Doing the legwork as a human billboard
By Brian Offenther |
November 8, 2012, Thursday
|
Print Edition
Print Edition
THERE'S nothing more annoying than getting fliers handed to you. Some stranger pushes some piece of paper in your face when you're walking through a door or some corridor, advertising something you probably don't care about.
It's like those touch-screens in the back of a taxi, except that instead of being able to press the mute button, you potentially look in their eyes, glossed-over with the peculiar mix of boredom and anxiety: The only thing worse than being offered fliers is being the person handing them out.
Perhaps that's somewhat apocalyptic, but it's true, it stinks. It's aggressive in the sense that you have to reach out to people, but passive in the sense that you only engage with someone if they make the decision to, and it's often accompanied by condescending looks.
At the same time, it's something that I love doing, if only at a distance, because it's the bottom-rung work of putting on a concert or other music event. Anyone can put a lot of money down and call themselves a "manager," but many others refuse to cope with the slight shame associated with being a human billboard.
In more established music communities, doing this grunt work is necessary as a kind of hazing process: Since so many people want to be involved, it has a level of difficulty so people "earn" spots in coveted positions.
During a recent conversation, Craig "Chachy" Englund, guitarist/vocalist for local band Round Eye and also a veteran of competitive music communities in the USA, mentioned that many expat artists seem to hold a sense of entitlement that artists elsewhere wouldn't dare assume.
We agreed that many don't seem to have a real sense for how things work beyond the limited role they might take up. Xiao Zhong of local band Pairs has similarly emphasized his frustration that people don't seem even curious about how to expand their range of abilities.
Not unrelated to all this, I found myself at Europe-Asia Roundtable Sessions (EARS) on Shanghai, an event focusing on the Shanghai arts community, especially music. Its purpose is to connect music industry people and let them express their latest projects and ideas in roundtable discussions.
There were some people who had clearly put in the legwork - especially those associated with the Beijing-based Maybe Mars Record Label and the INmusic Festival - but based on discussions, it's clear that many only saw what to some is a "community" as an "industry." Their knowledge was in the numbers not the people, giving a skewed if not simply ridiculous perspective.
There are reasons that aspects of music can be capitalized: The music is art, and it's the basis of a community of people. Both of those things take a lot of sweat to put together.
If you haven't spent time on the ground and in the thick of it, poking and prodding, your efforts will only be viewed with skepticism and suspicion.
It's like those touch-screens in the back of a taxi, except that instead of being able to press the mute button, you potentially look in their eyes, glossed-over with the peculiar mix of boredom and anxiety: The only thing worse than being offered fliers is being the person handing them out.
Perhaps that's somewhat apocalyptic, but it's true, it stinks. It's aggressive in the sense that you have to reach out to people, but passive in the sense that you only engage with someone if they make the decision to, and it's often accompanied by condescending looks.
At the same time, it's something that I love doing, if only at a distance, because it's the bottom-rung work of putting on a concert or other music event. Anyone can put a lot of money down and call themselves a "manager," but many others refuse to cope with the slight shame associated with being a human billboard.
In more established music communities, doing this grunt work is necessary as a kind of hazing process: Since so many people want to be involved, it has a level of difficulty so people "earn" spots in coveted positions.
During a recent conversation, Craig "Chachy" Englund, guitarist/vocalist for local band Round Eye and also a veteran of competitive music communities in the USA, mentioned that many expat artists seem to hold a sense of entitlement that artists elsewhere wouldn't dare assume.
We agreed that many don't seem to have a real sense for how things work beyond the limited role they might take up. Xiao Zhong of local band Pairs has similarly emphasized his frustration that people don't seem even curious about how to expand their range of abilities.
Not unrelated to all this, I found myself at Europe-Asia Roundtable Sessions (EARS) on Shanghai, an event focusing on the Shanghai arts community, especially music. Its purpose is to connect music industry people and let them express their latest projects and ideas in roundtable discussions.
There were some people who had clearly put in the legwork - especially those associated with the Beijing-based Maybe Mars Record Label and the INmusic Festival - but based on discussions, it's clear that many only saw what to some is a "community" as an "industry." Their knowledge was in the numbers not the people, giving a skewed if not simply ridiculous perspective.
There are reasons that aspects of music can be capitalized: The music is art, and it's the basis of a community of people. Both of those things take a lot of sweat to put together.
If you haven't spent time on the ground and in the thick of it, poking and prodding, your efforts will only be viewed with skepticism and suspicion.
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