I'm not opposed to criticizing people if they've done something I disagree with, but are we just taking general shots at Mike now for the hell of it?
No.
I know I'm not; I totally get the concept of being exhausted from travel, but I was just observing that things seem to have changed. Not better, not worse, just different. If the price of not being in a 5,000 seat theater band is more travel and less fan-time, so be it, but it DOES seem to be a different approach than, say, 15 years ago.
Well, it's one thing slugging it out in a van when you're 25 and another when you're 50.
I'm sure the travel arrangements and they itinerary could be better, but then you'd be cutting into the profit margin. There's also a lot more entertainment competition than there was 25 years ago.
It's seems Mike sometimes catches it for the musical choices he makes but a lot of it is out of his hands. Trying to make a living making music isn't as easy as it once was, but I think he still manages to do a lot of what he wants to do.
As much as I love Flying Colors, Transatlantic, Liquid Tension Experiment or Neal Morse, none of those bnads are suddenly going to go on a World Slavery Tour.
Gigs are the major income for most musicians these days.
So I guess what I'm saying in a roundabout way is that the circumstances are different and there's more than one reason for it.