Build Your Own Clone Message Board

Hi all,
Coming to you for advice once again. Even though I've never met any of you, I appreciate and respect your opinions (90% of them at least, and that's good).

Here's today's dilemna:

16 year old son is in a screamo Christian rock band with three 18 year olds and a 21 year old. I mention Christian because although my son isn't very vocal about it, the other guys in the band are great guys for him to be hanging out with, and they do talk about being Christians as they are up on stage - which they see as a worthy endeavor, and I agree - they may be good influences on others.

Son is also going to be co-captian of varsity high school soccer team in the fall, his senior year.

Dilemna: Son wants to quit soccer to have more time with the band.

From our viewpoint, my wife and I see that as letting down his coach and teammates, missing out on a great leadership experience, and giving up on soemthing he is good at. We'd like for him to stick with it for 4 months (July - Oct), then he's got his whole life for music.

We've always told are kids we want them involved in at least one sport each year (for the physical activity, teamwork, etc.).


What to do? I feel like we shouldn't force him to play soccer, but we would be hugely disappointed if he gave up now on something he is gifted at, especially when he is this close to being done anyway.

Our current thinking is: OK, you can drop soccer, but you HAVE TO be involved in something: robotics club, jazz band, something (and then hope he decides it's just easier to stick with soccer).

I don't want this to get ugly (by threatening to take away his cell phone or car), I just don't want him to lose out on a great leadership opportunity, be viewed as a quitter at school, and not use his athletic talents at all.

Whaccha think? Anyone deal with something similar? We just don't want him to put all his eggs in the one basket of "being in a band". It's not like they are signed or even playing regular shows. They'll play 6-8 times a year. They are dreaming right now and I think those dreams may limit my son's future. I'd much rather he learn a skill (go to college, become a plumber, something) and have music as his escape, rather than the only thing he has. Anyone out there give up everything for your band? How did it work out, and what advice would you give a 16 year old?

Thanks a bunch.

That's a tough one. He shouldn't give up on soccer and maybe emphesize that he would be quitting his team and friends and letting a bunch of people down and essentially he'd be a quiter.

Compromise. Let him know if there is a fantastic opportunity (band gets singed or can do a support tour with a major act or something) then he could quit soccer. Everybody would better understand quitting if there were circumstances like that.

Thanks. We've already emphasized that he would be letting his coach and teammates down, and not help his soccer palying younger sister any by quitting (I can envision the coach saying: "Oh yea, I remember how her older brother quit, she's probably a quitter too",...). Like many teenager, I think, he has a hard time weighing how his decisions affect others, can only see things from his perspective.

I'd rather not let him quit mid-season. I'm trying to get him to see that if the "band thing" is going to be his passion and source of income in the future - if it's that important - it will survive him having 2 hours of soccer practice every afternoon. The other guys all work. It's not like my son is the one limiting their practice time.

Keep that advice coming. It helps and is much cheaper than therapy.

Yup, and most teenagers have trouble seeing things long-term. To him, the fall season is far in the future, and those four months of the soccer season might as well be 10 years long.

I can't believe I'm saying this, because I really don't care for sports myself, but.. I think you'd be right to convince him that he should just do this one last season of soccer. Then, like you said, he's got the rest of his life to concentrate on music. I hated sports as a teenager, but now that I have two teenage stepkids who are active in sports, and I can see the benefits that highschool sports provide.. I guess I kinda wish that someone had pushed me to do some sports.

I can't really provide solid parenting advice, like, should you force him or not.. that ultimately comes down to your parenting style, or something. But let him know how disappointed you'd be if he quit now - that usually worked on me.

Good luck, and let us know how it goes.

If it were my son I would probably say that once he has accepted the co-captain slot it's not something he can back out of. He was placed in a position of authority for a reason and with that comes responsibility. He can check Romans 13:1 for insight on who placed him there.

As far as the band thing goes I agree with you there too. At some point he will have a family to provide for (health insurance, fun stuff like that??) and need him to be there with them rather than out driving around the country. There's no need to give it all up, just keep it real.

I teach 14 year old students all day long and have a son of my own (he is only 3 though). A lesson that is vitally important for them to learn, but equally difficult for them to accept or understand is that you don't quit on your commitments. Your son made a commitment to a group (Soccer team) and he needs to learn to honor that commitment. He may not like the idea, but when he started, he told the coach, the team, the fans etc that he would be a part of the group for the duration of the season.
In real life, successful people do not walk away from their commitments. If you walk into work as an adult and say "I'm leaving today, I found something I'd rather do" you would lose a reference and be labeled as a quitter in the field. ( I know the reality is that people do this every day, but we typically don't regard them well). If you walk into work and say "I have been offered a new job, here is my 2 weeks notice, please let me know what I can do to clean up before I go..." You will be much better off. In some fields (like mine) I am under contract for a year, even if I wanted to leave, my district could sue for damages incurred in hiring and training a new teacher if I were to walk away from my job.
Back to your son, I would use this as a teaching tool: he needs to honor the commitment he made to the other young men on the team, the coach and the school (he is obviously well regarded if he is co-captain).
-P

This is very a very difficult thing to discuss because I obviously don't know you or your child or any details there of, so no offense intended with this. Everyone's got to find their own way (especially as a male who is just starting to break away from the pack at 16). I've seen people who do all the "good" things end up being losers while the losers end up having done the most impressive stuff at their 10 year high school reunions, and visa versa. One thing I have seen children who aren't given to opportunity to make their own decisions while being a child generally have a hard time figuring out how to make them as an adult. If being a musician is really what he wants to do, and fully understands the realities of what making the decision encompass, and chooses to do it anyway, then stopping him will, IMO, do more harm than good. I have found that by and large, the character of the individual will persevere regardless of what activities are being performed. The best you can do is guide him and provide him with support in the form of guidance and points to consider.

Sometimes the reality of the dream makes the dream a fuggin nightmare. I'd love to play music for a living, but me in a bus with a bunch of other guys would NOT work out well. It's just not how I'm wired, but I had to figure that out on my own because no one was going to stop me from 16 to 21 from playing music. While I was doing the music thing, I was also getting an engineering degree and working, so like most decision, it's not an all or nothing deal.

Maybe ask him how it would feel if the band's lead singer quit while they were practicing for a big gig?

Great angle to take. I was thinking it while readingthethreads before pwats'.

No offense to said it, but I think telling him you'd be disappointed if he quit soccer is wrong, too. Turn it positive. Tell him how pleased youd be if he stayed....that he earn points in showing what a standup MAN he is to everyone including his PROUD parents. Also, maybe make two deals with him:

A. If his band makes a move to the next level.....regular gig, contract, tour, etc....he can give his notice to soccer. Maybe even now he can go to the coach, as a MAN, and explain FOR NOW hie will play and give it his all, but that the coach should look elsewhere for a co-captain, should he find himself unable to fulfill the commitment.

B. Not a bribe, but a reward deal. Something like "Stick this out with the soccer (even with the conditions above) and at the end Mom and I will invest in the band....gear, practice space, gig van, etc".

Great angle to take. I was thinking it while readingthethreads before pwats'.

No offense to said it, but I think telling him you'd be disappointed if he quit soccer is wrong, too. Turn it positive. Tell him how pleased youd be if he stayed....that he earn points in showing what a standup MAN he is to everyone including his PROUD parents. Also, maybe make two deals with him:

A. If his band makes a move to the next level.....regular gig, contract, tour, etc....he can give his notice to soccer. Maybe even now he can go to the coach, as a MAN, and explain FOR NOW hie will play and give it his all, but that the coach should look elsewhere for a co-captain, should he find himself unable to fulfill the commitment.

B. Not a bribe, but a reward deal. Something like "Stick this out with the soccer (even with the conditions above) and at the end Mom and I will invest in the band....gear, practice space, gig van, etc".

I suppose I would encourage him to honor his commitments. But if he's really determined to drop soccer, I don't think forcing him will end up working out. Either way, if you let him make the ultimate decision, he'll almost certainly take more away from the whole experience. In my opinion, of course.


Ooooooh! Nice!

Yeah, as I said above, forcing is bad. But guilting is acceptable.

I didn't exactly have the greatest parents growning up.

I turned ok despite them, though.

I'm not one to give parental advice since me and the little lady decided not to have kids but I would say that if it was mine, your word is everything to me, like others have said. If you don't have your word then I've got no use for you. Now, I don't mean that directed at your son as 16 years old is hard age to understood the scope of what is meant by that. But, that is the standard I apply to adults and if it was my son or daughter somehow I would try to communicate that to him.

But, why I really wanted to comment is I was struck by the age difference. The difference between age 16 and 21 is like between 25 and 45...they are light years apart. The difference between 16 and 18, not as far of course but it is 2 years of hard knocks.

To what extent is there peer pressure? Something I gave in to a lot as I was always the youngest of the bunch I ran with in my teens. That pressure was stifling to me and could out rule what my dad said.....sometimes. I know you said they are a good influence but maybe think about that when you talk to him and be prepared for that to be a variable. He might deny it, but it could be very subtle comments made while jamming, whether it be implicit or explicit and maybe he is struggling with out to deal with that kind of pressure.

Anyway, thought I'd jump in for that thought.

Great advice I think by several on here. I was talking to Lady Blueshawk this weekend and telling her the dudes I converse with on her, don't think of the usual douche bags you have seen on Behind the Music on VH1. These, mostly, are some really smart dudes with great advice and have level heads and get it...who happend to play guitar etc... I think this thread speaks to it.

Good luck Scott.

^ Pretty much this. Guide him, and make sure he understands all the implications.. but in the end, you pretty much have to let a 16 y.o. kid decide what he wants to do in this case. The more I think about it, this is pretty much how my parents handled me when I was a teen, and like I said, I think I turned out ok. They let me make my own decisions, and some of those ended up being bad decisions, but I learned from them and it helped shape me as an adult.

Thanks all for the thoughts.

To clarify:
Boys soccer season is August - October, training starts in June or July. So, if he quits, he will at least be quitting well before the season starts, not mid-season.

Captains were announced at last fall's end of season soccer banquet, and it was a surprise to him. He actually didn't see it as an honor, he said "oh great, now I have to play soccer next year" with kind of a smile. But he did hang up his Most Improved Player plaque on his bedroom wall when he received it at the banquet, so it seemed like he was proud of that.

He is playing club soccer now till mid-June, isn't excited about practice 2-3 times a week, but plays hard in the games. He says he likes the competition, but he doesn't like "all" the time it takes during the week (4-6 hours/week).


Positive reinforcement is probably better than threats - agreed.

I can list at least 5 things he loses if he quits (leadership experience, a nice item on his very thin resume as he looks for work, etc.). And, I'm not sure what he gains, other than 2 hours free time every weeknight for 4 months of his life. He sees that as huge and impeding the band somehow (I don't know how, since the other 4 have jobs).

I'd like to invite the whole band to our house (they practice here 2-3 times a month) and just talk about their plans for the next 6 months, year, 5 years (3 of the guys are graduating high school in June). Hopefully, they might realize "we better think this through more". But, I'm not sure I have the right to grill 4 kids that aren't my own.

Thanks.

You are probably right, but what if his next decision is to drop out of school? Do we let him decide that too?

I realize that this is the typical teenage boy rebellion - and thank God it's not drugs, or a pregnant girlfriend. But - and maybe I am over-reacting and just looking at the worst case scenario - I fear this could be the first step in heading in the wrong direction in his life. He's not excited about soccer, then quits soccer. He's not excited about school, will he drop out?

It just seemed like it was smooth sailing for the first 15 1/2 years of his life (my wife and I are blessed with 3 great kids), and now he wants to drive off the road (sorry for switching analogies midstream) and try offroading cuz it's fun. He doesn't see that it may be hard to get back on the smooth road. I'm not sure he wants to get on the smooth road. "Smooth road" defined by me as: do well in school, be involved in activities, get out of school and learn a skill so you can be a productive member of society.

Thanks again for listening doc.

Just laugh and tell him "no one likes screamo-christian metal, especially women" and then go out and find the guy who introduced him to guitar and fight him to the death.


Joking ofcourse, as I have no advice that I know will work on a 16 year old. Mine are 3 and 6 and the thought of them in their teens blankets me in complete fear.

Obviously these things are different for every person and it doesn't always work the same way for everyone.
However, I'm 19 so I might be able to help a little. I was in a band at 16, Christian hard rock/screamo band with a guy three years older and two that were one year older. We started off when only the oldest had graduated, but he had a solid job doing construction. It got in the way, but we prevailed. Once the other two graduated, they got too busy to ever practice and within a year had dissolved.

We all felt like we had a future in it and were doing great things. In reality we were only playing a few shows a year and practicing maybe once a week or every other week. We recorded songs and built stuff for our shows. The whole nine yards. But the entire time I knew that I couldn't let my hopes of being in a professional band distract me. I was, and still am, young. There's plenty of time to focus on music after high school. I ran track my senior year and didn't play with a band very much. But in that time I grew as a guitarist. Honestly, I would encourage your son not to quit soccer. The bitter truth is these Christian screamo bands don't stay together. And then he will have too much free time on his hands and regret quitting. Remind him that he can play music whenever he gets the chance, that he will have plenty of time for both. Until they have several gigs lined up regularly it would be a bad decision to drop something like he has.

Hopefully this helps a bit. I like to think I'm turning out pretty well right now.

HAHA! And, I live in fear of my 2 year old hitting her teens as well, especially since she'll be 15 on my 50th birthday (ARCKGGGHHH!!!)

I don't have much to offer in terms of pointed advice, because my parents never intervened (be it with advice, prodding, pushing, anything) on my big decisions because in high school I never really made any. I stayed in school becuase I knew I needed to and there was nothing for me if I dropped out. Plus I had friends there and didn't hate school. I ran track even though I was bad at it. Why? Crap you not, because I couldn't make the swim team. I SUCKED at sports, still do. So I was a track sissy. Wasn't much of a decision really it was run track or don't do sports at all.

But I really do want to say you need to give your boy the benefit of the doubt on this one that quitting one extracurricular activity to be a part of another extracurricular activity shouldn't be seen as a step towards making all extracurricular activities into his only activities (ie dropping out of school). Especially not as a Senior. Hell for no other reason dropping out as a senior is about as useless as it gets. IF he should ever make so much as a hint at dropping out, tell him he can as long as he has a job to pay rent to live at home. He lives under your roof and you pay the bills while he's in school. More than fair and simple enough.

Thanks. Glad to hear from your (and my son's) generation. Everything quoted above sounds exactly like my son's band - EXCEPT your last sentence. He doesn't have "hopes", they are his plans, with no plan B right now.

My son is a smart kid, and I just don't want him to paint himself into a corner, I want him to keep options open, not decide at 16 that this first band he has ever been in is his plan for life.

Thanks again for all the advice.

I haven't heard from one person yet that dropped everything for their music and has never regretted it.

I'm trying to tell him: learn a skill, get a job, support your family AND be able to afford the gear you want. That's a decent plan for life, not: throw all my eggs in one basket and see what happens.

As for the argument that soccer takes up a lot of time, I can attest to that. I was a captain on my high school varsity soccer team this year, and it felt like all through fall, all I was doing was soccer. I alos felt that the huge time commitment and priority that the coaches placed on soccer for us (the team) made it quite a bit less enjoyable than it had been in the past years. It was still enjoyable, but I honestly would have rather had more practices with my band than the soccer team. So there's a wrench for your plans

As for advice, I don't really have any. But you should make sure he knows about the success rate of full-time musicians. There are many other skills (electrical engineering, pedal building, hint hint ) that have a more secure future. Also, I know Rob's gear bribe would have worked on me

My parents were both professional musicians who dedicated their lives to their art and managed to make a good living at it. My father sang 5-6 shows a week with the Metropolitan Opera in NYC for nearly 30 years, my mother toured as a regional opera star, then went on to teach and coach award-winning singers and eventually conduct orchestras and fully-produced operas. And they both told me one thing from when I was too young to even remember it, and kept telling it to me for years: "Don't be a musician."

Why would they say such a thing, especially when I was practically born with music running in my veins? Because they knew that all the talent in the world, even combined with hard work, doesn't mean jack sh*t when it comes to having a career in music. Other puzzle pieces have to fall into place, including timing, luck, and a big break. Otherwise, even the best and most dedicated musicians don't have much of a shot. And in today's short-attention-span corporate pop music scene, it's more so than ever.

Of course, I didn't listen, and tried for years to get bands off the ground. And I had fun doing it! But it sure as hell never got me anywhere. And unless you start sooner than your kid (lessons and coaching from early on with the goal of becoming a Justin Bieber-style pop sensation), the chances of getting somewhere big are even smaller.

So maybe tell him the decision is his, but have him take a hard look at the chances of success and weigh that against his other options. And yeah - Christian Screamo guys probably don't get a whole lot of action with the ladies unless they're also nice to look at and athletically-built. So maybe convince him to do both, using the soccer to stay in shape so he can make the most of being a musician by having drooling lady-fans?

Thanks. He is not a trained musician and doesn't want to be. He's a decent rhythm guitarist and also is the band's primary "sound engineer" and mixer when they are recording. He has a great ear, and he's decent at school especially math and CAD. He doesn't want to go to college for engineering, maybe something CAD related, but at the big company I work at, all that got outsourced to India. Maybe recording engineer? But not if it gets in the way of the band.

They don't want to hit it big like Justin Beiber. They are at the stage that they think anyone who is popular has sold out. So, it's an interesting goal: I want to be a musician for my life but I don't want to get too popular.

within reason it's better to let a teenager do what they want, because when you don't they rebel against everything.

to illustrate my point for you. there is this guy I know called David, his parents worked at the school we went to and they were heavy christians
they vetted everything - music - friends - food there was once a disgusting thing they did to him which was this - his mother was doing her monthly
room inspection and she found the loose floorboard where he had hidden some porn, Greenday cds and a few other things - nothing illegal like alcohol
or anything. they took his collection of stuff dragged to a public allotment him aswell and then they made him burn it all.
this is something everyone saw - there were bound to be things going on that weren't known. anyway as soon as he was able he moved to the furthest place in the country from them - he told me they can't get him there with their control.

that is an extreme story I know but to a teenager any time you make them do something they don't want to do it feels exactly like that to them
so save the guidance for things that matter, let him have his rock star dream with his band either life is meant to be enjoyed and he won't have long
until reality comes and slaps a mortgage on him

get him interested in building pedals for his guitar if you want an element of education in it
but really coaches and sports team mates or music? music one of the wonders of the world? or running around in circles with a ball?

Thanks.

I am not saying soccer is more important than music, but captian of varsity team will look better on his resume than "garage band member". Just trying to set him up for success.

I talked with my son more today. He isn't planning to make a living with music, it is just his passion. He wants to play in a band, and maybe own a used CD store or music store. THAT, I can work with. I can help him understand the pros and cons of owning your own business, and also let him figure out how much money it will take to get started, what are the costs, etc.

Maybe CD and guitar pedal store?

So, we're talking, that's obviously good. But why he can;t still do this and soccer is puzzling to me, but maybe I should let it go.

Thanks again all.