Sometimes you try a song and people don't respond, or you tell a story and you just hear crickets. But when you play thousands of shows, you start to refine stuff.
Sentiment: NEGATIVE
When you play a show or festival, people know what they're getting; they want it. Then you're thrown onto a show where people are watching TV in their houses, and whether they ask for it or not, we're being played in front of them. There's a lot of negative feedback.
When you do a play, or even a movie, you have weeks to finesse your character. You really understand why they do what they do. In TV, you get new material weekly about your character.
When you do a show five days a week and one night a week, the way I was doing, you use up so much music every day that pretty soon you find yourself hustling for material.
When you get into a production, there are a lot of things you have to hit to make the show work - like my cues or a cue for another person or making sure you don't mess up the beat, and you can let all of that get in the way.
I'm not a jukebox; I don't play exactly what the crowd wants to hear - that doesn't make sense. But, I do look at people requests. At the end of the day, they are the ticket payers and they are the ones that come to the show. If I played music that purely entertains me, I'd play very weird music.
When playing any song in front of an audience, you're watching them experience it, and it changes. In a lot of ways, it's almost like the music is just the background buzz to what's happening between you and the audience in the room.
To the audience, it's like I'm changing the subject every five seconds, but to me, my show's almost like a 90-minute song that I know exactly. I wrote every note, and I know exactly where everything is.
There's something in human nature, the trying-to-get-on-with-it quality of people, the struggle to maintain or keep the show going can be exhausting.
I understand our audience loves to see some drama on TV, but even they have got bored with similar patterns of carrying out reality singing shows.
I never try and do the same show, ever. The audience controls the dynamic of the shows. Sometimes they listen, and sometimes they ask a million questions.