So I’m out to dinner with a concert promoter.\u00c2\u00a0 He can’t understand the adversarial relationship between promoters and acts.\u00c2\u00a0 According to him, the promoter is the band’s BEST FRIEND!<\/p>\n
Think about it.\u00c2\u00a0 Who else is going to invest so much money in the band’s career?<\/p>\n
That’s what we’ve come to.\u00c2\u00a0 The labels are bankrupt, if not financially, artistically.\u00c2\u00a0 The acts they build can’t sell tickets and they don’t want to invest much.\u00c2\u00a0 Let’s make it simple.\u00c2\u00a0 If you make Top Forty music, the label will put money into you, but fans won’t come see you live, because they don’t believe you’re real, they know your record was made by committee, the same people who make all the other Top Forty hits.<\/p>\n
No, fans want to see credible acts.<\/p>\n
And the only people paying these acts is the promoter.<\/p>\n
Classic acts can’t sell a record.\u00c2\u00a0 So the promoter is their only source of revenue.<\/p>\n
Most new acts can’t sell tracks because they’re not exposed on radio or TV, they depend on the promoter’s bucks.<\/p>\n
So why is there such an adversarial relationship between acts and promoters?\u00c2\u00a0 Why is the person paying treated with so little respect?<\/p>\n
The act is paid a guarantee, oftentimes exorbitant, and dictates ticket price.\u00c2\u00a0 The promoter knows you can’t charge $49.50 plus surcharges for a lawn ticket, but in order to meet the act’s demands, that’s what you end up with.\u00c2\u00a0 And the customer says no and the act won’t help the promoter sell tickets by dropping the price.\u00c2\u00a0 This is a business?<\/p>\n
Actually, it’s fascinating looking at the landscape.<\/p>\n
There’s the occasional instant superstar, like Lady GaGa.\u00c2\u00a0 But most of the instant arena acts don’t last.\u00c2\u00a0 If you think Justin Bieber will continue to sell tickets, then you’ve never heard of the Jonas Brothers or Miley Cyrus.<\/p>\n
And it’s so hard for acts to develop.<\/p>\n
Maybe, just maybe, the concert promoter is about to become king.<\/p>\n
Last year was instructional, sure, Live Nation’s income took a hit, but so did Sarah McLachlan’s credibility.\u00c2\u00a0 Play to empty seats and suddenly no one wants to see you again.\u00c2\u00a0 Like my buddy Don Fox says, let the acts play to empty seats, that’ll revolutionize this business.\u00c2\u00a0 You’d be surprised who doesn’t sell out, despite the ads trumpeting the unavailability of tickets.<\/p>\n
He with the money ultimately wins.\u00c2\u00a0 When are concert promoters going to realize this?\u00c2\u00a0 When are they going to learn to say no instead of yes?\u00c2\u00a0 Robert Sillerman rolled up the old promoters into SFX fifteen years ago.\u00c2\u00a0 Isn’t it time to stop overpaying to keep the ball rolling?<\/p>\n
Sure, Live Nation’s stock would nosedive if they started saying no, but that’s the best way to realign this business.\u00c2\u00a0 This promoter talking to me tonight used the NHL as an example.\u00c2\u00a0 The league shut the doors, they just couldn’t make money with the financial system in place.\u00c2\u00a0 The players said they could construct their own circuit.\u00c2\u00a0 But they couldn’t.\u00c2\u00a0 They could play in Europe for less and they ultimately came back to the bargaining table with a realistic concept of what they were worth.<\/p>\n
We need to do the same in the concert industry.\u00c2\u00a0 Promoters need to stop paying so much to make so little money.<\/p>\n
And promoters must be able to promote.<\/p>\n
This promoter tonight talked about making a guarantee.\u00c2\u00a0 TO THE CUSTOMER!\u00c2\u00a0 If you don’t like the show, you can leave before the third song and get all your money back.\u00c2\u00a0 At these prices, we’ve got to give people insurance.<\/p>\n
And we’ve got to lower the prices.\u00c2\u00a0 Because who can afford them?\u00c2\u00a0 You can go to one show a year.\u00c2\u00a0 And that’s not healthy for our business.\u00c2\u00a0 Suddenly, concert attendance is like going on vacation, a once a year event.<\/p>\n
We don’t want concert promotion to go the way of recorded music.\u00c2\u00a0 Somehow the labels didn’t realize that it was best to get everybody paying a little for a lot, especially when they participate in 360 degrees of revenue.\u00c2\u00a0 Allow people to check out new bands and they might go to a show, and buy a t-shirt.<\/p>\n
Actually, that’s what’s truly happening now.\u00c2\u00a0 Word on the new acts is spread online.\u00c2\u00a0 You can hear their music for free on YouTube. Tickets are cheap.\u00c2\u00a0 You go because you want to be part of the collective, you want to be first.\u00c2\u00a0 This is the way the business used to be, before grosses were trumpeted in newspapers and greed killed the paradigm.<\/p>\n
You’ve got to set the promoter free.\u00c2\u00a0 He’s got to be your friend.<\/p>\n
Why should an act trust Doug Morris or Jimmy Iovine or Lyor Cohen yet abhor Michael Rapino and Randy Phillips?\u00c2\u00a0 Michael and Randy are paying the acts more money, and will continue to do so long after their record contracts have expired.\u00c2\u00a0 And good luck getting those record royalties you’re due.<\/p>\n
Bill Graham promoted shows.\u00c2\u00a0 And people came to his concerts because he was promoting them.\u00c2\u00a0 That’s the power of a great promoter.<\/p>\n
It just can’t be a banking deal.\u00c2\u00a0 Because acts are relying on the promoter to sell tickets.\u00c2\u00a0 Without radio or TV, who else can do the job?<\/p>\n
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So I’m out to dinner with a concert promoter.\u00c2\u00a0 He can’t understand the adversarial relationship between promoters and acts.\u00c2\u00a0 According to him, the promoter is the band’s BEST FRIEND! Think about it.\u00c2\u00a0 Who else is going to invest so much money in the band’s career? That’s what we’ve come to.\u00c2\u00a0 The labels are bankrupt, if […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","default_image_id":0,"font":"","enabled":false},"version":2}},"categories":[2],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-3932","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-music-business"],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p96vPs-11q","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3932","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3932"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3932\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3933,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3932\/revisions\/3933"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3932"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3932"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/lefsetz.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3932"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}