When I was a kid I remember listening to my sister's copy of Deep Purple Live in Japan. I'd sit in between the speakers as if they were a giant pair of mahogany headphones, imagining I was in the audience. The sound quality and the accompanying photographic work was superb, not to mention the packaging – double vinyl gatefold sleeve!
The main thrust of live albums (up until fairly recently) was capturing someone else's moment, someone else's sound (that someone else, of course, being the band). For our rock heroes (Metallica, AC/DC, Prince, Led Zeppelin), the live album was the highlight of their careers – capturing not only a better, more adrenalized version of themselves and their songs, but also bottling a national (or sometimes worldwide) feeling. It also gave them a chance to illustrate their true intent perhaps more accurately than with they did on the album with the aid of a poorly chosen producer (Joy Division might be a good example of that).
Before I really delve into things, let me preface this. I'm not saying that the iconic live albums of the past are not still iconic for a variety of reasons. They are. Rather, the motivation of the fan to own the music has changed dramatically. Let's take a couple who met not on the night The Who recorded Live at Leeds, but two nights later at the Manchester show. For them, a shitty cassette that the now husband surreptitiously recorded on a Radio Shack portable with a crappy stereo mic is ten times more important TO THEM than the hi-fidelity version of the Leeds performance.
How do you explain to someone who just finished listening to Johnny Cash's Live At Folsom Prison album that you actually MUCH prefer a bootleg recording of him ordering large fries and a milk shake from a drive-through on Highway 5 two days later – because you were there!
The main thrust of live albums (up until fairly recently) was capturing someone else's moment, someone else's sound (that someone else, of course, being the band). For our rock heroes (Metallica, AC/DC, Prince, Led Zeppelin), the live album was the highlight of their careers – capturing not only a better, more adrenalized version of themselves and their songs, but also bottling a national (or sometimes worldwide) feeling. It also gave them a chance to illustrate their true intent perhaps more accurately than with they did on the album with the aid of a poorly chosen producer (Joy Division might be a good example of that).
It's not about the sound anymore....
Before I really delve into things, let me preface this. I'm not saying that the iconic live albums of the past are not still iconic for a variety of reasons. They are. Rather, the motivation of the fan to own the music has changed dramatically. Let's take a couple who met not on the night The Who recorded Live at Leeds, but two nights later at the Manchester show. For them, a shitty cassette that the now husband surreptitiously recorded on a Radio Shack portable with a crappy stereo mic is ten times more important TO THEM than the hi-fidelity version of the Leeds performance.
How do you explain to someone who just finished listening to Johnny Cash's Live At Folsom Prison album that you actually MUCH prefer a bootleg recording of him ordering large fries and a milk shake from a drive-through on Highway 5 two days later – because you were there!
It's not about the band, it's about the fan.
It is the sum of the fan's moments that resonate for them, the waves of energy that surround a point in time that sweeten the harsh tones of a bad recording, reduce the feedback and carry them along on a different journey than a quantitative checklist of tone, tune and rendition. In this context the live album isn't a yardstick of sound quality or even adrenalized performance; it is simply a memory prompt, an invitation if you like that has a buildup to and a letdown from a specific moment in time.
Fans will associate this event with a drink (a Malibu, a Drambuie, a hot pocket, etc.) to which they were addicted at that period in life. They'll savor that drink while they listen to their shitty live recording of your show wearing the smelly concert t-shirt they bought from you (but never washed because a bead of your sweat dripped on the left sleeve) to round out the experience.
So what does all of this mean to your bottom line and the sustainability of your brand?
The Spiritual Side
We, as artists need to stop gate-keeping concerts, supervising vibe and rationing moments. Any one of them could be very important to someone and ridiculously inconsequential to another. To think that the determining factor of a live album's success is the quality of the recording is ridiculous. Fans have an internal sliding scale that excuses poor quality in direct proportion to the importance of everything surrounding the event. Has anyone ever criticized the graininess of the JFK shooting film or the glitchy-ness of the footage of the bomb going down the chimney? How many crappy mp3s do you have on your iPod?
The Economics
If you are serious about performing/breaking/sustaining or just being a great band and winning a larger audience, then you must perform 100 shows a year and maybe many many more. If you get into the habit of recording shows and making them available (you see I didn't say RELEASED?) it begins to turn in your favor.
If you have an audience of 100 people a night on average, then you might sell 10 copies of that night's performance.
10 CDs x $5 = $50/show ←That's your gas money!
Playing 100 shows/year, you're looking at 1,000 CDs (or "units") in the next 365 days! In dollars and cents that's:
10 CDs x $5 x 100 shows = $5,000/year ←That's your own van!!
Who wouldn't want to sell that many live albums?
You have to make each show special and different.
It might be easier to see this from a comedian's perspective. I recently saw Doug Stanhope at Reggie's Rock Club here in Chicago. Not only did he come on stage wearing an Urlacher Bears jersey, he inserted local references throughout the night and interacted with many audience members (sometimes in ways that they might want to forget). He is differentiating one show from another, making it more important for the audience members.
Let's look at some ways you can use this strategy:
Pay homage to your influences
"Here we are in Athens, Georgia. We want to pay tribute to one of our greatest influences, REM, by performing three of their songs."
Use "Free is the New Black" to move live albums
At your merch booth, list one of your live CDs as a freebie incentive when anyone buys your new shirt (or one of the tour shirts you made too many of....). Remember, FREE IS THE NEW BLACK.
Release a "best of"Once you have started to build your live archive you can then selectively edit a "best of" together. It will showcase whatever it is that people seem to like about your band. By recording 100 shows you'll accumulate more of these moments than you might think (especially if you pay attention to the calendar and use some of the strategies we have mentioned before like the January tribute to Nixon and Elvis). You can increase the chances of your virus spreading by:
- Singing "Happy Birthday" to someone every night
- Having ten members of the audience join you onstage for the mad maracas finale!
(Eric Idle did this to great effect with Monty Pythons Lumberjack song. He even eBayed the opportunity before hand – great publicity)
I KNOW that not all of these strategies will work for everyone. The approaches need to be tailored to your band, your genre, and your vibe or they won't work. It has to be authentic. Use these frameworks to build your own monster.
Don't obsess about gear
There are so many easy ways to accomplish live recordings these days. The actual recording of the performance is easy. The PreSonus Studio Live will work like a treat and seems designed to help you down this path. It's the creation of a moment, an experience, and a vibe that is difficult and a very important part of your job as a performer.
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