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danny,
you should start building your band now the way you
'see it' in the future. Do you want to create your own
system ( originals ) or play an exisiting proven
system ( covers ).
Either way youre going to lose some percentage. If you
play all covers you will lose people like me, who are
always looking for new innovative music, but you will
gain some hardcore surfers. But whats your topshelf
with playing covers, money wise, i see very little
room for dollars once youre playing gigs for money.
If you want to build your band as original, i wouldnt
do many/any covers, because i think your youd be
watering down your band brand. If you do all covers
and slowly put in originals, it will take you much
longer to get to your "original music vision" and it
might be hard to shake the "cover brand" you already
put in your listeners minds.
When it comes to this, the greatest example i see is
Jim Thomas of the Mermen.
In my mind the MERMEN means 'innovative guitar
instrumentals'. Now the mermen havent released an
album in a long time. Jim needs money. Does Jim start
playing covers with the Mermen to pick up more on a
niche. Heck no, it would destroy the Mermen brand. So
he started a band called the Shi-TOnes, to do all
sorts of covers.
What do you think ?
--- wrote:
> Hi All,
>
> As I've mentioned earlier, I'm in the process of
> putting a band
> together, and it's going well - I'm actually finding
> people who want to
> play this music! But there's one question that
> inevitably comes up
> when discussing the direction of the band: should
> we play covers of
> classic surf tunes? A simple question?... no it
> isn't. Buried in the
> heart of that question are some more questions, such
> as:
>
> Do you want to get gigs?
> Do you want to make enough money to cover expenses?
> Is it more important that more people get to hear
> some of your
> originals, rather than some people hear all of your
> originals?
> Will you be bored playing songs you've heard a
> thousand times over the
> last 30 odd years?
> Will your band-mates get frustrated from not getting
> a lot of gigs and
> quit the band prematurely?
>
>
> Music for me is about creative expression and doing
> something unique
> (however slightly) and I've found that building the
> songs are just as
> much fun as playing them. However, by limiting us
> to strictly
> originals and covers of songs that we like, I may be
> "cutting off my
> nose to spite my face". So I look to my "Brotherhood
> of the Springs"
> for their vastly greater experience in these matters
> and for some
> sagely advice.
>
> Danny Snyder
>
>
>
>
> [Non-text portions of this message have been
> removed]
>
>
