Thanks for this writing and congrats on a thousand.
I was recently about to jump into an NFT drop with a particular website when they made national news for selling NFTs without the artists permission. Also, when I hinted at at an NFT drop on TikTok, I got an avalanche of negativity. With those two experiences, my interest dropped.
I’m still intrigued though. Where do I find out more? Your Discord? Hal
There is a lot of hurry up and wait in music. But I like being a local musician. I get to play fun festival gigs for two hours and only drive 10-20 minutes to gigs.
If you get the musical itch again, you might want to try TikTok. My acoustic trio started doing it a couple of months ago. We livestream every other week to thousands of viewers all over the world.
I had no clue about TikTok until my band got back together and one of my band mates told me he started doing it during Covid. While music was shut down and we weren’t playing. He now has 65k followers! It only took me two months to get to 1000 followers. Now I can live stream and get tips. All from home. It’s not the same as a live audience but there is no travel. 🤓
I loved this post! I spent a decade on a similar band wagon and you've done a brilliant job of capturing the feeling.
So much waiting!
It would be different now with smartphones I imagine... Like you described, being able to look up somewhere on a map on your phone and check it out would have been so handy.
I remember the massive difference GPS made to touring... Being able to take in the sights of a new city while driving in, rather than looking out for a gas station to buy a local paper map (because the encyclopaedia sized road atlas didn't have enough detail) and then fumbling with that to rush to get to soundcheck on time. So then we could wait some more!
We never "made it" to the level of having a tour bus so spent a lot of nights sleeping on people's floors and couches. Looking back, I cherish those experiences - the hospitality so graciously afforded to some scruffy musicians, and the conversations and friendships that emerged. At the time though, I don't think I appreciated it enough.
Thanks for your wonderful stories, as always, and congrats on 1K! Onward!!
Great post! Your take reminds me of something my wife tells our single friends about marriage. Romance and all the fun stuff are great, she says, but if you think about the total amount of time you’re married to someone, a lot of it is going to be spent doing mundane stuff like assembling IKEA furniture, running errands, and doing home improvement projects. None of that is romantic, but it’s a pretty accurate description of most days in a marriage. None of that is to shit on marriage (or romance) but rather to say that your partner better be someone you’d actually want to spend countless weekends with doing what is sometimes called “adulting.”
This really resonates, especially your notes about being onstage and living that lifestyle. Folks mostly think it's the dream — and it is in some ways — but it's also exhausting and kind of aimless. Lots of touring musicians I know are fairly miserable. I guess the grass is always greener?
Hey Lyle! Sorry if you’ve answered this question elsewhwere, it what was behind those two giant leaps in your readership, where the line went vertical? I do this for the love of it, but I wouldn’t mind doing it for more readers every day, either!
Congratulations on your milestone!!
Enjoyed reading about your band days on the road Lyle, thanks for the perspective.
Thanks for this writing and congrats on a thousand.
I was recently about to jump into an NFT drop with a particular website when they made national news for selling NFTs without the artists permission. Also, when I hinted at at an NFT drop on TikTok, I got an avalanche of negativity. With those two experiences, my interest dropped.
I’m still intrigued though. Where do I find out more? Your Discord? Hal
There is a lot of hurry up and wait in music. But I like being a local musician. I get to play fun festival gigs for two hours and only drive 10-20 minutes to gigs.
If you get the musical itch again, you might want to try TikTok. My acoustic trio started doing it a couple of months ago. We livestream every other week to thousands of viewers all over the world.
I had no clue about TikTok until my band got back together and one of my band mates told me he started doing it during Covid. While music was shut down and we weren’t playing. He now has 65k followers! It only took me two months to get to 1000 followers. Now I can live stream and get tips. All from home. It’s not the same as a live audience but there is no travel. 🤓
Well done! Thank you for sharing your news and providing me with inspiration
I loved this post! I spent a decade on a similar band wagon and you've done a brilliant job of capturing the feeling.
So much waiting!
It would be different now with smartphones I imagine... Like you described, being able to look up somewhere on a map on your phone and check it out would have been so handy.
I remember the massive difference GPS made to touring... Being able to take in the sights of a new city while driving in, rather than looking out for a gas station to buy a local paper map (because the encyclopaedia sized road atlas didn't have enough detail) and then fumbling with that to rush to get to soundcheck on time. So then we could wait some more!
We never "made it" to the level of having a tour bus so spent a lot of nights sleeping on people's floors and couches. Looking back, I cherish those experiences - the hospitality so graciously afforded to some scruffy musicians, and the conversations and friendships that emerged. At the time though, I don't think I appreciated it enough.
Thanks for your wonderful stories, as always, and congrats on 1K! Onward!!
Great post! Your take reminds me of something my wife tells our single friends about marriage. Romance and all the fun stuff are great, she says, but if you think about the total amount of time you’re married to someone, a lot of it is going to be spent doing mundane stuff like assembling IKEA furniture, running errands, and doing home improvement projects. None of that is romantic, but it’s a pretty accurate description of most days in a marriage. None of that is to shit on marriage (or romance) but rather to say that your partner better be someone you’d actually want to spend countless weekends with doing what is sometimes called “adulting.”
Great piece Lyle. And congratulations on hitting 1,000 subscribers!
This really resonates, especially your notes about being onstage and living that lifestyle. Folks mostly think it's the dream — and it is in some ways — but it's also exhausting and kind of aimless. Lots of touring musicians I know are fairly miserable. I guess the grass is always greener?
Great post!
Hey Lyle! Sorry if you’ve answered this question elsewhwere, it what was behind those two giant leaps in your readership, where the line went vertical? I do this for the love of it, but I wouldn’t mind doing it for more readers every day, either!