Music consumer Travis Bleen cruises Spotify, a free Web service, for songs. The Internet has forced the music industry to evolve and now more bands and musicians have a chance to build sustainable followings, while fewer become rich and famous. (Photo by Billy Shannon/CNS)

Before Hurricane Irene barreled through upstate New York and destroyed the converted chicken coop where his band recorded, musician James Felice called the small structure home, sleeping next to a wood stove with blankets draped for privacy.

But since last fall, the burly accordion player for the young, gritty Americana group The Felice Brothers has moved into a one-bedroom apartment while his band mates share a small house nearby.

In an age where the Internet has forced the music industry’s business model to evolve, the Felice Brothers are one of many bands that are able to carve sustainable, if sometimes frugal, livings for themselves.

While Congress continues to debate how best to battle online piracy of copyrighted material, Sam Howard-Spink, a music business professor at New York University, thinks that free music online has hurt historically large profits for record labels more than it has hurt musicians’ income.

“The Internet has started to do what it was predicted to do,” he said. “It has created a middle class of music creators.”

Still, playing music as a means to make money is very often a struggle. Record labels now often wait for bands to develop a following before deciding whether to pump money into them. Before the Web, most musicians and bands had to either get signed by a major record label or find day jobs.

Now, Web-based outlets like Spotify and YouTube bring almost no direct money to rising bands but do allow for wider visibility and access to music-lovers who may fork over cash to see a show when the band rolls into town.

“Frankie’s Gun,” The Felice Brothers’ biggest hit, has drawn nearly 300,000 views on YouTube. Yet the band, which has produced five albums on independent labels since forming in 2006, must tour as much as six months out of the year to make money. “If we don’t play shows, we don’t eat,” Felice said.

Touring accounts for as much as 90 percent of the band’s income. When on the road, cruising through bars, clubs and small theaters, Felice said the band, centered on his brother Ian’s dust-choked vocals, averages five shows and 50 hours driving each week.

Until recently, the group relied on a large, dilapidated Winnebago to carry them to dots on the map. Eight men lived in the camper on wheels for two months during the band’s most recent tour.

“You can imagine it gets crowded and gross very easily,” Felice said. “Eight guys trying to sleep in 98-degree Georgia mug makes for one awful night.”

Jackie Otero, an independent music consultant and professor at Full Sail University in Orlando, Fla., said fewer bands are able to get rich and famous these days, but more can climb the ranks toward gaining a sustainable following.

“Live performance has always been the bread and butter for bands,” she said, noting that royalty rates at record labels are and always were generally low. Still, “it’s expensive to tour – lodging, food on the road, gas. I know a lot of bands that tour and they barely break even, but they’re doing it to get exposure.”

The Sawtooth Bluegrass Band, a five-piece based in Minnesota, is still determining whether to take the leap of faith of playing music full-time for a living.

“I think we could make it work,” said Jesse Moravec, the mandolin player in the well-polished band made up mostly of college students. The group sleeps in a small popup camper when they meander through the Midwest for shows in the summer, making enough money to avoid getting regular summer jobs.

The Carolina Chocolate Drops, a Grammy-winning throwback folk string band, take a 15-passenger van when on the road, and can now afford to stay in hotels.

“It’s changed over the last few years,” said the group’s banjo player Dom Flemons over the phone before a concert in Kentucky. “It’s more breathable for us now. We have days off between shows here and there.”

The North Carolina-based group revives old southern songs like “Your Baby Ain’t Sweet Like Mine,” and, according to Flemons, is doing fairly well financially, traveling around and playing theaters, arts centers and opera houses.

Flemons sees the Web as a tool with mostly upsides, like allowing for greater access to potential fans.

But Felice said his band at times complains about having virtually all their music available online at no cost. “But I think we all know that this is the new reality of the music industry,” he added. “It helps bands like us become known. It helps get people to shows.”

With a recent uproar among users over anti-piracy legislation, including the SOPA bill, a debate over whether musicians are being short-changed has been reignited. But with the benefits of widened exposure and fan-fueled social media promotion, musicians could see negative impacts from piracy restrictions.

“Obscurity is a much, much greater problem for the vast majority of bands than the potential loss of a few sales,” Howard-Spink said.

Felice, a gregarious 26-year-old, is content with the band’s situation and said they’re slowly approaching the middle class by doing what they love. “At the end of the day, we earn enough money to create the kind of music we want,” Felice said. “Because of a relatively small group of amazing fans, we are able to live very fulfilling, if somewhat simple lives.”

Email: wis2105@columbia.edu