Once we settled into our little house in Long Beach, we dug in and began scheduling gigs up and down the coast. Our work load was looking good and we were booked well into the summer months. One of our early spring gigs was at a hopping club in Hermosa Beach on St. Patrick’s Day. We couldn’t wait to show all those “Irish” folks what we had to offer. Excitement was high. Until we got the news. The very bad news that our gig had been cancelled. The club was being forced to shut down. Everything was cancelled and being forced to shut down. No live music, festivals or concerts. No dining out, meeting friends for a drink or taking in a movie. No NBA, MLB, NHL, MSL, NFL...every facet of live entertainment. Done. Caput. We were reeling. Schools were closing, businesses were shutting down. All to prevent the spread of this little thing we’d just begun hearing about. Coronavirus. It just figures that the year we decide to move to the entertainment capital of the world, all hell breaks loose.
We were just as pissed off as we were terrified. Every booking was cancelled for the foreseeable future. It began to sink in that we could no longer work. All that hard work booking and promoting ourselves, in basically a foreign land with no reputation and few connections, had essentially been a waste of our time and energy. We felt defeated. What did this mean? Did the music industry really just disappear overnight? Is the entire economy going to collapse? Should we head back to the safety of our home in Illinois?
Once we composed ourselves, we realized that we weren’t ready to give up so quickly. We’d been thrown a curveball. Everyone had. It happens all the time in this little game we call life. We had to find a solution, and we had to do it quickly. We put our heads together and figured, people were expecting a performance from us on St. Paddy’s Day, so why not give them one? The solution? Go live! We could reach people in California as well as our fans in Illinois simultaneously with the help of Facebook Live. The very next day we gathered all the gear we thought we might need for a successful broadcast in glimmering 4K resolution.
We had no idea what to expect from this little experiment. We’d established a little web presence, but we certainly didn’t think our engagement had been sufficient enough to host a successful musical livestream. We were advised to have a virtual tip jar but figured nothing could compare with the lost revenue from our cancelled live shows. Nevertheless, we held our chins high and kept our expectations low.
We couldn’t believe the response we received. It was unreal to see how hungry everyone was for entertainment since the dawn of the Covid pandemic. Between 50 and 75 people watched consistently and shared our livestream with their friends. We played original music and took requests for three straight hours, engaging with our wonderful fans. It was a ton of fun playing for old friends again while meeting new ones. It was humbling and gratifying to be rewarded for our work with generous tips from our viewers.
Streaming our Friday Night Quarantunes has become part of our routine. We reach well over 1,000 people each week, topping over 6,000 viewers on our best night. We’re always trying to find ways to reach potential new fans. We enjoy hearing about the weeks our viewers have had; everything from celebrating birthdays and anniversaries to starting new jobs and welcoming new babies.
We also host private livestreams to entertain residents at several retirement communities. We love seeing the shared photographs and videos of our older viewers tapping their feet, singing along, even dancing to our music. Seeing their faces light up when we play our music and fulfill their requests is extremely rewarding.
Not only have we been able to remain in California, we continue to perform several times a week for people from all over the country, and even for some new fans oversees. We’ve met people from California and Illinois, of course, but also Arizona, Washington State and Oregon, as well as Minnesota, Wisconsin, Iowa, Indiana and Tennessee. We’ve also made new fans in Ohio, Virginia, Georgia and Florida, and from as far away as France, Ireland and England. All from the comfort of our little house in Long Beach. Ah, the wonders of technology.
We sincerely hope that you’re all doing your best to stay healthy and get through this pandemic. It has closed a number of doors for so many of us for the foreseeable future, but fortunately for us, a new door has opened. We have learned that there is a demand for our music and we’re trying to find more awesome people who might want to listen. At first, we saw this pandemic as an insurmountable hurdle; a curse. Now we see it as a blank canvas, glowing white with the gleam of possibility.
Thank you, thank you, thank to all of you who have consistently supported us throughout all of this madness.
Be well and rock on, friends!