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The Death of the Middle-Class Musician

(thewalrus.ca)
300 points pseudolus | 2 comments | 28 Jun 25 22:06 UTC | HN request time: 0.406s | source
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Dumblydorr ◴[28 Jun 25 23:45 UTC] No.44409135[source]▶
Most musicians who can make it now are only middle class, with a handful of superstars and a huge legion of poor artists.

I’ve played many gigs for $20-100, which is once a month or week and tough work relative to typing some code from home. I played for 25 mins in front of 1000 people and spent 8+ hours total all-in to make 200 bucks. Way harder money than coding.

Really, think back through history. Musicians were needed for dance, parties, all occasions. Now hit play on your phone connected to a speaker, GG musicians.

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bamboozled ◴[29 Jun 25 04:14 UTC] No.44410313[source]▶
Now hit play on your phone connected to a speaker, GG musicians.

Not really comparable experience though.

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1. nine_k ◴[29 Jun 25 04:55 UTC] No.44410455[source]▶
Comparable, though very much not equal. Unless you came specifically to listen to music (e.g. many concerts), the music plays a technical role: dance music, movie soundtrack, restaurant / bar background music. For that, a good recording is adequate or even superior.
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2. bamboozled ◴[30 Jun 25 07:21 UTC] No.44420419[source]▶
Yeah, I love going to a bar or nice restaurant and listening to the same recording of Take Five or Kind of Blue, over and over and over and over and over again with zero variation throughout my life. It's amazing.