Remember when you used to just go out on a short afternoon road trip armed only with some posters, a couple of cassette tapes of your Band, some business cards and you could actually spend and afternoon hitting clubs and come home with bookings that would give everyone a $100 per night paycheck form the gig?

There were not a lot of hassles. The club owner listened to the tape, you had a couple beers he opened up his calendar and you opened up yours and boom, a booking. Yea, those were the days.

Today it seems like it requires an act of Congress, 58 written recommendations and a free 4-hour live audition to get them to even commit to calling you back. Maybe, if you are really lucky, and the club doesn’t change hands or the drunk doesn’t lose the card.

If you’ve been in a band, you know the scenario. And what makes that matter even worse is that after all of that the pay scale is still much the same as it was back in the seventies and $100 per man is still the going rate. Gas has gone up, the cost of equipment has gone up. Everything that a musician has to use to get to that gig and get it completed has increased. Everything except the pay, that is.

That is what makes a networking site like myMusicCircle so valuable as a tool. You can list your band there and if there is a need for what you do the people can actually contact you. I know, I know. It is a novel concept to actually think of a club or other entity other than a bill collector contacting you. But that’s what is supposed to happen in a perfect world.

Let’s face it; everyone would be a lot happier if they all knew the place they belong. Club owners and other talent buyers need to realize that just like the cost of his liquor, which is a cost of doing business for him, good music gear has gone up in price. And just like his liability insurance, the cost of keeping the gear insured has also gone up.