Are We Heading Towards a Live Music Drought or an Evolution?

Recently, in a post from Consequence of Sound, the topic of a live music drought is disussed. The band Grizzley Bear’s Ed Droste describes a lack of value put on live music shows these days. And although he’s on a world tour with huge crowd turn out, he claims that they are losing money. He warns of a “drought” due to a lack of being able to afford touring and putting on a great show. He seems to blame lack of record sales and tv ad placements.

Do I agree with this assumption of an impending drought? I don't know yet. It’s hard to predict. Fans have come to expect crazy light shows, costume changes and huge displays from top tier artists and always know to expect smaller more basic shows when going to middle to lower tier artists’ shows.

I actually prefer the more basic shows. I see and hear the artist in a more pure light. I appreciate the simplicity and essentially, the honesty that comes from a less spectacular show.

Ed Droste continues his instagram blurb by saying, “Nobody cherishes or puts any value into the craft that goes into songwriting, or studying music! Yes pop stars write hits. Yay! They also get branding deals, and corp gigs…But when you are dealing with a dying industry and you actually care about a real live show and you aren’t a star, there’s not much you can do.”

Never the less, Grizzly Bear will be touring this year, a lot! So it looks like we haven’t quite reached a drought yet. If I want to put a positive spin on things, I could just think of the possibly imminent drought as an evolution to a new way of seeing shows. For example, I saw Jack White at the Mayan this week where the ticket stub said it was a NO PHONE SHOW. I knew the phone in the locked cases was a thing, I just hadn’t experienced it yet. I was given a lockable pouch to store my phone in for the show. It was opened by the staff after the show. It was actually really great to be amongst an audience of non phone users. This is an evolution I can rally behind. So, is a simpler live show a drought or an evolution. We shall see.