If you’ve ever been on tour in an independent band, you know that not every show is well attended. We’ve come a long way over the last eight years or so, but when you go out for a few weeks, each show might fill a different role in the tour. Each one is worth playing for the people there — you never know what someone is walking into the room carrying. But the room is not always full of people.
This is a long way to say that after playing to about a hundred people the previous night, we played to about seven lovely people in Wetzlar. Two heard about us on the local radio. One likes the label we’re on, and convinced his pal to come along. One was Jack’s mother who was in London, and made the hop over to catch a show. Others were listening from behind the bar.
I think there are a few ways to approach these situations. You can wish for things to be different, be disappointed in yourself, blame others. Or, you can play a show that meets the room where it’s at. In these moments, I remind myself that I choose to make music that deeply impacts literally dozens of people — not music that passively appeals to thousands of people. So we did that.
As folks applauded after the set, I walked through the room and thanked everyone individually. People shared stories about their own families and loved ones that related to the songs about my dad. One hadn’t been to a concert in several years, and found it lovely. Almost everyone bought merch. And the booker seemed to be happy, providing us food, beer, our guarantee for the night, and a place to sleep.
This is what we do for each other. Even when the show is nearly empty, we can fill it up with stories and songs.