11 May

Sting once said a band is a way to avoid growing up. It’s why he left The Police, because he didn’t want to be a teenager forever. When you read the history of most bands, you’ll find the same thing, how for members it was a way to belong, socially, in teenage life. Also why there’s often an anxious hierarchy of ‘cool’, amongst musicians. Being in a band gives them a way to belong, in wider society. But that also places them in competition with other bands trying to do the same. So they end up having the same problem, within the industry itself, competing for status. It’s why I never went into music as a career. Can’t stand the culture, I’m happy to be free of teen life. Any musician who tells you this competition for status isn’t a burning part of the industry is lying.