So, after finally getting home Sunday morning, Heather and I got up and got to our gig in Canton – SNAFU hosted by our friend Dave Morreale at Mike McGovern’s.
After our house concert experience, I think Heather and I both had our concerns about playing a BAR totally acoustic, but Dave’s been assuring us that the acoustic qualities of this room are simply exquisite…
We got there pretty early on the most beautifully autumnal day so far this year, including the ones I’ve had while dreaming of GOOD Rennaisance Festivals. The air was crisp (I actually borrowed a sweatshirt thingie from Heather) and the sun was just hitting that gold-ignition point on the horizon. Setting over a church and a dog park was a nice touch. Shadows grew slowly as we walked around Baltimore streets, seeing lots of people out walking their four-legged beasties. I’ve Lived in this area for years and never knew this part of Baltimore existed. I’m newly in Love.
In any case, Mike McGovern’s is a small neighbourhood bar, with an awesome upstairs room with couches and a loungey feel. THIS was where we played, and it really did have incredible acoustics. It didn’t hurt that Heather and I were just so relieved to be doing anything OTHER than the gig we’d played the night before – we were on the edge of exhausted which makes us pretty funny (plus or minus my “black holes suck” moment)AND Dave had paired us up with the Lovely and talented (Muppet intro much?) Rachel Cross. It was a pleasure to rock so hard, knowing that every ounce of energy bouncing around that room was 100% me. No microphone in the way, I advanced on the audience and let fly.
The only thing that put a damper on the evening was the fact that ASCAP is pointing their legal weight at Mike McGovern’s in attempt to extort $400 a year from them.
Now, on the one hand, the idea that a bar should pay $400/year for the sake of having Live music, that doesn’t seem too extreme. It’s less than $10 a week, and ASCAP is theoretically looking after its members – I can SORT of see it in the case of larger clubs who do have ASCAP artists come through, or who legitimately think they’re going to have a lot of guys coming through and playing ASCAP licensed covers. Unfortunately, neither was true tonight.
An original songwriter series, Dave Morreale’s music (which is the only part of him that ASCAP is supposedly protecting) wasn’t being played, and all in all, the idea that ASCAP can then waltz in and say “pay this or we’ll sue you and shut you down” is appalling.
I’m going to write about this a little bit more, but I don’t have that firm a grasp on it. Notes – ASCAP is SUPPOSED to make sure that you get your royalties from when other people are playing your music (either through radio or through covers) – but their payouts are based on a minimal sampling of popular radio programming across the nation. Dave’s never seen a penny of anything.
The other way the base their pay (as I understand it) is to get ASCAP members to send in a list of all the venues they’ve played over the course of the year, and for each one they send you a $20 check… (yeah, ladies and gentlement, perhaps a $4000 check if we were members – perhaps more) BUT then of course they’ve got a nice little list of venues, most of which probably AREN’T members, and indirectly, we’ve just levied a $400 fine against most every place that was nice enough to let us play.
Dave IS a registered ASCAP member, and I think that that may be where the problem lies – but the CONCEPT that that bar should pay $400/year to ASCAP, so that (if Dave fills out all the proper paperwork) ASCAP can pay HIM $20. Those extra $20s here and there would really help all of us struggling musicians out – BUT – the owner of Mike McGovern’s is now forced to really look at Live music and do a cost-assessment. His first response isn’t “oh, that’s just $10 a year”, it’s “that’s a $400 recurring fine” and his FIRST response is to cancel SNAFU, and Live music as a whole….
So, fine – we make $4000 this year, but we go back next year and half of the venues we’re hoping to return to say “sorry, we’re not doing Live music anymore – look at this fance mp3 player we’ve installed”…
I don’t know, like I said, I’ve got to do more reading. It’s like, there DO seem to be advantages to being ASCAPped, but they don’t have anything to do with getting your actual royalties, they come more from turning in a list of places you’ve played, and that’s mostly for the sake of their head-hunting. We’d have to make sure we only played (or only REPORTED) ASCAP venues we’d played… and in theory, I don’t see anything wrong with it working the other way around… i.e. the idea that venues start saying “we don’t book ASCAP artists, sorry”… and I don’t think that that would be a bad thing.
Ranting and learning and ranting some more. And of course, maybe I’ll learn something that makes me sign up and shut up, but only if it doesn’t harm the people we’re playing for. Pleck. Fucking mob.
“I shall TRY some of your burned replicated bird meat!” (thanks Klingons)
