Progger falling on hard times

It is sad to hear these things, although it has to be said that managing large sums of money takes responsibility and maturity. Many of these acts like Wishbone Ash nd BJH did enjoy some commercial success. Their albums did chart in their day, and inevitably they must have made a respectable amount of money. How they spent it/invested it may well be at the root of their finacial downfall. Kate Bush is a good example of how wealth can be maintained despite never touring, and a relatively small musical output.

Both Bill Ward of Black Sabbath and Peter Criss of Kiss made millions in the 70's, by the 80's Criss was a tramp, living rough in NYC, and Ward was living in his mates garage (prior to recording 'Born Again;' and the Sabbath comeback) In the case of both, most of their fortunes probably went up their noses..

Obviously I agree that prog rock musicans should be paid huge amounts of money just for beling very talented and keeping me entertained  but in reality artists need to look at what they do within the context of record industry politics, what Joe Public wants, and their potential shelf life.

I`m interested also in this topic as I`m  aware artists in general have been known to suffer often  many die poor and then society decides they like their work and pay a fortune for it (like the money is any good dead) I`m not even sure why good fortune isn`t always the reward for good work but it seems commerce hates  art and will make the artist .. poet .. philosopher  suffer at any cost. Its all about filling up concert halls .. selling big amounts of records and filling up girly mags with cute pics of the ideal dream man,  nothing to do with the music ..  the  art  ..  the  poet .. the stuff of substance thats makes this  form of art "prog rock" last  an  eternity  for its devoted fans  ! (Mr Commerce it wont sell fast but it will sell long)  

It is sad.

Has to be said Vincent Crane suffered from depression for years which can't have helped his situation.

I'm sure Floyd guys are extremely comfortable now, but they lost a fortune in 70's due to bad financial advice, ELP blew a fortune on 77 works tour and i've seen Emerson quoted saying he is not well off today.

Kevin Ayers said he only kept going for years due to the help of wealthy friends.

Like many of us on this forum I have spent thousands of £ over the years on LPs/CDs/concerts/tour T-shirts, etc.. A lot of record companies and middle men are sitting on a nice pile of cash, while a lot of artists suffer. Doesn't seem right to me.

With the arrival of the WWW, comes a whole new way of doing business.  Many unknown bands (prog or otherwise) can market their music in ways not available 5 years ago.  You don't even need a label to sell your music anymore...what you do need is a crash course on "marketing."

You need to learn how to market your band and your music.  Your band needs an Official Web Page, you need to find ways to get exposure for your music and you need to make your music available on line, selling your own CD's and digital downloads...(some of those MP3 files should be available free...)  

I've heard of some artists being dropped by their labels only to continue doing business on-line...of course they already have a following and a fan base to help them along.  But when you consider that selling you CD directly will yield you more income, even if you sell less albums this way then through a label...the benefits are obvious.  Let me further explain.  Take the fact that some labels will only give you between 1$ and 2$ per CD's they sell, you're going to have to sell a hell of a lot of music to make a little money.  I've heard of a local band, smalltime rock outfit, that ended up selling 35,000 copies of their self-produced debut CD, at 10$ a pop.  You do the math!  ($$$)   One of the artist who was dropped sold more than 100,000 copies at 10$ a pop...he stated he'd never made so much money on an album before even though he had sold a fraction of the number of CD's he'd sold before.

Today, if a relatively unknown prog artist can sell 25,000 CD's on line, I figure he's making a pretty good living.  Consider the extra money he might make touring (money from the gigs themselves, and selling CD's on site, t-shirts, baseball caps, etc...) I think most prog bands have to look at how the music business works today, and they need to learn more about marketing strategies and new innovative ways of selling their music...  

Guess this kind of boils down to the old art vs. commerce dilema.

On a big label, the corporation is investing a lot of money. They expect a hefty return on that investment and generally call the shots. The contract generally favours the label to protect said investment.

On a small label, the band gets a lot more say but are limited by the size of the company as far as resources.

So, does an artist sacrifice some control over their work for more audience reach (and financial gain) or keep the integrity of the work at the cost of few or nobody hearing it?

It's a sad fact that sometimes you have to make a decision based on finance. After all, if you don't make any money, you will have to find another way to pay your bills. This means that you will have less time to devote to your creativity and your art suffers.

Anyone in a creative field has to face this sooner or later.

Then there's the problem of a larger label priorities. If a large company offers a major star a hefty signing bonus, they are going to concentrate on the release of that album. Others will likely be put on a back burner. A recent example of this is Emm Gryner, great singer songwriter but the big label that signed her put most of their effort supporting other more commercial artists. Because she didn't have a lot of sales (despite the lack of support that wasn't her fault), she was dropped. She's still hanging in there but on a smaller label (or is she completely independant? I forget).

By the way, if you get a chance to see Emm Gryner, do it. 

chopper wrote: I find it sad that Nick Barrett of Pendragon had to remortgage his house to finance the last Pendragon album.

I read on another forum somewhere a message Nick Barrett wrote about this kind of thing, he said that the musicians union in the uk reported that the AVERAGE income of it's members in 2004 was £10k, that is less than welfare assistance in the UK, he also said that he earned a deal less than that in 2004.

However I think this is where there is something of a paradox, there are folk who STILL feel that it is ok to download, and "share" music with countless others, and whether you like it or not, this DOES have a knock on effect on the sales of albums, and therefore the income of musicians. and I think it is done in the false belief that "oh they can afford it" / "I want that album, but can't afford it right now" / "I will try before I buy"  schools of thought.

The flip side of this is that we end up having these kind of discussions, for a lot of musicians (and what we would think of as successful musicians) it is not a case of bad financial management, it is not a case of poor advice, it is a case of not making enough money. It is getting harder and harder to make a living out of music. We idolise these guys, we have been buying their music in some cases for 10, 20, or 30 years, and we think that because they have been held on a pedestal for that time in our lives that they must be living in the lap of luxury. Most are not.

It will continue to become harder and harder for guys like this to produce music (for us) and to tour etc etc if we keep sticking our heads in the sand. If we continue to burn a copy for a mate (who burns for his mate, who pops it onto p2p etc etc) then there will be a longer list of musicans we idolise in the "found dead and in poverty" category.

It really is not the same as in the old days when we taped a copy of a vinyl album for a mate, co s back then the quality was so poor that the mate would HAVE to buy it.

So, in conclusion, to avoid the "shock at poverty struck idol" kind of conversation we all need to take responsiblity and to not allow this to happen. My friends think I am a music nazi because I don't burn copies for them, I don't take stuff from p2p, but I do sleep at night knowing that I am not contributing to the downfall of some of my musical idols! Why should I biuld them up, only to break them down?

Climbs off soap box................and refreshes the coffee pot..............