Theres never been a better time to be a guitar player

p90fool

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
Second hand Stratocaster £170
50w Marshall head and cab £150
Tubescreamer £16
Crybaby Wah  £19

OilCityPickups

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
Second hand Stratocaster £170
50w Marshall head and cab £150
Tubescreamer £16
Crybaby Wah  £19

I'd agree about the pay being crap today ... between playing hotel residencies and rock gigs in 1979 I was earning more than my dad who was an engineer. But then unlike the more clean living musicians of today, much of that went on beer, fags, and trying to impress entertaining the opposite sex ... never mind various substances ... 
If you hang about the Black Heart in Camden these days you may well see an all vegan, non smoking, non drinking metal band. 

guitars4you

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
Second hand Stratocaster £170
50w Marshall head and cab £150
Tubescreamer £16
Crybaby Wah  £19

I think you are right about that - 1978 and as an 18 year old playing in a function band I could earn a min of £50 in a night (often a social club) but on a good night for say a rotary club do, rugby club do etc pushing £100 - 4 piece band and I was by far the youngest and felt that I wasn't get a fair share of the gig money either - £50 then equates to around £250 now - Most weekends I'd get 2 gigs and sometimes 3

Dad's not with my now, but still have some of his old paperwork from his gigging days in the 50's and 60's so will need to dig them out but he regularly talk about what he could earn then  and even better what my Grandad would earn playing 'functions' in the 30's

OilCityPickups

guitars4you said:

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
Second hand Stratocaster £170
50w Marshall head and cab £150
Tubescreamer £16
Crybaby Wah  £19

I think you are right about that - 1978 and as an 18 year old playing in a function band I could earn a min of £50 in a night (often a social club) but on a good night for say a rotary club do, rugby club do etc pushing £100 - 4 piece band and I was by far the youngest and felt that I wasn't get a fair share of the gig money either - £50 then equates to around £250 now - Most weekends I'd get 2 gigs and sometimes 3

Dad's not with my now, but still have some of his old paperwork from his gigging days in the 50's and 60's so will need to dig them out but he regularly talk about what he could earn then  and even better what my Grandad would earn playing 'functions' in the 30's

That's about what I was earning doing SAGA hotel dance band stuff - £50 a night. ... however being in a seaside holiday town
I could usually bank on gigging four or sometimes five nights a week. I did the odd solo acoustic gig in small hotel bars and I'd get £50 for those too. 

guitars4you

OilCityPickups said:

guitars4you said:

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
Second hand Stratocaster £170
50w Marshall head and cab £150
Tubescreamer £16
Crybaby Wah  £19

I think you are right about that - 1978 and as an 18 year old playing in a function band I could earn a min of £50 in a night (often a social club) but on a good night for say a rotary club do, rugby club do etc pushing £100 - 4 piece band and I was by far the youngest and felt that I wasn't get a fair share of the gig money either - £50 then equates to around £250 now - Most weekends I'd get 2 gigs and sometimes 3

Dad's not with my now, but still have some of his old paperwork from his gigging days in the 50's and 60's so will need to dig them out but he regularly talk about what he could earn then  and even better what my Grandad would earn playing 'functions' in the 30's

That's about what I was earning doing SAGA hotel dance band stuff - £50 a night. ... however being in a seaside holiday town
I could usually bank on gigging four or sometimes five nights a week. I did the odd solo acoustic gig in small hotel bars and I'd get £50 for those too. 

Sounds like similar gigs/material - Not punk etc that an 18 year old of the day should be playing - Any thing from quick steps to foxtrot and a few pop songs - Rockin' all over the world was about as modern as it got - But I was still at school and thought about going on the boats for a while, so such work was useful - Plus it was were my dad and grandad had worked - Just looking again - 3 gigs in a weekend and that is around £750 today and I was 18 in the 6th form 

OilCityPickups

guitars4you said:

OilCityPickups said:

guitars4you said:

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
Second hand Stratocaster £170
50w Marshall head and cab £150
Tubescreamer £16
Crybaby Wah  £19

I think you are right about that - 1978 and as an 18 year old playing in a function band I could earn a min of £50 in a night (often a social club) but on a good night for say a rotary club do, rugby club do etc pushing £100 - 4 piece band and I was by far the youngest and felt that I wasn't get a fair share of the gig money either - £50 then equates to around £250 now - Most weekends I'd get 2 gigs and sometimes 3

Dad's not with my now, but still have some of his old paperwork from his gigging days in the 50's and 60's so will need to dig them out but he regularly talk about what he could earn then  and even better what my Grandad would earn playing 'functions' in the 30's

That's about what I was earning doing SAGA hotel dance band stuff - £50 a night. ... however being in a seaside holiday town
I could usually bank on gigging four or sometimes five nights a week. I did the odd solo acoustic gig in small hotel bars and I'd get £50 for those too. 

Sounds like similar gigs/material - Not punk etc that an 18 year old of the day should be playing - Any thing from quick steps to foxtrot and a few pop songs - Rockin' all over the world was about as modern as it got - But I was still at school and thought about going on the boats for a while, so such work was useful - Plus it was were my dad and grandad had worked - Just looking again - 3 gigs in a weekend and that is around £750 today and I was 18 in the 6th form 

I was lucky enough to be in a punk band too ... because work on the Island was seasonal I'd flog my arse off with the dance band hotel gigs ... with the odd punk rehearsal and gig to keep my hand in ... then as soon as the Grockles  (Isle of Wight word for holiday maker) had buggered off - it was gigging on the Island with punk ... then once we'd bought our J4 Van it was all over the country (while all signing on naturally).  Saga in the summer - rock and roll (slang for dole) in the winter. 

Kebabkid

Indeed it is for us but also for the younger generation or beginners. My son attended a Saturday Rock School for a few years, ok, he's a drummer. Being taught current and classic repertoire and getting the chance to play those songs in the context of a band and even as part of a concert was a fabulous and invaluable experience. We never had anything like that and even finding a good guitar teacher that could teach you Songs of the Day correctly was hard. I watched those children grow and widen their musical appreciation and ability with quite a few going onto BIMM or the ACM to study at degree level - the likes of Cory Wong, Vulfpeck and Snarky Puppy really seem to be popular and resonate amongst his cohort as well as RHCP.

As has been said, the educational content out there as well as the technical explanations via the internet are great and something we probably take for granted now and Forums like this.

The quality of cheap but good equipment these days i.e. your Pacificas, Squiers, Sires and amps with effects that are loud enough and both light and portable enough or a box of tricks - you can be up and running for under £200  these days if you buy used. Looking back for me, my choice was a Hondo, Satellite, Columbus guitar, which weren't great (I went for a great Westbury Standard) and even then, you were looking at £150 and after that was the big jump to Fender and Gibson and the like.

There's still a lot of guitar-centric songs out there and I know a lot of friend's children that are opting for guitar and are excited by it. As an aside, the Uke is currently the most popular instrument taught in school and that's probably helping to act as a precursor toward moving to guitar.

It's a good time 

Rowby1

I think there’s a lot of bleak views about it being “better years ago” on this thread and I’ll admit there’s no money in gigging now as there used to be but it’s not all negatives.

I went to a relatively local (30mins drive away) open mic/jam night last week with a drummer friend who’d been there before. He’d warned me that it could be quite chaotic and the level of talent was “mixed” at best. It was packed, I was probably the oldest guy there. Real spread of ages from teens upwards. Lots of passion for making music. I think things may be in decline but there’s still plenty of younger people falling in love with playing live music together. 

Musical_Mystery_Tour

OilCityPickups said:

I bang on about it, but Finland is more or less my second home. Helsinki or Tampere or any one of the larger towns/cities today has the sort of music scene we had in the seventies ... venues all over the place, new bands everywhere. Town councils have a totally different attitude to music ... they see it as 'essential art' that needs space to flourish in. Even small bands doing original material tend to tour - of course the fuckwits who gave us Brexshit have seen to making that more difficult for our UK musicians to do that - but at least we can drown our sorrows in pints of wine.  

I suppose the issue is ... there has never been a better time to be a guitarist, but it's coincided with the country going to ratshit :-) 

Yup, Tampere is a great town, I seem to recall it used to be referred to as the 'Manchester of Finland' or some such, because of its history of being an industrial centre and how that has affected its modern development which has many parallels with the actual Manchester in th UK, wherein it has developed quite a recognisable music scene. And like Manchester 'oop north' here in Blighty, I've had plenty of good nights out in both cities. Just hang on to your wallet, in both places!

SlopeSoarer

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
Second hand Stratocaster £170
50w Marshall head and cab £150
Tubescreamer £16
Crybaby Wah  £19

Randomly I found this on a auction (not eBay) website yesterday, reminiscing about an early gig where I played Mark E Smith at pool. They were supporting Wayne County and the Electric Chairs.

I'm guessing it was the Fall's sort of book keeping!? How does this compare would you say (I have absoulutely no idea) to your comparison?

OilCityPickups

Musical_Mystery_Tour said:

OilCityPickups said:

I bang on about it, but Finland is more or less my second home. Helsinki or Tampere or any one of the larger towns/cities today has the sort of music scene we had in the seventies ... venues all over the place, new bands everywhere. Town councils have a totally different attitude to music ... they see it as 'essential art' that needs space to flourish in. Even small bands doing original material tend to tour - of course the fuckwits who gave us Brexshit have seen to making that more difficult for our UK musicians to do that - but at least we can drown our sorrows in pints of wine.  

I suppose the issue is ... there has never been a better time to be a guitarist, but it's coincided with the country going to ratshit :-) 

Yup, Tampere is a great town, I seem to recall it used to be referred to as the 'Manchester of Finland' or some such, because of its history of being an industrial centre and how that has affected its modern development which has many parallels with the actual Manchester in th UK, wherein it has developed quite a recognisable music scene. And like Manchester 'oop north' here in Blighty, I've had plenty of good nights out in both cities. Just hang on to your wallet, in both places!

Yep the Manchester of Finland because it was at one time a cotton town. I've actually never had any occasion to hang on to my wallet either through the place being rough ... which it isn't, or the prices being high ... which if you don't drink British beer there ... and go for Nordic Brewery ... it's cheaper than London. The Vastavirta-Klubi Bar nestled under the hillside and overlooking the lake ... with the disused sentinel of a shot tower across the road ... is probably my favorite small live venue in Europe. 

Kurtis

Kurtis said:

It will probably come to them eventually. 

Might be the opposite and it will be a revival that comes to the UK before too long. 

I'm led to believe there's been a bit of a "pop punk" resurgence going on for a while. With lots of new subgenres

PAL

OilCityPickups said:

When I started playing seriously ... fifty years ago (jeez I feel old) learning guitar was really difficult. If you had the money ... or rather if your folks did, you might get lessons. My parents would only pay for piano lessons, so I had to do it the hard way. Books, magazines and wearing out my LP collection by constantly setting the needle back to hear that bit again. If you were lucky a mate had learned something you wanted to learn ... and you got the low down from him. Progress was slow ... but with determination you got there. I started gigging the year I got my first good guitar ... a second hand Telecaster.

And gear was super expensive or super crap ... you took your choice. My first electric was a Maya (Teisco lookalike)... basically a Strat built by someone who'd never seen one and hadn't a clue what you did with it. Plywood body, cricket bat neck and tiny frets. Gutless pickups ... but that didn't matter as it was going through a FAL Kestrel combo ... possibly the worst guitar amplifier in the world ... ever ... from Freemans catalogue. 

Fast forward to 2024, 

You can get tab of pretty much everything ... you can get folks pn YouTube breaking down even the most complex solos into idiot sized pieces. You have tuners in your smartphone, and software to record at home or looper pedals for practise. You can collaborate with other musicians thousands of miles away at practically the speed of light, write with partners you may never meet,
and publish music from your own lounge ...

And as for gear ... I played a £99 Fazley Tele copy the other day ... dear lord ... lightyears ahead of the Columbus and Avon crap we had to manage with. Amps are stunning - a Boss Katana 50 ... a very gigable amp ... I know as I have ... £215 at Gear4Music.
Three hundred notes to gig with brand new equipment, that's crazy. And we have Harley Benton, Jet ... all crazy cheap for what you get. 

You can get pretty much whatever amp or guitar you want/can afford bought with the click of a button and delivered to you door ... and if you don't like it ... just send it back. There's more choice than ever before ...

And yet at the moment all I see on here is the sort of continuous whining you get from a bunch Brit pensioners on a cruise ... :-)

When the economy causes you to be able to 'consume less shit' ... why not be grateful and 'enjoy the shit you've got?'
Why not start a new band, learn a new song, try a new genre you've never tried before, go to a jam session and get the adrenaline and enjoyment of bouncing musical ideas off of other folks. 

It's not the seventies ... in many ways it's much, much better than the seventies.  



 

PAL

Well said I agree 100%.

thomasross20

I preferred the old days tbh, now it's information and gear overload and find I play less than ever because of it.

Kurtis

Obviously punk isn't as big in the UK as it was in the 70s and 80s but I'd be surprised if there isn't still a thriving scene somewhere.
It's a bit more underground, but isn't that what it was supposed to be anyway? 

OilCityPickups

Kurtis said:

Obviously punk isn't as big in the UK as it was in the 70s and 80s but I'd be surprised if there isn't still a thriving scene somewhere.
It's a bit more underground, but isn't that what it was supposed to be anyway? 

There's very much a thriving punk scene, as there is a metal scene - I know ... I talk to guitarists out on those scenes about pickups every day.  The issue today is it's much harder to get from 'forming a band' to 'gigging regularly' than it used to be. As the number of venues has shrunk so bands are forced to compete and this has driven wages down, If you throw into the mix the rise of the 'sports bar' with huge flat screen TVs - of course not a thing in the 70s - the rise of the 'gastropub' (always sounds like a small mollusc to me) then music is getting squeezed out of many of it's traditional breeding grounds.

Rather than moaning about it, personally I think more of us should take the Finish example and become amateur promoters to boost the DIY scene. There it's pretty common for bands to group together and approach venues, provide their own ticketing, door staff, PA rig ... and this runs across the generations, younger bands getting support and appearing on the 'bill' with older and more established bands. Profits are split and work generated.     

DavidR

Agree totally. 

Choice of decent acoustics in mid 1970’s was saving up your hard won pennies for a US instrument (not Gibson, who were going through a major purple patch) or Yamaha. Epiphone we’re not bad and a bit cheaper. 

Now? Ginormous choice of quality instruments from scores of makers for great prices with US makers the province of the seriously well off or collectors. 

Also. Recording music and distributing it to the world wasn’t even an option back then but now it’s simple and more or less available to all. 

I don’t think there’s less music being played. I think much of it is just online. Admittedly a lot of it is a bit introspective, and please, no more Rap,  but there are shedloads of people playing and that’s good. 

Brilliant. Thank you God! Too much choice? Nah! Bring it on. 

Play Guitar. Drink beer. 

:-)

bertie

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
 

fuck me -  loading it in..................  I started getting money for gigs in about 1981,  we'd be lucky to get £50 for the band down in sunny debbun.................. tho it was small town stuff to be fair, and still being in school I wasnt really in it for the money, just the fame        (and other fringe benefits !!!)

OilCityPickups

bertie said:

p90fool said:

Of course the beginner gear is better now, but the pay is also crap. 

My first year as a teenage gigging guitarist breaks down as;

£50 a night each
 

fuck me -  loading it in..................  I started getting money for gigs in about 1981,  we'd be lucky to get £50 for the band down in sunny debbun.................. tho it was small town stuff to be fair, and still being in school I wasnt really in it for the money, just the fame        (and other fringe benefits !!!)

But I bet you wen't playing the St Bernards Waltz, the Gay Gordons and the Valita ... with a side order of Bony M for a bunch of pensioner grannies (and not so many grandads - guess they all shuffled off the mortal coil)  - sitting in a frilly shirt playing the dots for about four hours.

£50 was fecking blood money!