Last
summer someone said that The Shanty Hounds were the busiest band in
Key West. When I sat down and thought about it, that was partially
true, at least as a band. Frankly, I was
breathless! I recalled years ago when living in Miami/Dade and
reading an interview with a noted Blues player, stating they would be
doing close to 300 gigs that year. I found that both amazing and
difficult to take in mentally. “Close to 300 gigs” in a year.
Holy smokes!
Now,
here I am writing this over a dozen years later and I'm
doing over 300 gigs a
year. I'm writing this on Christmas Day 2019 and we, The Shanty
Hounds, have played 360 gigs this year and we have two gigs tomorrow
(Willie T's and The Curry Mansion), a gig on Saturday (The Tipsy
Rooster), two gigs on Sunday (Willie T's and Two Friends Patio
Restaurant and Bar) and a gig on Tuesday (Rick's) that will leave us
at 366 for the year.
It should also be stated that a lot of the single acts
here in Key West do more than we do.
While these numbers completely floor me when it was
brought to my attention, I stopped and thought about it. Yes, we were
doing about 30 gigs a month.
On
November 2, 2017 in a letter to my guitar manufacturer Ibanez, I
itemized our gigs and calculated that we were playing in front of
3000 people a week.
We
are doing more this year and I'd say we're at minimum 35% more than
2017. That being the case, we're playing in front of around 4000
people a week or, around 210,000+/- people a year.
So,
what do we, The Shanty Hounds, Dani Hoy and Chris Rehm, come to the
table with? What do we have to offer? The numbers above speak for
themselves.Well, we're different. As far as other performers go, they
usually travel around the country in RVs doing shows for people who
want to see them. They may very well travel 400-800 miles from gig to
gig. We may travel 4 – 8 blocks
from gig to gig. Friday's
first gig is long distance, eight blocks.
We
always bump into friends/fans/supporters of ours. We always do! I
know for a fact that several couples are in town at this very moment
who will be by to see us! They are fabulous supporters of live music!
Some know our style of music, Every week we gain new friends! Many
don't know our style/genre. “There's a style of music that is about
Key West and the tropics? Wow! Cool!”
We're
very grateful for all of our friends, both well established, and new!
When not in town, some of our friends tune in and see us on the
YouTube stage cams at Willie T's or Two Friends. Thank you folks!!!
Now and then we'll go Facebook live and end up with as many as 1,200+
tuning in. THANK YOU!!!
We do
meet many, many people who do love our original music! Key
West gets everybody! These people come from all walks of life.
Accountants, appraisers hair stylists, lawyers, even music
professors. Imagine having, not one, but three music professors
tell you “Your songs are really excellent!”. For me it's
somewhere between being embarrassed and being humbled, and grateful.
But that's what we do. In
addition to hanging out with our local and visiting friends, some who
didn't know Trop Music existed before they met us, we also introduce
new fans to our music. We bring new fans to the genre. At every gig
we meet, laugh, and make new friends and they follow our music! 366
Gigs by year's end, an audience of @ 210,000. Dani's has arguably the
best female voice in Trop and is a fabulous songwriter to boot! I'll
be a Nashville published songwriter for 20 years in 2020, with songs
in with people from Junior Brown to Trisha Yearwood, or that we've
had several very, very well seasoned people at MOTM come up to us and
say on the last night of the event, Saturday evening, and tell us
“We've been here all week and we've seen all the top acts. You guys
are the best we've seen! You have an energy that no one else
approaches”.
I'm pleased with 366 gigs
and playing in front of 201,000 this year. I love living in Key West
and I'm honored to be here. I love this town and I love what we do
here. However, having those experienced MOTM fans say that last
sentence, makes it special, acknowledged, and worthwhile:
“We've been here all
week and we've seen all the top acts. You guys are the best we've
seen! You have an energy that no one else approaches”.
Thank you.
I
just came out with a new EP entitled “All The Best From Key West”,
which was my sign off moniker for the last dozen years or so. You may
have seen the previous blog on it? If you missed it and would like to
see it, here's the link:
keywestmusic.blogspot.com/2019/12/all-best-from-key-west.html
With
this new release I'm taking a different approach. In the past,
starting with “Shanghai'd and Marooned in Key West (things could be
worse)” in 2011, I'd send it to all of the Trop Rock radio stations
and this worked great. The releases received good attention!
In
the last couple of years however, the Trop audience has dwindled.
Just one example of this is this particular blog. When I first
started witing it, up until about a year ago, when I posted it, I
would have between 200 and 500 views on the first day. Now? Maybe 75
in a week is avarage. Because of this, I've begun to look outside in
order to augment sales, namely to Americana.
Trop
Rock is limited in it's outreach/assistance to artists. No knock
against it at all, it is what it is and doesn't profess, or strive to
be anything that it isn't. There are two publications in the genre,
however for what I'm looking for, they are not set up to do.
I
wanted a review of the album, but I knew neither do reviews. With
Americana I had no trouble whatsoever in getting a review and what a
review it was!
Four
days after the album was released, it was part of their top ten
releases of the year!
So,
we're off to a great start. You never know in this business however,
so we'll see how the wave continues.
