by Thomas Altmann » Wed Feb 02, 2011 7:45 pm
Actually this is two topics in one. (1) Drinking (or taking in other drugs) and playing, and (2) taking up the leadership of a band, or any kind of organisation for the matter.
(1) I used to drink up to 5 or 6 glasses of beer in one evening when I was young. The other guys in the band served themselves more extensively, so while I made sure I could still play well, I used to get annoyed by their irresponsibility that made my work even harder. I learned that whatever any individual musician needs to do the best job he/she can, he is self-resonsible for that. Whether it takes my fellow musician to do a walk in the park, a mile of jogging, a new girl each night, or a joint or half a bottle of booze, it shouldn't matter to me.
Fact is, in most cases, stoned musicians don't play better but worse, not to mention the damage he/she does to him/herself.
I stopped drinking after I got my driving license and had to drive to and from the gig myself. I also found out that the actual creative process is more successful and more enjoyable when I'm sober, especially when I have to read.
I think that everybody should be clear whether he/she really wants to belong to a band of musicians who are dedicated to the art and find their joy in approximating perfection, or rather a bunch of nice guys that enjoy getting high and having fun together, all the while fooling around on some noise-producing gadgets. I prefer making music with the first species of people, but it can be great to spend a night in a bar with the second. Some artists would not necessarily make my favourite drinking companions; but certainly most people who are fun seekers in the first place are simply wrong in a musical organisation. They have to decide.
Evidently, I tend to belong to the kind of people who sooner or later prove to be assholes in the eyes of someone who just wants to have a good time and has mostly given up the idea of making great music. The point that such a person is missing is that it is him who is in the wrong place, and it is him who actually spoils the true objective of the group, making my life and my work harder and preventing me from having my kind of "fun". It doesn't fit, simply as that.
(2) There will always be people who are unable to recognize the obvious facts and take the consequences. If a band doesn't really work as well as it could because I'm in it, I feel I should find a band that is better off with my talents and no longer stand in the way of the other. It's better for the first band, better for the second, and better for me. Some people are unable to see that. It is the unpleasant task of a leader to do what's necessary and make the respective decisions, also on behalf of that someone who for some reason is not able to do this for himself. I bet every musician has been fired from a band or rejected after an audition at least once in his life. It's nothing that is to be regarded a death sentence. It is part of the business.
I have been a bandleader in a few instances. I don't do it anymore. I can't. I see the facts, and I take the consequences: I'm not a born leader. I might be a musical inspirator, and I might carry great ideas, too; but I definitely get problems with people. I don't know why, but the people in the band use to misunderstand my leadership as an attempt to enact social power and start to rebel before I got my business started. Talking of business: I dislike fellow musicians to become extra kind because they reckon they might get a sub job one day; I hate talking with agents and managers ("Do you by chance also have a black girl singer working with the band?") and I have a real problem with the business side of the art in general. As a result, I contract one job and feel raped where others would contract five with a smiling face. Then I get to this one job with my band and take care of everything up to the very moment the first number is counted off. It doesn't come easy to me. It makes me sick. It prevents me from doing a good job at the ultimate purpose of the whole business: Playing good music.
Thomas