Nashville is in Trouble.
Did you hear the news? Nashville is in real trouble. I'll tell you all about it right now.
You know what's coming up, that's the artist of the day, right before we get into the meat of everything, so Let's go... Today's artists that I love, that I think you should know about, if you don't already know about them, is a man and a wonderful songwriter, guitar player, his name is Blake Mills. Blake Mills has recently produced a whole bunch of records for people, but my personal favorite is his own artistic works. Blake produced some really awesome records and worked with some really amazing artists such as the Alabama Shakes, and also John Legend, for example, but I love Blake's artistic works personally as my favorite way, he's contributed to the music world, his album Hiho has been one of my favorite albums for quite some time, he has kind of a weird quirky voice, and his songs are really intricate from a guitar perspective, but also he really holds his own as a songwriter and his lyrical taste, I think are really awesome.
Let's get to Nashville and how they're in a hill of... Well, folks, it's not looking good for Nashville.
Unfortunately, this Covid-19 pandemic has really done a number on the local scene there, and not to mention all the tornados and everything else, it's been rolling through Nashville in the last six months, it's obvious to say that every industry has had its core shaken from this pandemic, but I still think a lot of law makers, and if you follow this channel, you would know how I feel about this, that a lot of the law makers don't really understand what's going on in the music industry, and it's really starting to show its effects. Some recent statistics that are talking about the Nashville ecosystem and where the clubs might be heading, and it's not pretty.
Fifteen independent music venues has experienced over a 90% loss in revenue since March.
Of the venues, I just mentioned, they have about six weeks left before they're gonna have to close their doors, so it shakes down to about 15% will be done in about a month, and the remaining percentage will be done in about six weeks. In about 13 weeks, all but one independent music venue is likely to be closed forever, as we know, artists make a living because CD’s have been basically deemed not desirable anymore by the general public and by streaming, touring is kind of all musicians have left, and if there's no venues for people to tour in, then where are the musicians gonna make their money to the layman, most people believe music is gonna come back, but the truth is without music venues and artists to come together, it's going to make the whole process hard for artist to continue to make money. So if one part of the wheel is broken, it's just not gonna work.
So how big of a problem is this for Nashville?
Well, I'll tell you, it's a 98 billion per year. Average problem. That's a lot of money. Music Venues, as you know, were the first to close and will be the last one to open, not supporting the ecosystem would be a huge mistake and relieve lots and lots of people without work also, you gotta think about the hospitality industry and this whole thing... I mean, they have to be suffering to... People used to travel to Nashville all the time, just like any other city. So if you're thinking about just one thing here and not really taking it seriously, what you're doing is you're affecting a whole bunch of other industries that are tied into music, so if you ever think about the arts just making a rebound and coming back on its own and it'll be fine, you might wanna start thinking a little differently because this is a web that will not be untangled any time soon. But don't worry, I'll keep you up to date on what's going on in Nashville and all across the country right here.