I recently had a first in my Seven Days career: Working on a feature for our annual Money & Retirement Issue, I came to the conclusion that, unfortunately, I just didn’t have the story I wanted. My editors agreed, and we were lucky enough to have other content to cover me, so we pulled my piece, which I am still working on.
It happens sometimes — better to let a story marinate than to force a shitty, undercooked version of it into the world. And the subject of this story, the current state of touring in the music industry, is a doozy that demands some serious research to understand. Yes, the big talking points are pretty simple: Ticketmaster bad, touring hard, money scarce. Within those broad outlines, however, many complex factors are shaping a rapidly changing industry. Or, as Guster‘s Ryan Miller told me recently, “The music industry is destroying and re-creating itself in real time.”
I talked with Miller and a host of other Vermont musicians, promoters and venue owners about how they’re coping with the challenges of touring. So be on the lookout for that story in the coming weeks.
One local musician with whom I spoke about both touring and the new music he has coming down the pike is Burlington-based Xander Naylor. The jazz guitarist, who plays with local fusion act Breathwork and tours with New York City-based roots outfit Mwenso & the Shakes, has been heading overseas to play shows in India. I rang him up to talk about why he’s so keen to play abroad and how he does it.
“Right now, I’m not even touring in the U.S. because I haven’t figured out the equation for that where I come home even breaking even,” Naylor told me.
Naylor plays plenty of shows in the Burlington area (up next: Thursday, April 6, at Foam Brewers with Mike Bjella) and tours extensively with Mwenso & the Shakes. But he’s come to the depressing conclusion that, as a solo artist, it doesn’t make sense for him to tour the U.S. right now.
“Honestly, I’ve played long-weekend tours in the U.S. and come home losing more money than if I had gone to India for five weeks,” he said.
Naylor isn’t throwing in the towel. He insists he’ll tour stateside again once he works out the right economic equation. In the meantime, he’s found a more fulfilling avenue for playing his music live.
In November, Naylor toured India with the Xander Naylor Trio, a jazz combo consisting of himself and Indian musicians Vinay Kaushal and Shreyas Iyengar. Doing jazz workshops and playing shows at clubs such as Skinny Mo’s Jazz Club in Kolkata, Naylor found a welcoming environment for a touring musician.
“The human connection I’ve felt on these tours has been unlike anything else,” Naylor said. “From the venue owners to the other musicians, there was just so much fucking honor in the way everyone treated each other.”
Naylor is a strong believer in booking shows where he thinks his music will be a good fit. The indie-rock model of trying to break your band into difficult markets to “prove yourself,” as he put it, doesn’t yield the results it once did.
“Look, there are countless models,” he said. “But the people who keep touring over the years and don’t get burned out — they find the right places to go rather than just grinding themselves into the ground trying to force something.”
Applying for grants has helped Naylor find those places and open up new avenues, like his Indian excursions. The University of Vermont grad secured grants to fund his international tours; a Vermont Arts Council Creation Grant helped him record a new album of his Indian jazz fusion that he hopes to release this summer.
“I’d advise any musician to utilize grants as much as possible,” Naylor said, though he added a caveat: Such funding is generally more available to artists playing traditional forms of music than for say, indie rock or synth pop. “We’re always looking for the ‘next sound’ in America, so we need grants to help preserve our older traditions like jazz, blues and folk … Yeah, those are big.”
In addition to his Indian jazz fusion album, Naylor has a second record in the can and ready to go. With fellow Vermont musicians Rob Morse, Ethan Snyder, Tripp Dudley and Bjella, he recorded an original score for the independent film Hayseed, which he said is “playing in international festivals and should be released for distribution soon, along with the soundtrack.”
It’s all part of a busy year for Naylor, including what he hopes will be another tour of India, so long as he secures the funding.
“I don’t look at it the way I did when I was in my twenties,” Naylor said. “Back then, it was just about getting on the road to play; money didn’t matter. But that’s not sustainable. If you’re going to tour these days, you need to have your shit together.”
This article appears in Apr 5-11, 2023.
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