A close look at the lives of working musicians who aren’t the center of their stage.
Secret (and not-so-secret) weapons, side-of-the-stagers, rhythm and horn sections, backup singers, accompanists—these and other “band people” are the anonymous but irreplaceable character actors of popular music. Through interviews and incisive cultural critique, writer and musician Franz Nicolay provides a portrait of the musical middle class. Artists talk frankly about their careers and attitudes toward their craft, work environment, and group dynamics, and shed light on how support musicians make sense of the weird combination of friend group, gang, small business consortium, long-term creative collaboration, and chosen family that constitutes a band. Is it more important to be a good hang or a virtuoso player? Do bands work best as democracies or autocracies? How do musicians with children balance their personal and professional lives? How much money is too little? And how does it feel to play on hundreds of records, with none released under your name? In exploring these and other questions, Band People gives voice to those who collaborate to create and dissects what it means to be a laborer in the culture industry.
[Nicolay's] original research...makes for fun reading...and goes deep on a neglected population of musicians...A lively...peek at the artistry at the edge of the stage.
Band People might be one of the least bacchanalian books ever published about the rock-and-roll life style, but also one of the most honest. It’s a collection of stories about how musicians who have made contributions to songs beloved by millions...simply get by...You come away wishing that they could all succeed, at least on their own terms...Reading Band People, I was struck by the amount of work required simply to stay collegial with one another—the division of labor, the sheathing of ego, the grace.
A perceptive portrait…Taken as a whole, these profiles succeed in complicating the ‘lone genius’ narrative of artistic creation and raising provocative questions about how society values the production of music. It’s a captivating look at what it means to occupy the complicated space ‘between a career and a calling.’
From cult heroes like guitarist Nels Cline and bassist Mike Watt to band stalwarts like Fugazi bassist Joe Lally and Babes in Toyland drummer Lori Barbero to studio first-calls like drummer Josh Freese and bassist Melissa Auf Der Mar, Band People shows the nuts and bolts of what they do and how they do it. These players out of the spotlight have memorable things to say about every aspect of their trade. 'Who are these band people — the character actors of popular music?' Nicolay asks and then answers definitively.
Riveting…The book’s research and testimonials reinforce one another to great effect.
Beautiful [and]…reverent, [this book has] so much love for [musicians], while at the same time being so practical…There’s so many great insights…If you’ve got a music-loving person in your life, it’s a good gift.
In [Nicolay's] book, the clichés of rock ‘n’ roll have refreshingly taken a back seat to the struggles of talented freelance professionals in a competitive business...The choice to keep the focus on a smaller segment of the musicians allows his story to delve deeper into a particular subculture of musicians as opposed to getting lost in the wide range of books Band People could be.
[Band People is] a candid look at the lives of musicians who don’t spend as much time in the spotlight—all conveyed with a virtuoso’s touch.
[Band People] reads like a thoughtful fusion of business textbooks, oral history, and heartfelt documentary, but without the glossy schmaltz or soft-focus lens...I thoroughly enjoyed the book...[which] serves as the craft-centric inverse of well-known mythologies like Our Band Could Be Your Life.
By illustrating other people's successes in creative relationships, [Band People] allowed me to better understand and articulate my own similar successes.
Band People combines techniques to analyze making music as a career and as a job. It’s a little reportorial, a little theoretical, and a little memoiristic.
Festival catering is where working musicians knock out our water cooler talk. What drummer’s a dream on tour? What singer pays dirt? What bassist should never, ever drive? With Band People, Franz Nicolay has assembled festival catering’s fantasy roster, a wrecking crew of career players in astute conversation with one another on business and relationships and how those collide in music work. A fascinating guide to the labor and love of playing in a band, with invaluable insights for newbies and lifers alike.
Most books about musicians focus on the superstars that everybody knows. Franz Nicolay’s writing is so valuable because he cares about the other 99.9 percent of performers—the sidemen, the session musicians, the road dogs who make their living in the shadows. In Band People, Nicolay shows just how fascinating—and difficult, and rewarding, and important—the lives of these people can be.
What makes Band People so unlike most books about popular music is that it's actually about music, and not really anything else. Instead of projecting a meaning onto songs, it explains the craft of song creation; instead of lionizing the rock 'n' roll lifestyle, it describes how a life in rock 'n' roll can be realistically achieved. It's the difference between learning about a war from a general and learning about a war from a soldier.
Franz Nicolay brings together musician interviews, pop-music sociology studies, and social-psychology research to demystify the world of the workaday band member. Partly an oral history of the post-DIY musical present, partly a how-to manual for getting along with your bandmates and getting paid, Band People offers a thorough crash course in what it means to be a working musician in the pop and rock scenes.
Franz Nicolay is a writer, musician, and faculty member in music and written arts at Bard College. In addition to records under his own name, he has been a member of World/Inferno Friendship Society and the Hold Steady. He is the author of The Humorless Ladies of Border Control: Touring the Punk Underground from Belgrade to Ulaanbaatar and the novel Someone Should Pay for Your Pain.
- Introduction
- 1. Training and Early Goals
- 2. “Plays Well with Others”: The Social Lives of Bands
- 3. The Work of Band People
- 4. The Family Business: Musicians with Children
- 5. The Artist and The Artisan: Money and Credit
- 6. Going Bad
- 7. Peers and Ambitions
- Acknowledgments
- Notes
- Bibliography
- List of Interviews
- Index
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