disc, they made a **** ton more from that album than by touring alone.

One-hit wonders from the '80s still talk in interviews about getting royalty checks for tens of thousands each year - not **** you money, but it pays the mortgage. Cult acts like Sonic Youth steadily sell their back catalogue with reasonably-solid royalties going to the band.

Until the last ten years, being a mid-tier radio artist made for a healthy income apart from touring. Being a huge rock star set you for life. Being a one-hit wonder (if it was a true hit) gave you a steady paycheck for a long time.

There's really a 20-30 year period where this is true - mid-70s to the cratering of CD/album sales.

 

[milosz]

I sort of wonder how this concept gained so much currency - a combination of piracy justification and misreading Steve Albini's The Problem With Music?

 

[SField]

Originally Posted by milosz

(emphasis mine) This is not exactly true. Album sales, radio play and the attendant royalties were a huge source of income for 'rock stars' for a long, long time. Green Day sold something like 8 million copies of Dookie in the US alone - a comparably large album fifteen years later (American Idiot) didn't even go platinum. Nirvana, Soundgarden, Pearl Jam, Bush, etc. - all the big rock acts of the early-mid '90s made set-you-for-life money. Hootie and the ******* Blowfish sold like 14 million in the first year their album was out - even at $1/disc, they made a **** ton more from that album than by touring alone. One-hit wonders from the '80s still talk in interviews about getting royalty checks for tens of thousands each year - not **** you money, but it pays the mortgage. Cult acts like Sonic Youth steadily sell their back catalogue with reasonably-solid royalties going to the band. Until the last ten years, being a mid-tier radio artist made for a healthy income apart from touring. Being a huge rock star set you for life. Being a one-hit wonder (if it was a true hit) gave you a steady paycheck for a long time. There's really a 20-30 year period where this is true - mid-70s to the cratering of CD/album sales.
Uhh, if you actually knew how much most bands got... a dollar a disc? Are you absolutely, *******, completely and totally insane? Most people get between 8 to 12 cents a disc then minus 35%, minus debts to label (usually just advance because mechanical and promotional costs are factored into gross pay), then taxes. People are incredibly misinformed about what money artists make. I remember 50 was on the radio talking about this recently. It's precisely why the man tours so much. Royalties depend completely on how your contract worked. Most deals are 3-4 originals, one back catalogue. You deliver, you can renegotiate on royalties. But most one hit wonders didn't do that. It's true they get fat quarterly checks, but not really that much. There's such a massive amount of evidence to support this that I wonder where you get your info from exactly? Is someone in a band lying to you or do you not realize most of the **** on MTV cribs is rented? I spent some time involved in the industry and these things are quite common knowledge. Albums don't make you **** unless you were independent. Major labels cost you a lot of money. They hold up their end by getting your name out there and putting you on TV but almost everything comes out of your pocket. Money is in touring. Most rappers don't tour which is why almost all of them are broke and try starting marsupialed product lines. And like you say, albums don't sell anymore so it's even less of a viable source of income. Green Day probably made their money playing huge gigs and selling t-shirts. Oasis made huge money off their albums since they were inde, and bands like GNR were able to leverage, but most of their big money came from the stadium tours. For anyone out there who marvels at money that people in entertainment make: take any content based revenue someone makes (barring very special deals reserved only for the biggest names), then subtract 50-60% from it. It costs a massive amount of money to make and keep someone famous. This is true for actors as well. In a lot of cases for very famous people, that still leaves a hell of a lot of money, but remember the 40% take home rule. The acts that make the real money are disciplined people with a great tour manager and a solid merchandising pipeline. It works like a well oiled money machine. Dave Matthews and Iron Maiden are great examples of this.

 

[Alter]

Originally Posted by SField

Uhh, if you actually knew how much most bands got... a dollar a disc? Are you absolutely, *******, completely and totally insane?

You know most people get between 8 to 12 cents a disc then minus 35%, minus debts to label, then taxes. People are incredibly misinformed about what money artists make. I remember 50 was on the radio talking about this recently. It's precisely why the man tours so much.

Royalties depend completely on how your contract worked. Most deals are 3-4 originals, one back catalogue. You deliver, you can renegotiate on royalties. But most one hit wonders didn't do that. It's true they get fat quarterly checks, but not really that much.

There's such a massive amount of evidence to support this that I wonder where you get your info from exactly? Is someone in a band lying to you or do you not realize most of the **** on MTV cribs is rented?

I spent some time involved in the industry and these things are quite common knowledge. Albums don't make you **** unless you were independent. Major labels cost you a lot of money. They hold up their end by getting your name out there and putting you on TV but almost everything comes out of your pocket. Money is in touring. Most rappers don't tour which is why almost all of them are broke and try starting marsupialed product lines. And like you say, albums don't sell anymore so it's even less of a viable source of income.

Green Day probably made their money playing huge gigs and selling t-shirts. Oasis made huge money off their albums since they were inde, and bands like GNR were able to leverage, but most of their big money came from the stadium tours.

I worked in the industry for a bit and agree with all of this. Most of the band's money, which is definitely less than $1.00 a disc with a major label, will go back to the label to recoup all of their marketing and promotional costs. If the band was fronted money for recording or tour support then that has to be paid back first, too. Even if a band starts making it big off of a record, the label starts spending more and more on promotion to try to get it to blockbuster status. Again, the artist has to pay all of those costs back before they see any of the profit. The bands don't usually realize this at the time because they are on tour and making good coin off of the concert and merch sales. It isn't until the record stops selling that they realize that they didn't actually get any checks from the record company. Around this point it dawns on them that all of the limos and hotels and champagne that the labels were arranging for them were being paid for out of their pocket.

The only exception would be if the artist held on to 100% of their publishing rights and were able to recoup all of their mechanical royalties from the label but many bands sign this away.

The few bands that do eventually make money from record sales are the ones that survive through their first contract which was probably for 3-5 records that can re-negotiate a new contract with more leverage.

 

[eglbc]

My coworker was a rockstar. he started his band, and saw it through from a little ****** hardcore band to a huge touring force.
Toured the world on ozfest and other global tours. now he does the same **** i do.
follow your dreams, and end up in the same place of people who didnt follow their dreams.