Commitment

By David A. Barber
Author of Gigging, Everything You Need to Know About Playing Gigs (Except How to Play Your Axe)

Hip hop acts are not as committed to their art as the average rock band.
How can we say that? How can we know anyone’s level of commitment to their art?
OK, it’s an over-generalization, but please read on. We will explain.

We’ve spent countless hours hanging out and/or working in local live music venues and made a few observations.

The average rock band has a drummer, a guitar player a bass player and a vocalist. Sure, commonly there are more guitars and/or other instruments, but we’re generalizing here. Let’s consider the guitar player. He owns a guitar and an amp and has spent considerable time learning how to play his instrument. The same can be said for the bass player. The drummer has piles of gear and has probably spent untold hours woodshedding, learning the rudiments. He wears out sticks and drum heads regularly. The guitarist must replace strings and know how to tune his instrument. The vocalist has less gear unless he is also a guitar or bass player, but many successful vocalists do have their own microphone and some even have custom-built mic stands. Together they have spent many hours (hopefully) practicing songs and commonly writing new ones. Individually and collectively the average band has a fairly high level of commitment. They have each spent at least several hundred bucks on equipment, but more commonly they’ve spent thousands of dollars on gear and they have spent many long hours learning how to play.

Now, let’s compare that to an average hip hop act. The hip hop act consists of 1 to 6 rappers. They commonly dress all fly, which ain’t cheap. They bring their beats on a CD, or if they are lucky they might have a live DJ spinning some beats for them. In comparison to the rock band, that’s not a very high level of commitment. Now the DJ has to own turntables, records, and related gear. He has to spend considerable time listening to records and practicing his turntable moves. The best hip hop acts (in our humble opinion) have entire bands backing up one or two rappers. Suddenly, the level of commitment goes way up. The average rapper has spent some time with his beats and practiced his raps, but when he gets on stage with the other 3-5 guys it hardly ever sounds like they have practiced together much. and you can rest assured that most of them don’t know what an SM-58 is, much less own one of their own. (It’s a microphone.) The level of commitment from an average Hip hop artist seems low.

We are determining an artist’s level of commitment based on the amount of gear the act brings in the door. Sure, that ends up being a judgment about their level of financial commitment, which isn’t entirely fair. We’ve also seen some absolutely horrible rock bands with super-expensive gear. They haven’t spent the time (made the commitment) to learn how to play well. Having a rapper buy his own microphone isn’t gonna make that guy a better rapper, but it’s sure to make him think harder about badly he really wants to be a rapper.

The best artists are usually the most committed. They spend many many hours on their own perfecting their chops. We know guitarists who sleep with their ax. Every waking and sleeping minute is devoted to playing. We don’t care what you do if you’re committed to it on a high enough level you’re gonna get better and better.

What is your level of commitment to your art?