Think Out Loud

Touring bands face challenges as venues drop COVID mandates

By Julie Sabatier (OPB)
May 5, 2022 12 p.m. Updated: May 5, 2022 8:45 p.m.

Broadcast: Thursday, May 5

Typhoon performs from its new album, "Offerings," at the OPB studio.

Typhoon performing at the OPB studio in 2017.

Dave Christensen / OPB

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Musicians who have held off on touring during the pandemic are starting to venture out again. Bands and their fans are thrilled to be together again in real time, but there are still significant risks and challenges for the people on stage. Now that many venues have dropped their mask and vaccine mandates, musicians are concerned about having to cancel tour dates if they get sick. We talk with two Portland-based musicians — MAITA, and Kyle Morton, lead singer of Typhoon — about the joys and fears associated with touring right now.


The following transcript was created by a computer and edited by a volunteer:

Dave Miller: Musicians who have held off on touring during the pandemic are starting to venture out again. Bands and their fans are thrilled to be together again in the same place at the same time but the pandemic is not over and there are still big risks and challenges for people on stage. Now that many venues have dropped their mask and vaccine mandates, musicians are concerned about having to cancel tour dates if they get sick. For more on what it’s like to tour now, I’m joined by Portland artists MAITA and Kyle Morton, who is the lead singer and bandleader of Typhoon. Welcome to you both.

MAITA: Hi.

Kyle Morton: Thanks for having me.

Miller: I want to start with the positives because it’s easy to focus on the opposite, and we’ll get there to talk about the challenges and fears, but Kyle first, what’s the best part of being on tour?

Morton: Yeah, it’s good to lead with this. And, we haven’t played shows in four years. Typhoon’s last show was in 2019. So getting back out here and just just being in a room with people, just playing the songs live. We released the record in 2021 and I’m sure MAITA can relate to this but it’s just weird going through that and then just kind of watching your streaming numbers. There’s something super anticlimactic about how we have this record in the world and then we’re sort of just watching blips on a computer on a computer screen. It’s just been really cathartic to be out here.

Miller: MAITA, have you been able to find joy playing in front of people again?

MAITA: Absolutely. I mean at the end of the day, that’s really the reason why I got into playing music, that was the moment that I wanted to be an artist was at another artist’s show. And I think that for a lot of people who form relationships with music, it’s finally getting to see it live in a setting where everything is happening all at once and everyone is sharing in that and there’s this kind of collective energy that comes together like a cumulative sort of energy and you can’t mimic that over any kind of screen, I would say.

Morton: Yeah.

Miller: Can you feel, MAITA, a hunger on the part of your audiences that you didn’t feel before?

MAITA: I think so. I feel like people are really excited and I feel that sometimes after the show as well, just talking to people, as well as during. I think people have been waiting for a long time for this and at the same time, things start to feel really normal, really fast and at the same time I feel like people seem very comfortable and there’s a kind of ease to it, where it’s like, oh yeah, this is what we’ve been missing and here we are again. And it just feels right.

Miller: It’s such an important point. It’s fascinating how quickly after something wasn’t normal for so long, how we can go back to that feeling of normal again. Kyle, you’re on tour right now, you’re in a car in a parking lot in Atlanta, is that right?

Morton: Yeah, yeah. This is a real tour experience. Actually, the train just went by, so yeah, I might get hassled here.

Miller: Does it feel like the audiences are different or is it just you thinking they’re different?

Morton: I would just like to tack on to what MAITA was saying, the normalization thing is real. Right now it’s happening differently, at least from my point of view, between musicians and the audience because the reality for musicians is, for most folks, if somebody gets COVID-19 you cancel shows and that’s just what happens. It’s financially ruinous. It’s a big problem. But with the crowds, we’ve been to 15 cities now on this little run and it’s just really interesting to see the various levels in places where three weeks ago, everyone was wearing a mask and now it’s all bets are off. But regarding the people that come out to shows to answer your question, we love them. We’re so happy people are coming out. And there does seem to be a way in which it feels palpable, that we’ve all been through something and that it’s hard to take this for granted now when it just went away for two years.

Miller: Kyle, you put out an album during the pandemic as well. Am I right that it was largely stitched together with recordings that band members did on their own?

Morton: Yeah. Mostly. I think I joked on OPB at the time that otherwise we could have constituted a super spreader event because there’s a lot of us.

Miller:  It’s a big band.

Morton:  Yeah.

Miller: So did that mean you had to sort of relearn how to play together?

Morton: Yeah. Yeah. Which was weird. We’ve never done it like that. We had to learn the songs from our record, which you mentioned is called Sympathetic Magic. And then we have actually released two. It turns out having some downtime helps make records. But kind of reversing the normal way that we do songs which is write, then arrange and then play it live and then start recording, this was kind of like reconstructing it from what we’ve done in the studio. It was strange but it made me very happy to play the songs in a room with these folks.

Miller: MAITA to go back to the early days of the pandemic and then sort of zoom forward, how many of your tours were canceled?

MAITA: Oh, I don’t remember, maybe two or three. Well, at a certain point, I think we stopped announcing, we stopped confirming them. We would just get holds and so we would get a batch of holds and then we’d wait and see what would happen and then we would move them.

Miller: So the hold was maybe in six months, things will be better? So we’ll tentatively plan this. But then, and then it wasn’t better?

Morton: Exactly. The venue would set the date  aside for us and then we just have to reschedule and reschedule. So I think that in the very early days it was about cancellations. And then after that it was just postponing and waiting and I’m just trying to find the right moment when it seemed actually feasible and safe.

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Miller: But in other words, over and over, a tentative return was ripped away or pushed further into the future?

MAITA: Yes.

Miller: How did you decide then that it was time to start touring again?

Morton:  It’s hard. I think one of the big challenges that we faced as artists was feeling the sense of responsibility that it was in some part up to us to figure out how to set the tone for whether it was safe or not. And, I struggled with that a lot thinking about whether or not it was responsible to play a show or go on tour and gosh, I waffled back and forth so many times with a lot of shows. And I think at the end of the day, we just had to take into account every piece of information we could find, like how infectious it is COVID-19 right now? How dangerous is it? What kind of precautions can we take? And, also what is everyone else doing?  I just had to figure out weighing the risks with the benefits of how much do people want to go to shows right now and how much do they need music and how risky is it.

Miller:  When you were putting all of that  almost impossible calculation together on your own because it’s not like anybody else was going to make this decision for you. This was down to you. How much of it was about your own sense of risk or  bandmates’ risk and how much of it was about the risk to people to, to your fans, people who are going to your show or the people working in those venues? These are all these sorts of different groups of people.

Morton: Yeah,  I think it’s a lot easier to lose sleep over trying to figure out whether it’s safe for the people who aren’t within our band because that’s really easy to just ask them and say, “how do you feel?” And then to get that verbal understanding because we know exactly what we’re getting into. And I think a big part of it for me was feeling like thinking about everyone else within the system just because you can’t really know what everyone is feeling. And it’s so simple to look inside yourself and say, okay, I feel okay about this. So, I think that was the bulk of it.

Miller: Kyle, how did you all decide it was time to hit the road again.

MAITA: Man, well we booked the tour in 2020, which a lot of people were thinking we’ll be out of the woods by then by a long shot. And that’s not how it played out. After that, it was like, we didn’t have to ever postpone our date because we had booked them so far in the future. But the whole time I sort of felt I was playing chicken with this thing. Like, well it’s going to cancel, here comes Delta, here comes Omicron, here comes, whatever. It’s going to cancel for some reason or the other and then still kind of labor away at it as if it’s going to happen and then when we got to it, our hope was we had a lot, like MAITA was talking about, we had a lot of sort of band consensus meetings about how do we feel, what’s the data? And going into this, it’s not where we hoped it would be and it’s been a little fraught. I should mention a lot of it kind of rests on, I had a kidney transplant, so I’m kind of the lowest common denominator as far as who is at risk for COVID-19. So it was, I think a lot of folks looked to me to see what, when I felt safe out here. And I mean, I don’t know, I don’t know if there’s a clear answer to that.

Miller: Did you have masking or vaccine requirements in place for the various venues or did they have them in place when you started the tour?

Morton: That’s an interesting question. Yeah. Almost all of the venues did. And then almost all the venues dropped them at a certain point and we asked them to keep them in place and for all the reasons. I would say just sort of anecdotally like some of the venues did a really good job with that. Some said they were checking the vaccine cards and just didn’t. With the masking thing, I’ve really found that we have to as a band, we have to kind of like use our megaphone for that. So we have signs we put up. And I give a little spiel at the beginning of the show and with a couple exceptions, I’ve been really impressed with folks, even if they didn’t show up wearing a mask, then go into that mode, without so far being heckled.

Miller: Can you give us a sense for what that spiel is before you start a show? You go out there as the lead singer and what do you say?

Morton: It’s different every night and it’s kind of reading the room, but we play a little intro bit and then I say thanks for coming out. The only reason we’re here is because we didn’t get COVID-19 in the last city because they masked up so, please just pay it forward. Something along those lines. If I have to go to defcon one, I say  I have a kidney transplant and you’re like, you probably read about us in the newspaper. So putting a mask on, that’s sort of been the approach, it’s not going to be perfect, I’m always gonna look out and see somebody’s smiling face and have mixed feelings about it. But at this point, we just want to finish out the tour. We want to protect our fans who are at risk. And somehow make this make this thing make sense and be worthwhile.

Miller: MAITA, What have you experienced on tour in terms of your audience is masking or responsiveness to those kinds of questions?

MAITA: I experienced a pretty similar thing when we went on tour back at the end of February for almost a month. And definitely city by city,  it differed a lot. Venue by venue differed a lot. And I think at first we were a bit shocked at how quickly all of the mandates were dropped. And even within each venue how a lot of those that booked the show understanding were no longer in place and I think we were just a little bit like it was, it was so soon after starting to tour that this happened. And so we weren’t quite sure how to react. And I think I felt a little bit powerless because it’s really for me, especially because conflict is hard for me. So when you see an entire venue, the promoter, the staff, like when no one is wearing a mask, it’s so hard to say, hey, this is something that we need. And I think since I wasn’t used to it yet and we were just surprised by it, we didn’t really have the courage maybe to advocate for that. And I think now going forward that we’re used to it and we really kind of understand what’s going on a little better, I think it’s a conversation that is important to have from the stage with the venue.  And, I think one thing also, too, is especially, especially if you’re going to talk to an artist, one on one, like at a merch booth or something that’s–I think the number one place where a lot of these COVID-19 transmissions are happening.

Miller: As opposed to if you’re separated if you’re on a riser and you’re 10 ft away.

MAITA: And I think that if you just can’t bring yourself to wear a mask during the show at the very, very least like if you’re going to be closer than six ft to the artist, that is the time to really, really do it because those one on one encounters, I think we’re realizing, are the place where we feel the most not safe, I would say.

Miller: Kyle, how many musician friends of yours or acquaintances have tested positive in the last few months?

Morton: A lot, luckily I’m knocking on any wood I can find here. One of our bandmates tested positive about 10 days before we left on our tour and then luckily recovered and tested negative multiple times so we were able to leave. But I’ve never known so many people to be infected with it and I’m grateful that it seems to be the most people I know were all vaccinated and are having mild symptoms, but I don’t know if I could give you a hard number on, It just seems to be pretty much everywhere. Every day I see bands canceling shows, somebody tested positive.

Miller: How would that work financially for you if  you have a show tonight in Atlanta, for example, if right now one of the band member’s symptoms, gets a quick test, and tests positive?

Morton: It’s sort of game over and that’s sort of the game, you tour until/if somebody gets COVID-19 because our protocol, which we had to kind of come up with and I borrowed with some other artists that have done from some other artists that have done some touring, but that person quarantines and we’re going to have to leave them in whatever city and put them up in the hotel and hopefully they can rejoin us depending on where it falls on the tour. But the reality is if somebody tests positive, chances are, you know, we’re traveling with nine people, and someone else is going to as well. So it’s like the whole thing really is for us, just about prevention and that has really informed the mood of the tour, which is, it’s been unlike any other. We’ve toured so many times and this is unlike anything else. We all celebrated after a New York show because we came to the point where  the tour was basically solvent, we’ve played enough shows that we weren’t going to go into a horrible amount of debt over it and that’s the reality.

Miller: A lot of musicians are facing. In other words, you start a tour not knowing if you will make money, you have to get to a certain point in order to even have it even break even?

Morton: Yeah. I’m so glad you all are doing this show because I think this is the thing that gets missed. Tours have to be planned so far in advance and there’s a considerable amount of startup costs and labor that go into them. I’m renting vans, paying crews. Depending on the level of the tour, it’s a significant amount of investment and then if you go out, play a show, get COVID-19 and have to scrap it, that’s a financial disaster. And not to even mention that, this is what you’ve been planning all year. This is the big tour and then it’s done and now we all need to find jobs  or whatever it is. A lot of people count on revenue from this and it’s been really hard and that’s part of the calculus for folks touring again is.  How long can an artist just sit and not do anything? I mean playing shows is how we make any money.

Miller: MAITA, I want to see if I can bring this plane back up to the joy altitude. That’s where we started.

Morton: Sorry about that. We’re right in the middle of this.

Miller: No, no, this is what I wanted. We wanted to understand to get a full true picture of what it’s like for touring artists today. But MAITA, you’re heading on the road again soon. In fact, the two of you are going to be playing together as well soon. MAITA, what are you most looking forward to for the next tour?

MAITA: Yeah, so I’m packing literally right as we speak to go on a little run with another Pacific Northwest band called Forest Brothers. Since we did that first tour which was such a whirlwind with a lot to process and now that I feel like I finally found some momentum with the rhythm that is touring, I think that these upcoming dates are going to really feel like the treat that we’ve been waiting for. They’ll have the risk part, the part where we’re worried, the part that we have to figure out how to do things like we still have to think about it, but we figured out how to think about it. And so I think that I can expect that there will be a lot more relaxing and enjoying and being present in the moment in the good parts of touring because it was hard work to get the machine back up and running. There’s a lot to think about and it’s just getting used to another job almost. It is another job that we’re getting trained backup for and I feel like now I can finally enjoy it.

Miller: MAITA and Kyle Morton, best of luck to you. Stay safe and thank you.

Morton: Thanks so much for having us.

MAITA: Thank you.

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