Wednesday, July 30, 2008

Creating the LAME Studios Concert: Part 2

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the LAME crew setting up the sales booth

the third lesson was KISS: keep it simple, stupid!  it sounds so simple, yet it’s so difficult to pull off sometimes.  in his interview on the “live at abbey road” television series, john mayer talks about his hit single, gravity, and how he struggled to hold on the the KISS principle.  he explained that as the musician who wrote the song, he was well aware of how sophisticated the song could be.  anyone who knows john mayer knows that he’s a phenomenal guitarist, and he could easily fill songs with line after line of blistering guitar riffs.  but mayer fought his own tendencies and sought to strip down and simplify the song, and the end result is a simple, yet beautifully effective song.

while organizing this concert, i felt like john mayer.  i knew that i could really pull off something stunning, with spotlighted mannequins modeling LAME t-shirt designs in chronological order, as a sort of history exhibit.  i could have brought in an expansive concert lighting rig because i know how to run lights.  i could have multi-track recorded the live music for later mixdown at one of the music studios i know.  i could have brought in an elevated stage for the VIP seating area so VIPs would have a clear view over everyone’s heads, and i could’ve brought in stanchions to surround the whole rig.  servers could have taken orders from VIPs and delivered it straight to their section.  i could have added a lot of STUFF to improve the concert experience, but i held back to keep things simple. 

by keeping things simple, i could cut costs and reduce ticket prices, thereby freeing up attendees to spend their cash on merch and food.  i knew that i couldn’t pay the bands what they deserved, so i at least structured the floor plan to funnel traffic by the bands’ merch tables, in hopes that people would buy band merch.  the floor plan worked well, because the area in front of the merch tables got plenty crowded.  i know LAME sold a couple dozen shirts, which gave them a profit.  i didn’t dip into any of the merch sales; the artists received 100% of the money from their own sales.  i was tempted to take a percentage cut out of their merch sales, but i knew that if i was the artist, i wouldn’t like that.  so i didn’t do it, nor will i ever do it.  by keeping everything simple, i saved a lot of gray hair and i was able to sleep well at night because my brain wasn’t focused on developing and implementing new ideas.  and if any ideas did come up for the future, i always keep a notebook and pen by my bed to write them down.  then i can sleep.

Posted by Nehe555 on 07/30 at 11:45 AM
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