With concerts indefinitely shut down thanks to COVID-19, musicians who’ve spent much of their lives on tour are stuck at home this summer, and pondering an uncertain future. “I just don’t even know what is realistic at this moment,” says Cheap Trick’s Tom Petersson.
Buddy Guy
I haven’t picked up the guitar since they canceled me in Arizona almost two months ago. I was born on a farm down in Louisiana, and this is a flashback, because this time of year we were sharecropping in the fields all day. And then we would stay locked in the house, trying to stay home as much as you can. I grew up distancing from people except for the family in my house. Even before I got the chance to make a living playing music, I was driving a tow truck. This is the longest I’ve been home in 50 years, maybe a little longer. I want to get back out there. People are so mad at the world, but when I play music, I see them smiling. I own the largest blues club in the city, they closed that down. Before that, [business] was fine. My next birthday, I’ll be 84, so when you get up in that kinda age, people say “I better go check him out.” I hope they come up with a vaccine, so I can get back out there and let them know I’m alive and well and trying to keep the blues alive. I don’t know what else to do now. I can’t go looking for a bus-driving job.
Stevie Nicks
All we have right now, if you’re home in quarantine, is time, unless you’re taking care of kids. So, really, you could do anything that you’ve been wanting to do your whole life. That’s how I’m trying to look at it. But, even though I didn’t have a tour planned, my brain doesn’t know that yet. My brain is like, “OK, you came off the road, and usually you would be going to rehearse.” It’s still bugging me that I should be getting ready for something, and I’m not. This has never happened to me ever in my life. The second I come off the tour with one career, the phone’s ringing off the hook from the other career, saying, “Are you ready to do something cool?” This is the year I was going to talk to everybody about making my movie and do some recording and meet new people. Well, you’re not going to meet any new people, because you can’t leave your house.
John Fogerty
The coronavirus is so real and so scary and life-threatening. I haven’t seen yet a solution that will work until we get a vaccine. I guess I’m more patient than some. I keep telling my family, if it was lions and tigers roaming out there, you could see that, so that prepares you psychologically, so you realize you don’t want to go out there and be reckless. All of this opening-up talk is pretty scary to me. I’m afraid we’re probably end up going backwards. And I don’t want to be the guy who contributes to that. You go do a concert with 10,000 people, and then find out afterwards that some of them died? I don’t think any of us will really be ready until after we have a vaccine and people feel safe again. I’m an older person, and a lot of people my age have died. Maybe some other guy thinks it’s a good idea, but I’m not dying for Donald Trump. I’m not dying for the economy. How can you have any kind of a crowd?
Sammy Hagar
I’ll be comfortable playing a show before there’s a vaccine, if it’s declining and seems to be going away. I’m going to make a radical statement here. This is hard to say without stirring somebody up, but truthfully, I’d rather personally get sick and even die, if that’s what it takes. We have to save the world and this country from this economic thing that’s going to kill more people in the long run. I would rather see everyone go back to work. If some of us have to sacrifice on that, OK. I will die for my children and my grandchildren to have a life anywhere close to the life that I had in this wonderful country. That’s just the way that I feel about it. I’m not going to go around spreading the disease. But there may be a time where we have to sacrifice. I mean, how many people die on the Earth every day? I have no idea. I’m sorry to say it, but we all gotta die, man.
David Crosby
I’m not making any money from anywhere and [my house] is in jeopardy. I’m not whining about it, though — it’s what we have to do, or we can’t beat the coronavirus. But I don’t think most people know what it’s done to the music business. It’s everyone that I know. They’re completely out of work, and a lot of them don’t make a lot of money. Everyone is like, “You’re a rock star and you drive in a Cadillac and you burn money.” Bullshit. Ninety percent of us are working people, and our job is gone. I hope I’m back on tour next year, but I’m not sure I’ve got a next year. That’s the thing: I’m almost 80 years old. When you take away my next year, you might have just taken the last one I got. That’s a bitch. I think they are doing the right thing to not have aggregations of people, but don’t kid yourself about the effect. To us? To the musicians? It’s a goddamn disaster.
by Jonathan Bernstein, David Browne, Patrick Doyle, Andy Greene, Kory Grow & Brian Hiatt, Rolling Stone | Read more:
Image: Buddy Guy by Lyndon French
[ed. And these are successful musicians who at least have some royalties coming in. Musicians as a whole are going to be in bad shape for a long time.]
Buddy Guy
I haven’t picked up the guitar since they canceled me in Arizona almost two months ago. I was born on a farm down in Louisiana, and this is a flashback, because this time of year we were sharecropping in the fields all day. And then we would stay locked in the house, trying to stay home as much as you can. I grew up distancing from people except for the family in my house. Even before I got the chance to make a living playing music, I was driving a tow truck. This is the longest I’ve been home in 50 years, maybe a little longer. I want to get back out there. People are so mad at the world, but when I play music, I see them smiling. I own the largest blues club in the city, they closed that down. Before that, [business] was fine. My next birthday, I’ll be 84, so when you get up in that kinda age, people say “I better go check him out.” I hope they come up with a vaccine, so I can get back out there and let them know I’m alive and well and trying to keep the blues alive. I don’t know what else to do now. I can’t go looking for a bus-driving job.Stevie Nicks
All we have right now, if you’re home in quarantine, is time, unless you’re taking care of kids. So, really, you could do anything that you’ve been wanting to do your whole life. That’s how I’m trying to look at it. But, even though I didn’t have a tour planned, my brain doesn’t know that yet. My brain is like, “OK, you came off the road, and usually you would be going to rehearse.” It’s still bugging me that I should be getting ready for something, and I’m not. This has never happened to me ever in my life. The second I come off the tour with one career, the phone’s ringing off the hook from the other career, saying, “Are you ready to do something cool?” This is the year I was going to talk to everybody about making my movie and do some recording and meet new people. Well, you’re not going to meet any new people, because you can’t leave your house.
John Fogerty
The coronavirus is so real and so scary and life-threatening. I haven’t seen yet a solution that will work until we get a vaccine. I guess I’m more patient than some. I keep telling my family, if it was lions and tigers roaming out there, you could see that, so that prepares you psychologically, so you realize you don’t want to go out there and be reckless. All of this opening-up talk is pretty scary to me. I’m afraid we’re probably end up going backwards. And I don’t want to be the guy who contributes to that. You go do a concert with 10,000 people, and then find out afterwards that some of them died? I don’t think any of us will really be ready until after we have a vaccine and people feel safe again. I’m an older person, and a lot of people my age have died. Maybe some other guy thinks it’s a good idea, but I’m not dying for Donald Trump. I’m not dying for the economy. How can you have any kind of a crowd?
Sammy Hagar
I’ll be comfortable playing a show before there’s a vaccine, if it’s declining and seems to be going away. I’m going to make a radical statement here. This is hard to say without stirring somebody up, but truthfully, I’d rather personally get sick and even die, if that’s what it takes. We have to save the world and this country from this economic thing that’s going to kill more people in the long run. I would rather see everyone go back to work. If some of us have to sacrifice on that, OK. I will die for my children and my grandchildren to have a life anywhere close to the life that I had in this wonderful country. That’s just the way that I feel about it. I’m not going to go around spreading the disease. But there may be a time where we have to sacrifice. I mean, how many people die on the Earth every day? I have no idea. I’m sorry to say it, but we all gotta die, man.
David Crosby
I’m not making any money from anywhere and [my house] is in jeopardy. I’m not whining about it, though — it’s what we have to do, or we can’t beat the coronavirus. But I don’t think most people know what it’s done to the music business. It’s everyone that I know. They’re completely out of work, and a lot of them don’t make a lot of money. Everyone is like, “You’re a rock star and you drive in a Cadillac and you burn money.” Bullshit. Ninety percent of us are working people, and our job is gone. I hope I’m back on tour next year, but I’m not sure I’ve got a next year. That’s the thing: I’m almost 80 years old. When you take away my next year, you might have just taken the last one I got. That’s a bitch. I think they are doing the right thing to not have aggregations of people, but don’t kid yourself about the effect. To us? To the musicians? It’s a goddamn disaster.
Image: Buddy Guy by Lyndon French
[ed. And these are successful musicians who at least have some royalties coming in. Musicians as a whole are going to be in bad shape for a long time.]
