In the spring of 2007, I moved to Seattle along with the other three devastatingly good-looking members of my band. A year and a half later, after endless months of cripplingly horrible shows, desperate attempts to cobble together part-time jobs, and Oasis-worthy internecine squabbling, one of us finally broke.
“Guys,” our guitarist said one night at a band meeting, “I’m gonna play out the shows we have booked, and then I’m done. I can’t keep going on like this.”
We had thought that moving to a bigger city might help actualize our dream, never mind the fact that we knew exactly one person in Seattle. Emboldened by a blissfully naive confidence, laughing off the idea of vitamin D deficiency with quips about Flintstone vitamins, we had disentangled ourselves from our sleepy California town, packed our minivan, and driven north into the
leprous arms of impending doom.
We played our Seattle debut the week we arrived, a show I’d booked from out of state. Our ignorance as to which clubs (not) to play was profound. On that first night, we found ourselves unloading a trailer full of gear into the friendly confines of the Central Saloon in the teeth of a driving rain. An hour and a half later, we’d performed a full set of contemplative indie rock for the bartender and our single friend, been blasted with jock metal for every second of the experience we weren’t actually playing, and seen our group morale sink to previously unimaginable depths.
You’d think this holocaust of a coming-out party would have led to a tempering of my freewheeling booking strategy. Fool me once, and all that. Instead, I continued to engage in shameless, ill-fated MySpace binges, hitting up reputable bands (Thao with the Get Down Stay Down, the Cave Singers, even—oh, good grief—Fleet Foxes), none of which I ever heard back from. I imagined them lazily scrolling through their inboxes while eating oysters purchased with the sort of royalty checks I would never see, skimming my pleas while thinking, Who’re these assholes? They only have two plays today.
So it went. Playing a community center in Kirkland for a crowd with an average age of 12? Check. Agreeing to play a “festival” that turned out to be a Mennonite farmers market in Central Washington at 11 in the morning? Double check. Having the bartender at the Comet Tavern put on an extreme grind record in the middle of our final song because he didn’t even realize we were still playing? If it hadn’t happened to me, I wouldn’t believe the story.
Ours were trials robust enough to shake the faith of even the most committed troubadours. Which we weren’t.
After a while, I had to wonder: Was this the dream for which I’d given up my job, the comfort of my mother’s green-bean salad, a chance at making out with Genevieve Flaversham? In hindsight… I guess it was. Nobody had guaranteed us anything. True, people had told us we had a spark, a great live show, a facility for interesting arrangements. Who cares if half those people were our parents? Who were we to argue?! We believed in the pot of PBR-soaked gold at the end of the Sub Pop rainbow. We had been drunk on the idea of making it as a band.
They say that what doesn’t kill you makes you stronger. If there is some fantastic mathematics through which debt, relational strain, public humiliation, and endless frustration may be transmuted into strength, then I’m Hulk Hogan. That may be. But for a long time—and I say this with real regret—I got a bitter pinch in my stomach every time I heard about the buzz springing up around local bands we’d played with or that I thought we were at least as good as, whatever that means.
I can still remember a party I attended in the fall of 2004 at my friend’s Orange County ranch house. I was milling among a throng in the backyard, when a group of four young men emerged from the house and picked up some instruments leaning against the toolshed. Unbeknownst to me, I’d shown up at what turned out to be the first show ever put on by my soon-to-be-famous schoolmates Cold War Kids.
Over the next several years, I fawned over the band publicly while whining in private. Why did the Cold War Kids of the world get to strut like beautiful flamingos across David Letterman’s stage while I was trying to convince the bartender at Chop Suey to let me have a bottled water? Hadn’t we worked our asses off? Weren’t we paying our dues? The deck was stacked against us! I mean, how could we make connections when we were locked in the basement four nights a week writing songs with hooks so dreamy Ben Gibbard could only fantasize about them? He had Zooey to comfort him. I only had bandmates I’d grown tired of seeing, a house with no central heating, and a hamper full of dirty clothes the smell of which permeated my bedroom so profoundly that I was often kept awake at night—as much by the smell of moldering long johns as by my endless second-guessing of our decision to leave Santa Cruz.
It’s been almost three years since we broke up and no answer to my questions has been forthcoming, unless of course you count my growing awareness of how grotesque my sense of entitlement was. Part of me seems to have assumed that I had the right to be paid to play music. Turns out that’s not how life works.
I still find myself occasionally pining for the sour-beer smell of a club before it opens, a greenroom fridge full of skunky Heinekens, and a 40-minute time slot. Alas, our bass player moved back to California, where he now works nights in the vast walk-in refrigerator of the local Safeway. Sometimes I imagine him stocking gallons of 2 percent milk in that freezing, dark cavern that smells like a mausoleum, and I wonder how big a cemetery you would need to inter the savaged hopes, burned-out dreams, and low-quality merch of all the forgotten bands that’ve ever played the High Dive on a Monday night. 
Ben Bishop is the former pianist and singer in Caravel.
@17: I guess I haven’t heard of the Cold War Kids because I’m 41 and have actual kids, and a wife, and a job, and a house, etc., and don’t follow much music other than my own little scene in my little midwestern city. Just going along and having a nice, non-famous life with music as part of it. Playing music is important and I wish this Ben dude here luck.
One thing though: a Mennonite farmer’s market actually sounds like a pretty cool deal to play. If you can find a way to connect the music thing with the whole local food, farm-core type of scene, you might be onto something!
@94 That’s exactly what I thought. Then again I left Santa Cruz to move to London to ‘make it big’ in publishing. Had good times, but man that city drains your wallet instantly then spits on you for being poor.
Love it here, but miss that Pleasure Point Pizza. Also, Pearl Jam playing to 800 at the Catalyst Club in 93 was one of the best nights of my life.
Thanks for sharing. I laughed out loud several times. Sure did bring out a lot of comments – and a lot of bitch haters – who probably made the same mistakes but obviously haven’t come to terms with it…
Music isn’t about playing sounds, it’s about shooting copious amounts of heroin in front of a microphone. Silly SoCal Kids!
First off, the reason your band didn’t make it was because your music is awful:
http://www.myspace.com/caravelband
Second — did this kid win a “publish my story in the Stranger” auction item? This is not up to the quality of writing I expect from a Stranger feature.
First off, the reason your band didn’t make it was because your music is awful:
http://www.myspace.com/caravelband
Second — did this kid win a “publish my story in the Stranger” auction item? This is not up to the quality of writing I expect from a Stranger feature.
lemon session is a fucking dick.
@lemon session: CUNT.
Hahaha. You ain’t seen nothin’ kid. I was in a loser, bottom feeder band in ’91-93, the height of the “grunge explosion”, back when you were just graduating to big boy pants. Every awful combo West of the Mississippi and beyond moved to Seattle to “make it.” And guess what? Like us, most all of ’em sucked. We played every, shitty, dead-end gig in town. You haven’t stared into the eye of existential despair until you’ve played a Monday night gig at the old “Mad Dog’s” in Lake City. A Tuesday night at the Colorbox offered little more solace. My favorite was a T-shirt hawked by that same club which read:
YOUR HAIR’S TOO LONG
AND SO IS YOUR SET
@107, thanks for digging that myspace page up so that we could all hear what James Taylor taking a messy shit on Ben Folds sounds like. Horrible.
@18: MORE FLAVERSHAM!!!
@AllTheRestOfYou: Just reading your comments makes me feel sad for you. Your smug self-satisfaction about your pitiful crucifixion of this unarmed author is thoroughly Pyrrhic; it reveals only this: you are small people.
@18: MORE FLAVERSHAM!!!
@AllTheRestOfYou: Just reading your comments makes me feel sad for you. Your smug self-satisfaction about your pitiful crucifixion of this unarmed author is thoroughly Pyrrhic; it reveals only this: you are small people.
@18: MORE FLAVERSHAM!!!
@AllTheRestOfYou: Just reading your comments makes me feel sad for you. Your smug self-satisfaction about your pitiful crucifixion of this unarmed author is thoroughly Pyrrhic; it reveals only this: you are small people.
Maybe you didn’t make it cause you have a crappy band name.
Also you’re a quitter and a bitch.
CMON people, this piece is funny. Self-deprecating, whiny, so what? It takes guts to paint yourself like a loser. Personally, I think any struggling musician can identify with his overarching sentiments and observations – it’s a cold world out there, and it’s tough finding your sweet spot…
Go back to California. We don’t want you here. Same goes for you east coasters and midwesterners. Just go back to where the weather and food and drivers and scene and yes, even you, are so much better. We’re tired of hearing you whine when you can’t make it and don’t fit in.
All I got out of this was that you wore long johns in Seattle.
It is never cold enough, long enough to wear long johns in Seattle, unless it’s a brief cold snap and your job involves you being outside all night long.
@118 not true. i wear long johns whenever it’s below 50 which is pretty much september through july…and i feel great!
just figured I couldn’t let any argument on here go without a rebuttal
thank you for your article. i liked it. the one thing i learned from the comments: how negative and cynical people are. why are so many of you angry at the world?
I am so far removed from the local music scene as to be positively Lawrence Welkian (or, as I prefer, Lennon Sisterian) but I just have to ask: As a genuine Cold War kid (I’m 45, and the “Iron Curtain” fell in 1989, when I was 24) how could anyone under the age of (charitably) 30 be considered a “Cold War Kid”?
Or are people at my advanced age still making music that is relevant to the youth?
We live in an amazing, amazing world, and it’s wasted on the crappiest generation of spoiled idiots.
Jesus what a bunch of Seattleite hipster fuckheads! This isn’t an ‘I anonymous’, it’s a reflection piece from a guy who’s actually a halfway decent writer talking about what it was once like to be naive! He’s not complaining! He’s writing AGAINST people with a sense of entitlement! Did you not read the fucking article?
Hey, Ben Bishop, thanks for the article. From one musician to another. None of these wannabe cocksuckers have any idea what it’s like to do something creative for a living. And thy especially have no idea what it’s like to have to learn from it.
Sounds like you couldnt hang kid. Flintstones vitamins, grow the fuck up. If your songs were as boring as this article its no surprise you failed.
Ben, just know that IT NEVER ENDS. As an old (over 25) and relatively successful band member (gold albums)your story is The Story. I too have played Tuesday nights at an empty bar, gamely improvising on “Feelin’ Alright?” by Traffic to get to 11:45 p.m so we can take a break from playing to the bartender. And playing in a field to people cleaning up the day after a free festival. It’s Darwin, baby. No one dreams of flipping burgers at McDonalds.
Marty Jourard
people are probably being such dicks because about 90% of seattlites consider themselves “failed musicians” but aren’t smart enough to get paid for writing about it. and anyway, as long as you keep playing you haven’t failed. technically you’re still fail*ing*. i think it’s an interesting story a) because so many can relate to it (myself included. drove three hours to play the ocean shores elk club in a giant empty room with a big, high stage adjacent to a tiny, packed barroom full of alcoholics) b) the guy’s at least repentant. even god can forgive sinners… and it invented herpes! we can do better. i.e. take it easy ya d-bags.
Hahaha- I can definitely relate to this story, not alot of difference from my arrival in Seattle. Thanks for sharing Ben!
@117: I am from the Midwest and am fitting in here. Also, the weather is better here than there. But oh, the drivers. Suffer the poor drivers.
The Good News is that if you didn’t make it here you were Destined to make it Nationally. That explains the derogatory comments too! The Bad News is that you and your potential Band are Unknowns…i.e. difficult and embarrasing to come out Cold to a National Audience. Also that the band up and left could mean that it’s you, yourself and you that will make it and double or triple the aforesaid insecurity! I have heard of this type of Breakup where the Band that ditched out became the Successful Half, but not about to hold my breath on that one. People who make it Big tend to be Loners, I’ve noticed. If you try “coming out” in that context and actually Repel the Invaders, I Guarantee YOU WILL MAKE IT!!! (Good Name for a Grunge Band under Obamabama !!!)
I hope you read this even though it’s unregistered. I enjoyed your story, and as a freelancer myself (though not a musician) I could relate. I feel for you. I guess the other folks putting you down just enjoy being mean. It can be hard to continue, and I hope to get out of the freelance racket once my current obligations are fulfilled. Good luck.
I liked the article.
But why would you leave Santa Cruz to try and make it in Seattle? Santa Cruz is known for its music scene; Seattle is known for its music scene circa 1993. If you were going to leave Santa Cruz to “make it”, wouldn’t you go to an actual *big* city like L.A., New York, or Berlin?
@117: if you think the weather’s better in the midwest, you obviously have a) never been there and b) never looked at a national weather map: http://www.weather.gov/forecasts/graphic…
The fucking top of a fucking sports arena collapsed because of all the snow in Minneapolis, Chicago is windy and cold, and the whole damn midwest is unbearably hot and muggy during the summer.
My advice: switch to accordion or banjo (you don’t even need to learn how to play them!) and more to New York, Minneapolis, or Portland. You’ll be a star.
im with you @100– i thought this was well written, and it sounds like you’ve grown a lot. thanks for sharing it with us.
i think it’s easier to pick things apart and whine and complain and be negative, then actually try and get something from it.
Whoa. Listened to Caravel and thought a few things:
1. Piano Lessons.
2. Find your voice. Take a moment and figure your voice out. This sounds typical and predictable.
3. Hollow sounds and mechanical intonation.
Did you play for professional people? If so, did you get notes from them? Maybe whatcha need is good feedback and coaching vs. quitting.
very good article.
sounds like you loved the idea of being famous. If you were in it for the sake of making music, you’d still be doing it.
The hostility directed against this article confuses me – I’m guessing it comes from other failed ‘artists’ who found it hitting too close to home. I thought it was funny and well-written. Quite a relief after reading shit by Charles whatshisname.
this is all one big joke on the readers right?
I have to agree with @106, the writing was more like a fairly good high-school newspaper featurette than something I’d expect from the Stranger. If dude isn’t willing to tough it out and become a better composer, then he’d damned-sure better be willing to tough it out and become a better writer! And THAT takes quite awhile!