Understanding how markets work

“How can they be paying us only £5 a gig?" I wailed. "What kind of a negotiation is that?”

I was joshing Tim Mack, the manager of the band I played in (in the 1960s), the Idle Hands, who had landed us a regular gig at the premier venue in London, the Marquee.

“If you want to try to get more, be my guest,” responded Tim.

So we trooped into the Marquee manager’s  office.

“This is just slave labour,” I ranted. “We are good - and we get paid loads more at other venues.”

“Look,” said the manager patiently, “there are a hundred bands out there as good as yours, and any one of them would play here for nothing. All you guys need to decide is this: do you want to play here or not?”

It was the day I learned for real how markets work.

We had a joyful reunion of the band on Tuesday, less dear departed Tim.

On not being Eric Clapton

Playing with the Idle Hands in the mid-1960s was an exciting and joyful experience. We had plenty of work. Much was around our north London base (Hampstead, Highgate, Golders Green…), where we played well-paid birthdays, weddings, bar mitzvahs and so on for the offspring of wealthy parents. Quite frequently, it seemed, the police would show up in the early hours of the morning following complaints from neighbours about the noise level. Not surprising, I guess, given that we often played in a marquee in daddy’s garden.

The rest consisted of regular (but miserably compensated) club gigs – mostly the Witches Cauldron of blessed memory in Belsize Park, and the wonderful Marquee in Wardour Street, Soho. Alongside the slave-labour wages in those clubs, there was always the chance that we might get spotted and be given fabulous recording contracts.

One evening, after our set at the Marquee, I settled down with a beer to listen to the headline act – John Mayall’s Blues Breakers. As usual, good, I thought. But not especially so. The Idle Hands was a pretty good band too.

Then, in the middle of their set, on slouched a young guy with longer hair, shoulders hunched, back to the audience. He plugged in, twiddled a bit, turned round, and took off.

It was Clapton. Eric. Slowhand. God.

This was a kind of virtuosity so far out of my league that it persuaded me that I should no longer be dedicating my life to becoming a career rock-musician.

Maybe there was some other way in which I might excel. But what?