Selling Mirrors in the Cities of The Blind

The world is full of inspiring wonder and unimaginable beauty just waiting to be discovered.

If asked to say in a nutshell what The Enid is all about, I would say: "The Enid is a vocational band creating a unique style of high quality music for an intelligent niche audience. Whilst we are always seeking ways to expand that audience it will never be at the expense of quality and content.

In essence this makes The Enid's music "elitist". A dirty word in some quarters but not a bad thing to be if you can. Is it somehow OK for troops and athletes to be elite but not musicians and artists?

Saville Row or Primark?

“Crunch time” for The Enid We cannot go on selling our music and putting on concerts at “the going high street rate” in an attempt to compete on price with "the arts" which rely on the public purse to subsidise ticket prices. Neither can we contend with an entertainment industry delivering a celebrity-driven endless recycling of the mediocre and the transient to the undiscerning masses. Both in film and music, I find myself inhabiting a world in which the packaging and promotion is all and the content mostly anodyne at best and largely irrelevant.

Crossing The Rubicon

There has to be another way

An Art House band like The Enid can only go forward by selling our work for what it is actually worth. The time has come for the band to cross the Rubicon – there can be no turning back. We have achieved a great deal artistically since the Bush Hall in 2009 but the financial aspect is not getting any better with £125K of losses on the books.

Symphony Hall & The CBSO

In spite of being a near sellout, the Birmingham concert with the CBSO left us with a £26,000.00 bill. Unlike the orchestra who were able to obtain a £4.5 million stabilisation hand out from the tax payer to insure survival, The Enid has had to rely on the fans, our ingenuity and wits. Putting on that show was a steep learning curve. We made a lot of mistakes, none of which will be repeated at Watford in November.

In Conclusion

Taking on board the message

I appreciate that there will inevitably those amongst our wider community of fans who simply won't get it. Indeed I know there are from various letters/emails received, mostly from those who see their relationship to the band as one of a consumer.

I appreciate this completely reasonable point of view but the overwhelming message I get from The Enidi members  is that The Enid has been trying to sell too cheap and consistently undervaluing itself. The band has taken this message on board. From now on there will be no corners cut on quality. We will go forward with an enduring goal to provide the best possible value for money.