Nashville! One of the three biggest music cities in the US, Nashville is positively brimming with musicians. I expected a great response from the playaz here.

But life is full of surprises. I only got three people interested in the project, and one of them decided he wasn’t interested when I couldn’t pay his full fee. Another one didn’t work out schedule-wise, so I was down to one person. That person was Don ‘DC’ Chamberlin, bassist.

I spent a pleasant morning/afternoon with Don laying down bass parts for several tunes. Don in particular was all over one of my older jazz/blues tunes, playing a part far better than the part I’d imagined. He also gave me a banana for breakfast. Thanks Don!

And that was that. Nashville.

“Why do you think the big cities seem to give you the littlest response, Zach?” asks Attractive Girl inquisitively.

My theory is that in the big music cities, most of the players are busy working, so they’re not out hunting for more work. Thus, they miss my ads and never even know I was there. I have no proof of that, but it seems to make sense in my head.

“Do you have any other interesting observations about Nashville?” she continues inquiring.

Why, yes. One other thing. Everywhere I’ve gone, the response from musicians has been one of excitement, mixed with a little bit of awe. They think the project is unusual and awesome and they are usually happy to be a part of it. Some pro players who usually play for money even donate their time. Nashville players, on the other hand, responded differently.

“How much does this gig pay?” asked one of them.

“Does this thing pay?” asked another. In fact, that was the entire text message. No introduction, just that.

This is not a judgement — I don’t think ill of musicians trying to make a living, in fact I rather think ill of people abusing musicians by asking them to pay for free since it’s just “having fun.” If I had backing for this project I would pay all the players. But since I’m paying for this project myself and I’m already going broke buying gas, I have to rely on the awesomeness of the project, involvement with lots of other great musicians nationwide, convenience of participation, and the publicity the project will generate to draw in the musicians. And that was not enough for some of the Nashville peeps.

“Hmmm, interesting,” muses Attractive Girl. “Will you pay me for being Attractive?”

NEXT: The ham is birming!

“Hey, you didn’t answer me.”