Photo of a concert crowd at Austin City LimitsThe Austin Music census revealed a lot of issues currently impacting the industry and issues that could make it crumble in the future. A lot of the data, and articles analyzing the data, showed the biggest problems to be for/with the venues and personal life of musicians. In the statesman article, a Facebook comment mentioned over saturation to be one of the underlying issues. According to the comment, it has been an issue for years.

I think a good way to utilize the data is to show that over saturation and how it has changed in Austin. I wonder how the permitting system regulates the incoming venues? How did the city plan and manage for the music scene before the most recent population boom? When did rent increase so much that venue managers started charging musicians more, which in turn hurts the musicians bottom line and how they make a living.

It would be great to create a map outlining where the venues are and be able to have a slider show how locations/density changed in each decade. I would like to do the same for where musicians live, or where they most often played since living location may be too personal of information. I would also like to have a spider-web graphic to show how affordable housing, livelihood, age/gender of musicians are all impacted by how the problems at the venue level.

Music in Austin: Troubles at the venues