The Next Great Venue: Live Music at a Distance

By Natalia Sczcepanski

Whether it be an enormous concert hall, a hole-in-the-wallbar, or packed Allston basement —it all came to a halt in March. The SARS-CoV-2 pandemic effectively crippled the live music industry. Gone are the hordes of sweaty bodies packed together, dancing and singing along with the bands onstage. Now, the closest you can get is streaming a song and bopping to it in your bedroom. In order to stay relevant and keep a connection with their audiences, bands had to innovate. The DIY community is just one of many to make the switch to online performances. VIAL, Pinkshift, and The Vaughns—three bands active in the scene—took a moment to speak about their experiences these past eight months and how they dealt with such unique circumstances.

VIAL, an alt/punk group from Minneapolis, gave some insight into how frequently they gigged before the world came to a stand still. “Two to three times a month, at least,” KT (guitar) answered before their fellow members Katie (drums) and Taylor (vocals, keytar) both cut in with an enthusiastic “Two to three times a week!” VIAL maintained a consistent rotation of shows around Minneapolis; however as KT pointed out, with increasing safety issues the band slowed down the amount they played as the situation worsened. Similarly, Pinkshift from Maryland expressed an emphasis on playing live as well, with lead singer Ashrita saying “We would just play anything that would take us.” Of course now circumstances have changed: shows have since ceased due to new social distancing guidelines put in place around March.

These DIY scenes before the pandemic operated on in-person connections made at shows. However now, after these venues were forced to close, they lie in a state of limbo. The Vaughns lead singer/rhythm guitarist Anna and drummer Ryan pointed out the suffering of venues while the pandemic rages. They talked about The Saint, a popular venue in Asbury Park, New Jersey and favorite gigging destination for many bands throughout the state. Anna said “Unfortunately I think [staying open] is gonna be really hard for smaller venues. The Saint was really proactive—it wasn’t even them, someone in Asbury made a GoFundMe for The Saint and ended up raising over 50k.”  It was through the scene’s own initiative that this bar was able to survive, but that is not the case everywhere else. Some places lack the resources to campaign for donations and are then unable to pay the bills while shut down. Boston’s own Great Scott is just one example. Ryan critiqued the government’s reluctance to help: “Especially with the lack of government support on all these businesses that can’t generate any money, which really really sucks. I think when bands are able to get back on the road—small and medium size bands that would count on these venues to play while touring aren’t going to have those spaces.” The importance of these venues that The Vaughns brought up does not go unnoticed within the DIY community as everyone is impacted by the loss of former hang-out spots. It remains to be seen what will happen to these places in the future as the pandemic still continues to affect the world.

In light of the closure of venues and loss of in-person places to play at, the internet has become a crucial tool for these bands. Social media is a huge part of our lives in the 21st century: even before quarantine it existed as a tool to stay connected in an increasingly fast-paced world which social media is at least in part responsible for speeding up. However with social distancing measures, social media networks have become more important than ever before. Through apps such as Twitter and Instagram bands were able to promote themselves: especially now with an influx of users, the chance of cultivating an active online presence became greater. Ashrita explained that “[s]ocial media got [Pinkshift] out there more than anything else. We were on Twitter and maybe had 40 followers before [“i’m gonna tell my therapist on you,”] then Meet Me @ the Altar retweeted “On Thin Ice.” Then “Therapist” dropped and people put it on “listen to this” on reddit. So many people were listening to it and I think it’s more people than we could’ve reached if we weren’t focusing on the internet; which, we wouldn’t have been if everything was normal.” This new focus on the internet and connecting with people has allowed Pinkshift to reach people that otherwise might not have the chance to hear their music otherwise. These platforms allow users to not only post a simple update, but enjoy and spread new music. Even platforms such as TikTok are being used by bands to help promote themselves. VIAL started their own TikTok and now have around 21.5k followers and upwards of 287.4k likes. Something as simple as participating in a meme on the platform has allowed them and others to gain new listeners. 

While social media has helped bands grow their audiences, performing has taken on a new form entirely. Zoom, Twitch, and Instagram Live have become their most reliable venues. Pinkshift also said that Discord was used by some others; although, that particular service has not been used across the board. The service allowed bands to perform in the voice channel while listeners sat back and typed in a delegated channel. Paul—Pinkshift’s guitarist—did point out however, that there were some limitations with performing live virtually: “It’s kind of hard to do a full band live performance just because we don’t have the equipment to make it sound like anything. If we just played to our phone or computer it would just be a buzz.” Not every band has access to equipment that would compress and filter the sound. Myron’s drums, for instance, would overpower other instruments. On top of that, his cymbals would distort the sound entirely. There is some merit in sending a pre-recorded track and instead playing that over a livestream. VIAL enthusiastically said that even the popular video game Minecraft has been used by them as a way to gig virtually. A pre-recorded track was played over the server’s audio to allow in-game members to mosh real-time. Kate, the bassist, explained the experience further: “We did like a Q&A in chat. It was one of our very first shows that had been moved over to livestream instead of just being cancelled. So nobody really knew what they were doing.” Even if there was no precedence when it came to online shows, the ingenious DIY community soon figured it out. Now organizing online is much easier and more common. 

No one expected that a pandemic would shut down the music industry and force smaller communities of bands to seek out alternatives to playing. Each member of these three bands expressed what they would have said to themselves before quarantine took place. The responses ranged from Anna’s “Invest in a Nintendo Switch,” to Myron and Ashrita’s discussion on whether it was better to apply for medical school now or later. Kate perhaps offered the most realistic response in “I don’t think that there is a single thing that I could tell myself, from either before quarantine or even the first two weeks of quarantine, that my past self would believe.” Whatever vision people had for the future of the alternative community this year is drastically different than what it has become. And while we wait patiently for some semblance of normal life to return, Taylor remarked that at least “[t]he vibes are still great, I think we’re just missing out on the people singing along with us, the moshing, like the jumping around.” Either way, bands such as Pinkshift, VIAL, and The Vaughns are still out there releasing music and sharing it with the world.