As an independent musician, one is responsible for everything, not just the music, and I mean everything.
I never really thought about it much, but when I was in a band there were always other people to bounce ideas off - and demands to satisfy - but a solo musician all of these decisions fall to me, and sometimes I'm not entirely confident I'm making the right ones.
There are all the musical decisions, whether this note is right, or that lyrics is finished; the performance decisions - what to wear, what setlist works best, what song to save for an encore; and then there are all the business decisions, which tend to take more time and effort than the musical ones. These include what type of merch to have, what design on the merch, where to sell them, where to gig, when to tour, where to record, budgeting, do I need a touring vehicle, etc. etc. As I get more serious about my career as a musician, I'm finding more of my time is devoted to the business end.
I've been thinking about this since the weekend when I was asked during a radio interview whether or not I would want someone else doing all the leg work, and the fact is that yes, I would. However, I'm torn in that I have become enough of a micro-manager to want everything under my thumb, but in order to do that my thumb needs to be the size of a football field.
I can barely imagine what it is like for independent artists who have "made it" to some extent and have many more decisions to make. I hope that one day I can understand it.
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