SINGERS PRODUCING

If you already think you are a great singer and a well happening front person, then we have a problem. It means you will have the sort of ego that will render it totally impossible for you to be objective about everything else that has got to be done.

Singers have historically made the worst producers of their own work. The reason for this is simply that singers have to become so emotionally involved in their performance it cancels out any sort of over view. At the very least they need a musical partner that can give them some direction.

If a singer was able to have this calculated view of their own work the end product would undoubtedly come over as cold and empty. So if you do see yourself as a singer, find a partner fast before going any further.

TARDINESS

Singers – good or bad – are invariably a problem. They not only make incredibly bad time keepers which can lead to disasterous consequences when you are facing a jam-packed schedule during the period when your record has entered the Top 30 but not yet made Number One, they also tend to confuse their role as singer of songs with that of would-be world leaders.

FRONTMAN APPEARANCE
When it comes to TV. performances singers make obvious focal points for the cameraman, thus the viewers at home are forced to watch. This is not because what is coming out of their mouths is of any great importance, it is just the 'easy option' -tradition of the medium.

In fact, most singers on Top of the Pops make complete prats of themselves. The viewers at home amuse themselves discussing this pratishness, either the size of the singer’s nose, his taste in shirts, the dickhead state of his haircut or their shagable qualities.

This last example is usually done in such a disparaging and sexist way that it hardly inspires any real admiration. That said, you will need an act to go on TV. with. People will need some sort of human focal point to relate to.

ON NOSTALGIA BANDS

Once or twice a decade an act will burst through with a Number One that hits a national nerve and the public’s appetite for the sound and packaging will not be satisfied with the one record. The formula will be untampered with and the success will be repeated a second, a third and sometimes even a fourth time.

The prison is then complete; either the artist will be destroyed in their attempt to prove to the world that there are other facets to their creativity or they succumb willingly and spend the rest of their lives as a travelling freak show, peddling a nostalgia for those now far off, carefree days. These are the lucky few.

Most never have the chance of a repeat performance and slide ungracefully into years of unpaid tax, desperately delaying all attempts to come to terms with the only rational thing to do – get a nine to five job.