Lamarca, I'll offer a (perhaps tortured) analogy:

I grow things, cook, bake. Found that I could get paid for doing these things at a local farmer's market. People came to SEE ME TO PAY ME for this food. I could NOT believe it. I had something to offer that lots of people CAN do - many of them better than I can. What I am doing is CHOOSING to spend my time doing something I love, and letting people pay me for it because they are doing something they love more, I guess, and so don't have time to do THIS, but still want it.

After a couple summers doing this, when my littlest went to kindergarten, I opened a small neighborhood grocery where people can find good fresh things year round, and with the goal of connecting local growers and producers with customers. Again, I have been amazed at what people are hungry for, and I see a deep connection between this and what you're talking about.

You want people to enjoy your music for the 'right' reasons. I want people to deal with food in a 'right' way, for themselves and the earth. Well, the reality is that there are people who care about these things as deeply as you do, and that relationship and sharing is payment enough. Then, there are people with money for whom you are offering a 'product'. So be it. Find the balance, take the money, and feel humbled and grateful every day if you're able to get paid for what you love.

A caveat. I am now finding myself glaring at the shaggy dog, as Dick said in the Camsco thread. I am working to find a way to make this business what I need it to be for me, and still be what the people who PAY me want it to be. Finding the balance between providing bread for the person who will only eat WHOLE WHEAT NO SUGAR FRESH ON MONDAY PLEASE (but will pay for it) and the bread I will bake for my friends dinner and wouldn't dream of being paid for, and actually doing the work I love and not just spending my time in front of a computer spreadsheet program......

Don't get me started. What I'm saying in an overwinded way is, I see where you're going. You can make it work. It's love for the work that'll do it. Just don't forget what's important to YOU.

Dani