The dreaded empty show. No one's showed up. Five to ten people including the workers at the club. The most important gig you can play. This is the testing point. What you really bring to the show, when nothing is given back. If you can kill this show, ALL shows will be killed. This is the goal. Why drive ten hours to be mediocre? Why sacrifice income, relationships, and sanity to just show up and get by? Hell no. Damn no. Fuck no. Not me.
I had a talk with an artist last night after a gig in Kansas City at Davy's Uptown. She asked me, what do I get from my art. Get? Wrong and dangerous question. Get? There is no "get". It's about GIVE. You give and that's it. Give the truth. The truth of the moment. Anyone using "get" as the impetus for doing art is in for a world of unhappiness with super-special-mind-fuck-sauce.
We give until we die, and even then...even then we keep on giving. Art is to remind us that we are forever connected and bound to each other. The idea that "we are alone" is a sour-faced lie. We are never alone because we are permanently connected in the fabric of life, stars, gingham table cloth, dust, universe, etc. Good art brings us together.
Oh yea...back to my point...the empty nightmare show. Give what you've got and leave nothing left inside. You will be refilled and renewed to give the next day, and if you're not, tough shit and give it all you can anyway. It's what we do.
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oh no empty shows suck... but as long as you GIVE it people will want it..
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