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The band has settled down and will take respite from tour life for the next three months until making a long anticipated move to New Orleans. Until then FGF will play shows around Colorado most every weekend, building a fan base and capital to pay rent at our sublet in North Denver which has turned out to be a perfect fit, replete with kitchen, office, rehearsal space, living room for watching Broncos wins, and an extra bedroom for hosting company.

Needless to say, band life is pretty cushy as compared to our frenetic two-month fall tour. We even had this thing called the "internet" hooked up yesterday.

Just because we've found some regularity and even fruit and vegetables in our daily lives these days, doesn't mean we don't face challenges at our job constantly. Although we've worked hard enough to build a local gig schedule that will support costs like living in a house, such an intensive schedule can have its downsides. So many gigs cause a band to walk to the fine line between exposure and over-saturation in a given market. This phenomena really comes down to supply and demand economics.

The "demand" for a given musical act in a geographic region is static at any time. As soon as the supply of live shows by this artist surpasses the demand, attendance at shows will drop.

Most successful bands I've had experience with know this rule. They will play only once every four months to once every couple years in a market depending on their overall popularity, size of the market and size of venues available. This packs out the shows they do play, giving the appearance that the artist would be a sell out every time!

This may seem a sterile, non-artistic way to look at growing a fan base. But realizing the economics of the situation can help a band realize they need to make every show special from the minute it is booked, through promotion to the last note and final curtain.

And I don't mean special to the musicians on-stage. Some bands (Phish, The Allman Bros.) have seemingly defied these laws of music market economics and are capable of holding weekend-long festivals with no support acts, or 15-night runs at theaters, all because they forge a unique experience out of every show. This requires much forethought, rehearsal and many, many songs in the band's catalog. Not to mention musicianship that is as broad as it is deep.

It is this breadth and depth of material which our substanial gig schedule does allow for. We get to hone our skills in many different genres and styles, even if we are playing for ourselves sometimes...

We do get the opportunity to make some shows special in their own way. We took the stage minutes after Barack Obama made history on Nov. 4, playing to an ecstatic crowd at the Fox Theater in Boulder who had four years of optimism on their minds. For our scheduled NYE show in Denver at The Wash Park Grille, we plan on playing the psychedelic soundtrack to a late 90's cult film classic, corresponding costumes and all.

The bottom line is that we are a very young band and it would be impossible at this point to prize quality of production and promotion over quantity of gigs necessary to support ourselves.

A quote by someone who should be an inspiration to everyone in the music industry can help sum up what I mean:

"Now... what ya'll wanna do?
Wanna be Ballers? Shot-callers?
Brawlers -- who be dippin in the benz wit the spoilers
On the low from the jake in the taurus
Tryin to get my hands on some grants like horace
Yeah livin the raw deal, three course meals
Spaghetti, fettucini, and veal
But still, everything's real in the field.."

-Puff Daddy, "It's All About the Benjamins"