For me it used to be, play music often and push hard. Don’t save the band’s money. Spend everything I make and then some on gear, gas or beers. Our premise was essentially “See how long we can all go and hope we don’t burn out before we get discovered by a label.” Dropping that myth is a great thing, because it doesn’t respect a musician’s work for what it really is: a business. These days, creating music has become a DIY, entrepreneurial venture: the ownership, the responsibility and rewards are in the hands of the right people. The only thing we’re missing is a new compass to follow. What’s the model? What are the goals? What should I be working on at what stage, and why?

As I see it, deciding to start a band these days is quite similar to deciding to start a small restaurant. Your friends have always loved the food you cook, maybe you’ve even won a few local contests. Maybe you’ve taken classes and traveled to new countries to learn the local cuisines. At work, all you think about is getting home to try a new recipe. You come to realize this is your passion and so you decide it’s time to make a living out of your culinary talents. Very cool, life is short.

But straight off you discover that starting a restaurant requires a whole lot more than being a great cook. In fact, you soon learn there’s countless talented chefs in restaurants all around you, all trying to do the same thing you are. You also have leases, staff, suppliers, business and liquor licenses. You have to learn very quickly how to be good (or to get help) at a number of skills around brand, promotion, marketing, perhaps new technologies, health certifications. You find yourself dealing with tax forms, websites and city hall much more often than honing your recipes.

You also find out very quickly that your unique craft in the kitchen amounts to only a small part of the equation. And yet, it’s that small part that will label who you are as an artist, and it is entirely what will make or break your long term business. Oh, and you better be able to do your art in your sleep, in less than ideal conditions while managing a slew of other non-culinary concerns. You better be able to take chances with your art that might fail and be criticized. You also better be able to settle for an A- recipe that is easier to produce and distribute to a larger audience. That is, if you want to have a restaurant.

You do all these things not because you’ve lost focus, but because you have long-term focus. You know what you want your life to be, and even though your focus may be elsewhere right now, you’re working your ass off to build a long-term situation where you can focus on an artform that you love. You want to build a strong clientele, a good following, a brand in the marketplace. Once established, then you can try new recipes and improve your art whenever you’d like. You can connect with your customers, you can enjoy what you’ve created.

That’s the hope anyway. And as a musician, I have similar goals. In a DIY music industry, I think a lot of us do.

***

This analogy works for me in many ways:

  • talented restaurants and bands are a dime a dozen (in most places)
  • both are entrepreneurial businesses (make no mistake)
  • both have to be good at many things besides their art to be successful
  • they both deal with a fickle public that has virtually unlimited choice
  • however, by standing out, both can develop incredibly loyal, long-term customers
  • in both cases it’s a unique, meaningful connection with the audience, not raw ‘talent’, that make you stand out from the crowd

This analogy also doesn’t work in a few interesting ways:

  • Starting a restaurant by yourself is a lot different than collaborating with three other people to do it. The vision needs to be locked from the get go. Bands tend to not have this conversation until it’s too late.
  • Bands typically deal with a wider geographic audience than a small restaurant. However, for a small band starting out, this probably makes more sense.
  • Bands make a lot less; i.e., people will pay to sample a new restaurant. Not so with bands.
  • Most importantly, people don’t just want ‘local food’, they want good food. Who cares if it’s local. Not sure why crappy ‘local bands’ are such a big deal.