September 8, 2024 • 16 mins
Welcome to One Bad Podcast.
Join Kurt and Shane as they kick off 20 years worth of stories, memories and advice for up-and-coming Canadian rock and roll bands.
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Join Kurt and Shane as they kick off 20 years worth of stories, memories and advice for up-and-coming Canadian rock and roll bands.
You can watch One Bad Podcast on YouTube, here: https://youtu.be/DIn99sZPj6U
Checkout One Bad Son online: https://www.onebadson.com/
Shane Volk: https://www.shaneconneryvolk.com/
Kurt Dahl: https://lawyerdrummer.com/
If you are a content creator, new or experienced, join our team!
If you'd like to advertise with us, head to our website.
Join the movement here: https://www.dufferinave.com/
Socials:
https://www.instagram.com/onebadson
https://www.facebook.com/onebadson/
https://x.com/OneBadSon
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:01):
Welcome the One Bad Podcast. Here's your host, Kadi and Shaner.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
So, Katie, we talked to Arenas in the last episode,
and you made this great point and definitely this is
where we need to go to. Where you know, people
saw us on those arena stages and all of a sudden,
they they got a certain impression of what our lifestyle
was like, right.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Well, yeah, I mean I think even just yeah, not
and not even even the rock and roll lifestyle, just
that they assume that we're doing really well, like financially,
you know. And I think and honestly, I thought we'd
had so we had one breakthrough record twenty twelve and
then our fallow up record both had like three pretty
solid hits. We're doing headline tours, and we're most importantly
touring a lot, right Like, we're gone all the time, touring,
(00:49):
get some Marina opening shows. And I think myself as well,
I thought we'd be like, okay, we made it now, right,
like the money's gonna be flowing in, right, And I
think that's what I really realized, just how hard it
is to make a living as a musician, right, and
or maybe more accurately, just just being real, like how
underpaid musicians are, you know, Yeah, and maybe it wasn't
(01:13):
always that way. I mean, I think to some extent
it was. But like you know, back in the heyday,
the seventies, eighties, and records actually sold like crazy. I
think musicians could make a lot more money. But but
I think it's just around that time, I was like, hey,
now we've made it. We've had all ticked all the boxes,
and there's what you got to do. And I remember
one year, maybe this was a couple of years, or
(01:34):
maybe the next year when we had number one with
Raging Bull, but we toured for like nine months of
the year, I think or something. It was like our biggest,
heaviest year of touring. And I remember, like you know,
February rolls around, we get our tax slips, and it
was like we each made something like maybe forty five
grand or something like, you know, and that's like that
was our annual earnings, which when you're eighteen, forty five
(01:57):
grand is nothing to scoff at, but when you're thirty eight,
it's it is. You know, it's not much money, right,
And and of course we don't do it for the money.
We do it for the love. But it was just
a real eye opener that hey, it's it's not what
people think it is. It's not like, yeah, I think
(02:17):
we could go on a whole podcast on this that
how the music industry works and how everyone else gets paid,
which we've talked about a bit. Everyone else gets paid first,
and then the musicians get last after all the expenses
are gone. And the people that involved don't care if
your expenses get racked up because they commission on gross
not on on net. But it's like, at the end
of the day, you know, musicians, for all the listeners
(02:40):
out there, I mean, your favorite bands out there, you're
you're thinking they're living this life of luxury and they're
probably making less than the the your plumber, you know,
and they're and they're gone, they're on the road like
half the year at least. Right So around the time
that's when I really started to really realize that, you
know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Well, dude, it's so true, and it's like it's cool
to be like open about it here, because it is.
It's a misconception that just you know, kind of like
you hear a band on the radio and you just
assume they're doing well, but there's a reason that you know,
bands like skid Row and like, you know, bands from
the seventies like still touring.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
That it's when people are like, oh.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
These guys should retire, but you're like, you got to
realize that they might not be able to like they
you know, even at that level, even if you had
this massive like you were touring arenas and stuff, at
some point you might not be now right, I mean,
it's people stay on the road oftentimes because that really
is where their money is coming from, right and they
(03:42):
if you've got you know, they've got expenses like everybody
else and things to pay four houses whatever, like, you know,
it is a thing. It's a reason why you know,
musicians are on the road because we love it, like
it's great and that's it's fun in all those things.
But also you know, for a chunk of time that
was like that was really where we were making our money.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
That was our living, you know, and.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
It's not easy, especially like you said, we could go
on and on about how much money, especially in this era,
is expected to come out of the artist's pocket. I mean,
you know, we don't have management anymore because we're at
the point where I mean You've always been our default manager,
even when we had a manager. But you know, that
guy's taking his cut, the label's getting their stuff, and
(04:29):
then you were shelling out. You know, if you're going
to go on tour, you're probably going to be spending
five grand on your on merch and then hopefully you're
recouping that. But also it's like gas and like you
keep adding that all up, a lot of money is
flowing out of your accounts and you're hoping some of
it's going to come back in, right, So it is
(04:50):
a thing, man, And I think, you know, I I
know that like where this conversation is going is this
thought that like a playing Arenas was the best, you know,
it was so good you want to keep that up
and just to think like there's.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Got to be more money out there.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
The more you know, maybe if we get that number
one as opposed to a number five, like does that
open new doors?
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Right?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
And we were doing everything that everybody was asking of us.
I think that was kind of something that something that
got under my skin with a lot of our team
was that they were like, well, what you know, you
can get on the radio, you know it'll open door.
So we got on the radio, it's like, well, if
you go top twenty, well if you can get top ten,
well here we got a number five, and then it's
like wow, but really, you know, if you guys get
(05:38):
a number one, then like that's the real thing. But
it was like every kind of box we checked for
the things that people were saying we needed to do,
we were doing. But as most musicians also find, like
there's so much more to it than that. It's like
you're always kind of especially in the era we've moved
into now, where it's like you release a song, even
(06:01):
if it's a massive hit, well what are you doing next?
Like everything gets kind of pushed like what's the right
way to say this, Like you're always you kind of
feel like you're continually treading water. And even a band
as successful as us, like there's the mid level bands,
which there are very few, Like I count as lucky
(06:23):
with the career we've had, you know, but I think
obviously you've got like the Taylor Swifts of the World
and the Pearl Jams, and they're like they're not having
any issues. They can at this point, they can do
whatever they want and they're gonna be fine financially. But
the mid level bands even that have like we've had
major success, but it is not an indicator that it's
(06:44):
gonna make you money for the rest of your life.
And again that's you know, you see bands break up
because of it. You see artists that are just on
the road because they're they're not enjoying it anymore, but
they're desperate.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
And we've known a lot of bands like that.
Speaker 3 (06:59):
Yeah, well, and you make your great point. It's like,
I think there's a time a transition in every musician's
life when it's like, you know, when you're in your say,
early twenties, and like you don't have a lot of
commitments in life, right, a lot of responsibilities like your
footloose and fancy free, you know, And that's kind of
where we started, right like early twenties Obs was kicking it.
(07:20):
That's where we started. And then and then life sort
of creeps in and responsibilities creeping and not in a
bad way. But it's like even if you you know,
stay single and never have kids and you still just
if you're thirty eight or thirty nine versus twenty one,
you want to be making more money and having certain things.
You deserve it, right, Like from busting your ass as
(07:41):
a musicians. So just life creeps in, whatever that looks
like for everyone. And there's that transition that happens, but
from early twenties to like to your thirties where all
of a sudden, like the realities of life sort of
become clear. And that's where it's just going out and
playing music for fun is only part of the equation.
(08:01):
You also got to have make a living at it, right,
And I think that's the real thing. And that's why
I've got so much, just so much respect for all
those bands that are still going, including ours, but bands
that just like stick at it and make it and
keep doing it right. Like even a band like you know,
say the Glorious Suns or artists like that, where they
(08:24):
they've whatever they're doing, it's it's a lot of work, right,
Like they got to be on the road a lot
to make that work. Or the beach is a great example.
They're killing it and they're really out there doing it,
you know, And it's a lot of sacrifice too, right.
It's like you're missing out on family events or personal
events or whatever, and home is the tour bus, you know.
(08:45):
And so if you get a chance if you actually
get a chance and make the most of it and
make it whatever that looks like, it's I always think
of the amount of sacrifice it must have taken for
any of those artists, because I've seen what took for us. Right,
Like you said, we were a mid level a mid
level success, right, we weren't. We weren't doing arenas. We
(09:07):
didn't even get to like the having a tour bus level,
which maybe we can talk with that for a bit,
because that's why a lot of people don't think of
that either. As so when we're on tour with Sebastian
Black touring in the US, which we'll talk about more later,
or even with def Leppard, it's like they can sleep
every night in the tour bus while it rolls, drives
to the next town, whereas we got to have a
(09:29):
quick maybe three hour sleep in the hotel, maybe four
hours if we're lucky, get up early, and then drive
the next day in our van and trailer. Right, Because
to get to that level of being a touring bus band,
if you make significant money because your your overhead every
day having a tour bus is like crazy, right, and
you got to pay a driver all that stuff and
(09:50):
gas and rent it and we just we never got there.
We tried, and we could have probably been a couple
of tours, but we would have made no money on
the tour. So we we decided to make money.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Well, and we knew bands that did that. We knew
bands that did exactly that. Like we were at a
point where, you know, between these between Black Buffalo and
Made in the Name, where it was like we could
have got a tour bus, like there was enough money
like to cover it. But yeah, you know, when we
would talk about that, we're like, well, do you want
to come home with nothing? Because you know, tour bus
(10:21):
I don't know, you know what it is now Probably
it's a thousand to fifteen hundred bucks a day at
the low end, and that's plus a driver, and your
driver gets a hotel room every night, so you know,
your operational costs are like two thousand to twenty five
hundred at minimum just to operate that bus. So it's like, yeah,
we could have we could have done the vanity thing
just to pull up in a tour bus. And we've
(10:42):
seen and toured with bands that showed up in those things,
and you know, because they broke up shortly after a
couple of them that we know, you're like you couldn't
afford it, right, And so it's like we'd have those
discussions where is it, like is it worth our the
vanity of like oh yeah, like we'd get to sleep
more and that would have been nice, like just on
a person level, but it was like we're also, like
(11:02):
you said, we're trying to like our lives are progressing
to this place where you kind of I mean, you
want to come home with some cash and have some stability,
right like, And I think that's what we're talking about,
is no matter what your life situation is, you'd hope
that after like twelve years of doing something, things kind
of stabilize where you're like, okay, we can sort of
(11:23):
like there's predictability in this whole deal, but they're just there.
Never is for I would honestly, man, I don't know
if this number is crazy, but i'd say like ninety
five percent of artists in general don't have stability in
that way predictable like oh, every time we go out,
there's a crowd for us, it's like things change so
(11:44):
fast all the time, right, Well.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
I think that's why sadly, like that's why there's so
many you know, addictions issues and mental health struggles with musicians, right, Like,
it's it is such a hard living again, that's I've
got nothing but respect and love for other musicians who
just you know, do it for the full time musicians
hired guns or touring musicians whatever. And because it is
(12:06):
such a it's such a hard, hard racket, right, of
any career out there, by far the most difficult. I think,
I can't think of a more difficult career. And like, yeah,
when you see I love like, yeah, you see the
success stories like the Pearl Jams or the Rolling Stones,
like those are the those are like the miracles, right,
so when you go see them live, you just like
(12:27):
grin in the ear to ear because they they did
it and they deserve it. I mean, for the most part,
the people that bands that are that big are there
for a reason, right, And it's it's it's pretty special
to see that. That was always the sort of shining
light at the end of the tunnel. I say, well,
look what Pearl Jam did it? You know, and.
Speaker 4 (12:44):
Yeah, yeah, well, and dude, it's this is a cool place,
like we're coming up time on this episode, but this
is where we're going to go with us, and we're
actually like, we're getting close to this podcast coming full
circle because we're getting close to that Sebastian Bock tour,
which is where we started this whole.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Thing off, and that all came about because of the
next record, and so this everything we've talked about now
in the last couple episodes with Arenas and this whole
kind of moment of you know, the Black Buffalo record
and everything that kind of was happening after that we
were on this upswing. But everything we're talking about right
(13:20):
now is so relevant because we're now at this point
where we're like, man, we've got hits. We've got massive tours,
Like holy shit, we're playing Arenas now, like you know,
we're driving into cities that we've never been and they're
playing our songs on the radio, and you're, you know,
but things are not stabilizing. We're not feeling like, oh,
(13:43):
you know, we're just gonna hop back into the studio
and we'll record more and money's there, and you know,
it was still I don't know how you felt, but
I still had that feeling kind of like that pit
in my stomach that we'd had for our entire career,
like it all could go away. I remember we played
a show with Billy Tallent and talking to those those guys,
(14:04):
and Ben said the same thing. He's like, man, I'm
grateful every time I step on stage because he's like,
you still kind of feel like it could go away,
like it it's a magical thing. But like you said,
it's so hard and there's such little stability. And I
think that's where this next episode is going to go
is because now I remember the end of the Black
(14:26):
Buffalo era and playing the last few shows, and now
it's like back to like, Okay, what's next, like more songs,
and we were starting to have this feeling of like
I don't even want to say it's like desperation, but
a little bit of like okay, what do we do next?
And it started the focus starts to go to like
(14:47):
what if we can get a number one hit?
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Like what if? Because we're kind of plateauing at this
this point.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
We're going across Canada and playing these tours and playing
the great crowds, and they're going up little bits at
a time, but it's not like this. You know, well,
you played the Big Arena show and now you're playing arenas.
It's like it wasn't happening that way, right, And so
now we're moving into the maiden the name era, and
I think, you know, there was just stuff creeping into
(15:16):
our decision making into like what is next, you know,
because it wasn't getting easier, that's for sure, you know.
And it's almost like now you have hits on the radio,
and you have to live up to the hype you've
built and also build bigger, build new hype. And so
that's where we're going with this next one. And it's
like so many highlights from this era, but tough times too, right.
(15:39):
I mean, it was more huge shows, but just you know,
this era is like we'll say it's complicated, Katie, this
era gets a little complicated, doesn't it.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Well, as Biggie said, more money, more problems, and that's
like like that was this. It's like more success, more
issues with us, right, like, and that's not just an
obs thing, it's just industry and general you're right, one
hundred percent. And and then I think the focus was
also which we'll go into the next one. It's like
number one song but also like a big breakthrough in
America and that was like the big that was the
(16:12):
the golden goose we had to get. It's like that
they got to break through in America. How do you
do it? We don't want to become like so many
bands that never break through in America. You know, we don't,
so how do you? How do we break through in America?
That was the big thing, which kind of led to
the producer that we chose, et cetera. But and and
the direction we chose to some extent. But yeah, let's
let's leave it there. Let's uh, you know, the more money,
(16:36):
more problems is a nice way to rap it. Love it.
Thanks for listening to One Bad Podcast.
Welcome the One Bad Podcast. Here's your host, Kadi and Shaner.
Speaker 2 (00:11):
So, Katie, we talked to Arenas in the last episode,
and you made this great point and definitely this is
where we need to go to. Where you know, people
saw us on those arena stages and all of a sudden,
they they got a certain impression of what our lifestyle
was like, right.
Speaker 3 (00:27):
Well, yeah, I mean I think even just yeah, not
and not even even the rock and roll lifestyle, just
that they assume that we're doing really well, like financially,
you know. And I think and honestly, I thought we'd
had so we had one breakthrough record twenty twelve and
then our fallow up record both had like three pretty
solid hits. We're doing headline tours, and we're most importantly
touring a lot, right Like, we're gone all the time, touring,
(00:49):
get some Marina opening shows. And I think myself as well,
I thought we'd be like, okay, we made it now, right,
like the money's gonna be flowing in, right, And I
think that's what I really realized, just how hard it
is to make a living as a musician, right, and
or maybe more accurately, just just being real, like how
underpaid musicians are, you know, Yeah, and maybe it wasn't
(01:13):
always that way. I mean, I think to some extent
it was. But like you know, back in the heyday,
the seventies, eighties, and records actually sold like crazy. I
think musicians could make a lot more money. But but
I think it's just around that time, I was like, hey,
now we've made it. We've had all ticked all the boxes,
and there's what you got to do. And I remember
one year, maybe this was a couple of years, or
(01:34):
maybe the next year when we had number one with
Raging Bull, but we toured for like nine months of
the year, I think or something. It was like our biggest,
heaviest year of touring. And I remember, like you know,
February rolls around, we get our tax slips, and it
was like we each made something like maybe forty five
grand or something like, you know, and that's like that
was our annual earnings, which when you're eighteen, forty five
(01:57):
grand is nothing to scoff at, but when you're thirty eight,
it's it is. You know, it's not much money, right,
And and of course we don't do it for the money.
We do it for the love. But it was just
a real eye opener that hey, it's it's not what
people think it is. It's not like, yeah, I think
(02:17):
we could go on a whole podcast on this that
how the music industry works and how everyone else gets paid,
which we've talked about a bit. Everyone else gets paid first,
and then the musicians get last after all the expenses
are gone. And the people that involved don't care if
your expenses get racked up because they commission on gross
not on on net. But it's like, at the end
of the day, you know, musicians, for all the listeners
(02:40):
out there, I mean, your favorite bands out there, you're
you're thinking they're living this life of luxury and they're
probably making less than the the your plumber, you know,
and they're and they're gone, they're on the road like
half the year at least. Right So around the time
that's when I really started to really realize that, you
know what I mean.
Speaker 2 (02:59):
Well, dude, it's so true, and it's like it's cool
to be like open about it here, because it is.
It's a misconception that just you know, kind of like
you hear a band on the radio and you just
assume they're doing well, but there's a reason that you know,
bands like skid Row and like, you know, bands from
the seventies like still touring.
Speaker 1 (03:19):
That it's when people are like, oh.
Speaker 2 (03:22):
These guys should retire, but you're like, you got to
realize that they might not be able to like they
you know, even at that level, even if you had
this massive like you were touring arenas and stuff, at
some point you might not be now right, I mean,
it's people stay on the road oftentimes because that really
is where their money is coming from, right and they
(03:42):
if you've got you know, they've got expenses like everybody
else and things to pay four houses whatever, like, you know,
it is a thing. It's a reason why you know,
musicians are on the road because we love it, like
it's great and that's it's fun in all those things.
But also you know, for a chunk of time that
was like that was really where we were making our money.
Speaker 1 (04:04):
That was our living, you know, and.
Speaker 2 (04:09):
It's not easy, especially like you said, we could go
on and on about how much money, especially in this era,
is expected to come out of the artist's pocket. I mean,
you know, we don't have management anymore because we're at
the point where I mean You've always been our default manager,
even when we had a manager. But you know, that
guy's taking his cut, the label's getting their stuff, and
(04:29):
then you were shelling out. You know, if you're going
to go on tour, you're probably going to be spending
five grand on your on merch and then hopefully you're
recouping that. But also it's like gas and like you
keep adding that all up, a lot of money is
flowing out of your accounts and you're hoping some of
it's going to come back in, right, So it is
(04:50):
a thing, man, And I think, you know, I I
know that like where this conversation is going is this
thought that like a playing Arenas was the best, you know,
it was so good you want to keep that up
and just to think like there's.
Speaker 1 (05:07):
Got to be more money out there.
Speaker 2 (05:09):
The more you know, maybe if we get that number
one as opposed to a number five, like does that
open new doors?
Speaker 1 (05:15):
Right?
Speaker 2 (05:16):
And we were doing everything that everybody was asking of us.
I think that was kind of something that something that
got under my skin with a lot of our team
was that they were like, well, what you know, you
can get on the radio, you know it'll open door.
So we got on the radio, it's like, well, if
you go top twenty, well if you can get top ten,
well here we got a number five, and then it's
like wow, but really, you know, if you guys get
(05:38):
a number one, then like that's the real thing. But
it was like every kind of box we checked for
the things that people were saying we needed to do,
we were doing. But as most musicians also find, like
there's so much more to it than that. It's like
you're always kind of especially in the era we've moved
into now, where it's like you release a song, even
(06:01):
if it's a massive hit, well what are you doing next?
Like everything gets kind of pushed like what's the right
way to say this, Like you're always you kind of
feel like you're continually treading water. And even a band
as successful as us, like there's the mid level bands,
which there are very few, Like I count as lucky
(06:23):
with the career we've had, you know, but I think
obviously you've got like the Taylor Swifts of the World
and the Pearl Jams, and they're like they're not having
any issues. They can at this point, they can do
whatever they want and they're gonna be fine financially. But
the mid level bands even that have like we've had
major success, but it is not an indicator that it's
(06:44):
gonna make you money for the rest of your life.
And again that's you know, you see bands break up
because of it. You see artists that are just on
the road because they're they're not enjoying it anymore, but
they're desperate.
Speaker 1 (06:57):
And we've known a lot of bands like that.
Speaker 3 (06:59):
Yeah, well, and you make your great point. It's like,
I think there's a time a transition in every musician's
life when it's like, you know, when you're in your say,
early twenties, and like you don't have a lot of
commitments in life, right, a lot of responsibilities like your
footloose and fancy free, you know, And that's kind of
where we started, right like early twenties Obs was kicking it.
(07:20):
That's where we started. And then and then life sort
of creeps in and responsibilities creeping and not in a
bad way. But it's like even if you you know,
stay single and never have kids and you still just
if you're thirty eight or thirty nine versus twenty one,
you want to be making more money and having certain things.
You deserve it, right, Like from busting your ass as
(07:41):
a musicians. So just life creeps in, whatever that looks
like for everyone. And there's that transition that happens, but
from early twenties to like to your thirties where all
of a sudden, like the realities of life sort of
become clear. And that's where it's just going out and
playing music for fun is only part of the equation.
(08:01):
You also got to have make a living at it, right,
And I think that's the real thing. And that's why
I've got so much, just so much respect for all
those bands that are still going, including ours, but bands
that just like stick at it and make it and
keep doing it right. Like even a band like you know,
say the Glorious Suns or artists like that, where they
(08:24):
they've whatever they're doing, it's it's a lot of work, right,
Like they got to be on the road a lot
to make that work. Or the beach is a great example.
They're killing it and they're really out there doing it,
you know, And it's a lot of sacrifice too, right.
It's like you're missing out on family events or personal
events or whatever, and home is the tour bus, you know.
(08:45):
And so if you get a chance if you actually
get a chance and make the most of it and
make it whatever that looks like, it's I always think
of the amount of sacrifice it must have taken for
any of those artists, because I've seen what took for us. Right,
Like you said, we were a mid level a mid
level success, right, we weren't. We weren't doing arenas. We
(09:07):
didn't even get to like the having a tour bus level,
which maybe we can talk with that for a bit,
because that's why a lot of people don't think of
that either. As so when we're on tour with Sebastian
Black touring in the US, which we'll talk about more later,
or even with def Leppard, it's like they can sleep
every night in the tour bus while it rolls, drives
to the next town, whereas we got to have a
(09:29):
quick maybe three hour sleep in the hotel, maybe four
hours if we're lucky, get up early, and then drive
the next day in our van and trailer. Right, Because
to get to that level of being a touring bus band,
if you make significant money because your your overhead every
day having a tour bus is like crazy, right, and
you got to pay a driver all that stuff and
(09:50):
gas and rent it and we just we never got there.
We tried, and we could have probably been a couple
of tours, but we would have made no money on
the tour. So we we decided to make money.
Speaker 2 (10:00):
Well, and we knew bands that did that. We knew
bands that did exactly that. Like we were at a
point where, you know, between these between Black Buffalo and
Made in the Name, where it was like we could
have got a tour bus, like there was enough money
like to cover it. But yeah, you know, when we
would talk about that, we're like, well, do you want
to come home with nothing? Because you know, tour bus
(10:21):
I don't know, you know what it is now Probably
it's a thousand to fifteen hundred bucks a day at
the low end, and that's plus a driver, and your
driver gets a hotel room every night, so you know,
your operational costs are like two thousand to twenty five
hundred at minimum just to operate that bus. So it's like, yeah,
we could have we could have done the vanity thing
just to pull up in a tour bus. And we've
(10:42):
seen and toured with bands that showed up in those things,
and you know, because they broke up shortly after a
couple of them that we know, you're like you couldn't
afford it, right, And so it's like we'd have those
discussions where is it, like is it worth our the
vanity of like oh yeah, like we'd get to sleep
more and that would have been nice, like just on
a person level, but it was like we're also, like
(11:02):
you said, we're trying to like our lives are progressing
to this place where you kind of I mean, you
want to come home with some cash and have some stability,
right like, And I think that's what we're talking about,
is no matter what your life situation is, you'd hope
that after like twelve years of doing something, things kind
of stabilize where you're like, okay, we can sort of
(11:23):
like there's predictability in this whole deal, but they're just there.
Never is for I would honestly, man, I don't know
if this number is crazy, but i'd say like ninety
five percent of artists in general don't have stability in
that way predictable like oh, every time we go out,
there's a crowd for us, it's like things change so
(11:44):
fast all the time, right, Well.
Speaker 3 (11:46):
I think that's why sadly, like that's why there's so
many you know, addictions issues and mental health struggles with musicians, right, Like,
it's it is such a hard living again, that's I've
got nothing but respect and love for other musicians who
just you know, do it for the full time musicians
hired guns or touring musicians whatever. And because it is
(12:06):
such a it's such a hard, hard racket, right, of
any career out there, by far the most difficult. I think,
I can't think of a more difficult career. And like, yeah,
when you see I love like, yeah, you see the
success stories like the Pearl Jams or the Rolling Stones,
like those are the those are like the miracles, right,
so when you go see them live, you just like
(12:27):
grin in the ear to ear because they they did
it and they deserve it. I mean, for the most part,
the people that bands that are that big are there
for a reason, right, And it's it's it's pretty special
to see that. That was always the sort of shining
light at the end of the tunnel. I say, well,
look what Pearl Jam did it? You know, and.
Speaker 4 (12:44):
Yeah, yeah, well, and dude, it's this is a cool place,
like we're coming up time on this episode, but this
is where we're going to go with us, and we're
actually like, we're getting close to this podcast coming full
circle because we're getting close to that Sebastian Bock tour,
which is where we started this whole.
Speaker 2 (13:00):
Thing off, and that all came about because of the
next record, and so this everything we've talked about now
in the last couple episodes with Arenas and this whole
kind of moment of you know, the Black Buffalo record
and everything that kind of was happening after that we
were on this upswing. But everything we're talking about right
(13:20):
now is so relevant because we're now at this point
where we're like, man, we've got hits. We've got massive tours,
Like holy shit, we're playing Arenas now, like you know,
we're driving into cities that we've never been and they're
playing our songs on the radio, and you're, you know,
but things are not stabilizing. We're not feeling like, oh,
(13:43):
you know, we're just gonna hop back into the studio
and we'll record more and money's there, and you know,
it was still I don't know how you felt, but
I still had that feeling kind of like that pit
in my stomach that we'd had for our entire career,
like it all could go away. I remember we played
a show with Billy Tallent and talking to those those guys,
(14:04):
and Ben said the same thing. He's like, man, I'm
grateful every time I step on stage because he's like,
you still kind of feel like it could go away,
like it it's a magical thing. But like you said,
it's so hard and there's such little stability. And I
think that's where this next episode is going to go
is because now I remember the end of the Black
(14:26):
Buffalo era and playing the last few shows, and now
it's like back to like, Okay, what's next, like more songs,
and we were starting to have this feeling of like
I don't even want to say it's like desperation, but
a little bit of like okay, what do we do next?
And it started the focus starts to go to like
(14:47):
what if we can get a number one hit?
Speaker 1 (14:49):
Like what if? Because we're kind of plateauing at this
this point.
Speaker 2 (14:53):
We're going across Canada and playing these tours and playing
the great crowds, and they're going up little bits at
a time, but it's not like this. You know, well,
you played the Big Arena show and now you're playing arenas.
It's like it wasn't happening that way, right, And so
now we're moving into the maiden the name era, and
I think, you know, there was just stuff creeping into
(15:16):
our decision making into like what is next, you know,
because it wasn't getting easier, that's for sure, you know.
And it's almost like now you have hits on the radio,
and you have to live up to the hype you've
built and also build bigger, build new hype. And so
that's where we're going with this next one. And it's
like so many highlights from this era, but tough times too, right.
(15:39):
I mean, it was more huge shows, but just you know,
this era is like we'll say it's complicated, Katie, this
era gets a little complicated, doesn't it.
Speaker 3 (15:50):
Well, as Biggie said, more money, more problems, and that's
like like that was this. It's like more success, more
issues with us, right, like, and that's not just an
obs thing, it's just industry and general you're right, one
hundred percent. And and then I think the focus was
also which we'll go into the next one. It's like
number one song but also like a big breakthrough in
America and that was like the big that was the
(16:12):
the golden goose we had to get. It's like that
they got to break through in America. How do you
do it? We don't want to become like so many
bands that never break through in America. You know, we don't,
so how do you? How do we break through in America?
That was the big thing, which kind of led to
the producer that we chose, et cetera. But and and
the direction we chose to some extent. But yeah, let's
let's leave it there. Let's uh, you know, the more money,
(16:36):
more problems is a nice way to rap it. Love it.
Thanks for listening to One Bad Podcast.
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