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US: West Colorado Club

#1,383
I 25 up and down like a yo yo. Back at it today to go run sound for one of the few bands that can actually get gigs for like $4K. It pains me that I can make more to roadie than to play bass and roadie sometimes. Oh well at least there is work.
 
#1,388
nortonrider said:
So...... After making a delivery and pickup in Denver this afternoon, I had to drive my semi down to Colorado Springs (where I am right now) to pick up a load in the morning.

My question is:
Do all of you front rangers just go out and drive up and down I-25?
It took me 3 hours to get from Denver to CO. springs.
Man....... this traffic sucks!

I can't wait to get back over on the western slope where I belong. This big city life sure isn't for me!
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The construction between Monument and Woodmen right now is a huge drag. On Labor Day we came back from Aspen the back way to avoid I-70. It took us as much time to get from Manitou Springs to Castle Pines as it took us to get from Aspen to Manitou Springs.

It's usually not that bad, absent the construction. But the winter weather really trashes I-25. I had my ice wreck at the Greenland exit in 1997, the wreck that has made me more careful in the winter than most of the idiots who blow by me in the snow.
 
#1,389
The previously mentioned traffic:
denvertraffic002a_zps316c34ae.gif
[/URL]

Man, I don't know how people do it everyday.
I do know that I am out of my comfort zone when driving a big truck in such a mass of humanity.

This is more of what I'm used to doing:
delivery004_zps441e3ae5.jpg
[/URL]
 
#1,391
The live music scene I summit isn't what it used to be. The only decent venues are in Keystone at the Goat and Snake. We don't play Breck anymore because its filled with punks that only want to star fights or heckle the band. That and there are a couple bands that showed up in the last few years that play for bar tabs so that is what the proprietors expect now or deeeejays that spin **** that sucks. Now Steamboat, Winterpark, Carbondale,Aspen even Vail/Avon are still great music towns.
 
#1,392
2milehighspike said:
The live music scene I summit isn't what it used to be. The only decent venues are in Keystone at the Goat and Snake. We don't play Breck anymore because its filled with punks that only want to star fights or heckle the band. That and there are a couple bands that showed up in the last few years that play for bar tabs so that is what the proprietors expect now or deeeejays that spin **** that sucks. Now Steamboat, Winterpark, Carbondale,Aspen even Vail/Avon are still great music towns.
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I've been playing in Colorado for over 20 years now and I have to say that the live music scene basically crumbled about 10 or 12 years ago. Breck was never all that great. Telluride, Crested Butte and Aspen used to be the highlights (and usually a good paycheck, especially if you could get certain people to keep their hands out of the money at the door. Thankfully those with the overactive nasal habits have moved on for the most part). Back in the early 90s my band from Boston used to come out here 4 or 5 times a year for a couple of weeks and we'd make $20-30k each time. When I moved here a few years later, even with throw together acid jazz bands, it was a reliable source of income, along with free ski passes, rooms, etc. But around 2001 it all fell apart. Clubs closed, people stopped going out to see music and it became a lot harder. I think that the rapidly rising lift ticket and real estate prices kept away a lot of the people who had formed the core of the music fans.

6 months before my band came to Colorado the first time, we played a party on Martha's Vineyard in the woods for the 4th of July. 5 or 600 people showed up and it was a great time. We were very much into getting a mailing list together, so we got a lot of names that day. When we made it out to Colorado the following February, at every gig there was someone who had been at that party and they each brought 10 or 15 friends. (Having Phish's mailing didn't hurt, as well). We figured out pretty quickly that there was a scene where people went to Martha's Vineyard, Block Island, Nantucket, etc. in the summer and Colorado in the winter. Back then, you could rent an apartment in Telluride (which had a tight community of people who lived there for years) for $400/month or a house for double that and live with all your friends for the ski season and then do that for the summer on the east coast and party, ski, swim and see music. By 2005, all those people were gone, forced out by rents that were more like $1000/week and up for a small apartment. The whole population of Telluride has changed, no longer artists and hippies who bought in cheap in the 70s, but now real estate pimps and the 1% from California and Texas. Funky old pickups, VW buses, and jeeps have been replaced by BMWs and Lexus SUVs. It's still a beautiful place, but the soul is long gone.

There are still a few venues out there, but the pay has stagnated or even gone down and it's much harder to motivate people to come out.
 
#1,393
edwinhurwitz said:
I've been playing in Colorado for over 20 years now and I have to say that the live music scene basically crumbled about 10 or 12 years ago. Breck was never all that great. Telluride, Crested Butte and Aspen used to be the highlights (and usually a good paycheck, especially if you could get certain people to keep their hands out of the money at the door. Thankfully those with the overactive nasal habits have moved on for the most part). Back in the early 90s my band from Boston used to come out here 4 or 5 times a year for a couple of weeks and we'd make $20-30k each time. When I moved here a few years later, even with throw together acid jazz bands, it was a reliable source of income, along with free ski passes, rooms, etc. But around 2001 it all fell apart. Clubs closed, people stopped going out to see music and it became a lot harder. I think that the rapidly rising lift ticket and real estate prices kept away a lot of the people who had formed the core of the music fans.

6 months before my band came to Colorado the first time, we played a party on Martha's Vineyard in the woods for the 4th of July. 5 or 600 people showed up and it was a great time. We were very much into getting a mailing list together, so we got a lot of names that day. When we made it out to Colorado the following February, at every gig there was someone who had been at that party and they each brought 10 or 15 friends. (Having Phish's mailing didn't hurt, as well). We figured out pretty quickly that there was a scene where people went to Martha's Vineyard, Block Island, Nantucket, etc. in the summer and Colorado in the winter. Back then, you could rent an apartment in Telluride (which had a tight community of people who lived there for years) for $400/month or a house for double that and live with all your friends for the ski season and then do that for the summer on the east coast and party, ski, swim and see music. By 2005, all those people were gone, forced out by rents that were more like $1000/week and up for a small apartment. The whole population of Telluride has changed, no longer artists and hippies who bought in cheap in the 70s, but now real estate pimps and the 1% from California and Texas. Funky old pickups, VW buses, and jeeps have been replaced by BMWs and Lexus SUVs. It's still a beautiful place, but the soul is long gone.

There are still a few venues out there, but the pay has stagnated or even gone down and it's much harder to motivate people to come out.
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Agreed, Edwin.

In 2011, we drove all the way up to Telluride to play the weekend of the Telluride Film Festival - Labor Day Weekend - at what had to be the most accessible live music club on the main drag up there. There were 4000 arts lovers in town for that festival.

We played for the bar staff both nights, while the karaoke bar beneath us had people spilling out of the windows. No, the band didn't suck, either. It broke my heart because it was representative of the kind of thing we'd been seeing in Keystone, Dillon, and a few of the other places we used to play. Saam Golgoon is trying his hardest to keep a live music scene happening in Park County, but there's not much oxygen up there.

I'm not seeing the scene in Denver itself as much better. You play for your friends and family most gigs, and if your friends and family draw isn't consistently 30 or more, it's hard to keep yourself in a rotation. There seems to be very little "live music lover" traffic now, compared to as recently as 10 years ago.

For those of us who are no longer, ahem, as young as we used to be...it's pretty hard to fill clubs with buddies week in and out.
 
#1,394
WJGreer said:
I'm not seeing the scene in Denver itself as much better. You play for your friends and family most gigs, and if your friends and family draw isn't consistently 30 or more, it's hard to keep yourself in a rotation. There seems to be very little "live music lover" traffic now, compared to as recently as 10 years ago.

For those of us who are no longer, ahem, as young as we used to be...it's pretty hard to fill clubs with buddies week in and out.
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The Denver scene appears cyclical; presently, "going to see a band" really means one is going to go jibberjabber with one's loudmouthed friends. It's gone up and down in my 20-some years playing around here, but it's never as good as places like hollywood or portland where people are actually coming to listen to the music, not just to be seen at a show. Color me bitter and jaded?
 
#1,395
themensch said:
The Denver scene appears cyclical; presently, "going to see a band" really means one is going to go jibberjabber with one's loudmouthed friends. It's gone up and down in my 20-some years playing around here, but it's never as good as places like hollywood or portland where people are actually coming to listen to the music, not just to be seen at a show. Color me bitter and jaded?
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I love Portland, but Hollywood? Man, every time I've played there, it's been either pay to play or basically play for free. The only bright spot has been that usually the bands I've played with have been better than the local bands we got paired with and so they would line the front of the stage watching us. It's ok in the sense that it's something to do on the way from California to Arizona, but I haven't really witnessed a scene. Although the jazz scene does seem pretty cool and I do have to admit that I missed the hairband scene of the 80s and 90s (and the great folk scare of the 60s and 70s). NoCal has been a lot more fun than SoCal.

When I moved here in 1995, Boulder was doing OK, but Nederland was the happening place. 5 venues going 7 nights a week and an audience that was absolutely starving for live music. That lasted for about 5 or 6 years and was ton of fun.
 
#1,396
edwinhurwitz said:
I love Portland, but Hollywood? Man, every time I've played there, it's been either pay to play or basically play for free.
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The Baked Potato is fun, but unless you're Abe Laboriel or Jimmy Johnson or one of the first call session guys out there, I think you're a spectator.

Not that I'm complaining. You can go in there on a Tuesday and see Haslip play in front of 30 people, 10 feet away from you.
 
#1,397
edwinhurwitz said:
I love Portland, but Hollywood? Man, every time I've played there, it's been either pay to play or basically play for free.
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Can't say I'm an expert in either locale, but I played the small room at the Knitting Factory and not only was it packed, I met cEvin Key and we actually made money by the time we settled our bar tab. It wasn't going to put steaks on the table but it at least put gas in the truck.

Lots of love for Portland, where people will come to see you just because. And they'll be quiet when they do it!
 
#1,398
edwinhurwitz said:
... I think that the rapidly rising lift ticket and real estate prices kept away a lot of the people who had formed the core of the music fans.

...... but now real estate pimps and the 1% from California and Texas. Funky old pickups, VW buses, and jeeps have been replaced by BMWs and Lexus SUVs. It's still a beautiful place, but the soul is long gone.

There are still a few venues out there, but the pay has stagnated or even gone down and it's much harder to motivate people to come out.
Click to expand...

I could not agree more!The Colorado that I remember when I moved here in "82 is long gone. I miss the people with soul who wanted nothing more than to ski powder, wash dishes at night and go see live music 7 nights a week. But there are still the locals out there that want to blow off some steam seeing a GOOD band. You can't support yourself with just playing anymore, but you can make enough to make it worth your while, and still have a lot of fun in the process. Were the money is at is playing private parties and weddings for the 1%ers , they like live music too.
 

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