Stress is

Tuesday morning and I've been at it since 5am. I don't sleep a lot anyway but with the new CD coming out and the preparations for the radio and press push plus the Cabin Fever Musicfest show with Nick Moss and booking the summer tour season I'm not sleeping much at all.

Working on a summer tour to support the new CD but the economy has started to creep into the equation in a way that I find weird.

All the tv and print news as well as the online guys are talking about the world coming to an end because a bunch of Bankers on Wall Street are not making OBSCENE PROFITS so of course that means you and I must prepare for the worst. Sometimes I wonder if the "fear" of bad times doesn't actually "cause" them?

I mean these promoters are telling me "we may not get as big a crowd due to the economy so everybody has to play for less or even free". But they don't know they won't get the crowd and if they do as well or better than the year before do you think they'll suddenly hand out the extra money? Not likely.

So the big corporations watch the news and they say "Oh no, the bankers won't give out credit and the public will stop spending soon so we better cut costs by laying off 50% of our employees now BEFORE it happens!" HUH!?!?

Meanwhile the public didn't stop spending squat yet but they see the news that this big corporation just laid off 20,000 people and all their competitors start doing the same because they don't want to have higher costs than the other guy and suddenly John Q Public says, "I might lose my job and end up on a bread line if we don't cut back!" and POW! everybody stops spending because of the fear of what MIGHT happen. Not what actually IS happening. It's some kind of self fulfilling prophecy and it just seems weird to me.

It sounds oversimplified but I can't help but wonder if the news guys shouldn't just shut up about some things.

I've believed that prices for stuff have been WAY out of control for a long time but nobody is lowering their prices and profit margins yet they expect everyone to take a pay cut while working harder?
I say if you want people to work for 1960's wages then how about cutting our mortgage and gas and food prices to those same levels?
Once the labor unions get whacked and all the new hires are working for 8-10 an hour will GM start making $2000-$3000 cars again? I'd really like to see that.

"sigh" I'm hoping calmer heads will prevail but it sure will be a tough time booking with promoters expecting the worst. But all you can do is ride it out and hope the attitudes swing to the positive.
I guess that's just the blues :-)