Who's the BOSS!?
Pre-COVID, I was playing at least every week. I had a residency, and things were going really well. We had a sold-out show at a bar that's no longer in downtown Austin, and generally the trajectory was great.
Obviously, everything got knocked off the rails, and life changed.
Fast forward six years later, and I've found myself in a band and all this other kind of stuff, but the return to solo performance has very viscerally reminded me that playing solo is so easy.
I don't recommend it as the only thing you do because the band dynamic is also an exercise in compromise and patience. If you're in the right situation, really wonderful things happen. Everything I talk about with Buckdancer's Choice falls into that category. That band has brought me so much, and I've learned a lot about myself and working with other people within a band environment. All of it is completely invaluable and informs the solo stuff and life in general.
But the counterpoint of solo work remains.
I'm the boss. I play whatever I want. My time is spent on the things I feel make a show an actual show.
The example I'll use today is deep cuts.
If you're playing a solo set, the ones I play are typically background music. You just have to keep it pleasant and lightly engaging. Don't play a solo acoustic version of "Creep" by Radiohead complete with an acoustic distortion pedal. Nobody wants to hear that in any situation, but especially in the solo acoustic world.
As far as deep cuts go, they have to be so good they can't be denied.
The same goes for originals. I played five or six last week, and they stood up to the material around them. So much so that I'm thinking about recording the ones that haven't been released with nothing more than a drum machine, bass, acoustic guitar, electric guitar, and one synth patch. Single tracks. Plenty of space. Build slowly, peak, then taper back down.
The funny thing is that the freedom to play songs I love also makes it easier to throw in something like a Hootie & the Blowfish song. Somebody out there absolutely loves that song, and if it makes their night, that's a huge part of the job done.
As a still-reforming music snob, I have to learn these things. It's OK to cheese out to a Hootie song.
I still draw the line at Toad the Wet Sprocket and Collective Soul. Those just don't connect with me. Maybe Toad is too commercial indie, and Collective Soul is too commercial alternative. I don't know. I don't think about them that much.
But this is all part of doing a solo show. You get to make all the decisions yourself.