We are not creating enough new hit acts.

Business is great at the top. Stadium shows had a stellar year. Despite constant complaints about ticket prices, the truth is people will pay the freight to see their favorite acts. But those might be the only shows they go to. As a matter of fact, the old habit of being an active concertgoer, attending multiple shows on a regular basis, seems to be fading. There are still oldsters who do this, having gotten into the habit growing up, and there are youngsters who are music fanatics going to club shows…but the acts these active youngsters are seeing frequently do not have mass appeal.

Business is off. You can read the statistics, but what you’ve got to know is in the middle there is a problem, even for arena acts…shows are no longer instant sell-outs.

Has the post-Covid surge died off? Yes, a bit. But the truth is we continue to live in an age of experiences, the one and done. You want to be there, there is strong basic desire and a bit of FOMO. People are still documenting their meals… Nothing has changed here.

Are people concerned about cash? Absolutely! And that affects grosses. However, when there is a burning desire to see an act people find the money…again and again and again. It’s a one time unique experience. You have to be there!

Do you have to go see a band that is constantly on the road one more time? In many cases, no. There is a point of satiation. Smaller acts are on the road all year, they come back to markets frequently, people are tapped out, they’ve been there and done that.

And stars used to lay fallow, take a year or two off. Now many go back on the road…to go once is a thrill. Why go twice? Especially if there’s not a slew of new music you want to hear. As for seeing the latest production… This is antithetical to a healthy music business. Then it becomes about the show. The music should be enough unto itself, the production must sit on top of it, not only not overwhelm it, but not be the main selling factor.

As for shows that didn’t sell out… It’s not because people don’t have the money, they just don’t want to go. Concerts are not like shoes or food, they are not necessary, you must feel it in your gut, you must want to go…it’s an emotion first and foremost. And that emotion is connected to the music itself. And this is where the music industry has done a poor job, it has not fostered that emotional connection to the point where people want to lay down their cash to see an act.

Now the business changed about fifteen years ago. Used to be you worked your way up to arenas. Then Sam Smith started in arenas! Word spreads just that fast, people want to lay down their cash, and once again, it’s the music that is selling tickets, not the production, not even showmanship, because no one has seen the act before! A similar situation applies to Olivia Dean.

And the interesting thing about Olivia Dean is she sits smack dab in the middle of a genre, soft R&B, that people are familiar with. You hear her music and become infatuated. Whereas most of what is purveyed by the labels, the Spotify Top 50, people don’t care about.

Of course there are hard core K-pop fans. And fans of other bands. But universal acts are few and far between. And this is a failure of marketing. Not everybody is going to like everything, but more people could like one thing.

The labels can no longer break acts, and therefore they have become safe, conservative. They don’t build any talent from scratch. They just sign what gets a reaction online or fits in with the pop and hip-hop genres. There is no excitement there.

It’s a business. But the nation is not music crazy. It might be TikTok crazy. In the past two decades music has abdicated its power as the leading edge art form.

So whose responsibility is it? To develop new music that is exciting and different?

Well, promoters have picked up the slack a bit, promoting new acts, but their system is not as efficient as the one the major labels employed in the old days…terrestrial radio, print and television. With these avenues on life support, everybody seems to have thrown their hands in the air and abdicated power.

But there are still acts that appeal to broad swaths of the public, like Adele…how do we make more like her?

Well, in truth Adele broke big before terrestrial radio listening totally cratered, but…

If we want the live business to burgeon, to generate more revenue instead of less, we must create acts the public wants to see. Easy concept, hard to execute.

TV competition shows don’t work… Some of these people can sing, but that is no longer enough, none of them become stars, because they don’t write! And many of the pop stars don’t write or do so as part of a committee. The public reacts to and resonates most with music that is written by those who sing it. Culture sells music.

And we have too many acts with poor singers. This was never a thing, it is now. Go to club shows…these acts have fans, but word can never spread because the lead singer just doesn’t have the chops.

Sure, Chappell Roan broke through, aided by festival appearances, kudos, but who else? We used to have a rolling list of new hit acts. Universal doesn’t even seem to be in this business anymore, merging Interscope and Capitol. The majors can coast on their catalogs, it doesn’t look like we can depend upon them to move the needle, they’re risk averse.

And concert promotion is a nuts and bolts business. You have to make money. And with people consuming less alcohol, the business is more challenging than ever.

Where are the acts people have to see, are dying to see?

There are a good number of superstars. But most of them have their roots in the old system, of radio and print and TV exposure. As for labels…their idea of artist development is to break a single album, whereas labels used to stick by acts for five LPs, growing their business.

So where are these new acts going to come from?

There will always be a music business, people will want to go to shows, but to grow…you’ve got to motivate the public, and you do this via new acts!

We need to promote quality acts that don’t sound just like everybody else in the marketplace. Of course it’s the public that must create this music and…with music absent from schools, it’s those who went to music school in Britain and Sweden who are triumphing. It’s not rocket science. You build from the roots up.

On top of this we have the issue of turning the public on to great new music, something that was not fixed with playlists, which remains a problem in the digital era. I’ve always said that Spotify could promote an act a week or a month…but the politics are a problem, labels whose acts are not chosen will complain.

Do we wait until something happens organically, or do we goose the system?

Once again, we need to have better systems to make people aware of quality new acts.

But we also have to inspire, find and promote quality new acts. Make people excited about music in general, not just one or two acts. We can start with tracks…the public is eager for great ones. Forget the career, the detritus of mediocre music, this is the service that radio once fulfilled. We actually need a gatekeeper, we’re living in a Tower of Babble, and no one seems to want to take the reins.

Where are the opening acts trying to blow the headliner off the stage?

Well, opening acts have been so bad that most people don’t even arrive to see them. It didn’t used to be this way, the undercard was a core part of the show, not anymore.

So we can debate ticket prices all day long, talk about bots and fees and… That’s for shows that everybody wants to go to. How about the shows that are struggling, how about quality new acts without traction…who is talking about those, who is championing those?

That is the question.