If you want to make it big as a professional musician, most people suggest that you deal with the practicalities first, such as getting a day job which will help you transition into your professional music career gradually.
Unfortunately, this does not work in most cases, and here are a few reasons why:
Reason #1: No effective exit strategy
While getting a day job will pay you a lot of money, the truth is that you will not be able to gradually drop the number of hours that you work while transitioning into your career as a professional musician because it just does not work that way.
For this, you must find work that allows you to drop or lift the number of hours depending on your time requirements to focus on becoming a professional musician, thus, a full-time job will not help.
Reason #2: Lifestyle changes
While most people take full-time jobs that give a better pay, the transition into a music career will not be easy, especially if you have a family of your own. Having a full-time job means you will have to quit at some point in order to pursue a career in music. And as an amateur in the industry, you will not be paid that much in the beginning.
Reason #3: Inability to take advantage of opportunities
Just in case you have been putting some great music together with your band while working at a day job, what will you do then if a record label signs you on yet offers something not much? Will you leave your day job then?
It is a difficult position to be in, do you agree?
Reason #4: No quality time and energy left
Working a day job means that you will spend the most productive time in your life doing things that are not related to music. This will definitely not help you start a music career, and will require much longer time to get you where you want to go.