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COWBOY CHARTER

Country music report 2025

RAGA & ROLL SOUND CHECK India market report

Developments in live audio tech

ALL NATIONS UNDER A GROOVE The boom in diaspora touring

REGAL RENAISSANCE USHER’S TRIUMPHANT RETURN

HERMAN SCHUEREMANS

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IQ135 CONTENTS 43

Cover photo: Usher at The O2 arena, London, on the first night of his epic ten-date residency © Gareth Cattermole

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NEWS

FEATURES

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Most Read The top ten most-read stories from IQ’s daily news coverage

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Living Legends Chris Bray outlines progress made since the ASM Legends merger

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Analysis Key stories and news analysis from around the live music world

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Diaspora Touring Eamonn Forde reports on the emerging market for specialist diaspora events

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New Signings & New Music A roundup of the latest acts that have been added to the rosters

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Sound Check Derek Robertson examines the everchanging world of live sound engineering

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The IMS Business Report The findings from the 11th annual report on electronic music

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Raga & Roll Adam Woods examines the flourishing live music market in India

COMMENTS & COLUMNS 14

What’s Next for Sustainable Live Music?

Oltea Zambori encourages us to embrace sustainability at our events

Cowboy Charter Gordon Masson and Hanna Ellington don Stetsons to explore the burgeoning genre of contemporary country music

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How Shakira Made History in Mexico OCESA’s Jorge Cambronero enthuses about the Colombian superstar’s wildly popular LatAm dates

The Architects: Herman Schueremans We take a look back at the foundations laid by the legendary promoter to construct Belgium’s live music business

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City Focus: Berlin Shining a spotlight on the German capital

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Members’ Noticeboard ILMC members’ photographs

Royal Renaissance Hanna Ellington talks to the people tasked with keeping Usher’s Past Present Future tour on the road

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From the Archives professionals read Who will be the top five touring acts IQ every day. Make in 2025?

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LIVING LEGENDS It’s been nine months since the US-headquartered premium experiences company Legends completed its blockbuster $2.3bn acquisition of venue management giant ASM Global. Here, Chris Bray, the company’s newly appointed president of Europe for the combined Legends and ASM business, tells IQ about the merger process and their hopes for the future.

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The merger completed last August – what have you been focusing on in the European Business?

It’s been a busy and intense six months since the acquisition. It’s rare for two global businesses of this size to come together, so as you can imagine, we have taken our time to get to know our teams, to understand each other’s businesses, and to establish the opportunities that our enormous wealth of expertise will bring.

What’s clear and reassuring is that we share the same values and are aligned to very similar visions – to deliver world-class experiences for every fan that visits our venues.

The first major priority was centred around refining our structures, bedding in the new organisation, and sharing internally our company ambitions for the future. We then looked to establish ways in which we could bring both teams together quickly to deliver even more value to

our venues. This has been the most enjoyable part for me and has cemented in my mind the fantastic opportunity that we have through our talented people to bring new and world-leading solutions to our existing and future clients and partners.

And, of course, we have also been focussing on what is looking to be our busiest year ever. In the first quarter alone, we have opened a brand-new venue in Derby and two venues in Sheffield in the UK. We launched our first Italian venue with a huge Sam Fender opening show in Bergamo, and in Sweden, we re-opened Avicii after a €100m renovation, on time and to budget. We were also very excited to announce our newest partnership with of Thousands Aston Villa FC ,where we are working with them professionals read to create best in-class supporter im-Make IQ packages, every day. proving the overall fan experience sure at theyou legendget the ary Villa Park.

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ALL NATIONS UNDER A GROOVE As migration has made the world a more diverse landscape over the past half-century, delivering live entertainment in the native language of those migrants is becoming big business in urban metropolises. Eamonn Forde reports on the emerging market for specialist diaspora events.

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very week, somewhere around the world, crowds of migrants attend local venues to be entertained by fellow countrymen and women, while the citizens of the towns and cities that host these shows are blissfully unaware of the spectacle that doesn’t just entertain but strengthens bonds among communities living in foreign climes.

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Migration is a defining feature of the modern world due to a complex combination of economic, political, cultural, and familial factors. The International Organization for Migration’s World Migration Report 2024 stated that in 2020 there were 281m people living in countries other than their countries of birth. This is an increase from 153m in 1990 and more than triple the number in 1970.

Those who relocate to other countries often

Hins Cheung © Andy Paradise

cleave to certain things that provide a powerful and direct connection to “home” – and chief among them are food and music. These are a way for people to keep their culture alive and also introduce it into the places they have migrated to.

A few countries have historically dominated the export of popular music globally (the US, the UK, Sweden), but as immigration grows, so too does what we can term “diaspora touring.” This is where, when immigrant communities become established and reach a certain size, it becomes possible for acts from their home countries to play to them where they now live.

A Taste of India

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Rock On Music has been, inprofessionals its own words,read “bringing the heartbeat of Indian music day. to theMake IQ every UK” since 1986, promoting artistssure in cities youwith get the long-standing Asian communities, such as Lon-

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SOUND CHECK THE CHANGING LANDSCAPE OF LIVE AUDIO TECHNOLOGY

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Live sound engineering is both a science and an artform, and those tasked with delivering pristine audio to live events must navigate an ever more complicated terrain in a rapidly changing industry to ensure that every note is perfect. reports on the current state of play in the industry.

ttend any meman, CEO of d&b group, ga-show by an “and so the demand for A-list superstar, high-quality sound equipand what sticks ment is ever increasing.” in the mind afD&b serviced five of the terwards? The top ten highest grossing costumes, mindglobal tours recently, inDerek bending visuals, and excluding Coldplay, Taylor Robertson plosive pyrotechnics? GiSwift, and Pink, as well as ant robots firing lasers festivals including Rock in into the audience? ImmerRio, Sziget, and Glastonsive 3D on huge LED screens? All very impressive, bury, but Harman notes that success isn’t just no doubt. But many overlook one of the most crulinked to mega gigs and events. “We anticipate cial elements of any live spectacle, mainly be- sign, immersive systems, and rigging efficiency solid growth in smaller venues for this segment in cause they only notice when it’s bad. We’re talk- are reshaping what’s possible and expected, both 2025, and we also expect a healthy festival market ing, of course, about the sound. Live audio is onstage and behind the scenes. in 2025 – our installation business is steadily often taken somewhat for granted, but a huge In this report, IQ speaks with four leading au- growing.” amount of effort goes into ensuring the artist dio firms about the pressures of today’s market, 2024 was, says Andy Davies, senior director of sounds exactly like they should – and that fans, the tech they’re investing in, and the realities of product management at Meyer Sound, “another wherever they’re standing or seated, can hear delivering consistent high-quality sound in a record-breaking year.” Yet this year, he foresees every note and nuance. fast-moving industry. And for many suppliers, the more “consistency in touring rather than major This challenge, coupled with the record num- question isn’t just what’s next in terms of innova- growth. The explosive post-pandemic growth has ber of global tours and festivals planned for 2025, tion – it’s whether there’s enough gear and quali- now stabilised, and I think that’s actually a good mean the demands on the live audio sector have fied personnel to meet demand. thing – it means a sustainable number of artists never been greater. Suppliers must now navigate he does of From rental cycles to maintenance logistics, touring and venues filling seats.” One area Thousands a complex landscape: tighter touring schedules, staffing shortages to sustainability, this is the see growth in, however, is venuesprofessionals upgrading theirread increasing technical expectations from artists state of play in professional live audio. in-house systems. “A lot were financially impacted IQ every day. Make and audiences alike, and a supply chain still under shows Just how buoyant is the live audio sector? during the pandemic, but with sold-out sure you and get the strain. At the same time, advances in speaker de- “Global touring is booming,” says Amnon Har- strong attendance, they’re now in a more stable

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Celebrating the pioneers of the modern live music business

Herman Schueremans Thousands of professionals read IQ every day. Make sure you get the whole picture…

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COWBOY — CHARTER — As the fastestgrowing genre internationally, country music is continuing to smash into the mainstream, with TV shows such as Yellowstone, 1883, and Nashville helping to elevate its presence and promoters around the world looking to fill festival headline slots, arenas, and increasingly stadiums, with its superstars.

GORDON MASSON & HANNA ELLINGTON report on a genre that’s rapidly shedding its historic niche credentials…

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he rapidly expanding fanbase for country music is perhaps best illustrated by the success of this year’s County to Country (C2C) festival series in Europe and the CMC Rocks QLD event in Australia, where tens of thousands of fans attended multiple shows to catch established A-list talent, as well as supporting scores of emerging stars, many of whom found themselves playing outside of their native United States for the first time.

This year’s C2C programme included a triple header in the UK – The O2 arena in London, Glasgow’s OVO Hydro, and The SSE Arena in Belfast – over the 14–16 March weekend, while the previous weekend, the travelling festival set down in Berlin (at Uber Eats Music Hall) and Rotterdam’s Ahoy arena campus, with dozens of acts on the bill to entertain country music fans.

A number of those artists, including headliner Cody Johnson, also made the trip to Willowbank Raceway in Queensland, Australia for CMC Rocks, 21–23 March, where the outdoor event has been growing ever since its debut 18 years ago at the Thredbo mountain resort in neighbouring New South Wales.

“Country music’s rise in Australia has been incredible over the past few years,” says Michael Chugg, one of CMC’s co-promoters. “A lot of factors have driven this: social media and streaming have played a massive role, allowing fans to discover artists outside of traditional radio and TV exposure. Festivals like CMC Rocks, Groundwater, and Deni Ute Muster have given country music a physical presence, while crossover artists and collaborations with pop and rock have introduced new listeners to the genre.”

Firmly cemented into the Australasian psyche, the genre’s success owes much to the hard work and strategy of the Nashville-based Country Music Association (CMA), who work tirelessly to pave the way for continued expansion for its members around the world.

“Country music continues to see incredible momentum both in the US and internationally,” states the association’s CEO Sarah Trahern.

“CMA tracks quarterly streaming consumption across several global territories, and what we’re seeing is not just growth but growth that consistently outpaces the broader music industry.”

Citing statistics compiled by Luminate Data, Trahern reveals country music streaming grew

Cowboy Charter | Feature

Beyoncé © Parkwood Entertainment

7% year-on-year in the US, compared to 1% growth industry-wide. In Australia, the numbers were up 28% vs. industry growth of 7%; Canada saw 18% growth vs. 6% industry wide; and Germany recorded a whopping 58% growth, compared with just an 11% industry increase.

In the UK, meanwhile, the Official Charts Company reported a remarkable 78% increase in the streaming of country music, versus just 10% across the general industry, noting that this percentage excludes Taylor Swift’s country re-releases.

“CMA is also launching an international insights initiative this year to broaden our understanding and support of emerging markets around the world,” Trahern tells IQ.

INTERNATIONAL REPRESENTATION

With the genre’s geographical reach continuing to grow, agents working with country acts are reaping the benefits.

Indeed, Nigel Hassler at CAA acknowledges that the demographic tuning into country is get-

“WHAT WE’RE SEEING IS NOT JUST GROWTH BUT GROWTH THAT CONSISTENTLY OUTPACES THE BROADER MUSIC INDUSTRY” Sarah Trahern | Country Music Association

ting more widespread. “It’s really exciting,” he says, noting that one of the challenges in having American acts hitting the road is the limited time they can devote to their international fans: “You normally get a two-and-a-half- or three-week window, so sometimes Scandinavia, for instance, doesn’t get served. But the beauty now is that we have a network of promoters who are really into country music and are very passionate right across Europe – there are now three companies actively promoting country music in Germany; there’s a couple in Switzerland; there are two or three in each market in Scandinavia; and two very strong ones in Holland. That network of promoters allows you to book a tour, and the fact we now have the infrastructure in place means that you can properly start to develop artists across a number of territories.”

Similarly, Zac Peters at Runway Artists reports he is targeting a bigger pool of promoters for his country music roster. “C2C has already expanded into the Netherlands and Germany, and there are new festivals starting each year,” he says. “Even promoters across mainland Europe who weren’t that bothered about country are now taking an interest.”

Peters cites the UK, Germany, and Netherlands as particularly strong, “While there’s alsoof Thousands smaller scenes in Denmark and Ireland,” he says. professionals read “The more the countries previously mentioned IQ every day. Make put on events, and then radio and pressyou pickget up on sure the it, plus social media demand as well, means that

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Feature | Royal Renaissance

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ROYAL RENAISSANCE: THE RETURN OF R&B’S KING T

After a decade away from the road, Usher is gearing up to take over Europe with his residency-style Past Present Future outing.

Hanna Ellington catches up with those working behind the scenes to support this visionary trek that signals the King of R&B’s reign is far from over.

All photos © Gareth Cattermole

he Mack is back.

Following two acclaimed Las Vegas residencies and a revered Super Bowl halftime show, Usher has returned in full force with Past Present Future – his first widespread tour in a decade.

The North American leg saw a total sell-out across 62 shows, with the four-city, 20date European leg on track to achieve the same results. Around 1.1m tickets have been sold between both stints.

Drawing from key elements of his decades-spanning career – like conjuring the lavishness of Vegas and the intimacy of club stages – the soulful superstar is riding the wave of his recent resurgence, redefining what touring can mean for artists of his calibre.

Love In This Club

Usher Raymond IV has cemented his legacy as a generational, multi-talented artist since his first single, Call Me a Mack, in 1993. After churning out eight LPs, countless chart-topping singles, and five headlining tours, Mr. Entertainment took his talents to Las Vegas in late 2020 to launch his first-ever residency.

This first stretch started as a 12-show stint at the Colosseum at Caesars Palace (4,100). Twelve quickly became 20 sold-out nights between 2021– 22, shifting 84,000 tickets and earning $18.8m.

No time was wasted for his second residency at Park MGM’s Dolby Live (5,200), an 80-show endeavour that raked in $95.9m and sold 394,000 tickets.

Altogether, his two critically acclaimed residencies grossed nearly $115m and sold 479,000 tickets across 100 dates – his highest-ever gross from touring.

Thousands of “It began as one vision and evolved, perforprofessionals read mance by performance, into the of show IQkind every day. peoMake ple around the world couldn’t stop talking sure youabout,” get the says WME partner and agent John Marx, who’s

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MARKET REPORT INDIA

RAGA & ROLL

INDIA’S LIVE MUSIC SCENE FINDS ITS VOICE

As the world’s most populous country with a rapidly expanding middle class, India has been long talked about as a potential goldmine for live music. Now, with A-list acts visiting on a regular basis, could that promise finally be set for fruition?

Adam Woods investigates.

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f you wanted to sum up the scale of the live opportunity in India in a few lines, you would struggle to do it much more economically than Ashish Hemrajani, founder and CEO of ticketing company and well-connected promoter BookMyShow, speaking at ILMC in London in February.

“I come from a country of 1.4bn people,” he said. “It has the [largest]

demographic in the world under the age of 35. There are 300m Indians that speak English as their first language. Unlike in China, Spotify, Netflix, and YouTube all exist in India, and kids growing up are exposed to the same music universe.”

This picture of youth, scale, and global connection explains why, at a time when some well-established live markets are struggling to make the sums work, India is fast becom-

MARKET REPORT INDIA

“Their exposure to different genres of music has also contributed to getting those genres of music artists to India and getting them to perform here” Deepak Choudhary | EVA Live

Ed Sheeran brought his tour to India earlier this year © Mark Surridge / AEG Presents

ing the market so many have long predicted it could be.

The evidence is all around, and most of it bears BookMyShow’s fingerprints. Coldplay (through BookMyShow.Live/Live Nation) hosted the two biggest stadium shows of the 21st century in January at Narendra Modi Stadium in Ahmedabad, Gujarat, pulling in more than 130,000 eager punters each night, on top of three shows at Mumbai’s

50,000-cap DY Patil Stadium.

The bottom line is compelling.

Coldplay’s Ahmedabad concerts generated an estimated economic impact of INR 641, (£56m) including a direct boost of INR 392 (34.4m) to the city’s economy – deploying 15,000 personnel and funnelling 138,000 travellers through the local airport, according to a newly released report on the shows by BookMyShow and EY India.

Ed Sheeran (BMS Live/AEG Presents) was in the country a year ago, with seven shows in six cities, adventurously scattered the length and breadth of the landmass. Lollapalooza (BMS Live/C3 Presents) has visited, too, bringing Green Day, Shawn Mendes, Glass Animals, Louis Tomlinson, and Nothing But Thieves to Mumbai’s Mahalaxmi Racecourse for its third Indian edition in March.

Travis Scott, Dua Lipa, Maroon 5, Guns N’ Roses, and Bryan Adams have all put India on the schedule in recent and coming months – and that’s before we even mention ever more feverish tours for Indian superstars such as Arijit Singh, Diljit Dosanjh, Yo Yo Honey Singh, Pritam, and Shreya Ghoshal, whose success at home is a match for any visiting act.

Dosanjh in particular is a leading light in Indian music’s push for wider recognition in the Western world.

The 40-year-old singer delivered three sold-out shows at London’s O2, promoted by Live Nation, and came onstage at an Ed Sheeran show in Mumbai a couple of months earlier, where the pair gave a rendition of Dosanjh’s hit track Lover in Punjabi.

What now happens, amid all this excitement, is a rush to bring together booming supply and demand in a country that, by the admission of its leading lights, is still sorely lacking in infrastructure. The careful Hemrajani (who has spoken in detail about the challenges of staging concerts in cricket stadiums, with their delicate grass), has memorably likened the current state of India’s entertainment framework to building an airline without an airport.

For arenas, as Hemrajani has noted, India mostly has festival grounds or cricket stadiums that are only very occasionally adapted for music.

For grassroots venues, the country likewise has relatively few. India’s is

a live market that is effectively growing from the top down.

“Even stadium-sized concerts are being set up just for the duration of the concert, ground up,” says Sushil Chhugani, founder of India International Music Week and of Stubborn Company, which builds businesses with young creative entrepreneurs. “And this is not just in far-out cities; I’m talking about in the heart of Mumbai city. At the MMRDA Grounds, in [Mumbai’s business district] Bandra Kurla Complex, you can configure your concert based on the size of the audience. And when there is no concert, it’s just bare, barren ground – it doesn’t even have grass on it.”

So clear is the opportunity that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has weighed in with expectations of his own. “Big artists from around the world are attracted to India,” he told an investment forum in Odisha, eastern India in January. “You must have seen the beautiful pictures of Coldplay concerts in Mumbai and Ahmedabad... I expect the state and the private sector to focus on developing necessary infrastructure and skills for the concert economy.”

For decades, in spite of occasional shows by Michael Jackson, The Rolling Stones, Beyoncé, and other superstars, a nation obsessed with cricket and Bollywood never really seemed on the cusp of embracing a Western-style gig-going habit.

Even now, concerts as a sector are dwarfed in volume by other types of events. According to EEMA-EY research, concerts accounted for 1% of projects conducted by Indian event companies last year, compared to managed corporateof Thousands events, which took 58% of the marprofessionals read ket, and weddings and personal IQ every day.

Make events, which accounted for 18%. sure you get the But volumes are certainly in-

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FROM THE ARCHIV ES

Who will be the top five headline acts in 2025?

Back in the prehistoric year of 2015 – before Covid-19, TikTok, and national blackouts – we asked IQ readers who they thought would be topping bills in a decade’s time. Now, ten years on, we look back at those predictions, and some of them are scarily accurate.

Do you think the same will remain true in 2035? Paul McCartney and Neil Young definitely have another ten years in them, right?

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CLAES OLSEN, ØYA FESTIVAL CHRISTIAN DOLL, Due to the ongoing debate around keeping alive old dinosaurs or the need for a new Rolling C2 CONCERTS Stones, I believe (and hope) that the future headliners [in] 2025 are totally unknown at present.

So I have taken the liberty of guessing the details of the forthcoming headliners.

1. Established February 2019 in LA 2. Established June 2020 in Kansas 3. Established January 2021 in Oslo 4. Established March 2023 in North London 5. Established April 2024 in Liverpool

I hope that some of today’s younger artists will keep on going and take second on the bill, together with some cool heritage acts.

ARTUR ROJEK, OFF FESTIVAL

Hard to imagine, as time goes by so fast, but let’s try… Florence & the Machine, Tame Impala, Jack White, James Blake, and someone I don’t know.

I think we will see the same headliners in ten years that we’re looking at now – and for the next ten years: Metallica, Foo Fighters, and Toten Hosen, as well as AC/DC or Iron Maiden! There has been no really big new band or artist in the last few years – sad but true!

CRAIG BENNETT, ID&C

The Beatles as a hologram. Or Oasis – still just a rumour, though, fueled by what’s left of Twitter, by an increasingly irrelevant and somewhat frail Liam Gallagher.

NICK HOBBS, CHARMENKO

Traditional festivals might be on the way out, and there won’t be any headline acts in 2025, they’ll just be a vapid, constantly shifting bunch of 15-minutes-of-fame seekers. Of course, even in of Thousands this bleak vision, there will be niche retro eventsread professionals where AC/DC fans get together IQ in their Zimmer every day. Make frames to watch some miracle of sure longevity, but the you get that’s not the future, that’s the past…

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