2004-09-21 - 9:38 p.m.

so i had to do this project for my arts and entertainment in the marketplace class on an occupation of our choice in the music industry. i chose the indie music artist and we had to have one contact person...so i e-mailed blitzkid and i was so moved and inspired by goolsby's responses to my questions that i'm gonna post them.

the questions...

1. As a music artist, what do you do in a typical day, week, and year?

2. How does one prepare to be qualified for this career choice?

goolsby's answers...

1). My day usually consists of checking the mail for merchandise orders and compiling them to be sent off weekly. In that meantime, addresses are filed and kept on record and patrons are emailed of their order status. The band's email account is opened and inquiring emails are then answered in what hopes to be a timely manner. Certain emails determine the course of the days work from there. For example, if we get an email from someone up in Trenton, New Jersey saying that they want to shoot a video for our band and need to discuss the idea as soon as possible, then such instances are immediately administered attention. This may involve calling this person and talking out details which may entail a myriad of neccessities that could rightfully take up the remainder of the day and evening. so it is a hit and miss when it comes to determining a days work load in that respect. There are days when two or three very important correspondences are recieved by us and it may take up to three of four days to tackle them all. It can be very tedious especailly when a constant barrage of correspondences that each rightfully deserve full focus arrive in multitude. This is merely and example. The workload of the band does not solely consist of computer based activities. There is old fashioned and back bending labor involved as well, not including the live performances. That is a good place to end an example. a live performance. To merely get to a live performance there is a host of meticulations that cannot be circumvented. First, and hardest is booking a show. Hard only if you have not yet established yourself as an act at a certain venue, collective. When you are indie, you are just that. Facing the tide and the winds alone and without grace. But a peasant can steer a ship as well as a nobleman. To clubs however, if you are not a guaranteed draw to their establishment, thus clearing the overhead costs to book you, such agreements and bookings do not get made so swiftly. If such shows are made in sequence of one another the tension and frustration can certainly mount if all interactions follow the same pattern. youre on a time frame. you need to book in enough time that you are still allowed to promote accordingly. hopefully, the club(s) has called you back and you now make flyers. All the while keeping your fingers crossed that everything goes as planned because you are either about to mail out a stack of flyers to the club you are playing (if it is out of town)or you will be solely handing them out all day on your own. It happens very often a date will be set at a club and the day after you set out the flyers, the venue pulls out or something equally as unsettling. Then, showtime. It requires a lot. it takes more than it gives, and depending on your feelings towards the music you inject into others it can be a very humbling experience or it can be a very grotesque and revealing of your psyche. Both i find to be quite appropriate and rewarding as they are revealing. you hope to make some gas money for the ride home, you hope to get a taco, you hope taco bell is open after you realize youre now driving 4 hours back home at 2:15am. then get up the next day and go back to work at McDonalds. yeah, you always end up back at shitty McDonalds. where you get to be the clark kent of the fast food enterprise until next weekend.

2)prepare to be hated, scorned, mocked, misundertood, targeted, back stabbed, dumped, bruised, robbed, loved, adored, prepare to have the lines of what is real and fake in those two cases forever blurred, and accept the concept of becoming financially inept. Now...take some time to let those ingredients mix, write music about it, agree to bleed for it and exercise yourself musically. transcend. and it helps to practice so you dont sound like crap. that slows the process and deadens it somewhat.

damn dude, i know those were way long and full of shit youd expect to hear out of a Jim Morrison impersonator but its from the heart. maybe its the cold medicine, but its from the heart. hope that helps. see you on the 9th hopefully.

song of the day(1): green day - "american idiot"

song of the day(2): sum 41 - "we're all to blame"

i kind of already gave you a quote...greedy.

i'm coming in this weekend whether you want me to or not so i hope none of you developed a hatred for me while i was gone...or stole any of my stuff i left behind.

uh...the end.