The Truth About Being A Cruise Ship Musician (Trigger Warning) — Transcript

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1. 0:00A few years ago, I ended up on cruise
2. 0:02ships because I was a musician in
3. 0:04Melbourne, Australia with $16,000 of
4. 0:06debt and I was out of options. This is
5. 0:08the real story of what life is actually
6. 0:11like. I'm going to show you the parts
7. 0:12that look incredible on Instagram, the
8. 0:14parts nobody talks about, including
9. 0:16probably the darkest moment I witnessed
10. 0:18at sea, and the decision I made on my
11. 0:21last contract that meant I never had to
12. 0:23go back. Stick around because there's
13. 0:25something at the end of this I wish
14. 0:27someone had told me before I ever
15. 0:29stepped on board. So, let's start with
16. 0:31the good stuff because there is a lot of
17. 0:33it. I was playing in the show band,
18. 0:35which basically means you're the house
19. 0:37band for all the major production shows
20. 0:39on board, and you back the guest artists
21. 0:42that come through. And the pay was not
22. 0:44too bad at the time. I'm sure it's gone
23. 0:45up since. For the first 9 months, I was
24. 0:47putting about 90% of my paycheck
25. 0:49straight into my debt, and the day I
26. 0:52made the final payment, I still remember
27. 0:54it, that feeling of freedom, genuinely
28. 0:56one of the best moments of my life.
29. 0:58Something else happened that I didn't
30. 1:00expect either was my playing got
31. 1:03dramatically better. See, I was jazz
32. 1:05trained and I wasn't as used to playing
33. 1:08big rooms and big stages, big
34. 1:09productions, and suddenly I was gigging
35. 1:11almost every single day for about 3
36. 1:13years straight. I really learned how to
37. 1:15play out to a big room and fill the
38. 1:17stage. You can't really buy that kind of
39. 1:19experience. It's a really good gig to
40. 1:22cut your teeth on stage, that's for
41. 1:24sure. It's also an okay way to travel. I
42. 1:27went to some amazing places all over the
43. 1:30world, like Alaska, Costa Rica, Brazil,
44. 1:33Malaysia, and the Caribbean. Places I
45. 1:36genuinely never would have had the
46. 1:38opportunity to go otherwise. Now, I'll
47. 1:39be honest though about the travel
48. 1:41because it's not quite what it looks
49. 1:43like from the outside. You're only in
50. 1:45most of these ports for a few hours at a
51. 1:47time, and back when I was doing it, it
52. 1:50might be a little bit better now, but
53. 1:51internet on ships was so expensive and
54. 1:54unreliable that most of your port time
55. 1:56was spent finding a cafe and catching up
56. 1:59on your life back home. So, you're
57. 2:00seeing these incredible places through a
58. 2:02pretty small window, but they were still
59. 2:04real and I'm glad I saw them, but it's
60. 2:07more like a taster of places you might
61. 2:09consider going back to at some stage.
62. 2:11And then, of course, there's the people.
63. 2:12You meet musicians and performers and
64. 2:15amazing people from every corner of the
65. 2:17world, different cultures, different
66. 2:18backgrounds, different ways of seeing
67. 2:20things. And of course, there are
68. 2:22dancers. There are a lot of dancers.
69. 2:25Some of the best friendships I've made
70. 2:27in my life came from ships. But, here's
71. 2:30the thing about the social side of
72. 2:31things, it also has a dark side. Before
73. 2:34I get to that though, I want to mention
74. 2:36that the living situation can be a
75. 2:37little bit grim. You often have to share
76. 2:40with someone in a bunk bed, unless you
77. 2:41have a musical director role, in which
78. 2:43case you have your own cabin. There are
79. 2:45single shares as well where you have
80. 2:47your own room to sleep in, but you share
81. 2:49a bathroom with someone else. But, the
82. 2:51point is often times going into it, you
83. 2:53don't actually know ahead of time, so it
84. 2:55can be a little bit of a roll of the
85. 2:57dice as to what your living situation
86. 2:58actually is. Now, I'll be honest about
87. 3:00myself here because I think it's
88. 3:01important. I was pretty all or nothing
89. 3:04on my contracts. Either I was completely
90. 3:07locked in, gym every day, sauna,
91. 3:10meditating, practicing,
92. 3:12or
93. 3:13I was in the crew bar every night,
94. 3:15socializing, wasting my money, smoking,
95. 3:18drinking, staying up too late. There
96. 3:21wasn't much middle ground for me, and
97. 3:23there isn't much else to do. The social
98. 3:26life on a ship can become a bit of a
99. 3:27vortex, and it's very easy to get sucked
100. 3:30in. I remember one of my musical
101. 3:31directors, this was back when I was
102. 3:33working for NCL, and we were actually
103. 3:36mates, and he pulled me into his office
104. 3:38one day and he was like, "Look, I'm
105. 3:39really not supposed to show you this,
106. 3:40but check this out." And he showed me a
107. 3:42receipt. It was for one of the musicians
108. 3:44on board who had spent his entire
109. 3:47paycheck, like two and a half, three
110. 3:49grand, on beer. Like, he just spent it
111. 3:52all at the crew bar. I just stood there
112. 3:54looking at it like, "That's crazy." But,
113. 3:56that wasn't even the darkest thing that
114. 3:58I experienced on a ship. One afternoon,
115. 4:01we had some jazz sets scheduled on the
116. 4:03pool deck, I got a call from the
117. 4:05assistant musical director telling me
118. 4:08that the gig had been canceled. Now, if
119. 4:10you know anything about ships, gigs
120. 4:12don't get canceled, like ever. Something
121. 4:15is always worked out, so I knew
122. 4:17immediately that something was wrong.
123. 4:19That evening, he came to find us and
124. 4:21told us what had happened, and our
125. 4:23musical director had attempted to take
126. 4:25their own life. They tried to jump from
127. 4:27the top deck and had been stopped by a
128. 4:30guest. They were medically disembarked
129. 4:32the next port that we were in, and we
130. 4:34never saw them again. It was one of the
131. 4:36most sobering moments of my life, and it
132. 4:38taught me something that I believe to be
133. 4:41true about ships. The ship amplifies
134. 4:44whatever mental state you're in going
135. 4:46into it. If you're in a good place, it
136. 4:49can be an incredible experience. If
137. 4:51you're struggling mentally, it can push
138. 4:54you to places you didn't think were
139. 4:55possible. That's the extreme version.
140. 4:57Obviously, most musicians don't end up
141. 5:00there, but what happens to most of them
142. 5:03is more gradual, and in some ways, it's
143. 5:05harder to see coming. There's a culture
144. 5:07in the cruise ship musician world that
145. 5:08gets worn almost like a badge of honor,
146. 5:11which is this darkness. If you've ever
147. 5:13seen the Facebook page Dark Show Band
148. 5:15Musicians, you know what I'm talking
149. 5:17about. There's a lot of resentment, a
150. 5:19lot of bitterness, a lot of entitlement,
151. 5:22and it's interesting because a lot of my
152. 5:24dancer friends they never had that. You
153. 5:26see, for dancers, they've worked a lot
154. 5:29since they were very young, they've
155. 5:30sacrificed a lot for their craft, and
156. 5:32they're mostly just genuinely grateful
157. 5:35to have a paying gig. That attitude is
158. 5:37often very different for musicians. And
159. 5:40if you were someone who's a bit more
160. 5:42positive, high energy, if you were at
161. 5:44all excited about the work or the travel
162. 5:47or anything, you got labeled like green
163. 5:49or naive, like you didn't understand the
164. 5:51realities of the job yet. And that can
165. 5:53really wear you down. And before you
166. 5:55know it, you're sort of turning into one
167. 5:57of them. The trap actually has a name,
168. 5:59it's called just one more contract. And
169. 6:01the joke is, I mean, it's not really a
170. 6:03joke, is that musicians will say that
171. 6:04for like 10 or 20 years, right? Just one
172. 6:06more, then another, then another, until
173. 6:09they're old and jaded and still on the
174. 6:11ship and they hate it, and they can't
175. 6:13quite remember when it stopped being
176. 6:15temporary. There's a lot of musicians
177. 6:16like this. And I remember the exact
178. 6:19moment I realized I was heading there. I
179. 6:20was working for Royal Caribbean. Me and
180. 6:23one of the musical directors had been
181. 6:25pretty drunk for one of the
182. 6:27performances, one of the production
183. 6:28shows, which is obviously a massive no.
184. 6:31The next day, the cruise director called
185. 6:33us into the office and rinsed us for it.
186. 6:36And I remember sitting there thinking
187. 6:38like, "Just fire me. I I genuinely don't
188. 6:40care." And that thought really scared
189. 6:42me. Like, that night I was laying in my
190. 6:44bunk bed. I had a roommate, bunk beds,
191. 6:47very glamorous. And I just said to him
192. 6:49like, "I'm done, man. I like I don't
193. 6:51want to live like this anymore." I knew
194. 6:53in that moment it was actually my last
195. 6:55contract. I didn't want to become one of
196. 6:57those jaded, bitter musicians who
197. 6:59complains about everything and comes
198. 7:01back year after year and gets more and
199. 7:03more miserable. So, I made a decision.
200. 7:06On my last contract, I actually hired a
201. 7:08business mentor, somebody who wasn't a
202. 7:10musician, who had no idea about the
203. 7:12music industry, and who just knew how to
204. 7:14build something online. One thing about
205. 7:17being a musician on a ship is you have a
206. 7:19lot of free time. So, every day when we
207. 7:21docked, while everyone else was heading
208. 7:23to the beach or resort, I was finding
209. 7:26the nearest cafe and I was opening my
210. 7:28laptop. I remember my last contracts in
211. 7:30the Caribbean, these crappy cafes and
212. 7:32bad Wi-Fi, the laptop on a sticky table.
213. 7:35I actually started building a coaching
214. 7:37program for drummers. I'd done a lot of
215. 7:39teaching, I knew it could do well, and I
216. 7:41had a clear goal. I really wanted to
217. 7:43move to London when I got off the ship,
218. 7:45and I needed something to keep me afloat
219. 7:47when I got there. So, I was filming
220. 7:49content on the ship. I worked on the
221. 7:51program, I did it every single day, and
222. 7:53it felt really scrappy and uncertain.
223. 7:55Half the time I had no idea if any of
224. 7:57this would work, but I had a real
225. 7:58purpose. And for the first time in a
226. 8:00long time, I had a reason to get off the
227. 8:03ship in a port that wasn't just to find
228. 8:05like, you know, better internet to
229. 8:07download more movies. And one afternoon,
230. 8:09I was in a cafe in the Caribbean, I
231. 8:10remember, and I was doing I used to do
232. 8:12these consultation calls with potential
233. 8:14students to kind of tell them about my
234. 8:15program, my offer. I'd done a few of
235. 8:17these before, but I'd never actually
236. 8:18pitched anyone, I'd never actually asked
237. 8:20for money. So, I'm going through this
238. 8:22call and I start to get to the end, I
239. 8:24start telling them about my program, and
240. 8:25then I tell them the price. And right as
241. 8:28I was like telling the price, I notice
242. 8:29in the camera on Zoom, like I look up
243. 8:31behind me and there's just like some
244. 8:32broken TV with all these wires hanging
245. 8:34down, and I I just thought like, "Man,
246. 8:37there's no way this guy's going to say
247. 8:38yes to this program." He obviously
248. 8:41politely declined, but it kind of
249. 8:43changed something for me, right? I could
250. 8:44kind of see what it could become. And
251. 8:47long story short, I finished the
252. 8:48contract, I moved to London, and that
253. 8:50program worked out. Uh and I made a
254. 8:52decent amount of money with it. So, if
255. 8:53you take anything away from this, right,
256. 8:56save your money. You have zero expenses
257. 8:58on a ship, no rent, no food, no bills.
258. 9:00There's genuinely no excuse to finish a
259. 9:026-month contract with nothing to show
260. 9:04for it. Use your free time for
261. 9:06something. I wasted plenty of mine, but
262. 9:09those crappy Caribbean cafes were where
263. 9:12I actually built my way out. And think
264. 9:14about what comes after. That's the thing
265. 9:17most musicians never do. The networking
266. 9:19sounds good in theory, but people
267. 9:21scatter back to every corner of the
268. 9:23world, and it doesn't actually travel
269. 9:24with you. So, figure out what you're
270. 9:26building on the other side before you
271. 9:29get off the ship. Because ships are a
272. 9:31stepping stone, and the trap isn't the
273. 9:33crew bar, it's not the small cabin, it's
274. 9:35not even that musician darkness. The
275. 9:37trap is getting off the ship with
276. 9:39nothing but the memory of it, and then
277. 9:41going back out because at least there
278. 9:43you have an income. Don't let that be
279. 9:45you. If you're curious about the online
280. 9:48teaching program I built while I was out
281. 9:50there, you can check out this video
282. 9:51right here. I'll walk you through
283. 9:53exactly how I did it.