Probably every up-&-coming musician (and other types of artists for that matter) are told that you should enjoy what you are doing, and not go for the fame and fortune. Well, can't you do both? Its almost as if people think that if you want to go for the big spot, you automatically don't have love for what you are doing. What if Eminem had had that thought? Or 2pac? Or any other big star? Can't you have passion for an art form and still have goals with it? Or should you neglect any big dreams you have with it, in order to do come far with it? Isn't that a contradiction really?
I love music, but if I didn't have goals for how I wanted to progress, I never would have learned anything and probably given up a long time ago.
That "do it for love, have fun and don't take it so seriously" mentality is what fuccs beginners up-next to "be original", "don't sample because you might get sued", "Music theory is nice, but you don't need to learn it", etc. It usually (always) leads to making frustrated posts here. I can find at least 5 threads for each one of the examples mentioned. "Do it for the love, have fun..." leads to "ehh, this is too hard, I will move on to something else", then the inevitable, "Help, I have been making beats for ____ and I am not progressing, why?"
Now, no one is saying you shouldn't have fun and not take it seriously, but that comes much later on, when the fundamentals have been internalized. I have fun playing jazz and soloing over changes, but that came after a few years of putting in the hard work and stress learning how to do it. Not saying I am an expert, but its fun to go to a jam and sit in with other musicians-something I could not do in the beginning because I hadn't put in the work to get there. Like I said in another thread, things like "being original" and "having fun" should be side-effects of the work you are putting in to learn and perfect your craft-NOT a starting point and certainly not a goal.
I should do a compilation of some of the worst advice people give beginners here.
