Of course. They're in competition with all the other bands.
I feel like we need to break out the Housing Theory of Everything on this one.
Bands have been in competition with other bands since music was invented, that's not new. What's new is that it costs $200/night for a hotel room when you're making, uh, $200/night. If everything didn't cost so much then making that amount of money would work.
The music I like is good, and the music I don't like is bad. Zero people share my opinions on which is which. Are you sure you aren't just unhappy that other people don't share your taste and prefer superstar music?
Not to mention that those superstars need to come from somewhere. If a career in music is basically like spending all your money on lottery tickets, society ends up poorer: many hard-working young musicians are going to see it for the exploitation machine that it is, and go sell advertising instead.
Why would you think otherwise? How do you explain people buying "bad" music with their own money?
> many hard-working young musicians are going to see it for the exploitation machine that it is
Reminds me of every person I know that was laid off was sure he was a superstar.
I'm sure there are some overlooked gems, but remember Jimi Hendrix who came out of nowhere and went straight to the top. He was just that good.
I mean. I can enjoy ambient eerie dream-themed wailing and blown brass instruments [0], but it's not for everyone.
He definitely brought up some interesting points I had not considered about how only weekends will give a band a large draw, about over saturation of venues in the U.S., etc.
More fans mean more attendance on tours, so we're back to that, but also more fans buying merchandise, whether that's albums or something else. So there's no disproof of the argument that the band's worst enemy is obscurity, and then limiting the distribution of their music is still the threat rather than the solution.
Touring first doesn't work.
And if you're not good, touring won't fix it.