Live music sucks on TV.

We all know that, and anybody who’s tried to turn it into a business has lost their shirt. Turns out you have to be there.

And now that’s where everybody wants to be, THE SHOW!

So I’m returning to a series on Amazon Prime last night and I see the logo for Stagecoach on the home screen. This I have to check out. After all, it’s about ten, when the headliners go on. But what I get is a T-Mobile advertisement that’s so offensive… The host is not endearing, it’s endless and I turn it off and go back to my show.

But when that’s over…

I go back to the stream to see Luke Combs on the Mane Stage.

Now I just finished watching the Ron Delsener documentary earlier in the day. And they showed Simon & Garfunkel’s concert in Central Park in 1981 and the audience size was OVERWHELMING!

That’s the way it was on TV last night.

This ain’t no Coachella, this is closer to JazzFest, where people park their asses all day in front of the main stage waiting for the headliners.

The configuration is completely different from Coachella. And by time the headliners take the stage, everybody in attendance is watching, it’s an endless sea of people and that’s impressive and I felt left out.

I don’t want to see influencers parade their wares, I’ve got no problem eating gourmet food, but what I enjoy most, what I go to the show for, is to be a member of a mass-attuned multitude, all on the same page, paying attention to the act on stage.

I mean most people are so far away that it’s not even worth shooting video. Sure, you can take pics of the screens placed strategically throughout the crowd, but what’s the purpose in that?

No, at that point, you’re just there for the music. It’s been a long day, you’re talked out, you’ve been waiting for this…

For such a long time.

And the guy on stage…

Doesn’t look like anybody in the Spotify Top 50. Oh, these people exist in real life, just not in entertainment, not where you can see anybody’s body. And if someone even slightly overweight appears on television, they make a big deal out of it. But Luke Combs… Looks like a guy you went to high school with. And one of the great things about him is he evidences no charisma. And that makes him even more attractive. Big time music has become all about artifice…outfits, makeup, hard drives…Luke Combs looks like he dressed to work on his car.

But he’s into it.

And he calls Bailey Zimmerman on stage to do their new single, “Backup Plan” and I get it the first time through, and that almost never happens anymore.

And then Luke turns it over to the band and…

They start playing Skynyrd’s “Gimme Three Steps” and…

That’s when I start to wonder…why don’t we have this in rock?

Oh, we’ve got Active Rock. You need to go to school to understand it, know all the history of how we got here. Maybe its fans like being outsiders, because one thing is for sure, they’re passionate but this music is not mainstream.

What is mainstream? Hip-hop and overproduced pop. Everybody’s fearful of AI, but this music sounds like it was made by AI. You read the fantastic press and then you hear the track and you go back to the oldies, this stuff is so bad. I know, I know, it’s commerce, but there’s not much art.

And then we’ve got country music.

Which lost its twang long ago.

Country is the rock of the seventies. With tons of Fenders and Gibsons… And not so many hard drives.

Sure, there’s a ton of drivel. Written by committee numbers about babies and church and lame dates, but…that’s not all of it.

I know, I know, you hate country because its epicenter is in the south and all those people are rednecks, but…

They’re not. At this point in time, country is a big tent. It’s truly the sound of America. Hip-hop? You can talk the talk, even dress accordingly, but most people’s lives are far away from this paradigm, too often the music is a cartoon.

But this guy Luke Combs… He looks like you and me. He’s fronting a band of real musicians and this is quite the opposite of Charli XCX, who we had to hear about ad infinitum last summer who played Coachella sans band…at least that’s what I heard. Singing to track. So you can dance and prance… Once again, that’s commerce, but it’s far from the essence of music.

Now after I shut the TV off Garth Brooks came out to sing “Friends in Low Places” and…

If you were there you swooned. This was the surprise magic you were hoping for.

But what resonated even more was Luke’s subsequent appearance with the Backstreet Boys to sing “I Want It That Way.”

“You are my fire

The one desire”

I had to buy that CD, entitled “Millennium,” just to hear “I Want It That Way” whenever I wanted, which turned out to be quite a bit.

It’s got 1,744,938343 streams on Spotify. That’s right, almost TWO BILLION!

But the act was poohed-poohed by the skinny jeans/leather jacket crowd. 

All I know is I used to blast that CD in my car, starting with the opener, “Larger Than Life,” which then slipped into “I Want It That Way” and “Show Me the Meaning of Being Lonely.”

You know what the triple-header opening of “Millennium,” nearly as good as the three songs that open “Slippery When Wet,” have in common?

MAX MARTIN!

The best producer of the last thirty years, who started in a metal band and can write and sing hits seemingly at will.

A hit is a hit is a hit, but there are very few one listen records anymore.

But just like the boy bands were put down at the turn of the century, dismissed as dreck by the supposed cognoscenti, the same thing has happened to modern country.

And country is a big tent. There’s not only the radio stuff, but Chis Stapleton, Willie Nelson, even all those Americana acts like Jason Isbell. This is where it’s happening, but just like the media missed Trump, they’re missing this music story.

If you’re hiring a million writers, putting so much in that the cut can’t breathe and remixing the track ad infinitum…

You’re missing the point.

We want humanity. Life. We want to feel connected.

And I felt connected with the crowd last night.

Didn’t matter what anybody’s politics were, because we’re more alike than dissimilar. It’s the power of the music.

When done right it lifts you up and makes life worth living.

And even though the audio sucks, the excitement of the audience is palpable in this Backstreet Boys/Luke Combs video:

View this post on Instagram

A post shared by Backstreet Boys (@backstreetboys)

Everybody’s singing along. They all know the track whereas today’s number ones elude most everybody.

Sure, the landscape has changed, but so has the music.

I WANT IT THAT WAY!

In the of 1969, between my 2nd and 3rd year in law school at UT in Austin, I got a summer job at ASCAP in the membership department. At the time, BMI had more rock acts on the charts than ASCAP. I talked my boss into buying two tickets to all the the Schaefer Beer concerts at Wollman Rink and letting me be ASCAP’s “goodwill ambassador” to meet the acts or their manager. Ron Delsener was great. He helped me out. We would chat at the shows. While watching the Jeff Beck group with Rod Stewart, Janis Joplin and friends were standing next to me. She was looking at Rod Stewart. I heard her say, “I’d like to get my hands on that little Limey.” I saw Arthur Brown with his flaming helmet singing atop of the PA. If a fortune teller had told me that in the 80’s I would get Arthur and Jimmy Carl Black a gig painting my Mother’s house in Austin, I wouldn’t have believed her. The two of them had a painting company called Gentlemen of Color. That’s a story for another day.

Back to Ron Delsener. In April of 1972, I had joined Spirit as lead singer and bass player when Jay and Mark left to form Jo Jo Gunne. Spirit was headlining Carnegie Hall. Dr. John was the opening act. As I was coming down the narrow stairway from the dressing room to go onstage, Ron was coming up. He looked at me in amazement. “I didn’t know you were in this band.” I said, “I’m working for you tonight.” That wasn’t the last time I saw Ron. But, all my memories of him were good ones. A stand up guy.

Looking forward to seeing the documentary,

Al Staehely

__________________________________________

Many fond memories of working with Ron in the ’70’s/80’s. I was told later in life he had a real dread of passing away. Hope he found peace with that. Always a gentleman and always a dapper dresser. No jeans and t’s.

Willie Perkins

__________________________________________

I worked for Ron in the mid 90s. I was in office when the Sillerman meetings were happening but left before the acquisition.

Ron is a force of nature for sure and a true original, a total character – a man of his time much like Bill Graham. But having not yet seen the movie I wonder how much time is spent on Mitch Slater (who passed away way too young)?  He was a big part of Ron’s success during that period.

I’m sure others will write in with additional color but Delsener/Slater (the company name before Sillerman bought them) was the training ground for some of the best names in management and touring – many of whom are still active today.

Rishon Blumberg

PS – Ron’s sister Harriet who worked at his company too and subsequent merged ones just left her gig very recently at Live Nation.

Something definitely was in the water at the Delsener household growing up. Amazing work ethics.

__________________________________________

Love Ron.  His granddaughter / daughter are wonderful people who grew up w my daughter.

Saw Ron back stage from Roger Waters to Van Halen.

Always treated me like family and I’m inspired by his relentless work ethic.   One of the great ones!   Oh and I grew up watching his rock concerts in the 70’s on tv after SNL.   Then it was great to become friends in the 90’s.

TRUE LEGEND AND MORE IMPORTANTLY A GREAT MAN.

Stratis Morfogen
Dot.Cards/stratism

__________________________________________

I can’t wait to watch this. Ron was one of the local promoters my Dad had a lot of respect for. They worked together often and were friends.

Michael Weintraub

__________________________________________

Ron was probably my favorite promoter from the ‘old days’ when I worked for APA and The William Morris Agency approx around 1970. Always a gentleman and a pleasure to work with! The Ultimate professional.  Another favorite of mine with Bill Graham RIP.

Sincerely,

Iona Elliott

__________________________________________

Graham cut an exclusive deal with the venue behind his back and renamed it the Fillmore East.

Gary’s shows in 1967 included a double header show by The Who, Jimi Hendrix, Jeff Beck, The Yardbirds w Jimmy Page, and Otis Redding.

Ron recently told me that he and Gary shared office space around this time.

Best,

Josh Kurfirst

__________________________________________

Thanks for the heads up on this one. I went to many shows that Delsener produced — starting with the ones at Wollman Rink in Central Park, forgot he did those. And many downtown at the Palladium, uptown at the Beacon, and in-between, the free shows in the Park, Carnegie Hall, and MSG. Perhaps the only time I saw him onstage was at the Palladium, 1978, trying to calm an agitated, upset crowd after Van Morrison walked offstage after only about 20 minutes…show over! At least Rockpile did a burning opening set. I did see Van a couple other times subsequently, and he was fantastic.

Thanks for your great letters, podcasts and Sirius/XM show!

Todd Ellenberg

__________________________________________

Hi Bob – One evening around 1999/2000, I was hanging out in a lounge on East 27th Street in Manhattan. Ron Delsener was there assessing the interior design of the lounge together with an architect. I learned later that Ron was planning to do some renovations at the Roseland Ballroom (now a 62-story luxury rental property). I had been introduced to Ron through Donald Trump in 1996/1997 when Donald had 55 Wall Street under contract. I toured Ron through the historic grand banking hall as Donald suggested it would make a “tremendous” performance venue. The hall is now run by Cipriani (Cipriani Wall Street) catering to large corporate events. I thought to reintroduce myself to Ron and say hello. He was gracious, we talked a bit. After a while Ron said to me “you wanna hang out?” I hadn’t heard that expression since the 1970’s. I felt wistful, but solaced. It became clear that Ron was somewhat smitten by my friend Staci, a tall, strikingly attractive brunette. We explained to Ron that we were waiting for her fiance to join us, who owned the restaurant across the street. Ron invited us to see David Byrne at the Roseland Ballroom which he was promoting that evening. “Come for a little while and I’ll drive you back here to meet your boyfriend,” he suggested. Why not? We got into his black stretch limousine and drove up to West 52nd Street. Ron asked Staci if she liked caviar. Who doesn’t? We drank vodka and ate caviar at the Russian Vodka Room (still there) next to the venue. Afterwards, the three of us walked into the Roseland. Multiple “Hi Mr. Delsener” greetings were hurled our way. Walking down a hall backstage we literally ran into David Byrne who was already dressed in his iconic oversized pink shag pants. Ron introduced us. David was incredibly polite and relaxed considering he was about to go on stage. I recall that the show was full if not sold out. The VIP section was a raised floor, audience right, where there were four small tables, each with four chairs. The three of us sat at one of the tables, the other three tables remained empty. After about four songs Staci and I really had to get back downtown. Ron said “I’ll give you a ride back as promised. I really need to meet this guy…”

Mike Gochman

There were 216 million people in the United States in 1975. There are 347 million people in the United States today. So don’t compare the concert scene of yesteryear with the concert scene of today. There are over 50% more people! That’s why so many acts can sell out stadiums, which are not getting any bigger (as a matter of fact, a lot of baseball parks have gotten smaller!) You may not have heard of the act, but they can sell out Madison Square Garden!

There is a limited pool of dollars at streaming services. And not everyone can get paid. You can complain about this, be wistful for the days of yore, but in the days of yore most acts would not be able to play in the game at all. Recording was expensive, and distribution was closed and the truth is you have fewer barriers to entry today, but climbing the ladder to success is ever slower.

Movies come and go. When done right, records are forever. However, all the hype is frontloaded. Many of these highly-hyped albums fail in the marketplace, if for no other reason than expectations are so high. Unless you have the kind of music that many will cotton to, be wary of the overhype.

Nobody can press the button. There is no easy path to success. If the major labels can’t break an act, what are the odds that you can go to the top quickly? Essentially zero.

Don’t follow trends, they mean less than ever before. Be yourself. This is not the late seventies when disco ruled, nor the nineties or first decade of this century when we lived in a hip-hop nation. Everybody’s into different things. Chasing trends is a fool’s errand, if anything it short circuits your career, because true believers, upon whom you depend, will abandon you for selling out.

If you can’t say no to money, you have no credibility. Not every offer is good, not every offer is right.

We haven’t broken a worldwide superstar since Adele. And her latest album didn’t reach the number of people the previous one did. That paradigm is kaput. No one can reach everybody, don’t even try.

There’s an underground of hobbyists. Think about writing and performing music that they can play and sing.

Play the hits, but throw in some obscurities for hard core fans so they’ll keep coming back.

Speaking of hits… If you’re a heritage act, stop trying to have them. Then again, if you put out new music and it’s not a one listen smash, don’t even bother. If you’re a heritage act your audience is your fans, not the gatekeepers. Keep this in mind. What do your fans want to hear? This does not mean you cannot experiment, but be sure to let people know that’s what you’re doing, especially if you play this experimental music live.

Some fans are savvy, most are not, especially older ones. They go to the show to hear the hits. Having said that, there’s a huge business in acts that have no hits. These are the acts people like to champion. I hear more about Goose than most of the acts in the Spotify Top 50.

Don’t beg your fans. Give them opportunities, make them feel like insiders, but don’t treat them like Girl Scouts who have to sell cookies.

If you want to be taken seriously with your new music, you cannot get plastic surgery and act like you’re twenty five. It’s creepy. You have to mature.

If you can’t sell tickets without production then…your music isn’t that good and your fans are not that dedicated.

No one believes that any act is retiring anymore. Having said that, fans are not pissed when you go back on the road, because they’re such fans. We learned this with Motley Crue.

Age is no longer a deterrent. Unless, of course, you’re playing a young person’s game. Chris Stapleton is forty seven. He was unknown by most until he hit forty. He’s selling authenticity and maturity.

You can hate Morgan Wallen, everybody you know can hate him, and he can still sell out stadiums.

Failing is not the stain that it once was. As long as it’s an artistic experiment. If you play large venues at high ticket prices and can’t sell out, that’s going to hurt you.

Charge what the tickets are worth. That’s the only way the bots and scalpers can be beaten. Sure, there will be complaints. Then again, I can’t write a single thing without getting negative feedback. No one pays a fortune for a ticket and then complains it wasn’t worth it. They’re thrilled just to be in the building! You cannot let the tail wag the dog. Look at the price of food. Everything is expensive but concert tickets should be cheap? Dinner is a hundred and fifty bucks but a show should be less than a hundred? No one asks to buy a Mercedes-Benz for ten thousand bucks, why are concerts underpriced?

The press always gets it wrong when it comes to music. Because the people writing the articles are not regular music beat people and those who are on the beat are not the best and the brightest. Sorry, but it’s true!

It doesn’t matter what the critic has to say about your show, it matters what the fans have to say!

Sure, a lot of the acts act like nincompoops, but you’d be surprised how far intelligence will get you. David Crosby was a notorious a*shole, but he was taken seriously and quoted everywhere because he was a deep thinker.

Complaining will get you nowhere.

Either interact with your fans or don’t, don’t go online occasionally, that never works. Keep social media at arm’s length unless you’re going to participate multiple times weekly. And never have a team member post on social media, people can tell the difference, you’re fooling no one, it must be you or nobody!

Have a sense of humor. You may be aware of this story:

“Katy Perry dissed by fast-food giant Wendy’s after Blue Origin spacefllight: ‘Can we send her back.'”

https://pagesix.com/2025/04/15/celebrity-news/katy-perry-dissed-by-wendys-after-blue-origin-spaceflight/

The best thing is Wendy’s refused to apologize. Don’t get all up in arms if someone is making fun of you, everyone’s fair game these days, and it’s the price you pay for being famous. Best to make fun of yourself. If Bill Maher knew the game he’d do so re the Larry David blowback, but he’s busy defending himself, which makes him look like an outsider who believes he’s better than we are. I mean come off it.

What are you famous for? If you’re a musician, beware of blowback when you step out of your lane.

Stay out of the gossip columns, unless you’re Kim Kardashian or someone using music to build an empire that has nothing to do with music.

There’s not enough money in music to compete with the billionaires. But you can make them truly angry by pointing out their flaws. That’s the essence of art, speaking truth to power.

The more the lyrics sound like you, the more people can relate to them.

Leave the rough edges and mistakes in, this is what hooks people.

Only auto-tune if you can’t sing at all. It eliminates all the humanity from records.

Slick works for the Spotify Top 50, it doesn’t work for everybody else.

You have to commit a major faux pas to lose your fan base… Zach Bryan is still selling out stadiums despite the girlfriend story.

Get a manager who’ll work for you, who may not be the best manager extant.

If it’s on hard drive, you lose respect. Play completely live, don’t try to sound like the record, that’s for the Spotify Top 50, and that’s a lot of pressure. You don’t want people to remember where they were when they heard your song, you want them involved with the live show, and that only happens if it lives and breathes and there are mistakes.

If you’re not a great singer, it doesn’t matter how great your lyrics are, find someone else to sing your songs.

Bands are harder to keep together than ever before, because the money’s just not that good.

Managers, agents and record companies will work you to death. Say no before getting hooked on drugs to get through.

People don’t want to own music, we live in an on demand culture with access at our fingertips. Been collecting DVDs of movies recently?

You must have videos on YouTube. Sure, make a video for a recording, but people love live stuff more. If someone wants to go down the rabbit hole don’t put up a roadblock, allow them to go from clip to clip for hours.

You can’t game virality. The only way you can win is to be in the game all the time and hope that something catches the public’s eye/imagination.

Never put restrictions on your music. Let people do whatever they want with it. The Beatles will be remembered in fifty years, you won’t. Get down off your high horse and be thrilled anybody wants to spend the time with your tunes.

If you don’t write a lot of songs you’ll never have a hit. Not only is it a muscle, working breeds inspiration, it puts you in the right head spot.

Being able to play your instrument never goes out of style.

Nobody knows everything, the world is too vast. If someone tells you they do, ignore them.

Be a student of the game. Read Don Passman’s book and look at the charts and get a feel for what is going on.

If you’re not willing to be broke, don’t plan on being a musician.

You’ve got to give to get. If you want all the money, you’ll get very few opportunities.

Those with success have all the leverage.

Don’t complain that the game is stacked against you, that Spotify and Live Nation are the enemies, this just puts you in the loser camp with the rest of the naysayers, and no one really in this business will take you seriously.

People will take your money saying they can get you gigs, make you famous… If you’ve got to pay for the opportunity, say no.

You have to stay in the game to get lucky. No one ever knows what will be their big break and it’s rarely what they think it will be and it almost always comes later than you think it will.

https://www.abramorama.com/film/rondelsenerpresents

It’s hagiography, but…

Unlike most of these documentaries, this one was not made on the cheap. There’s tons of footage to go with the narrative, but…

You don’t learn a whole hell of a lot about Ron. He’s a hustler. That’s what we’re missing in today’s concert world. That was the music business from top to bottom prior to consolidation, a cabal of hustlers who wouldn’t fit in anywhere else. Now, it’s corporatized. And something has been lost.

I think Tom Ross puts it best at the end of the flick, when he talks about money now leading instead of music. Isn’t that the essence from top to bottom? One of the most amazing things about seeing the concerts of the sixties and seventies was that they played in small venues. Sure, Bill Graham folded the twenty six hundred seat Fillmore East, but… You see the bills, the acts he presented, and if you remember them at all many can still play arenas.

So…

There’s this gobbledygook about Ron Delsener being infatuated with Sol Hurok growing up, going to the show… Then again, those are Jewish roots. Very cultural. My parents took me to the symphony, there were unlimited funds for the arts. But then Ron works a connection to get in bed with the concert promoter at Forest Hills (THE BEATLES!), and then it all folds. He’s writing copy for advertising and then…

He comes up with the idea for concerts at Wollman Rink. Which either you know or you don’t. Either you’re a New Yorker or you’re not. Either you’re aware that shows were a buck (and then two, right?) and there were shows all summer.

You get to see Tina Turner in her prime, and even the Eagles. Everybody played there. And Ron made it work with sponsorship, first Rheingold and then Schaefer. Do you even know what those were? BEERS! You saw pics of Miss Rheingold in the subway…

The aforementioned Ross says Ron was the first to use sponsorship in the promotion of concerts, and I don’t know if this is true, but one thing is for sure, they were making it up as they went along.

And then you get concert promotion history. Not all of it, not Jerry Weintraub doing national tours and… But there is the story of Frank Barsalona, how he controls the talent and parcels it out according to territory, to keep rivals from poaching.

Barsalona puts the nix on Howard Stein for going outside his area… I always wondered what happened there. Barsalona gave all his acts to Delsener and that was it. Although Stein did write a book…

So Ron opens Carnegie Hall to rock in 1971, I went to that Elton John show. He puts Bowie in Carnegie on his first big tour, Ziggy Stardust, and he opens the Palladium and…

This is when those on the outside will feel left out. You see yes, it is a giant party, a giant hang, and either you’re in the club or you’re not. And in the seventies and eighties EVERYBODY wanted to be in the club. Hell, in the eighties there was a 24/7 music TV channel!

So it’s one household name after another, the Boss and Little Steven, Patty Smith and Lenny Kaye, and…your jaw will drop when you watch the footage of the famous Simon & Garfunkel concert in the park back in 1981… Because Paul looks so young, and today Art looks so old, and when they step up to the mic and sing “Mrs. Robinson”…

That was then and this is now.

Jon Bon Jovi says how you don’t even know your promoter today, it’s all done nationally.

And ultimately Ron sells to Sillerman, starting the ball rolling into what is now Live Nation, and then after getting his forty million, he ultimate retires (gets squeezed out?), but never gives up, Peter Shapiro gives lucid commentary.

However, the two most poignant insights are…

One, his wife lives in a separate apartment during the week. Ron knows she hates the apartment he loves, on a dead end street, but…there’s obviously more to the story. Ron’s daughter gives some insight into his personality…

Ron is working all the time.

His wife talks about burning out on going to the show… It’s exciting and then it isn’t.

And then Shapiro talks about Ron really being a loner.

Bingo, THAT’S IT!

He’s gladhanding, talking on the phone, being the straw that stirs the drink, but…who exactly is the person inside?

Oftentimes you see him alone at gigs, albeit enjoying the music, but does he need the action in order to keep himself sane, keep himself going, to avoid looking at who he really is, slowing down and looking inside?

That’s the movie I want to see… Who exactly is this guy.

And if you know these guys, and they’re mostly guys, they’re not like your next door neighbor. They think outside the box, they need success, they’re gamblers and they believe not only that they can open doors, but they can do things no one else has ever conceived of!

But you’re never out front. That’s someone else. You see John Lindsay and Ed Koch… You’re reminded how charismatic and good-looking Lindsay was, how Koch always asked people how he was doing (can you imagine Adams doing that today?), and Ron…he’s behind the scenes.

So, if you want to know concert history, this is a good place to start. However, we need a film with these production values that truly tells the story from soup to nuts.

And some of the footage is priceless. Pre-internet I would have said unavailable anywhere, but in the era of YouTube…it might be somewhere, but how do you find it? Well, it’s here.

The growing up story… It’s necessary, but there’s just not enough negative.

Life is full of ups and downs. Ron talks about winning at the Garden and making only ten to fifteen thousand bucks, and losing over two hundred grand on David Lee Roth’s solo show, but the emotional roller coaster, staying in the game, as much as this is a movie about Ron, I don’t think we really get to know Ron.

Other than he’s now old and his friends are dead and he lives in the past.

Then again, those days were magic, and gone, and they’re not making them anymore.

This was like tech, like app-mania. People sans portfolio came out of the woodwork to try and triumph. However, music is more visceral, more alive, more meaningful than tech.

Those were the days that were.

And they’re in this movie.

And for that reason alone, it’s worth watching.