Derek, you're kidding right? [img]tongue.gif[/img]
The clubs sell you the tickets so no matter if you bring in a good crowd, they make their money! If you bring in 10 people, the club still made money from the door. If you bring in 500 people, they'll make tons of money at the bar.
Danny
Yeah, it's really hilarious how the clubs are exploiting these bands with stars in their eyes. 90% of the bands are horrible too. The only people that go to those shows are the bands waiting to play next, and their friends, who love them unconditionally.
Don't move to LA. Los Angeles is dry. Please all of you LA folks don't attack me on this, this is an absolute fact coming from the mouths of Vinnie Colaiuta, Ralph Humphrey, and many others.
If you're looking to tour with big name pop acts, moving to LA to check out the audition scene may be worth a try. But if you want to work nightly in a city making anywhere between $75-$1000 a gig, then I suggest NYC. NYC still has a club scene where you can play nightly. LA hasn't had this in years. No one works locally, everyday in LA. Not even the big names. However drummers like Shawn Pelton, Nir Z, Steve Jordan, Steve Hass and Billy Ward work everyday. Either in clubs or in studios.
The little session work there is in LA is being done by Vinnie, JR, Abe and Russ Miller. Not to mention the out of towners like Aronoff and Chamberlain.
What I did find pleasant about LA, is the lifestyle. Nice weather, cheaper living, and a nice comfort level. What you won't find in LA is amazing music anytime at over 200 clubs, regardless of genre. You can go out in one evening hear Marko Djordevic blow in 31 with a Bulgarian band, Jeff Tain Watts or Steve Hass on a Monday night at the Zinc with Ron Affif, Anton Fig or Keith Carlock with Oz Noy at the Bitter End, Antonio Sanchez and his own band at Licoln Center Jazz, Van Romaine with bluesman Billy Hector at Terra Blues, Mike Stern with Danny Gotlieb every Weds, Ari Hoenig with Anthony Jackson and Wayne every Thurs..
Jerry Marotta with the in house band at The Bitter End every monday. And there's tons more. TONS...Every night. Not to mention The Met, Lincoln Center, Julliard and Manhattan school of music, and all the museums. And I haven't even touched on the action in Brooklyn.
L.A in it's heyday could not compete with this. To begin with it's a 2am town. That on it's own limits the show possibilities.
L.A has some amazing players, some of the best on the planet. But you don't see them locally very often. Maybe once every 2 months. Joel Taylor you can see every week if you want to.
As you can see, NYC is the place to be if you want to be bombarded with culture and great music. LA is a nice place to live with maybe 4 creative music clubs and about 15-20 showcase rock venues. You can imagine how hard it is to even get a gig at those places. There are so many musicians and no where to play.
Move to NYC my friend, trust me.
<font color="#a62a2a" size="1">[ July 25, 2005 06:45 PM: Message edited by: Flarobstix ]</font>
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">What you said.... [img]smile.gif[/img]Originally posted by Flarobstix:
What I did find pleasant about LA, is the lifestyle. Nice weather, cheaper living, and a nice comfort level. What you won't find in LA ia amazing music anytime at over 200 clubs, regardless of genre.
Although, I wouldn't say that we have 'cheaper living'. Renting an apartment is one thing, but buying a house in a good neighbourhood down here is RIDICULOUS! Real estate is extremely over-valued at the moment.
You're dead on about the music scene here though. It's pathetic. I think that this is more of a worldwide phenomenon of cultural de-evolution. People the world over just don't appreciate music with any interesting harmonic, rhythmic or social content anymore.
[img]graemlins/cry_smile.gif[/img]
Yes DSOP. I didn't think that our boy was buying a house..HA!! But you're right, real estate is not in fact cheaper in some areas of LA.
I also didn't intend to make the LA scene sound worthless. It's not. However it doesn't even offer 15% of what NYC does as far as the arts are concerned. You can and will see some great music in LA, but not every night. Sometimes not even every week, depending on your tastes.
<font size="2" face="Verdana, Helvetica, sans-serif">True. There was a time when you COULD see some great stuff every night, but those days are long gone. It's strange though, the few times that there IS a show worth seeing, the club is usually almost empty.Originally posted by Flarobstix:
You can and will see some great music in LA, but not every night. Sometimes not even every week, depending on your tastes.
Dave Weckl, Steve Smith and Zawinul are all playing in town soon. I'll try to catch all of these shows, but they won't be cheap. Maybe that's why they're never packed - most musicians in this town don't have two nickels to scrape together.
Guys--I would love to have a discussion about "what's happening/what's possible, and where" in terms of music and various cities & scenes around the world today in 2005. We've got people here from so many places. Off topic for this thread, and this always gets talked about casually here...perhaps I should just start a thread? With luck, some people would have opinions... [img]wink.gif[/img] But we should keep this one for Andreas's question.
sounds well addressed to me. They are simply telling Andreas not to move to LA to persue a music career and following up on why.
Andreas,
I wise move would be to ask Steve Hass on his board. He's a part of today's up and coming movement, he has amazing gigs, and he lives in both NY and LA. His take on the situation would be current and accurate. Not heresay or guesses and not experiences from people who come from the old recording scene. He's in the NOW. He's very approachable.http://www.stevehass.net/cgi-bin/discus/discus.cgi
That's my advice. He'll steer you in the right direction.
Ask him about the Britney Spears audition he almost went on, and his exhange with Ricky Minor. It's a great story he told to me in person. Tells you a lot about auditions.
Just been to a one week intensive stay at a Jazz-camp of so to speak. and one of the teachers there was Soeren Moeller (Piano player). He's been living in New York for 3 years, and studied at the Manhattan School of Music.
A guy at the place named Steffen has studied with Mike Stern, and goes to New York this fall.
As for what they say, it's through my observations that New York is the place to go at the moment. It's where all the tour guys rally their troops, seek out all the economic support in sweden for your project and submit yourself to an institution in the New York area, so you can charge Sweden for federal study support. You "can" live for that while you have no gigs yet. I think he made a skema of all the expenses for a stay at the Manhattan school of music. it was something near 311.000 Danish crowns. he got it all covered by local funds and govermental support directives. But that requires alot of support on paper from every famous guy in Sweden you know. If they say you're capable of taking on any gig in the States, have them write it down on a paper so you can use that in the application for funding your trip. When Soeren finished his stay at Manhattan, he was allready gig'ing alot at the clubs with Ari Hoenig, Jeff Ballard etc, mainly by the reputation giving out from his Teachers etc.
Soeren was 27 when he moved. So still, you're plans are way ahead of his, he might have had the same ambition at your age, but only saw it possible to manage it 10 years later, But he has a good carreer in New York And Denmark, he comes home in the summer to a nearly black calendar filled with gigs. It's a great combination he says.
His advice to me was to work on my latin-jazz if my goal was to move to new york. You're gonna be in serious company with some afro-cuban monsters.
I would say it's too early for you Andreas, you're obiously capable of carring the gigs that will come your way, but they're soo many other things that must fit in. It's not only the skill and dedication to the music that makes you ready for the big move it has to something you do, not something you doubt, not something you're asking advice if it's a good idea or something like that. You should be in a motivated condition that makes you do it no matter what, no doubts, no fear, just plain determination for your goal and the love for the journey that will make you achieve them.
For now i would recommend ( out of experience myself though, talk to Hass ) a two month trip where you hang out with some guys, go to some jam-sessions etc. or see if the city as a place to live is something for you, cause it's going to be your future home. Nobody buys a home without taking a tour through it first.
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