Promises, Promises!
It’s been two and a half years since I moved to the UK. Sometimes it feels like I received my letter of acceptance from the University of Bristol just yesterday and sometimes I feel like I’ve spent at least a decade chasing this fickle dream of independent life of an adult. There are moments when it seems like a lot has changed since I first landed in the Bristol Airport and then, there are times when I come to realise that despite all the efforts, I am still pretty much at the same level of “adulting” I was back in 2014. However, there is one thing I can be certain about: I am not the same person I was two and a half years ago. I have learned a lot about the business I want to be in and lost that naivety with which I once looked at my career. I have grown stronger and become tougher. I have had good and bad experiences and enhanced the important quality of resilience. Over time I have also acquired a habit of taking people’s words with a pinch of salt, which has both negative and positive connotations. Before you say that it’s a very sad thing to happen to a young person like me, let me elaborate.
It’s not like I don’t trust anything anyone might tell me. A younger version of myself would probably be beyond the moon to hear that someone promised her a gig. That version would check her inbox day and night and tell all her friends that soon she was going to open up for someone like Beardyman. However, after two years of empty promises and regular dealings with braggers, I slowly learned how to be more cautious. If something good happens out of a polite chitchat – that’s great! For the remaining 99% of the time, and in order to save yourself from major disappointment, it is essential to have your guard up when you out there talking business.
The truth about the false intentions of people who really like to talk but are not as good with at acting upon their promises hit me for the first time when I went to play a few gigs in Brighton. It’s a gorgeous city full of little narrow streets and little colourful shops with festival flags all over the place. It seems as though every person you meet is an artist of some sort. As the locals say; “You are not born in Brighton, you move there when your soul makes the call”. Over one weekend I met so many talented creative people and acquired a real collection of “useful” business cards. I even made it to a secret private party of the local music elite. There were a lot of beautiful exchanges of creative ideas. There was also a lot of bragging and an endless flow of empty words that meant nothing. The trip came to an end but the promised joint gigs and collaborations never took place. A large wave of disappointment hit me hard and taught me to know better next time. What was it, though? Was it just people being kind and promising nice things to a naïve beginner in whose eyes they saw nothing but a desperate desire to get her foot in the industry’s door? Or was I unlucky enough to stumble across every self-centered character in the city whose primarily goal was to put on airs and boost their egos? It is time for some detailed analysis.
We are all familiar with this awkward situation: you are queuing to get your first cup of coffee in the morning and accidently meet eyes with an old acquaintance of yours from whom you haven’t heard a thing for around 10 years. You shout something like “Oh my God!!!!” then give each other a hug, quickly exchange the same old numbers which you had probably both deleted because you had no use of it and then promise to grab lunch and catch up at some point. At some point… That’s the key phrase signaling that no one is actually planning on meeting each other. In fact, the moment you leave that café, you forget that you even met that person in the first place. You might accidentally stumble across each other again in a year or so and the situation will repeat itself. This is a polite white lie that you are taught to tell. It’s similar to asking strangers how they are doing when in reality, let’s be honest, you don’t really care.
When it comes to the music business, it is important to understand that 90% of encounters with producers, promoters and musicians will not provide any fruition of a project. You will be promised five gigs, three interviews and a few contacts of “the best video-making team in England”, but time will pass and those promises will dissipate. You can choose to hold grudges or get really upset about it, but most likely there have been no cruel intentions behind those empty words. The society demands that everyone is nice and polite and sometimes people take it to a whole new level, get carried away by the situation and promise something that they do not intend to act upon. It does not make them bad people but surely this behavior can’t be described as the most professional. Hence, the habit to take everything that you hear with a pitch of salt is a smart way to keep friendly relationships and save a lot of nerve cells. As they say; no expectations, no disappointments!
Before growing wiser thanks to my trip to Brighton, I had a whole series of encounters that were supposed to decide my destiny but for some unknown reason never did. If I ever were to give the ‘Most Worthless Promise’ award, I would have a perfect candidate in mind - a widely popular Canadian rock band. However, no way would I want to sound bitter or disappointed about my encounter with the band because that meeting would definitely make it to the top 5 of the most exciting moments of my life!
When a friend of mine visited me in Moscow, I decided to show her the infamous Moscow nightlife taking her to one of the cool clubs in the centre. While queuing we stumbled across a large group of English speaking dudes all in leather jackets and covered in tattoos. They seemed unbelievably happy to finally meet someone who could understand what they were saying and invited us to join their party. We had no clue who they were, so we chatted politely and laughed at their tour stories.
When someone says “rockers” I imagine tough guys who swear a lot and drink even more. However, the band was nothing like those stereotypes. As true Canadians, they were incredibly polite, smiled a lot and made everyone feel really welcome. The next day the guys played at “Stadium Live”, one of the big concert halls in Moscow, and kindly invited us to join them. Again, I am guilty in having preconceptions of what the rockers’ backstage life must look like, none of which were confirmed. There was no drugs, no half-naked girls; there wasn’t even much alcohol to be honest. The band quietly got ready for the show, gave an interview, had a few glasses of wine, chatted to us and other guests that they had invited, asked if we were alright for at least 10 times and went on to rock the crowd! I don’t know how my friend and I have never heard of said before, but they turned out to be super famous not just in Canada or Russia, but in the whole world! The massive crowd knew every lyric of their songs!
So you must be thinking, why such a nice band got my Most Worthless Promise award? For the needless urge to brag about their private business, that’s why! A few members of the band opened up a company dedicated to discovering young aspiring musicians and bringing them to the doors of bigger labels, ensuring their future and getting a bit of a percentage out of those deals. Being exactly the definition of a “young aspiring musician” and hearing a few big names that were casually dropped here and there, my head immediately got lost in the clouds. I mean, even 2 years ago I wasn’t a complete fool and realised well that a promise did not always mean a successful deal. Besides, with the big names that were mentioned, I had a feeling I wasn’t ready yet. What I wanted, though, was a competent opinion on my art from the real professionals who went on stage every day of their lives and made music that sold thousands of copies. So, the actual promise I had received that day was not supposed to make me a super star but could have definitely helped me advance in my songwriting and performing skills.
The concert went amazingly! We said our farewells to the band and its manager, the guys went on with their tour, my friend returned back to Bristol and I started waiting for the news. As you can probably guess by now, I received no news whatsoever. I guess that’s how you crush the dreams of some “young aspiring musicians”... Good thing I have always been a resilient one! Hopefully, there will be a day when I will get a chance to ask the guys how their promised review is doing. Somewhere on the red carpet… before receiving a Grammy… for the Song of the Year… Sorry, I was dreaming for a moment.
So, we’ve looked at the situations where people act nice just for the sake of being nice and the situations where bragging is the primarily purpose of the conversation, as opposed to actually meaning what you say and taking responsibility for it later. There are also circumstances when people simply overestimate their availability or capability. In my early days in the UK, I had a meeting with the owner of a local development artist company, who diligently wrote down every detail of my biography, praised my unique style and even provided a superb PR plan he would like to arrange for me. While I was maniacally calculating where to get £900 to kick-start my career, someone less delusional suggested that I looked up the company that I wanted to team up with. Quick Google research showed that my future partners were pretty much at the same level of their career that I was at and the impressive £900 fee would definitely benefit their business but probably not my art.
There are many promises in the music industry that are given without proper consideration. However, there is a small percentage of words that hold true meaning. And this is what makes the music business so exciting! You never know whom you will meet and what will happen. From a hundred musicians you have met at gigs, there will be one band that will get back to you about collaboration. There will be one promoter who will actually look you up after hearing some good words about your set. There will be one company that will respond to your never-ending series of emails with demo attachments. After all of the promises of the Garden of Eden, the promises that only provided pots of fake flowers, you will finally receive your bouquet of roses - the promise that will finally determine your destiny.
Based on the article from Rock-Vector N17 (37) 03.05.2016
https://rock-vector.com/reader/2016-37/
Comments