There’s an attitude in the music world – one of many – and it’s a bad attitude. Unhelpful. Works against the very people who have it.

I’ve been guilty of it.

It’s the attitude that art is a beautiful, pure, self-creating and self-sustaining thing, and that money is an evil, dirty, crass creature that should never touch art. It’s an attitude that’s rooted in a kernel of truth: When the reins are taken by the folks who are fascinated with the business side as an end in itself, then art tends to suffer. The industry becomes a caricature of itself. When music becomes just another manufacturing process, driven by very little more than just growing from quarter to quarter, then the chances of making something amazing tend to drop.

The problem with giving the kernel of truth more than its due is that you have to start denying reality. Writing, performing, or technically supporting music is an occupation for humans. Humans engage in occupations to find meaning in their lives and create things of value. We create things of value in the hopes that we can exchange those things for things we need more of. Like, you know, food. And places to sleep. And sweet amps, and awesome guitars, and cool drumkits, and PA systems that can rattle every building in a one-mile radius WOOOOOO!!!! ARE YOU READY TO ROCK, TOQUERVILLE?

Toquerville is a small town in Utah, by the way.

Where was I?

As near as I can tell, being a professional musician (or music support human) is about creating a brilliant alloy of art and business. It’s about mixing these two materials that are precious for different reasons, so as to make a whole that serves a useful purpose. If you want to view art as “silver” and business as “gold” (or the inverse), then the alloy you’re talking about is electrum.

Hence the post title.

The way this analogy shakes out is that, if you want to work with an alloy, you’re best served by making the alloy as the first step in the process of crafting something. If you want to be a professional music human, you will do well to be conscious of the business side at the inception of your career crafting the artistic side. If you aren’t, then you’ll have to tack the business side on later, and that’s not always the best thing.

Plated Versus Solid

The thing with alloyed metal is that it’s really hard to make after you’ve already built something. If you want to add gold to an already-made silver item, then you’re pretty much stuck with plating the gold onto the surface of the object. To actually mix the two metals, you’re probably going to have to wreck the structure of the thing that’s been made, and start again.

In the same way, starting a musical endeavor that’s “pure silver” (all art, no business) is perfectly doable. You can make some amazing tunes, and have some great times. You can ignore the money, or even reject the business side entirely. That’s all fine and good if it’s what you actually intend to do. It’s not so fine and good if you get the idea that the business side will just magically “work out.”

It probably won’t.

What’s more likely to happen is that you’ll quit when you can’t afford the time, money, or both required to make more art. If your art appeals to a great many people, then you may end up getting taken for a ride by managers/ labels/ club owners/ whoever that really know how to bend the business aspect to their will. In the best case scenario, someone will figure out a way to do a nice job adding a practical business to an artistic substrate. “Plating” the business onto the surface of a “pure art” base is doable – and can even be done well – but it’s still just a foreign thing that’s sitting atop something else.

On the other hand, if you decide from day one that you’re going to be realistic about the business side, you retain a lot of control. You know where the money is, and where it isn’t. You can take charge of career decisions in a rational way, because you’ll have factually-supported notions of what would be fun (but expensive), less fun (but good for some cash flow right now), and freakin’ awesome (and likely to generate a ton of income). When you integrate a seriousness – not an overriding obsession, just seriousness – about the business side, and do it right away, then you’ve just given yourself an edge. You’re not just claiming to be a pro, you’re taking the steps to ensure that you are a pro.

Business can wreck things, it’s true. However, it’s far less likely to wreck things and corrupt the art if it’s integrated and well understood from day one. That’s because you, the art person, are in charge of it. You’re much more likely to have trouble with business if you don’t have any understanding of it, and then try to bring a not-very-artistic business human on board to run things that are already out of control.

If you want to craft with electrum, make the alloy before you’ve already built everything.