In an age of digital convenience and on demand streaming services, there’s still nothing quite like heading to a gig with your best buds and dancing the night away. But heading to and supporting shows like this are much more than the enjoyment you gain from them. Gig culture is unfortunately easy to ignore for some people, as live albums are often produced and placed on streaming services, and it’s easy to forget that a great performance is akin to a great show as opposed to a simple replication of the material on an album.

Sometimes it’s easy to miss the full intent of the artist when experiencing an album through its recorded presence alone. Sometimes, you need to be face to face with the artist you respect to feel the full integrity of their creativity.

Gig culture is more important than ever. We hope to explain why, and perhaps persuade you to spend this Winter headed to your favorite shows, and crafting memories with your friends:

Natural Recommendations > Algorithms

We all know that YouTube, Spotify, Apple Music, Amazon Music, and a bunch of other streaming services offer us many different recommendations thanks to the music we have consumed and repeated. This can often help us find good new bands and songs that inspire us, and then become the new soundtrack to our lives. However, while this is useful and convenient, there’s nothing quite like being recommended music among those you respect. Small, niche bands you just HAVE to check out can feel like an exciting new discovery, especially when your passion for them was gained through osmosis as your friend gushed about their best songs and projects. It might be that digging through the underground music scene you love is much better when you naturally happen upon artists, but for that, you need to embrace gig culture. This will always be more personable and possess more soul than any artificial listing you might be given, no matter how accurate to your tastes.

Supporting Artists

With streaming services often a point of controversy due to the small amount of payment the artist actually receives from the stream (as low as 0.04% of the revenue made per stream in some ridiculous cases,) heading to see your favourite band perform live might be the best way to financially support them, even over and above purchasing merch online. Not only that, but bands and artists often appreciate your physical presence just as much, as it helps them live the music they create, and bring that to an audience they know are appreciative. Gig culture will never die because the one to one interaction between band and audience is too special to be forgotten, no matter how convenient on-demand culture becomes. Just be sure to use reputable ticket retailers such as The Ticket Merchant, as these verified retailers offer you official tickets and thus contribute to the artist as you hope to do.

With these simple tips, experiencing or continuing to experience gig culture should hopefully inspire you as it should.

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