The Steel Guitar Forum

Well,after some more research it seems that school bus drivers in Atlanta make about twice as much as they do anywhere else I looked...I see what you mean,Bill...

I was a school bus driver for 20 years here and when I stopped it was 20,000 per year in 1999

. . . stay in fans pool houses, barns, sleep on floors, or drive through the night and not sleep.

And then there's the downside.

stay in fans pool houses, barns, sleep on floors, or drive through the night and not sleep<<

Trouble is; that there are a lot of people that are willing to accept lousy pay and intolerable living conditions just for the opportunity to play...until they run out of those kind of people the situation will continue to exist.

Living on the road my friend
Was gonna keep you free and clean
Now you wear your skin like iron
And your breath's as hard as kerosene

(Townes Van Zandt)

Bagel Street???!!! My wife use to live on Bagel Street. Niagara Falls!!! SLOWWWWWly I turned, step, by step, until.....

It's extremely difficult to be the lowest bidder when you have to stand in line behind all the folks willing to do the job for "FREE/NOTHING!"

I recall the days when we were doing our weekly television shows.....when some 'musicians?" would actually walk right up to the band leader and offer to displace me, the working musician, for a lower fee. WHEW!

alot of interesting stories here please keep them coming.

Hey Joe -

I'm sorry you had such a bad trip. But, hey, it could have been worse...it could have been raining.....
...inside the bus...

Seriously, I'm real sorry your guitar got banged up. That stinks. I feel for ya.

Here's to you having a MERRY CHRISTMAS!!!

Pete

I spent a few weeks here and there on a tour bus. If you have good professional folks around you taking care of details it can go SOMEWHAT smoothly. The traveling part got to be a drag - the real fun was the 90 minutes or so on stage...but geez it went by so fast.

Ditto on people comin up behind you and underbidding you for the work. I had a "friend" from another band come backstage after a show and slipped the artist I was touring with his card and said "call me if you ever decide to replace Marke. I'll work cheaper, I'm sure".

ya gotta love this business

Hey Joseph,
I got a call from Lucky today to say that I have the job as the permanent steel player.
Thanks for the contact info....Happy Holidays

thats great to hear, my wife and I did go to tenn to play the last two gigs on the tour, lucky is very nice to play for. and you can depend on what they tell you.you will always get your pay no hassles at all. I was upset the other day over my guitar and said I would not play anymore but if someone called and needed me I would go again. but cant right now I have no guitar. fedex has my guitar and I dont know how long it will take them to pay for the damage or how much fight I will have on my hands.

I make good money local now, ran the road for 10 years straight and dident make it worth it, i just loved the gypsy back then!
You make more money working smart and networking within a perimeter, Low overhead is always the key and fish for the best acts and be clean and professional, there is absolutly no need for any steel player living like a dog and travelling 100's of miles to a gig, it isent required, better days are ahead joseph!

Joseph,
I think you are in some good company. I pick with some ex road warriors. They have had their fill.

Road travel, for the most part, is a younger man's game; unless the situation is professional enough that the amenities make up for the fact that during the greatest percentage of time spent, you are a prisoner of the bus or motel. You're unable to fix things at home, play with the kids/dog, run errands for the wife, sleep in your own bed, get regular exercise/body functions (not joking), etc. Traveling like that puts your body in an artificial "fight or flight" sense of tension.

Like I said, it's all situational. The personality mix is important. A couple years ago I was in a band that had a very unhappy guitarist who constantly had a tug of war with the artist, and the tension his presence caused made going out for four days a 96 hour nightmare. Then I went out for a month with Michael Murphey and it was like an extended vacation with four old friends.

I do miss the good dollars I made/make when I go on the road, but I have a lovely home, a wonderful wife, and I can make enough selling courses and playing locally that I can pick and choose what traveling gigs I am offered, and not have the proverbial wolf at the door.

I really MISS being on the road. I miss the nights of six pickers spending the night in a single motel room,the band leader so cheap would rent a single and sneak the rest of us in. I MISS working with at least two drunks and a dope head. I MISS being away from Sweetie Pie and my critters [THOMAS KATT and SISSI KATT] For a week or two at the time.I MISS sleeping on some club owners couch to save motel money. I miss sitting on the side of an interstate for hours waiting for a tow truck. I miss the bandleaders little psycho girl friend.Miss eating Big Mac's for breakfast,dinner, and supper.Miss getting screwed by club owners.I miss the slobbering drunks saying how great I am,OR how I suck,or about that GREAT Fender Les Paul they have at home that was made in 1933 and it's worth 50 grand.I miss those times I got home with a hundred dollars LESS in my pocket than when I left. Been staying home now a few years,When I get that road fever,all I have to do is think about all those things I MISS. YOU BETCHA, DYK?BC.

Bama Charlie
Were we in a band together that I forgot about? Surely all that couldn't have happened to more than ONE band, could it?

Mr. Herb,Several over the last fifty years.Left out a LOT of horror stories just to keep it short. YOU BETCHA,DYK?BC.

I really got no business in this discussion but I just want to say I don't know how you guys did it/ do it. I worked in my business 7 days 13 hours each for 5-6 weeks at a time then 10-21 days off then back at it on the North Slope for 10 years. The money was OUTRAGEOUS good and the food and living conditions were really really nice, but I still ultimately had to give it up. I sure miss what I was doing though. Best job I ever had.

While I tend to do long 'runs' in shows that play in one location for a number of weeks, I'm still dependant on having to be away from home to make a living.

When they provide decent accommodation and reasonable working conditions it's not too bad but whatever reservations I may have are moot at this point - at sixty-seven it's probably too late for me to take another course in life.

You can be sure I'd rather stay at home these days, but no-one's offering to pay me to do that so it continues...

It's a bit depressing sometimes!

Bama,

You didn't mention pulling the bus over on the shoulder of the road in the middle of the night to empty the sewage tank.

It's weird how a person will put up with all that just to play music for a couple of hours. Few would do it to travel to work on telephone or power lines, etc.... for a lot more money/benefits. Something about the roar of the crowd. I think after you've done that and get older it's not as important. That's been my experience anyway.

When I worked with Monroe, the bus was only for transpostation, and we flew sometimes (always First Class). The road manager would hand everyone their own motel key, and call to wake you at the proper time, we always ate at good places. It was really a pampered treatment, but even at that I wouldn't want to do it all the time anyomre.

Mr. Rick,Don't be so mean and rub it in. I never got to fly first class to a gig, I have flown coach back home when I would get stuck thousands of miles away from home.[Read my post in the story section about San Bernardino]Right now I do get to gigs in a Silver Eagle, But it took MANY years to get to this point. Never more than a couple of hundred miles from home.If I get stuck somewhere,I can hitch hike home. By the way it's easy to pull off the road and go in the bushes than clean the pee tank. None of us likes latrine duty. YOU BETCHA,DYK?BC.

ive been there and done that il just stay home now days too old LOL