In May, Record Union released the 73% Report, so named for the 73% of surveyed musicians who reported suffering from “…negative emotions such as stress, anxiety and/or depression in relation to…music creation.”
Though this number would set off alarm bells in any other industry, it does not register the same shock in the music world. Sure, we grieve the untimely passing of artists like Scott Hutchinson, Chris Cornell, and Mac Miller, but these tragedies are never wholly unexpected. Such is the nature of the limelight, recalibrating otherwise grim realities into idealized, widely-circulated stereotypes: instability is seen as freedom, substance abuse is fuel for an energetic performance, melancholia marauds as creative fodder, recklessness is just misplaced passion.
This comorbidity between creativity and mental illness has captivated our cultural consciousness, often illustrated in romantic scenes like van Gogh cutting off his ear, Virginia Woolf wading into the Ouse, and Kurt Cobain’s infamous suicide note; we purport these episodes as tragedy, yet take an undeniable, voyeuristic pleasure in the drama of public self-destruction. But according to science, this enduring connection is but a popular fallacy–“Studies using test or clinical assessments have not proven a connection between creativity and mental illness,” (Psychology Today) –begging the question: what is to blame for the mental health crisis in music?
When pressed to describe the triggers of their negative emotions, musicians surveyed in the 73% Report primarily cited “fear of failure,” and “financial instability.” These responses are supported by a study released last year by the Music Industry Research Association, which stated the median musician earned just $21K from music-related activities, only $5.4K of which was generated from live performances! The study also noted the average musician received income from three different sources, as opposed to one steady job.
There’s a name for the thing that’s killing our musicians, and it’s not creativity; it’s the gig economy.
“The gig economy started in music,” said the late economist Alan Krueger. “The term comes from jazz. The idea is you have to be nimble; you have to do multiple things. That is going to be the secret for music. The artists are going to have to find how to use their music to market something else” (Variety).
It’s nice to think of musicians spending their days capturing the human condition in song, but the reality for your average indie artist is much bleaker: side-hustling to pay the bills; marketing shows and self-finacing production; maintaining mental health on the grueling, unglamorous road. Even successful superstars like Lady Gaga and Ariana Grande suffer from industry fatigue.
In an aptly-titled article, “Sometimes, Artists Turn Their Back on the Music Business for Good Reason,” Peter Robinson notes: “All these extra obligations have benefitted some bands and singers in terms of allowing them to round out their artistic proposition, but it’s the rare artist who’ll tell you this explosion of required content hasn’t resulted in them spreading themselves or their ideas incredibly thinly.” When creativity–the very thing that draws people to music in the first place–becomes blocked by gig economy baggage (and it almost always does), career burnout is inevitable. The lucky ones turn their backs on this toxic system, trading tour buses for classrooms, even real-estate jobs. The unlucky ones end up in the 27 Club.
And if you think musicians are the only ones suffering from gig economy burnout, think again. According to a recent survey of 520 promoters, venue operators, and event organizers, 82% reported high levels of stress, 67% suffered from anxiety, and 40% dealt with depression. The three most popular triggers for these feelings were: “no regular income,” “a lack of support,” and “unsociable hours and the effect the job has on relationships” (Skiddle).
As the digitization of music continues to raze and rebuild the industry, the gig economy has only become more prevalent. Indie record labels have been forced to expand their reach into uncharted territories, leading Rolling Stone to declare: “Every Music Company is Morphing into the Same Thing.” Boutique promoters are on the Endangered Species List. And let’s not even start on Fyre Festival and its contemporaries biting off more than they can chew in a desperate bid to impact the market….
At the dark heart of the gig economy is a simple paradox: the music industry is neither a functional “industry,” with consistent benefits, infrastructural support, and a steady paycheck, nor a true representation of “music” –a concept more akin to philosophy or religion than a transactional exchange. Such Janusian thinking has allowed the music industry to forsake standard business practice in favor of hawking an emotional experience; people are drawn in by a love of music, and they stay, despite the long hours and below-average pay, because the industry has told them it’s a privilege to be there in the first place.
Lisa Gritter expounds, “…the music industry is unique in some aspects—the line between your personal life and your work is scarcely there, for a start. Your office is often located on festival grounds, inside a music venue, or on a tour bus, which also means the bar is never far away. It makes your work fun, interesting, and dynamic, but it can also lead to an excess of incentives” (Vice).
For too long this “excess of incentives” has been positioned as the real compensation to working in music, but after years of accepting perks instead of proper pay, the incentives begin to carry less emotional weight until they’re inevitably replaced with disillusioned resentment. If standard business practices were commonplace, the industry might be functional, but the mere association to music has thus far prohibited a healthy work-life balance (and all the catharsis born of rest and relaxation). When opportunities arise, the only answer is, “Yes.” And if you’re handed that free drink at the end of a sleepless weekend, you take it.
“You can get away with it in music,” says Royal Mountain Records founder, Menno Versteeg. “You know, people go to work at the bank because it’s a good paying job, and I don’t want to speak out of turn, but people will do anything to be in music” (Vice).
Versteeg has a plan to fix the damage done–Royal Mountain Records recently announced a new policy allocating $1500/artist for mental health needs–but as noble and encouraging as this is, it’s like taking Advil for a broken leg; until the bone’s reset, it’s all just pain management.
When actress/musician Kate Nash was recently asked about her greatest achievement, she replied: “Surviving the music industry. I think it’s been responsible for killing a lot of musicians. Lots of us have mental health issues, and drink and drug problems, and the industry doesn’t really care” (Independent). For too long we have let musicians, the mouthpiece of our culture, suffer while we idly consume their content; if we cannot adequately compensate them, we do not deserve their offerings. The gig economy is unsustainable long term, and unless we acknowledge and address this, we will continue to see talent prematurely snuffed out.
The commodification of artists in general, and musicians in particular, has driven countless talent to the margins of our society, sacrificed the elevation of art, and stripped the struggling music industry of valuable revenue. Musicians are people, not products; until the industry starts seeing them as such, they will struggle to survive. Perhaps with a little more humanity, we can help them thrive.
- Rebecca Castellani is the Director of Venue Operations at We Save Music, a frequent contributor to WNPR’s “The Colin McEnroe Show,” and a freelance writer. Connect with her on LinkedIn.
