Greenwich Village Gazette

A Club for Songwriters?
by Randy Burns

Dreams are for strangers who need them.  They talk about their dreams all the time...when they don't have etchings or music they can play you.  Listening to someone's new CD (these days) is the same as looking at pictures of a new baby.  Cute, one short look...then out and away you go.  Away to someone or anything more interesting.  Anyone can have a baby...and anyone can put out a new CD. 

Music sucks the way it is now.  No real songwriters performing...a few good singers, a good sound upon occasion, but in general...music is not here anymore.  Quality has been drained by quantity.  I'm not talking Jazz, just Pop, Soul and Rap.  New songs still work on the young, but not on the over twenty-five...not like they used to.  "I'm a songwriter," well, isn't everyone?  It's a lot like poets in the 60s and 70s.  You couldn't move your elbow without waking one up (and you were always sorry you hadn't been more careful).  Indy labels dominate...but very few Indy artists survive.  Good for the ego, and no one gets hurt.  A few listen to it, but few think it's anything but shit.  Your CD must get airtime.  Maybe not 'MUST' but airtime still works. 

Now, where to play live?  Nowhere.  People don't come out and listen to singer/songwriters the way they used to...way back in time.  Performers hit the out of touch human wall.  The closed club goers, the foreigners and the idiots.  That's the crowd you play for now...if you can find a place to play.  I did a set last week at a club and it cost me thirty dollars.  A few beers and thirty dollars later -- I had had the pleasure of doing a set for a room full of people who did not come out to listen to anyone.  I enjoyed it, though.  That didn't bother me.  I know exactly what's coming -- if anything is.  Why can't someone open a songwriter's night and MC it with class?   With introductions and a good system.  Why must the club owners rip off the singers who are playing for free? 

Well, it's changed...it's all changed, and it can change again.  First, you need a bunch of really good songwriters who can sing too.  A club owner who respects the effort they make to present themselves to the public.  A drink or two for the good performers who return.  A little appreciation goes a long way.  Make them feel appreciated and they'll return, and so will the audience.  Audiences can tell when the place doesn't give a shit about the people who are singing to them. 

At the end of the night the owner checks the register to see if he made money.  He doesn't (and never will) check the register to see if he might make money in the future.  He doesn't know who the audience liked so he can treat them nice and ask them to come back again. 

Club owners with open mike nights are lazy bastards.  They let some jerk run them and they don't do a thing...but check the register at the end of the night.   That's not the way good places thrive. 

It certainly isn't the way you find good performers who will play in your club.  How could you?  You don't even know who the good ones are.   Someone could change all this.  Maybe I will. 

Any decent places out there need someone who can run a good singer/songwriter night for you?  I know the performers.  You won't see them out playing very often, but they'll come if the place is run right.  I know they will.  This present day New York club attitude has to change.   

Randy Burns

RBwrites@aol.com      

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