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@ Raasclart! inpc
2025-02-02 12:22:46
I’m totally wasted! I don’t mean off my head on drugs, I mean absolutely physically and mentally exhausted.
Lugging heavy PA equipment up and down stairs, plus mixing shows is a lot and at my age I’m struggling with it. Yesterday was a write off due to exhaustion. My wife and I went to the cinema, and I slept through the film. A shame, it was something I wanted to see but I was toast. I went to bed at 8pm and slept for over 12 hours. I still feel wrecked today.
Live sound was always a sort of plan B. For a number of years teaching and performing with a band or a DJ was enough to get by on. I was comfortable, financially speaking. That was until about between 2012-14, that’s when we really felt the effects of the post 2008 crash. While a lot of noise was made about the initial event, reality for the likes of me was a slow and steady decline. At that time I was leading workshops with kids with difficult backgrounds, many kids in care due to abuse and neglect. That was a solid 40% of my income, another 30% came from teaching Sound Production at a local university and the final 30% from shows.
2014 cutbacks ripped services to shreds and a few friends lost jobs. Since then, doing live sound kept the rent and bills paid but fast forward to 2025 and I’m way too tired for this shit! I hate admitting it but my earnings probably peaked around 2008 with a bump in tours from 2017 till Covid. Since then earnings have been steady in £'s but getting wiped out by inflation. In fact I had decent acounts this year but every month I'm broke by the time bills and basics have been taken care of. I LOVE mixing live music and I’m pretty good at it. I’ve had musicians call me ‘musical’ which is the highest compliment but I’m totally fucked still 2 days after Friday’s show. It's unsustainable.
I’m quitting live sound unless some touring comes up again, touring is different, living on a bus for 3 weeks pays the same as 3 months of local work and I just mix, no lifting gear. The band I tour with are based in the US and only come to the UK/EU every couple of years. I get odd trips away with other artists but they’re usually fly out EU gigs. 1 or 2 shows then fly home, plus they're irregular.
Right now I’m more interested to learn ways of making income online, I started the Kali Mera Show to learn self hosting content. Committing to a project each morning has done wonders for my mental health, cutting down on morning doom scrolling. It’s been highly successful in that regard but not so much financially. However this is jst phase 1. I’m learning the tech, learning the production and making as many mistakes as possible while the stakes are low. I’m very happy 10 or so people enjoy the show on a daily basis. Tiny numbers but I don’t fuck with YouTube or the other big tech platforms. Fuck them!
Phase 2 involves getting premises and broadening the services I can produce, focussing on content for others, getting some opportunities happening for young talent, arranging meet ups and setting up a hub to bring together the crazy, talented people I know. It’s going to be tough, I’m in a run down area, there’s not much money here (relatively speaking) but it’s an area I really dig and want to make better.
Why am I telling you this? I’m writing this as a means of getting my brain straight and sharing it because I’m open to improving myself. I see people doing interesting shit here and that helps with motivation and confidence. My only social media for the last 6 years has been the Fediverse and much as I love it, there’s a gloomier outlook there. The world is a strange place with so much bad shit but out of 8 or so billion people, I can only take on so much. Building shit in my own local community and provide facilities for online wins sounds way more productive and helpful in some small way.
I accept we’re all going to hell in a handcart but may as well enjoy the ride…
There’s much to learn, I’ve only ever been ‘in business’ for a short time in my life (despite always being freelance) and I sort of gave up on my previous attempt. Had I paid more attention I could’ve built a strong YouTube presence but I’m not into being a vehicle for companies to push their products, nor do I want to teach people music online. That market is now heavily saturated and very, very boring as far as I’m concerned. My heart wasn’t in it, even back in 2015. I’m not an influencer.
With a real life space there’s premises, business rates, and investors to consider, as well as developing services that people are actually happy to part cash with. It’s going to be hard but different hard to physically lifting sub-bass speakers up and down winding staircases! I don’t want to talk too much game, it’s results that matter but wasting days to exhaustion doesn’t help. It’s time to hang up my headphones and focus (FOCUS YOU FUCKING FUCK!).
Maybe you’re reading this and thought ‘shit, this guy’s totally deluded’. That’s cool. Tell me. I value feedback. A fair few cats here give life advice so I’ll assume you might know what you’re talking about...