If you believe what you read on the internet, Charles Darwin said: ‘The most important factor in survival is neither intelligence nor strength but adaptability.’
Naturally, such is the nature of the internet, the merest semblance of research shows Darwin never actually gave the quote in question. Yet it remains somehow apt for the times we are living in: for musicians in the age of coronavirus, adaptability has been the name of the game.
‘We’ve naturally seen a shift in the way our members work over the course of the pandemic,’ says Kelly Wood of the Musicians’ Union’s live performance department. ‘Many artists whose careers have generally involved a lot of gigging and live work have had to replace that work.’
Seeking to keep their heads above water amid the catastrophic impact of the touring shutdown, an army of musicians set about discovering alternative outlets for their sonic talents.
‘As songwriters and composers, artists have strong transferable skills which they’ve been able to use to find other opportunities,’ adds Wood, ‘such as creating music for productions, music libraries, podcasts, audio books and potential theatre projects.’
‘As songwriters and composers, artists have strong transferable skills which they’ve been able to use to find other opportunities.’
Look hard enough, and good news stories reveal themselves. Writer and musician William Stokes, a member of three-piece avant-psych band Voka Gentle, is a case in point, having ventured into library production and TV work.
‘We were planning on touring throughout 2020,’ recalls Stokes. ‘But as it turned out, the lockdown got more and more strict, and we ended up having to wait a long time even to get into a studio. So, you had to adapt as the goalposts moved.’
Stokes had met with John Wraight, library manager at Voka Gentle’s publisher Bucks Music Group to discuss potentially branching out as far back as 2019.
‘I knew that I wanted to give commissional soundtrack work a serious go,’ says Stokes. ‘Two things have materialised since then that have given me the opportunity to do that. One of them was making an album for Bucks’ standard library division. I’ve also been commissioned recently to soundtrack a six-part documentary for Vice Media. I was just looking for ways to adjust to the situation, and those opportunities came along at the right time.’
Pandemic or no pandemic, Stokes sees moving into other lines of work within music as standard for those in the profession.
‘I couldn’t tell you how many people I know who have decided to go into production for other artists, for example,’ he says, ‘even though some might see that as a total nuclear option to get subsidiary income in. But as far as I’m concerned, that’s a totally normal part of the lifestyle.’
James Brown, guitarist and songwriter for Leeds rock band Pulled Apart By Horses, says the cessation of touring left him struggling for purpose and hit his money-making ability hard.
‘After maybe a couple of months of the first lockdown, I got my head together and started thinking about what I could do creatively, more than anything — not even in a financial sense at the time, but more as an outlet to keep my sanity.’
‘We were getting plans together to go out on tour, but then lockdown came along so it came to a stop and I had nothing to do, literally, absolutely nothing, other than watching BBC News every morning just to see what was going on,’ he says.
‘I guess it was the same for a lot of people who were self-employed and ended up hitting a brick wall — you have to find something else to do to make up the money you’re not earning. You’ve got to pay the bills, basically.
‘After maybe a couple of months of the first lockdown, I got my head together and started thinking about what I could do creatively, more than anything — not even in a financial sense at the time, but more as an outlet to keep my sanity.’
Having built a studio in the cellar of the Leeds bedsit he resided in at the time, Brown started approaching contacts in the arts world and offered them his music services for film and TV soundtracks.
‘I reached out to a few directors I knew and said, “Do you by any chance need some music? Because I have nothing to do and I’ll do it for free,’’ he says. ‘And obviously a couple of people were like, ‘Yeah, of course, if it’s free,’ so I did pieces for a couple of short films.
‘I didn’t really think anything of it other than that it was a creative outlet for me. But off the back of that, I got some paid work to do production music and library music, and then some TV and film stuff for Universal. And I’m literally about to finish work on a Mexican horror film at Abbey Road. I guess it was one of those things where one thing leads to another and it helped me get through not being able to create and work as a musician. I had this four-wall syndrome thing, and working on composition for film and TV helped me to see past those walls, essentially.’
Birmingham-based dubstep artist James Vine, aka Enigma Dubz, was able to fall back on production and co-writing work after being forced to call off his US touring plans.
‘I’ve been working as a co-writer and a producer for about eight years, on and off, in between other projects,’ he says. ‘But luckily, we got a deal with Sentric Black Rock at the start of this year and it’s really opened the doors to a lot more opportunities and clients.’
One project Vine is especially proud of involved him composing the music for the BBC One documentary Football, Gambling and Me about retired footballer Paul Merson.
‘In a very strange way, the pandemic has allowed me to reassess where I need to be to future-proof myself.'
‘I ended up writing the whole soundtrack for that documentary, under my own name,’ he says, ‘and then there are a handful of other briefs, which are going on at the moment. None of them have been confirmed yet, but there’s quite a few big artists who are in the mix with Black Rock. So fingers crossed, things materialise with that.
‘In a very strange way, the pandemic has allowed me to reassess where I need to be to future-proof myself. I’ve got such a varied network around me: I grew up playing classical music and then switched to underground music, but the classical side is so much more adept for working for film and TV. I’m really hoping the Paul Merson project leads to more of it.’
However, outside the smattering of individual success stories, a recent study of 1,000 UK professional musicians by independent charity Help Musicians revealed that a third are still earning nothing from music, while 22 percent are actively considering leaving the industry. The results came as no surprise to Stokes.
‘I think the advice I’d give would simply be based on my personal experience, which is that working as a musician — even at the highest level — is a cottage industry,’ he adds. ‘It’s an industry where you show somebody what you can do, and then you basically flog your wares afterwards and hope that people like it.
‘If you get to that point on the ladder where you feel like the only way is down, you have to remember the drive you had to step on the ladder in the first place.'
‘Throwing yourself into composition does not guarantee you income, career development or recognition as an artist. All you can do is cast the net as wide as you can. And if you’re fishing in the right place, you should see some results.’
In times of struggle, Brown encourages musicians to stay cognisant of what inspired them to get into the business way back when.
‘Regardless of what you do — whether you’re in a band, you’re a singer-songwriter, or are composing for film and TV — it’s so important to remember that drive you had in the beginning,’ he concludes. ‘Back then, you didn’t have anything, but you had a vision and you carried it through thick and thin until somebody listened to you.
‘If you get to that point on the ladder where you feel like the only way is down, you have to remember the drive you had to step on the ladder in the first place — because that’s what got you up it. Unfortunately, after reading those statistics, a lot of people have found themselves lost at sea. But there is a beacon out there, you just need to look for it and keep going.’
This feature originally appeared in M Magazine's End of Year Special. Read it in full on Issuu.
