Your local music scene may be a dying art form, and in a few more years could become a completely outdated musical platform. Blame it on reality TV, social media outlets ,or yourself.
Up until about 5 + years ago there was a general sense of anticipation and excitement in checking out a new band for the first time, an unknown struggling artist, and coming away loving them or going to see the local favorites that became your friends. The bars that showcased live music were well known and it was evident in the overflowing crowd.
This was a community of music lovers. Not only would you get to hear great music but have stimulating conversations with fellow music addicts. It was a place to lose yourself other than seeing an over-priced concert. For 5-10 bucks you were exposed to live, loud rock and roll, hip-hop, jam-bands or folk, whatever your desired tastes, pretty much all was welcome as long as it was original.
Today, it seems altogether different. I myself have not been as loyally devoted to the local music scene as back in the day, chalk it up to getting older, but I still check it out on occasion, and the vibe just doesn’t feel the same. There is a void where there used to be a room filled with energy so palpable you had goose bumps, and the high you got from seeing a performance in such a small intimate setting.
And I think the main reason is this: a large part of the scene was made up of musicians. In any given city’s local music hangout, the creative leaders not only performed, but hung out there. They were the driving force of these establishments, the magnetic energy that drew in the crowd and kept them coming back. The musicians were the biggest supporters of the music community. They would frequent on nights that they weren’t performing to promote their upcoming shows, getting to know people, handing out flyers, and spreading the word.
Nowadays with people being able to make music & distribute it right on their computer, there is an attitude that it’s not necessary to get out in the trenches amongst fellow musicians and the common people in order to build an audience. And the endless amount of music competition reality shows doesn’t help the cause.
Aspiring artists have become spoiled by reality singing competition shows like The Voice and video-sharing websites like YouTube. They don’t want to live, breathe, and suffer for the art anymore, because they don’t have to. Why go out to a dive bar night after night and perform for little or no money when you can just share your music on Soundcloud and promote it on Twitter. As a result there has become an extreme lack of desire to go out and explore and support the local music scene. Your local bar that once catered only to live music has to now find other ways to draw people in, some by incorporating a DJ room, having a comedy night, or adding a food menu.
The young generation only need to be exposed to things that are larger than what is right in front of them. Learn not to settle for instant gratification but desire to make the human connection. I saw this on Record Store Day with so many young kids exploring unfamiliar territory and liking it. And hopefully aspiring musicians will long to be inspired and true to the art of making music by surrounding themselves within the community because they are the energy source, musicians feed off of people and vise versa, and that is a beautiful thing.
I’ve heard the following from Dave Grohl on different occasions and it couldn’t be more right on: “When I think about kids watching a TV show like American Idol or The Voice, then they think, ‘Oh, OK, that’s how you become a musician, you stand in line for eight f-ing hours with 800 people at a convention center and… then you sing your heart out for someone and then they tell you it’s not f-in’ good enough.’ Can you imagine?” he implores. “It’s destroying the next generation of musicians! Musicians should go to a yard sale and buy and old f-ing drum set and get in their garage and just suck. And get their friends to come in and they’ll suck, too. And then they’ll f-ing start playing and they’ll have the best time they’ve ever had in their lives and then all of a sudden they’ll become Nirvana. Because that’s exactly what happened with Nirvana. Just a bunch of guys that had some crappy old instruments and they got together and started playing some noisy-ass s*&t, and they became the biggest band in the world. That can happen again! You don’t need an f-ing computer or the internet or The Voice or American Idol.”