Here is a clever video I saw this week highlighting the challenges musicians often face in getting anything like a decent amount of money for their performances:

I recognise entirely that musicians aren’t blameless – they can often be flaky and self-indulgent. However, when you pay a band to play music you aren’t just giving them money to enjoy themselves for 45 minutes – you are covering their travel to and from the event (so look locally if you want to keep that down), the purchase and maintenance of the tools they use and more. The ‘exposure’ won’t pay for a place to rehearse and polish the music.