IQ Magazine 32

Live Music Intelligence An ILMC Publication. Nov 2010, Issue 32

Park Live

On the road with Linkin Park

Highland of Opportunity

Scotland’s live scene profiled

Taxspotting

MGR Media at 30

In Session

Swiss sensation AVO Session Basel

Live is a Box of Chocolates: Daniel Pugsley Safe & Sound: Morten Therkildse Support Acts: John Whittingdale Fantasy Festival: Hillel Wachs & Bryan Steiner

Issue 32, Nov 2010

Contents

News 6 In Brief The main headlines over the last two months 7 In Depth Key stories from around the live music world

Features

22

14

14 European Festival Report The results of IQ’s annual survey revealed 22 Park Live On the road with Linkin Park’s A Thousand Suns tour 32 Highland of Opportunity Olaf Furniss traverses the Scottish live music market 42 The Taxspotters Rock ‘n’ roll accountants MGR Media at 30 48 In Session Adam Woods profiles Swiss sensation AVO Session Basel

Comments and Columns 10 Live is a Box of Chocolates Daniel Pugsley shares an artist’s view of touring 11 Safe & Sound Morten Therkildse with a suggestion for safer events

32 42

12 Support Acts John Whittingdale MP on the role of government in live 13 Fantasy Festival?

Hillel Wachs & Bryan Steiner on future audience highs

48

52 In Focus The autumn conference season begins 53 Insight Michael Chugg gets literary 54 Your Shout A bunch of who?

A gaggle of what?

Editorial

The Time Machine

Don’t believe everything the experts tell you, writes Greg Parmley...

THE ILMC JOURNAL Live music intelligence Issue 32, November 2010 IQ Magazine 2-4 Prowse Place, London, NW1 9PH, UK info@iq-mag.net www.iq-mag.net Tel: +44 (0)20 7284 5867 Fax: +44 (0)20 7284 1870 Publisher ILMC and M4 Media Editor Greg Parmley Associate Editor Allan McGowan Marketing & Advertising Manager Terry McNally Sub Editor Michael Muldoon Production Assistant Adam Milton Editorial Assistant Joanna Gardner Contributors Lars Brandle, Olaf Furniss, Daniel Pugsley, Bryan Steiner, Manfred Tari, Morten Therkildse, Hillel Wachs, John Whittingdale & Adam Woods.

Editorial Contact Greg Parmley, greg@iq-mag.net Tel: +44 (0)20 7284 5867 Advertising Contact Terry McNally, terry@iq-mag.net Tel: +44 (0)20 7284 5867 Design & Production Martin Hughes, Dan Moe enquiries@oysterstudios.com www.oysterstudios.com Cover photo: Ignug at Roskilde © Steffen Jørgensen www.jint.dk

A

t a music business conference in Paris this month, a group of experts discussed what the music industry would look like in 2025. It was an eye-opening experience. Not least because some of the predictions included High Street record shops that simply carried more stock, and CDs priced back at €19 which sold in their thousands.

I missed the predictions about a return to 8-track and reissues of Brothers in Arms saving the Western world, but they may well have been there.

At one point, I put up my hand to ask what fate would befall the live music industry.

I was informed that the future lay in complicated home cinema units that will allow concertgoers to enjoy shows from the comfort of their sofas. No selfrespecting music fan would ever have to risk having their feet stepped on again.

Now, I’m no futurologist, but some of these ideas seem a little out of touch with reality. Just as physical retail is surely the last basket that labels will be putting their eggs into come 2025, the point of the live music industry – and just why it’s proved so resilient to the wider downturns – is that it’s like a problem… something best shared.

But what’s my point here? Well, I

guess two things. First off, don’t believe everything you hear at music business conferences, and secondly, when it comes to the future of the business, your own guess is probably as good as anyone’s. What makes it such an exciting time to be involved in the business right now is that most of the balls are up in the air, and no single prophet knows where they’re all going to land.

Still, there’s plenty of planning, progress and predicting going on, and nowhere is this more evident than in the festival sector, where a raft of innovations are being trialled. Our third European Festival Report (page 14) threw up a bunch of exciting ideas, and more are already underway for next year. The season was a positive one overall, despite the usual thrills and spills brought about by inclement weather, force majeure and altogether more avoidable mistakes.

Elsewhere in this issue, we profile Scotland’s vibrant live music market, which has a remarkably organised homespun scene (p32); AVO Session Basel (an event which proves that when you’ve got the right patrons and enough willpower there’s little that can’t be achieved) gets ready to party for its 25th (p48) and we head out on the road with Linkin Park (p22).

Enjoy! greg@iq-mag.net

To subscribe to IQ Magazine: +44 (0)20 7284 5867 info@iq-mag.net Annual subscription to IQ is £50 (€60) for 6 issues.

News

In Brief...

Below: Lady Gaga Below Right: Jyske Bank BOXEN Arena Top Right: Jens Michow Far Below Right: Ben Challis

As the festival season (for most) winds down, the seat swapping and deal trumpeting continues in earnest. It’s all go in the few short weeks before Xmas...

August

• Five protestors supporting Amnesty International are detained at a U2 show in Moscow, with officials also closing information stalls of Greenpeace and an AIDS charity.

• Organisers of the UK’s Reading Festival pull the plug on Guns N’Roses when the band are late for their headline slot. Days later, the band is bottled off stage in Ireland by angry fans.

• Both Live Nation and AEG express interest in managing London’s Olympic Stadium after the 2012 games, in partnership with London football clubs – Live Nation with West Ham United and AEG with Tottenham Hostspur.

• Pollstar reports that Ankarrock in Finland drew just 17,000 from 14-15 August, half the number of tickets it sold in 2008.

• The lead singer of Ou Est Le Swimming Pool, Charles Haddon (22), commits suicide behind the main stage at Pukkelpop festival in Belgium after injuring a fan stagediving.

• Live Nation Australia announces its first major tour – four December dates with U2 – after launching earlier in the year. The dates are co-promoted with Michael Coppel Presents.

• Live Nation UK promoter Jon Dunn moves to Festival Republic, the company to which he was previously seconded for booking Latitude and Big Chill festivals.

• The Observer claims UK-based ES Group is part of a consortium charging inflated prices (including £61k for soap dispensers) for the Commonwealth Games in India.

• The 14th edition of Australia’s Homebake Festival is postponed due to a lack of suitable headliners.

• Sheffield Arena in the UK is renamed Sheffield Motorpoint Arena in a fiveyear, seven-figure naming rights deal with manager Live Nation.

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September

• Germany’s Federal Cartel Office launches a retrospective probe into CTS Eventim’s purchase of See Tickets Germany and Ticket Online Group for €145million.

• Former Wembley Arena head Paul Sergeant is announced as the new GM of the Acer Arena (cap 21,000) in Sydney, Australia.

• Organisers of AVO Sesssion Basel publish a limited edition book to mark the 25th anniversary of the Swiss festival (see page 48).

• Booking agent Gary Howard leaves Marshall Arts to join the The Agency Group in London. His roster includes N-Dubz, Peter André and Vengaboys.

• EMI owner Terra Firma is given the go ahead to sue Citigroup – which it claims misled it in the purchase of the major label – for “billions of dollars”.

• Police close down Berlin Music Week early, cancelling performances by Fatboy Slim and 2 Many DJs, after crowd concerns in the wake of the Love Parade tragedy in Duisberg.

• See Tickets chairman Nick Blackburn leaves the UK-based company he has headed up for ten years, having allegedly become disillusioned with the operation.

• Dave Kirby, founder of The Kirby Organization, dies at home after a long battle with prostate cancer.

• A survey of 414 ticketing sites by regulators across Europe finds that 247 were breaking consumer laws and would be investigated further by authorities.

• AEG’s 18,000-seat Mercedes Benz Arena in Shanghai sells out its first nine concerts in advance of opening with a run by Faye Wong on 19 November.

• Live Nation Germany MD Johannes Wessels leaves the company just six months after being appointed.

• Australian promoter Michael Chugg publishes his autobiography, Hey, You In The Black T-Shirt (see page 53).

• Live Nation Entertainment chairman Barry Diller resigns his position in what the entertainment giant says was an expected move.

• Pete Nash, the last remaining booking agent at once-powerful London agency Helter Skelter, leaves to form his own company, Sound & Vision Agency.

• Live Nation president Michael Rapino tells investors that his company plans to pay artists less in 2011.

October

• Creative Artists Agency (CAA) announces a strategic partnership with investment firm TPG Capital, which takes a 35% non-controlling stake in the agency.

• The annual report by German promoter’s group BDV, carried out by GFK, reveals that the live entertainment industry shrank by 12% in 2009 to €3.17bn.

• Soul singer Solomon Burke dies of natural causes at Amsterdam’s Schiphol Airport at the age of 70.

• Lady Gaga opens the new 14,000capacity MCH Multiarena in Herning, Denmark’s first multipurpose concert arena.

• Ticketmaster US informs its affiliate partners that it will no longer pay commissions on sales coming from affiliate sites.

News

Danish Arena Opens Denmark’s new national arena opened its doors with Lady Gaga this month, the first in a series of huge names already booked into the 14,500-capacity Jyske Bank BOXEN Arena. Situated in Herning, one hour by car from Arhus and three hours from Copenhagen, the arena has cost just shy of DKK400million (€53m).

“Finally Denmark has its first proper cultural arena,” says Flemming Schmidt at Live Nation Denmark. “It’s a square arena, so visually you feel a lot closer to the action, and this is possibly the best sounding arena in the world.”

“The atmosphere was fantastic and Lady Gaga performed a great show in front of a sold-out audience,” adds Georg Sørensen, CEO of owners MCH. “We have made a great start and are now looking forward to

welcoming more of the world’s greatest artists.”

While the two-year build has been largely funded by private finance, the regional government also holds a 5% stake. The Jyske Bank BOXEN has the same capacity as Malmö Arena, which opened in 2009 just across the Øresund Bridge from Copenhagen, but MCH is confident that the flexibility of space on offer will help secure dates. As well as the 110,000m2 MCH Messecenter Herning, MCH Herning Kongrescenter (14,000m2), MCH Arena and MCH Outdoor Arena, the new build boasts a number of smaller adjacent venues. Forthcoming dates include Prince and Linkin Park later this month; Elton John in December; and Kylie Minogue in February 2011.

Second Slide for German Market

Declining interest in concerts by the over 40s is being partly blamed for the second consecutive annual fall in the value of the German live entertainment market.

Figures released by promoters’ association BDV and local trade magazine Musikmarkt show a 12% drop in 2009 when the business generated

€3.17bn. In 2008 it generated €3.61bn, 7% down on the 2007 high of €3.87bn.

“We’ve found out that people over 40 are attending less concerts,” says BDV head Jens Michow. “The second point is that ticket prices in some instances are high. If you go to a Tina Turner concert and the ticket costs €120, for two people with food and a taxi you’re spending €350 – who can pay that? It’s a problem.”

However, Michow believes the trend is reversing this year, with promoters reporting an improvement in fortunes.

Looking forward, he predicts that promoters may well stick to capital markets rather than take a risk in the provinces.

“There’s no lack of concerts in this country, but you have to face that you might be forced to travel to Berlin or Hamburg or Munich,” he says.

Green Judges Get Tough

UK Live Awards Kick Off The first year of the Live UK Music Business Awards sold-out as the ceremony celebrated the great and the good from the UK concert industry. Over 200 guests assembled at London’s Portman Hotel to witness 25 awards (decided by over 1,500 voters) being presented.

“We had planned a fairly casual affair for the first year, with unallocated seating,” reports Live UK publisher Steve Parker, “But companies started booking whole tables and we had to quickly adapt and add capacity. It was extremely gratifying to

see a table of people from Preston students’ club 53 Degrees alongside one from Wembley Stadium, both collecting awards for the quality of their respective venue’s teamwork.”

Winners included Live Nation (national promoter), Glastonbury (best festival over 40,000-capacity), O2 (greatest brand impact) and Mumford & Sons (breakthrough artist).

Anthony Addis was awarded the best manager gong, and The Agency Group’s Geoff Meal picked up agent of the year.

Environmental group A Greener Festival (AGF) plans to continue “raising the bar” in 2011, after a record number of festivals earned the Greener Festival Award this year. A total of 47 events qualified, and co-founder Ben Challis says that in order to promote continual improvement, the criteria for the awards must get harder.

“We keep raising the bar,” he says. “This year was

a lot more about festivals measuring their carbon emissions with Julie’s Bicycle tools. Next year we’ll build in new ideas and suggestions for improvements. It’s taking the good practice we’ve seen this year and trying to extend it and spread that information.”

Of the 47 award winners, 34 are European, nine Australian and five North American. A number of festivals have been named as ‘outstanding’ including the Isle of Wight Festival, Shambala, Croissant Neuf Summer Party, Big Tent, Sunrise Summer Celebration and Wood Festival in the UK; Portugal’s Boom Festival; Øya in Norway; Lightning in a Bottle and Osheaga in North America and Peats Ridge in Australia.

News

European Festival Scene Boom Reported IQ’s annual European Festival Report has revealed a 6.2% increase in attendance – reversing the 3% dip that was recorded in 2009 – and a 15.4% increase in the average capacity of events.

The survey of 110 festivals (representing over 3 million tickets) also showed a slight dip in festival tourism, while escalating artist fees were still considered the largest threat to the sector.

“Some of our festivals sold out faster than ever, such as Lowlands or Werchter, and on others we hit record performances,” says Alan Ridgeway, Live Nation’s CEO of international music, of the summer season. However, Yourope chairman Christof Huber has a more circumspect view. “You either did really well, or you had a big financial problem,” he says.

The report, now in its third year, also highlighted a number of innovations, including the gradual move towards cashless sites. This year, both Hungary’s Sziget and Hurricane in Germany successfully trialled RFID cashless systems. Sziget issued 11,000 cards that could be used at 300 terminals across the site, and festival MD Gábor Takács says, “We found that 85% of the cardholders were satisfied with the service; it makes payment faster, easier and more secure.”

IQ’s report also included census data provided by Virtual Festivals and the UK Festival Awards which showed that Spain, Germany and France were the top three overseas destination for UK festival fans. See page 14 for the full report.

I Q Ma g a z i n e Nov 2 0 1 0

Murdoch Moves into Ticketing

Rupert Murdoch’s publishing group News Limited is aggressively taking on Australia’s “cosy duopoly in ticketing” with a new service, Foxtix. Though few are holding their breath that the Ticketek and Ticketmaster giants will simply move aside.

News Limited’s chairman and CEO John Hartigan vows that the new enterprise will cut booking fees, and leverage the group’s media assets to give “ticket buyers, venues, promoters and artists a stronger alternative to what currently exists in ticketing.”

In Australia, the major venues are all contracted to one of the two big companies. “No one is going to impact the market unless they can break down

the contracted venues,” says Michael Chugg, chairman of Chugg Entertainment. The new business will operate alongside the affiliated music ticketing firm Moshtix, which admits it’s a distant third in Australia’s ticketing market with a share of roughly 4-5%.

“ [We plan] to give ticket buyers, venues, promoters and artists a stronger alternative” Adam McArthur, GM of Moshtix, has taken up the same position at the helm of Foxtix. News Limited acquired the Web-based Moshtix back in January 2007. News of the arrival of Foxtix comes on the heels

of the September launch Down Under of Showclix, through a partnership with Australian firm Greetix. The online ticketing firm picked up arrangements with a number of festivals and boasted $7million (€5m) in ticket sales during its first week of business, shifting 1.8 million tickets in the first 24 hours alone.

LN German Operations Suspended Nation Germany GmbH converted to Music Pool Wessels GmbH and appointed Wessels as managing director, while former managing directors Niall Dunphy and Alan Ridgeway resigned.

Besides Ticketmaster Holding GmbH and Ticketmaster GmbH, the entertainment giant now has only Live Nation Germany Holding GmbH, registered in Berlin.

Wessels, who joined The future for Live Live Nation in February, Nation’s operation in is keeping seven staff on Germany remains uncertain the payroll of his new following the departure company and is currently of its managing director working on dates with Neil Johannes Wessels after just Young and in the hip hop six months. And with its scene. “I am very happy website shut down and to be my own boss again,” operating company closed, he tells IQ. Meanwhile, some are now speculating the website Livenation.de that the multinational currently redirects traffic could withdraw from the to an international site that illustrates Live Nation market entirely.

On 13 October, Live markets globally, and in

which Germany is absent.

Live Nation formally established a base earlier this year after selling its 20% stake in Marek Lieberberg Konzertagentur to majority shareholder CTS Eventim, simultaneously appointing former Ticket Online MD Klaus Zemke to head up Ticketmaster Germany. A key European tour stop, Germany has so far proved an elusive market for the world’s largest, US-headquartered entertainment company, primarily due to the dominance of ticketing operation Eventim, which owns several major national promoters. “We expect to issue a statement regarding our plans for Germany shortly,” says Ridgeway, Live Nation’s CEO of international music, who declined further comment.

News

AEG Venues on a Roll Out Having added Paris and Glasgow to its European venue map in the last two months, and opening in Shanghai in November, AEG facilities is continuing to expand its portfolio of buildings. Spread across five continents, the multinational now has 115 venue relationships, including 17 open or planned venues in nine European countries alone, and according to VP of business development, Brian Kabatznick, “We’ll be announcing a few more in

Claims that some of South Africa’s leading production firms are inherently racist have been met with scorn from several corners of the industry that fear it will unfairly damage the reputation of the business.

In a recent issue of Australian production magazine CX, Freddie Nyathela, president of the South African Roadies Association (SARA) described the industry as ‘quietly practising apartheid’, but several leading firms refute the allegations as a tactic to leverage work for his members.

In a string of correspondence between SARA, production services firm Gearhouse and promoter Big Concerts, Nyathela described Gearhouse as “a wolf (monster) in a sheep

the next few weeks.”

In China, the 18,000capacity Mercedes-Benz Arena opens next month in Shanghai with a sold-out fivenight run by local star Faye Wong. Owned by the NBA and Shanghai Oriental Pearl Group, AEG is managing the venue in a similar deal to the 18,000-capacity Wukesong arena that opened in Beijing in January 2008. Through AEG-Ogden, its JV with Brisbane-based Ogden IFC, the group has 16 venues across the region, including

to provide operating and revenue-generating resources for the new 12,000-capacity the new 15,000-capacity Scottish National Arena, which Perth Arena, slated to open is currently under construction in 2012. Such new projects in the centre of Glasgow. The bring the concept of an Asia arena, set to open in 2013, Pacific touring circuit of high will allow the 9,000-capacity quality arenas closer to reality. SECC and Clyde Auditorium “China is like Eastern to concentrate on exhibitions Europe,” Kabatznick says. and conferences.

“Since “The problem used to be the announcement of the a lack of state-of-the- art partnership there’s been an air indoor arenas but now of excitement and expectation. it has two wonderful We’re looking forward to a great buildings that can attract working relationship,” says international artists.”

SECC’s Meanwhile, in Paris, the In Europe, AEG has teamed up with the Scottish Exhibition group is consulting on the and Conference Centre (SECC) Palais Omnisports de Paris Bercy as the 26-year-old building considers its first major renovation. “It allows AEG to look at Bercy in a global sense, both as one of the great markets in the world, and its future – renovation, naming rights, operational standards and more,” says Kabatznick. “The relationship lasts until next year while the city considers the long-term management view of the facility.”

SA Industry Denies Racism skin, a company that was built through the exploitation and suppression of black people”, while claiming that Big Concerts has worked against his association by blocking workshops with foreign production professionals.

Both companies fiercely deny these claims. Gearhouse MD Ofer Lapid says: “There is no racial discrimination practised within the group – in fact we have several policies in place to counteract discrimination in any form, not only racial. The whole situation reflects extremely badly on the South African live events industry as a whole and unfortunately, on Mr Nyathela

and SARA in particular.

Mr Nyathela is involving the rest of the world in unresolved half truths, casting wild aspersions and causing damage to the industry.”

Nyathela was previously served an interdict, granted by the High Court of South Africa in 2000, after similar allegations of racism against Big Concerts were ruled to be unfounded. CFO Justin van Wyk says, “It’s unfortunate that we have to go down this route again – we not just facilitated these workshops but also got a thank you letter.

These accusations are designed solely to disparage our good reputation because we have

decided to use other black empowered firms who offer a better service, and perhaps Mr Nyathela needs to justify his existence by fighting this transformation ticket.”

Robbie Blake, head of the Technical Services Production Association (TPSA) has called an emergency summit between all involved parties, although Big Concerts are declining to participate until the accusations are withdrawn. In a letter to Nyathela, Blake said the issue had been “exacerbated by a variety of personal issues, personality clashes, hidden agendas and ‘perhaps’ transformative issues.”.

Top Right: John Hartigan Bottom Right: Neil Young Top: Mercedes-Benz Arena, Shanghai

Comment

Live is a Box of Chocolates Daniel Pugsley, bass player, songwriter and co-founder of ragga-metal band Skindred, shares the artist’s view of touring...

I‘m 14 years old. Standing, staring, with my hands on a stage sticky with beer and littered with amps and guitars. I was in The Joiners Arms, my local venue in the city I grew up in, Southampton (UK). It all seemed so glamorous: lights, stage set, equipment that I could only dream of one day owning. The anticipation was killing me. I was about to see the band whose records I’d listened to and jumped around my room, even daydreaming I was one of them. I‘d paid my hard-earned pocket money to get here so I was going to make it count.

They were huge, right? They must be to play this place, but where were they now? My mind turned to backstage.

If the stage set was like this, what was it like back there?

I envisaged huge all-engulfing sofas, maybe beds, a refrigerator full of drinks and food I hadn’t experienced yet – the most luxurious hotel/recreationroom my 14-year-old mind could conjure up. I couldn‘t have been more wrong.

Cut to seven years later and my first experience of The Joiners Arms as a touring musician. Down the stairs to a creepy beer cellar smelling of stale alcohol and damp, and decorated much like a public toilet, complete with ‘cock art’, broken beer cooler and the odd carpet sample mat strewn across the floor for added flair. The mega-sofa I’d envisaged was actually a booze-encrusted (I hope it was booze) stool. This cold, uncomfortable room was my home for the day along with the 14 other guys on the tour. I’ve never sat through SAW or Hostel, those kinds of films have never been my cup of tea, but I envisage the milieu being not dissimilar. This was where I had to get ready to play, clean up and prepare to put on the performance of my life.

Now, I’m in no way singling out The Joiners Arms, I truly love that place.

The reality is I’ve experienced those conditions all around the world. When you tour at a certain level you really can’t expect much more, that’s the game we’re in, but at what point should it change? I love touring. It’s pretty much all I’ve known in my adult life.

Obviously, in a touring party of anywhere between 6 and 14 (or however many you can squeeze into a bus) privacy is an issue. A lot of the time the only moments by myself

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will be when I draw the bunk curtain at night, or lock the cubicle door (if I’m lucky enough to find a stall with a lock) but the chance to experience different countries, foods, cultures, meet people outside of my own social network and play the music I’m a part of far exceeds the negatives. The key is to create a space that’s a little bit of home on tour.

So many times I’ve asked (or seen people ask) for wi-fi codes in venues, to see staff/promoters roll their eyes. I think they fail to really understand that for them it’s another day and another artist making a seemingly insignificant request, but apart from the business side, advancing shows and organising logistics, the internet is key in maintaining relationships on the road. What programmes like iChat, Skype and even something like Facebook mean to the touring musician nowadays is immeasurable.

At a certain level you just have to accept getting water, towels, and possibly warm beer on your rider, and feel lucky about it, but if you’re being booked at any venue as a headliner, you really hope that the promoter has considered your needs as a band. I can think of only twice in our 11-year career when we’ve had to pull a show because of a rider situation, and that was more to do with technical spec and venue safety, rather than a petty argument over that second bottle of red. I would always prefer to not let the fans down and play the show rather than pull it if conditions aren’t 100% right. This is true for most hard-working touring bands, as promoters know.

Times have changed so much for the music industry over the last 15 years. Even in the last three we’ve shifted from a situation where you’d tour to promote a record to releasing records in order to tour – live is, and should always be, the lifeblood of the industry. The live forum is the chance to capture the song in that very moment. It’s our responsibility to put on the best show possible so promoters should be committed to keeping the artist comfortable, clean and happy.

Comment

Safe & Sound Event safety consultant Morten Therkildse of ConCom Safety suggests the way forward for safer events...

While researching the competence, training and reputation of Danish event safety stewards, I spoke to Gerard van Duykeren, author of The Event Security Officer, who said, “Event safety stewards need crystal clear goals and objectives in their work at events otherwise their work will always stay as it is, until an accident happens.”

Unfortunately, accidents happen quite often. Within the last year we have experienced tragic losses at nightclubs, concerts and festivals around the world. So how do we improve the safety and identify the ‘crystal clear goals and objectives’ for everybody in the industry?

I believe that everything starts at the top. Promoters, crowd safety managers and the authorities must improve their knowledge and their way of working. They must agree on clear goals and objectives. A way forward could be better and more unified documentation. In order to ensure that events are well run and prepared the authorities should ask for proper documentation. But what is proper documentation, and who sets the terms?

There should be a defined way of documenting an event to indicate the risk assessment, the major incident plan and the general methodology of how the phases of the event are planned. It should show operational procedures and a proof of preparation. The way of assessing should be predefined and so should some of the issues that must be determined in the documentation. Proposals from Mick Upton, (former head of The International Centre for Crowd Management and Security Studies at Bucks New University) and Mark Hamilton, (managing director of G4S Events and the present head of the centre) outline a basis for a proper crowd management plan.

A crowd management plan produced in line with Upton and Hamilton’s suggestions make it obvious whether the organisers have thought about the challenges they are facing or not. The idea behind the documentation is to show the mindset of the organisers. Do they seem sufficiently competent to organise their event, or should the authorities raise a red flag and assist them? Sadly, the authorities are often not used to organising events, and therefore do not know what to look for. A unit of crowd managers should therefore assist the local authorities with their task.

Documentation costs nothing but time. But by documenting an event properly the organisers will improve their knowledge and awareness, and this is where we should focus. The training of the stewards is certainly not insignificant, but this is not the place to

start. If the organisers are inexperienced or incompetent regarding crowd management, using qualified stewards or security staff won’t completely compensate. The management sets the tone and they define the focus for everybody working at an event.

Working with crowd safety managers who provide clear goals and objectives improves the quality of the event’s safety stewards. In order to train stewards and keep their skills alive and in use, we need crowd safety managers and promoters who have set clear goals and objectives for their staff. Fortunately, we frequently see excellent promoters and managers. But we also encounter the opposite. And as production manager Chrissy Uerlings asked in the September issue of IQ Magazine, “The question then also becomes who has the knowledge to judge whether these plans are correct?”

Crowd safety management is international, we face the same issues everywhere and we see the same incidents everywhere.

What is needed is an international standard of how to document crowd safety management issues and to ensure that the organisers have thought about their responsibility.

“ Sadly, the authorities are often not used to organising events, and therefore do not know what to look for.”

If the European Union were willing to work toward a common standard for Europe, things might change. We have very good guides in the field of crowd safety management, and we have skilled and educated professionals. What we need is an international guide or maybe even a law stipulating how to document events. A law supported by a how-to guide, and by an international unit of crowd safety managers willing to assist with improving the industry. Authorities and organisers should be supported by an inspectorate who travels to events in order to assist and ensure the development of safer events by ensuring that the documentation is implemented and dynamically adhered to.

I believe that the way forward for safer events in the future is clear goals and objectives for everybody. It will be difficult to implement, particularly on a European level, but who are we to let difficulties stand in the way of safer events? Are we not supposed to work together toward a higher quality of safety at all events? It is time for the industry to take the next step.

Comment

Support Acts John Whittingdale MP, considers the role of the Government in the UK live music industry...

As a politician and chairman of the Culture, Media and Sport Select Committee at the House of Commons, I am very much aware of the economic and cultural importance of UK music. With the latest assessment putting the total value of the British music industry last year at £3.9billion [€4.6b], no government can ignore its contribution. And of that, live music is estimated to be worth £1.5b [€1.8b] – nearly 40%.

The success of British music is down to the extraordinary creativity of this nation.

British people buy more music than in any other country in the world. British artists are household names around the globe and we are second only to the USA as a source of repertoire.

There are many people in countries as far away as Japan, Russia and Brazil whose knowledge of Britain and the English language comes solely from listening to the music of British acts and attending, and singing along at, concerts by the likes of Iron Maiden, Coldplay and Elton John.

All this has been achieved largely without Government subsidy or interference but the longterm implications of the decline in profits of record companies are very worrying. If record company profits keep falling then there is less money for the cultivation and promotion of the artists of the future. The crucial steps to go from a packed gig in a local pub to selling out Wembley Arena need investment and that is now under threat. That is why I strongly supported the measures in the Digital Economy Act to tackle illegal file-sharing. These are by no means ideal and can easily be overcome by anyone sufficiently determined and savvy. However, if they can deter the majority of filesharers and persuade them to look for legal alternatives then it will be a major step forward.

The most important step that the Government can take to support live music is by removing the bureaucracy that exists around entertainment licensing. The Licensing Act was supposed to do this but it has had the reverse effect. Before the Act, many small venues took advantage of the ‘Two in the Bar Rule’ allowing them to put on live performances by one or two performers without the need to apply for a licence. With its removal, many pubs and clubs decided

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to stop having live entertainment altogether as the cost and bureaucracy of acquiring an Entertainments Licence was simply too great.

When the Select Committee examined the implementation of the Act, we recommended that smaller venues with a capacity of 200 or less should be exempted. After some resistance, the last Government appeared to be willing to consider this. Now the new Government has promised to press ahead and there is a real chance that we can get the law changed. If we can, it will be a real boost to live music across the country as well as providing help to a lot of pubs and clubs that are currently struggling.

The other issue that the Committee examined in the last Parliament was ticket touting – but here the answer is much less clear. Nobody disagrees on the need to tackle the fraudulent websites that take money for tickets that do not exist. This is criminal and those responsible should be prosecuted and the websites closed down – although this is made harder as most are based outside the UK. However, there is also a thriving secondary market operated by agencies that put those with tickets to sell in touch with those who want to buy them.

Many sellers are wholly legitimate in that they find they can no longer use the ticket. However, my own experience of trying to buy tickets for V Festival (which takes place just a couple of miles outside my constituency in Essex) was the same as thousands.

After going online as soon as the tickets went on sale, I found repeated messages that the site was busy and to try again. After 90 minutes, this was replaced by a notice to say that it was sold out and, sure enough, a few minutes later tickets were on sale on eBay and Seatwave at several times their face value. This is hurting real fans and is making money for organised touts at the expense of promoters and performers.

Promoters are having some success with technological solutions to ensure that those who buy tickets are genuine fans. However, pressure is growing for legislation – perhaps to put a cap on the amount over face value that can be charged. The Committee, like the Government, was reluctant to go down this road. However, unless the industry finds a way of addressing the problem then the Government may have to act.

Fantasy Festival?

Israeli promoters Hillel Wachs and Bryan Steiner consider future audience highs...

As the live industry continues to ponder the future of festivals, one aspect that has been getting less attention is interactivity.

The days of the semi-passive audience are passing, giving way to a desire for more involvement. Some very successful acts – ‘jam bands’ in particular – have always involved an aspect of audience interaction. (Phish threw a beach ball to the audience and then musically interpreted its movement.) And the experience of being part of the show is what the next generation is demanding. Moreover, it brings an element of improvisation and surprise. But if audience participation and interaction is the future, how can we use available technology to bring the audience into the performance?

The live Guitar Hero idea is a good starting point.

Place booths at the entrance to the gig or festival where a fan can record a line of a song – audio and/or video – to later be played back on screens during the live performance, with the fan appearing to be a member of the band. Fans would not need to jump on stage as a camera in the audience could also place them among the band members on the event screens. They could dance during a solo, sing and who knows what else a brave band and a blue screen could achieve.

The next stage would see fans able to record their body movements through performance or motion capture technology, as recently used in Disney’s A Christmas Carol and Alice in Wonderland. A computer then places their image alongside the band’s guitarist on stage. The dancing fan’s movements would be electronically integrated with the band’s performance.

Imagine playing air guitar next to your favorite lead guitarist?! The possibilities are endless.

“ . ..how can we use available technology to bring the audience into the performance? ” With today’s pervasive Pop Idol culture, we can’t resist the thought of events presenting ‘best performance by a fan’ awards, followed by a final festival performance from which an overall winner would be crowned ‘festival star’ or ‘tour star’. With the right sponsors it could even be a profitable venture. Who knows where it might lead, but we can already envisage people leaving a show saying, “Man, did you see that?! I was up there jamming with ___!”

Roskilde festival. © Marie Joensen

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“We had a better year than last year,” says Live Nation’s CEO of international music Alan Ridgeway. And it’s a comment that largely mirrors the experience of the European festival industry this summer. While there was the standard assortment of bumps and hiccups, the majority of events are still standing, many have achieved some level of growth, and as a general indicator of its health, there were 10% more sell outs than in 2009.

As usual, however, there were plenty of reminders about how risky the festival industry can be. Hultsfred, once Sweden’s largest festival, was cancelled before the gates opened; Estonia’s Rabarock took a break due to a four-fold increase in VAT; numbers at Benicassim in Spain dropped 30%, and HMV’s High Voltage Festival in London’s Victoria Park sank £1million (€1.2m).

Inclement weather once again played havoc with some sites, notably Rock en Seine, which closed early due to a rainstorm, and Sonisphere’s Finnish leg at which a freak thunderstorm killed one festival-goer and injured 40.

Tragedy also struck in July at Germany’s Love Parade festival in Duisberg when 21 fans died after panic swept through a crowded entrance and exit tunnel leading to the site. While not a festival per se, the aftermath was felt by many event organisers as authorities scrutinised the crowd management plans of many events, fearful of a repeat incident.

The third European Festival Report polled 110 festivals across Europe, mostly multi-day, outdoor events ranging in capacity from a few thousand to 100,000 and representing over 3 million tickets in total.

The survey also represents festivals employing some 90,500 professional staff and 96,300 volunteers. To supplement IQ’s festival survey, we have also included data compiled by Virtual Festivals/UK Festival Awards as part of its annual census of UK festival fans, and in many cases this has allowed us to compare the industry’s view with that of its customers.

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50 was two years ago, drawing 17,000 fans over 14-15 August, The report this year is largely good news all around. and in the UK, High Voltage and Hop Farm also declined Most important 40 Comparing like-for-like festivals, the average attendance to take part. But even allowing for certain absentees, the Second most important in Europe this summer rose 6.2% on 2009 figures. Given trend is an upward one, which, in an economic climate 30 last year’s report revealed a 3% drop in attendance, still recovering from recession, is positive news. Indeed, that it’s a positive about turn, and also notable is the average on asking festival organisers how they would describe the 20 capacity of events, which comparing the same sample market currently, 66% responded positively, while 29% of festivals, has risen 15.4%, from 24,318 in 2009 to said it was “static”.

10 28,745 in 2010. So, while festivals are attracting larger “Some of our festivals sold out faster than ever, such numbers than ever, they’re also expanding the size of as Lowlands or Werchter, and on others we hit record 0 their sites in anticipation of this increase. Efes Pilsen One Love Festival (Turkey), Skive Festival (Denmark), Don’t know Relentless Boardmasters (UK), Primavera Sound (Spain) over 31% 1% and Cully Jazz Festival (Sweden) were all among those to 7% add new stages this year. Meanwhile, festivals including 21-30% 8% Lovebox and Sonisphere in the UK, and Suikerrock in 0-5% Belgium, added entire days to their programme.

16-20% 43% It’s certainly the case that a festival, having had a bad 5% year, would be less inclined to participate in IQ’s survey, and a number of events that had a soft year are indeed Comp etitio other n from festiv als

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What are the first and secondmissing. most important Headline Figures Ankarrock in Finland dropped to half the size it

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Festivals by Capacity Rank 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10

Country Spain Germany Eastern Europe France Netherlands Ireland Belgium Italy Denmark Switzerland

Visitors * 231 168 138 121 117 116 96 56 41 38

Worrying 15%

Fantastic 5%

Terrible 0% Healthy 54%

* of 3,000 sampled

Top Ten European destinations for UK festival-goers

Static 26%

How would you describe the festival market currently?

performances,” says Ridgeway of Live Nation’s summer season, although Yourope chairman Christof Huber has a more circumspect view. “You either did really well, or you had a big financial problem,” he says. Huber himself had a tepid year after booking what he describes as a “too progressive” bill at his event, Open Air St Gallen, and angering customers by restricting drinks on site (numbers were 6,000 down).

The ‘festival tourism’ trend seen over recent years where festival fans take advantage of cheap flights to travel to events abroad is still very much in evidence, but numbers have dropped slightly on last year. 68% of events reported that between 0% and 10% of their audience was from overseas, compared to 65% last year. Tellingly, however, the number of events that didn’t know where their audience was from has dropped sharply from 7% in 2009 to just 1% this year.

Clearly, festival managers are becoming more adept at identifying who their ticket buyers are, and where they are from. And looking at Virtual Festival’s UK fan census data, Spain and Germany top the list of most popular overseas destinations.

The Sonisphere Effect Anyone who doubted the health of the European festival scene would be hard pressed not to be swayed by its big success story this year. Sonsiphere repeated four of its original six dates from 2009, and added another seven, selling over 700,000 tickets in the process with headliners Metallica, Megadeth and Slayer.

In just two years, the travelling hard rock festival has Great value 10%

Overpriced 38%

Call Centre 8%

Mobile 1%

Online 56%

Walk Up 12%

Box Office 23%

How are your tickets sold? chalked up over 1 million ticket sales. “We had an enormous summer,” says Stuart Galbraith at promoter Kilimanjaro Live. “In Poland we did just under 100,000 people; we did a cine-cast out of Bulgaria that played to nearly 100,000 cinema goers around the world; and Knebworth [in the UK] sold out on the Sunday. Turkey was 100,000 people across three days; Switzerland sold out at 55,000; in Finland, we were voted festival of the year in a national newspaper, and we’ve got two nominations for BT Digital Awards.”

Galbraith says that next season will see 12 Sonispheres, with this year’s weaker markets replaced. “We’ll certainly be going into France and Italy, and repeating most if not all of this year’s territories,” he says. And while his season was an immense success overall, the freak storm at the Finnish site, and a wet, muddy site in Switzerland served as a reminder that weather planning is now an essential part of any promoter’s game plan. “I’ve been doing festivals a long time and the weather is getting more extreme,” he says. “We now budget for bad weather, which I’ve never had to do before.”

Festival Tickets About right 52%

What is your opinion of festival prices?

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Including free events that participated in IQ’s survey, the average price of a full festival ticket this season was €105.36, or €110.57 across paid for-only festivals. 75% of events sold both day tickets and weekend tickets, and regarding purchase method, buying tickets online is still the most common (56% of tickets for the sample festivals were sold this way), followed by box office sales (23%) and walk up (12%). The results are similar to last year’s survey,

Five or more 7.2% Four 7.7%

None 12.1% One 29.2%

Three 16.2%

Two 27.6%

How many festivals did you attend this year? although the percentage of walk up sales this year has risen sharply, indicating that some ticket buyers are remaining cautious about festivals, preferring to buy last minute.

Ewald Tatar at Nova Music in Austria has nine festivals in total, and he reports sales being slower initially this year.

“The presales were slower in the spring. It could be the economic situation or just that we had bad weather until the end of May,” he says. “Ten days before Nova Rock in June, the weather forecast became positive, and ticket sales picked up remarkably.” Nova Rock moved 90% of its tickets, Frequency Festival settled with 35,000 out of a possible 40,000, and Two Days A Week and Lovely Days both sold out. Nova also relaunched the Forestglade 1 day More than 5 2% 5 days 6% 5%

2 days 15%

4 days 23%

How many days of music do you have?

3 days 49%

Festival on the Weisen festival grounds after a four year break, with Faith No More, Cranberries and The Gossip helping to sell 6,000 tickets – the best result since 2001.

“We didn’t have as strong a year as 2009, but overall we were happy,” Tatar says.

Looking at VF’s data regarding where UK fans buy their tickets, it’s clear that each market favours different purchase methods. With online accounting for an enormous 85%, the UK clearly prefers to buy via the internet, whereas interest in Portugal is drastically lower, as consumers prefer to purchase at the box office. Also from IQ’s survey, it was worth noting that mobile ticketing achieved a whole percentage point this year, whereas it has previously been stuck on 0%.

Trends and Changes In an industry built on offline experience, the digital dabbling of events across Europe is only increasing. The prevalence of mobile phones at festivals is being tapped into in other ways than just mobile ticketing, and this year saw Sonisphere release a suite of mobile apps across all of its events. Serbia’s Exit Festival also issued mobile apps for iPhone, Android, BlackBerry and Java phones, and organisers report that 5,000 were downloaded including 2,000 for the iPhone which featured the use of augmented reality to overlay information on the device’s camera screen. “All applications were linked and synchronised with a central database connected to Exit’s website, so all changes were automatically updated,” says the festival’s Vladimir Vodalov.

The use of digital technology is now widespread across European events, but while websites are now mandatory and online fan forums a common sight, one entirely new addition this year were several trials of prepayment cards as the road towards cashless festivals is slowly travelled.

The principle involves festival-goers being issued with a wristband or RFID card that is charged with credit to spend on site. Among those testing systems was FKP Scorpio at Hurricane Festival. “We issued 500 Hurricane Cards that could be used at a merch stall, two beer stands and the market,” says festival head Jasper Barendregt. “By using the card you can track whatever people are doing, not to play big brother, but to make sure the service is better the next year. It worked out pretty well. I’m fairly sure we’re going to roll it out for the whole of the festival next year.” Hungary’s Sziget festival adopted a wider trial, issuing 11,000 cards that could be used at 300 terminals across the site. It also installed 12 booths to sell cards where ticket holders could also top-up their account.

“We found that 85% percent of the cardholders were satisfied with the service; it makes payment faster, easier

and more secure,” says festival MD Gábor Takács.

Sziget has identified that it needs 800 terminals to operate the system properly, as well as a facility to top-up the cards directly via credit card. “75% of the customers would like to see the system operating again next year,” he says. One other future-focussed idea which launched this year was at Optimus Alive in Portugal. The festival launched a virtual stage, projecting hologram performances by three local artists: Homens da Luta, Paulo Gonzo and Carminho.

“Some people believed that it was real and were amazed when the artists disappeared,” says Nuno Vieira at promoter Everything Is New. But while technology facilitated new developments as always, many other developments were distinctly offline.

Some brought about by the unwanted attention growing events can attract. Germany’s Melt! Festival was the victim of organised criminals last year who plagued the campsite, stealing belongings and tickets. “So this year we put fences all around the site for the first time, and regulated the entry,” says organiser Stefan Lehmkuhl. “We also had more security at the train station to look for people who were selling false tickets, which was also a big problem last year. We didn’t have any cases of forged tickets and only From a shop From a friend 5% On the phone 4% 4% At the gates 2%

Online 85%

Where do you buy your festival tickets?

Festivals offering VIP upgrades to ticket holders: 30% Average % of festival-goers taking up a VIP offer: 4.1%

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five incidents of thefts. Last year there were 500.” Melt! was far from alone in making security improvements, with Dragonfly Festival (Spain), SummerDays Festival (Switzerland), Nozstock (UK), Pohoda (Slovakia) and Exit all strengthening security teams.

The VIP Treatment Whether it’s a pre-erected tent or arriving on site by helicopter, as the festival-going demographic has widened, so too has demand increased from some quarters for an upgraded festival experience. Of the festivals surveyed

by IQ, 30% now offer some form of VIP upgrade to the paying public, and of those, 4.1% of their audience are taking some form of camping upgrade. Galbraith points out that demand for such service is strictly on a marketby-market basis. “In the UK [where Sonisphere doubled the number of packages on 2009], Switzerland and Sweden, we had very successful VIP package sales, whereas other territories such as Bulgaria has no demand from the customers.” Sonisphere UK will be offering VIP packages – ranging from a four-star hotel stay to a pre-erected tent – in advance of its general onsale for 2011, but not all promoters are embracing such trends.

At Roskilde Festival in Denmark, Rikke Øxner (speaking at Reeperbahn Campus in September), said: “We find a growing demand for the get-a-tent scheme where you buy the ticket plus a tent. It’s a difficult situation because the audience was previously always equal We don’t know how much it will ruin the atmosphere of a festival, but we can’t close our eyes to it – we will have to do it, whether it’s newspapers in the morning or having coffee brought to you in bed.” And in the Netherlands, Mojo’s Eric van Eerdenburg pointed out that Lowlands, “has always tried to have a luxurious environment from the beginning. We have flushing toilets, and showers, although the campervan camping has become a big thing so we have to limit numbers as we don’t have space.”

Sector Concerns Looking at factors currently affecting the festival industry, the overwhelming concern still lies with artist fees. As with every year IQ has published the European Festival Report, it’s by far the highest bar on the chart, followed by concerns about competition, production costs, and new this year, the financial climate. When we asked organisers what was likely to be affecting their business in five years time, artist fees were again the major concern (although to a lesser extent), while declining sponsorship revenues came second. Live Nation’s Alan Ridgeway, however, says that if anything, interest

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from sponsors is increasing. “We’ve noticed a lot more interest over the last two or three years,” he says. “Sponsors are starting to see the value they can get out of being associated with the festival, because they’re not just getting publicity over the course of a weekend anymore.”

Other concerns include a lack of suitable headliners, which FKP Scorpio’s Barendregt says, “results in the need for more stages, as opposed to bigger stages. Following this trend will result in higher production costs (of both manpower and equipment) and ultimately also in a risk in reaching sufficiently large audiences. Combining this with higher safety regulations and an increasing awareness of the festivals’ footprint will affect the festival industry over the next few years.” And while other concerns include a rise in security and policing costs, the divide between free or subsidised events appears to be widening.

Dan Panaitescu at Sziget reports that “in Hungary and in surrounding countries, the involvement of government subsidies have distorted the natural market forces. Since our festival does not apply for or receive government grants and survives on strictly commercial terms, we struggle to compete with festivals that finance the majority of their budget from public funds.”

Such competition, and even fair competition between commercial events, means that few festivals can afford to rest on their laurels. Indeed, of the 110 events surveyed, 70% said they were planning improvements next year. Efes Pilsen One Love Festival is adding an extra day; Hurricane and Southside plan to increase their afterhours programme and introduce barcoded tickets; Ejekt in Greece is adding more stages and plans to build on the new event it launched this year at an old castle in Ioannina, 500km from Athens; Cornbury Festival in the UK is adding an extra day; and

What do you believe will most affect the industry over the next five years? the award-winning Dour Festival in Belgium is adding two extra marquee stages. It’s still early days for many events, 60 but London agents are already reporting a steady influx of50festival promoters as headline discussions begin earlier than ever. And while some complain of a saturated market, 40 Ridgeway confirms that Live Nation is looking to launch at least one new event in 2011. “If people get the concept 30 right they can have a successful event – not all markets are 20 saturated,” he says. “There’s room in certain countries for new festivals, particularly the developing markets like 10 Central and Eastern Europe.”

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Busy Bodies With a season as packed as 2010 has been, it’s surprising that some of the sector’s associations have found time to do anything, but both European festival association Yourope and the UK’s Association of Independent Festivals are a hive of activity. Yourope members now number 64, with new recruits in the last year including Rock en Seine in France, Rock-a-Field in Luxembourg and Rock for People in Czech Republic (although Association chairman Christof Huber assures IQ that members don’t have to have ‘Rock’ in the festival title to join). Huber says that one of his key aims is still the fluid exchange of information between members.

“We collect and share a lot of information on topics such as health and safety; TV and internet broadcasting; backline offers for acts; production information etc, and we exchange it with each other,” he says. Yourope also runs workshops throughout the year, and by sharing experiences, Huber says that all members are benefiting. “We had a discussion about force majeure in contracts this spring, and revised contract phrasing across all of the members as a result. Similarly, after the tragedy at Pohoda last year, [festival promoter] Michal [Kascak] came to the Health & Safety seminar and told everybody what went wrong and what needs to change so everybody knows. There’s a lot of cooperation and it’s working well.”

Yourope is also continuing to build on its involvement in the European Festival Awards. “It’s definitely given us more profile and the number of votes and festivals participating are going up,” Huber says. The award ceremony, which launched this year, expects to welcome 220 guests for its January 2011 event in Groningen in the Netherlands. A mixture of public panel voting will be used to decide 13 awards, including the new category Best Indoor Festival, which has been introduced to recognise the popularity of city centre events.

The Association of Independent Festivals (AIF), meanwhile, has been focussing on fighting injustice across the land, not least by wading into the argument regarding increases in policing costs as recommended by the Association of Chief Police Officers.

“ W e collect and share a lot of information... There’s a lot of cooperation and it’s working well.”

– Christof Huber

“It’s really shown why there’s a need for a collective voice,” says general manager Claire O’Neill, who reports that AIF is also currently forming a response to the review of performance rates as proposed by UK authors’ society PRS for Music. Since launching in 2008, AIF has built a membership of 26 indie events, which it calculates (via an annual audience survey) contribute £130million (€148m) to the national economy.

AIF is also currently building on its festival twinning scheme which began last year and O’Neill cites Norway’s Bergenfest’s marriage with Summer Sundae in Leicester, UK, as a prime example of success.

“Summer Sundae had six competition winners come over from Norway while Bergenfest has a Summer Sundae branded stage at their event,” she says.

Although even in festival land, the path of true love doesn’t always run straight. “The idea has gone really well although a few of the festivals are still looking for partners,” she says.

Participating Festivals Area 4 Festival (DE), Arvikafestivalen (SE), Beach Break Live (UK), Belgium Rhythm ‘n’ Blues Festival (BE), Belladrum Tartan Heart Festival (UK), Benátská Noc (CZ), Bilbao BBK Live (ES), Blue Balls Festival (CH), Cactus Festival (BE), Chiemsee Reggae Summer (DE), Coke Live Music Festival (PL), Cornbury Festival (UK), Couleur Café Festival (BE), Cully Jazz Festival (CH), Dour Festival (BE), Dragonfly Festival (SE), Efes Pilsen One Love Festival (TR), Ejekt Festival (GR), Esbjerg Rock Festival (DK), EXIT Festival (SP), Faces (FI), Festi’neuch (CH), Festival Country Rendez-Vous (FR), Festival Internacional de Benicàssim (ES), Festival Les Vieilles Charrues (FR), Festival Mundial (NL), Festival Week-end au bord de l’eau (CH), FM4 Frequency Frestival (AT), Gods of Metal (IT), Gothenburg Culture Festival (SE), Greenfield Festival (DE), Gurtenfestival (CH), Hegyalja Festival (HU), Heineken Jammin’ Festival (IT), Heineken Open’er Festival (PL), Heitere Open Air (CH), Hellfest Open Air (FR), Highfield Festival (DE), Hurricane Festival (DE), I Love Techno (BE), Ilosaarirock (FI), Isle of Wight Festival (UK), Italia Wave Love Festival (IT), Jelling Musikfestival (DK), Les Ardentes (BE), Les Eurockéennes De Belfort (FR), Les Méditerranées (FR), Lovebox (UK), Lowlands (NL), Main Square Festival (FR), Festival Marés Vivas (PT), Melt! Festival (DE), M’era Luna Festival

(DE), Metalcamp (SI), Music Meeting (NL), Nibe Festival (DK), Nova Rock (AT), Nozstock (UK), Nummirock (FI), Openair Frauenfeld (CH), OpenAir St.Gallen (CH), Optimus Alive (PT), Øyafestivalen (NO), Paléo Festival Nyon (CH), Parkpop (NL), Peace & Love (SE), Pinkpop (NL), Pohoda Festival (SK), Popaganda (SE), Positivus Festival (LV), Primavera Sound (ES), Provinssirock (FI), PuistoBlues/Lakeside Blues Festival (FI), Ragnarök Festival (DE), Relentless Boardmasters in Association with Vans (UK), Relentless NASS (UK), Riverboat Jazz Festival (DK), Rocco del Schlacko Festival (DE), Rock am Ring (DE), Rock en Seine (FR), Rock for People (CZ), Rock im Park (DE), Rock Werchter (BE), Roskilde Festival (DK), Ruisrock Festival (FI), Secret Garden Party (UK), Selector Festival (PL), Shambala Festival (UK), Skive Festival (DK), Slottsfjell Festival (NO), Solfest (UK), Sonisphere (UK), Southside Festival (DE), Suikerrock (BE), SummerDays Festival (CH), Sweden Rock Festival (SE), Sziget Festival (HU), Szin Festival (HU), Taksirat (MK), Taubertal-Festival (DE), The Co-operative Cambridge Folk Festival (UK), Tuska Open Air Metal Festival (FI), Umsonst & Draussen Festival Würzburg (DE), V Festival – Hylands Park (UK), V Festival – Weston Park (UK), Waveform (UK), Way Out West (SE), With Full Force Festival (DE), Wychwood Festival (UK).

Linkin Park

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Photo: VÊlez Stadium, Argentina, 7 October. Š Santiago Bluguermann/ Rockpix.com.ar

Park

Live After 50 million record sales worldwide, Linkin Park just hit the road to back a career-defining new album. Adam Woods investigates some celestial bodies…

W

hen they talk about the modern music industry’s inability to create a new generation of top-grossing megastars, it’s fair to assume they are not talking about Linkin Park. The doublefronted Los Angeles rap-metal six-piece may not have U2’s pan-generational appeal or AC/DC’s carto on rock ‘n’ roll revue, but they may one day have crowds of very much the same size. And sooner, perhaps, rather than later.

“There aren’t many bands, particularly young bands, that can be a headliner of festivals or stadiums in almost any territory around the world,” says the band’s UK promoter Steve Homer (Live Nation vice-president promotions, UK music.) “We are constantly looking at who can be persuaded to come out of retirement or reform to play on their sort of scale, and Linkin Park are one of the few bands you don’t have to ask that question of – you just wait for the cycle to come around.”

That cycle is now upon us. With A Thousand Suns – the fourth all-new album in a decade-long, 50 millionselling recording career – changes are afoot that could propel the band further into orbit or send it hurtling earthwards. And in characteristically fearless style, their lightning-quick autumn arena tour of four continents spreads that metamorphosis out across a 270° stage.

Outdoor shows in South America in early-October boasted a light version of the full arena experience. The indoor tour is now underway and takes in Germany, Austria, Switzerland, France, Denmark, England, Israel, Abu Dhabi and finally, Australia.

Linkin Park

With a number of those European territories ticked off with single dates, this first 25-date leg will consume two-and-a-half months, allowing for lengthy gaps after South America and before Australia. But the curtain first rose on the brooding black-and-white set on 20 October in Berlin, before a crowd still digesting the record’s tense, stripped-down sound. Reviews of the album have been the best Linkin Park have ever had, though fan reaction has been distinctly mixed. The good news for critics and new converts, and the bad news for the disenfranchised section of the hardcore, is that this tour is A Thousand Suns on wheels.

“We would like to think we are off on a new theme, and that with the production we are following the journey that starts on the record,” says the band’s longtime production manager, Jim Digby, who steers the operation with tour manager Bob Quandt. The tour’s video man, Nocturne Productions’ Skip Twitchell, has his own way of putting it: “They took their toolbox of past accomplishments, strapped it to the top of the van, unopened, and headed for the musical horizon without looking back,” he says. “Now we are hitting the road to show this story to Linkin Park fans all over the world.”

C

hen bands get as far into their career as Linkin “ W are, you do expect a real musical growth. And this is a real musical growth...”

– Scott Thomas, X-ray Touring

onverting Linkin Park’s 2010 sonic imprint into a live experience has been an intensive, painstaking process. A production that was intended to be nailed down in Los Angeles in early-October was finally perfected – after much constructive revision from a remarkably engaged band and senior production personnel – just before the European kick off. “We tried to do a really condensed production build in LA, to make sure what we had was functional and looked good, and it did, but we ran out of time, so we have had to build in some additional programming in Berlin,” says Digby.

The look and feel capture not only the striking monochrome album art, but the tone of the record itself, and where other global rock bands might fill in the gaps with a battery of pyrotechnics and relentless LED walls, there is something subtler and more theatrical at work here. “They have always gone for something visually striking – not too many bells and whistles, but something unique, with clean lines,” says X-ray Touring’s Scott Thomas, the band’s European agent.

Jim Digby has been hard at work on these things for months, starting with the logistics in January and moving onto the tour’s content by around July, roughly when the album wrapped. What has gradually evolved is a nine-truck production with a diamond-shaped stage, a corresponding 270° PA set-up and two full 13.5-tonne sets of equipment roaming the world ahead of the band. The set, which is a custom build, will travel with them, and has been carefully fashioned from non-custom parts in order to make Left: On the Road to Revolution at Milton Keynes (2008).

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Linkin Park

its journey around the world as smooth and practical as possible. But that is not the only clever part.

“The rigging is the unique aspect of this, in that there are no horizontal trusses left and right – everything is on the diamond,” says Digby. “That makes it impossible to build the stage and then fly the trussing in. So with great conscious thought, we decided the best way to do it was to have a rolling stage that can assemble out front while the rigging is going up. That means we can get lighting and screens loaded without the hindrance of working around the stage. It’s the most effective way to utilise both labour and time.”

Armed with a crack production unit, a sackful of original video content and some interesting new moves, Linkin Park is attempting to cement a crucial crossover into no less heavy but (whisper it) more mature territory.

“I think when bands get as far into their career as Linkin are, you do expect a real musical growth,” says Thomas.

“And this is a real musical growth for them.”

“It is a risky crossover as well,” adds Digby, “in the sense that hundreds of thousands of fans who are already satisfied with what they hear from Linkin Park are now going to have to open their minds a little further and, hopefully, yet again, find themselves intrigued.”

A

Thousand Suns has already been remarkably polarising. At one extreme, a reviewer opined that henceforth “all rock ‘n’ roll will revolve around Linkin Park”. At the other, an Amazon customer complained that it was “the worst album I’ve ever bought”.

“Musically, they are taking you to a different place than Linkin Park has in the past,” says Digby. “The band has

“ Musically, they are taking you to a different place than Linkin Park has in the past. The band has found interesting ways to interpret these songs onstage.

”

– Jim Digby, production manager found interesting ways to interpret these songs onstage.

They might take Brad [Delson] away from his guitar and have him play a small drum kit or keyboards; they might have five out of the six guys singing. From a performance standpoint, it’s not about Chester [Bennington] typically running around and belting it out the way he does.”

Musical left-turns excepted, a number of other things have remained consistent about Linkin Park in the last decade, including their attitude to touring, which remains, as it always was, a case of little and often. “We don’t overkill it,” says Thomas. “They don’t come in and play three months or anything like that.

But the ethos, right from the start, has been to come often. If that means doing two-to-three week tours multiple times on an album cycle, that is the best strategy – especially when an album cycle can be two years long these days. We always want to see growth through an album.”

The present jaunt differs from previous trips not so much in its scale but in the fact that this is the first time the band has kicked off an album campaign outside its homeland. US fans are still awaiting an official announcement, though co-frontman Bennington recently told MTV News the band would likely be Top: On the Road to Revolution at Milton Keynes (2008).

Linkin Park

touring there from late-January until March or April. “[It’s] interesting,” he said, “because we’ve always kicked off our touring cycles playing in the US, but, crazily enough, we’ve kind of become a worldwide band.” The first taste of Linkin Park 2010 went to South America, where a scaled-down version of the full production span through three outdoor dates between 7-11 October, at Buenos Aires’ Vélez Stadium, Santiago’s Maquinaria Festival and São Paulo’s SWU Music and Arts Festival.

But it was in Germany that the bells-and-whistles Linkin Park experience took flight with six nonconsecutive shows, kicking off at Berlin’s O2 World and culminating in Frankfurt on 2 November. Those two bracket dates in Stuttgart, Dortmund, Cologne and Hamburg, as well as one-night forays to Linz in Austria, Paris, Herning in Denmark and Zurich. Between 4 and 15 November, the UK arenas of Manchester, Newcastle and Birmingham will all get a visit, as will London’s O2 (twice), and then on to the Abu Dhabi Grand Prix and Tel Aviv’s HaYarkon Park. From 3 to 13 December, they are in Australia, where Michael Coppel will stage shows in Brisbane, Perth, Adelaide, Sydney and Melbourne.

This is not a tour that lets the grass grow under its feet, and it represents a good, albeit brief, picture of the band’s territorial strengths outside the US. “Germany and the UK are the band’s core markets in terms of the size of the countries,” says Thomas. “France is a very strong market, but it doesn’t really have the network of arenas across the country like Germany and the UK do. If it did, we would certainly be playing more dates there.”

In Germany, the band play to 82,500 over six nights.

It is their longest run yet, though not quite their biggest in audience terms. The Projekt Revolution roadshow, also featuring N.E.R.D, HIM, The Used and others, played to 100,000 over three outdoor shows in summer 2008. Those included one at Munich’s Reitstadion Riem, which, with a crowd of 35,000, was the band’s biggest German show to date. “They are en route to becoming a full stadium act in Germany,” says their German promoter, MLK’s André Lieberberg, who is also handling the Tel Aviv show. “It must be only two or three tours away. They have always played it healthy and safe and grown naturally, but I’m actually really excited to see what happens next.”

S

o far, the Linkin Park story hasn’t made room for anything but success and more success. Their first album, 2000’s Hybrid Theory, was certified diamond in the US with over 10 milion sales, even as the record industry was beginning to contract. Even in the wake of 2003’s Meteora and 2007’s Minutes to Midnight, it remains their biggest record, though it is the only one of their four not to top the Billboard chart. “They

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“ They have always played it healthy and safe and

grown naturally, but I’m actually really excited to see what happens next.

”

– André Lieberberg, MLK

Above: Vélez Stadium, Argentina, 7 October. © Santiago Bluguermann/ Rockpix.com.ar

Linkin Park

Staring

At THE SUN

Nocturne Productions co-CEO Bob Brigham compares the production phase of a Linkin Park tour with a record that is written in the studio. “They will have a starting point, and then in rehearsals they will keep fine-tuning it, finding things they like and things they would like to do differently,” he says. “They are not your conventional band that approves a production design and then turns up and says, ‘yeah, that looks good, let’s go play!’.” In its purest form, says Skip Twitchell, the video requirement was a simple one. “A Thousand Suns has a very specific graphic look, and our goal has always been to carry the artistic theme through to the video elements of the live show. They said, ‘here’s the look we want, now go crazy and be great’.”

The aim, unusually, is not so much to try to replicate the exact same show every night, Twitchell adds, but to have the freedom to change and improve on a nightly basis. Which doesn’t mean things can’t be complex. “On the video side, we are way outside the box, mixing all the newly produced hi-def content with an array of both manned and fixed cameras, negative imaging devices and a live feed from Joe Hahn’s DJ rig, using a mix of resolutions that would make any sane engineer pack his toolkit and walk away shaking his head,” says the eloquent Twitchell. “No off-the-shelf video wallpaper that you’ve seen a dozen times; no standard camera shots like you’d see at other shows.”

From Jim Digby’s point of view, the aim is a pure one. “We are trying not to spoon-feed the audience with things they see every time they go to a rock show,” he says. “We are trying to create our own clichés.”

“[Linkin Park] took their toolbox of past

accomplishments, strapped it to the top of the van, unopened, and headed for the musical horizon without looking back.

”

– Skip Twitchell, Nocturne Productions

have been an arena-selling act probably for seven years now,” says Thomas. “In 2001, they went from being special guests of the Deftones at the London Docklands Arena in March to headlining it in September,” though he adds that their first full European arena and festival headlining tour was in 2003.

Linkin Park never scraped along the bottom, but even so, Steve Botting can vouch for the increasing heft of their tours, because as North American CEO of freight company EFM, he has been responsible for packing it all up and shipping it each time.“It started off fairly simple, as they do,” he says. “But now, they have a couple of sets of equipment moving on ocean or via air at any one point. Right now,” he adds, speaking just a day before the first South American date, “I have got 13.5 tonnes of gear down in Argentina with over seven palettes. We have got an air shipment going to Europe which has just arrived, and I’m loading to go to Australia next week. I’m dealing with three to four continents at any given time.”

Though the Linkin Park organisation occasionally charters aircraft to carry its gear, more often they make use of ordinary commercial services because, as Botting points out, this is no spendthrift rock ‘n’ roll enterprise. “They are very smart about what they do with their money,” he says.

“Jim tries to keep it as cost-effective as possible.” As well as roughly 28 returning crew from the 50 out on the road, plenty of other suppliers have memories that go a long way back where Linkin Park are concerned. “We worked with them in 2003 in the UK, 2007 in the US, 2008 in Europe,” says Mojo Barriers managing director Cees Muurling. “Each time, we are able to advise them on small bits and pieces, and they always want the strongest possible solution. It’s a pretty lively crowd Linkin Park attract, but they are very considerate about them, very caring.”

Beat The Street’s owner Jörg Philipp goes back further still. “We supplied a bus for them when they were supporting the Deftones, and they lived on it, even on their days off, because they couldn’t afford hotels,” he says “It went straight on from there: one bus to two, then to three, and now they are up to six, though they are chartering most of the time, so mainly it’s for the crew. Charters or not, this is not a band that is afraid to get its hands dirty behind the scenes. Guitarist Delson runs part of the band’s business operation, including its merchandising; DJ and sampler Joe Hahn, a special effects expert who also directed the video for A Thousand Suns’ lead-off single The Catalyst, takes a key hand in the development of on-stage video. “They are really, really smart guys, very down to earth,” says Philipp. “Really, the energy hasn’t changed much in all the years, I don’t think. It’s just easier, because they are not on a budget anymore.”

Top Left: Artist’s rendering of A Thousand Suns live stage.

Highland of Opportunity 32

I Q Ma g a z i n e Nov 2 0 1 0

Scotland When it comes to both attracting talent and nurturing the home scene, Scotland is punching far above its weight, writes Olaf Furniss...

When the Scots-born Will Page, chief economist at PRS for Music, recently presented a report into the total value of the UK music industry in 2009, there were two figures that appeared to give him particular pride. Scotland’s live music industry accounted for 11% of British live music revenue, although the nation only makes up 8% of the UK population. Moreover, it had grown by 37% since 2006, second only to the south-west of England.

Even for the casual observer, it is not hard to see where this growth came from. From 2006 onwards there has been a continual rise in the number of small and medium-sized venues; while three summers ago there was an explosion in open air music events. Among the former are The Voodoo Rooms and HMV Picture House in Edinburgh; Glasgow’s ABC and Captain’s Rest; and Inverness’s Ironworks. (This is in addition to existing stalwart venues such as King Tut’s Wah Wah Hut, O2 Academy, Barrowland Ballroom and Braehead Arena in Glasgow; and Cabaret Voltaire, Liquid Rooms, Usher Hall and Corn Exchange in Edinburgh.) Nevertheless, Paul Cardow, head of Glasgow-based promoter PCL, (owner of the Captain’s Rest; a shareholder in the ABC; and co-owner of Edinburgh’s Sneaky Pete’s) believes that the rise was often at the cost of quality sound and music. “Lots of small venues have jumped on the live music bandwagon and have done it spectacularly badly,” he says. One possibility is that there will be a shakeout similar to that of the festival market.

Of the most high profile open air events in 2007 – Outsider, Connect, Isle Of Skye Festival and Rockness – only the 30,000-capacity Rockness took place two years later. “We are back down to the number of live events the Scottish economy can support in its current state,” says Joe Gibbs, co-founder and director of Rockness, and the promoter of 12,000-capacity Belladrum near the Scottish village of Beauly. However, he cautions that the downturn in the economy, the increasing costs charged by public services such as policing, and the music industry moving away from recording music revenues to live, are all factors challenging festival promoters.

Like many of his peers, Gibbs expresses concern about the power of Live Nation, in particular the exclusivity clauses which prevent emerging bands from playing any festivals not backed by the company. In 2008, he and his partner Jim King sold a 51% stake in Rockness to AEG, in part motivated by a desire to strengthen their booking position. The festival has risen to become the second largest open air in Scotland after

T in the Park which boasts a colossal capacity of 85,000.

The latter, is promoted by DF Concerts, in which Live Nation’s joint venture, LN Gaity, owns a 67% share.

However, DF’s CEO Geoff Ellis plays down any major rivalry with other key promoters such as PCL and Regular Music. Both have worked with DF on copromotions and retain shares in Glasgow’s ABC venue, which is part-owned by the Live Nation JV, Academy Music Group. “We lose more shows to Paris and Manchester than to our [Scottish] rivals,” he explains.

“And this is often because of the SECC’s [Scottish Exhibition and Conference Centre] lack of availability.”

So it’s unsurprising that Ellis welcomes the SECC’s plans for the 12,000-capacity Scottish National Arena in Glasgow, which is due to be completed in 2013. “It is going to have an unprecedented impact and means many more shows for Glasgow and Scotland,” he explains. “We have been crying out for it and I can’t wait for it to open.”

Mark Mackie, managing director of Edinburghbased Regular Music, which has a long history of promoting stadium and arena shows, echoes Ellis’s enthusiasm for the new venue. “The new arena is going to double the chance of availability, which will make a big difference,” he says, adding that the additional capacity will increase the chance of making certain shows viable. “The SECC team are really forward thinking.” In the eighties, Regular Music was the first large promoter to break out of Scotland’s urban Central Belt, promoting Highlands and Islands tours with Echo & The Bunnymen, and it continues to do so with The Proclaimers. While geographically Highlands and Islands is Scotland’s largest region, it is the smallest in terms of inhabitants, with only 400,000 of the country’s total five million.

However, one major development in recent years has been the rise in touring acts looking beyond the key cities Glasgow and Edinburgh. To a large extent this is attributable to the work of Ullapool-based promoter, Robert Hicks, who along with Gibbs and King, founded Rockness and continues to book for Belladrum. In 2005, his company Beyond Promotions launched the Loopallu Festival in his adopted town, which boasts a population of some 1,300 and stages the weekend event every September. Despite only having a capacity of 2,500, it has attracted headliners including Franz Ferdinand, Paolo Nutini and Mumford and Sons.

Hicks now routes tours taking in Shetland, Orkney, the Western Isles and numerous other small communities in the region, as well as using Inverness’s Ironworks

Scotland

venue, which he co-owns. “The biggest change I’ve noticed in the past 18 months is people wanting to do several dates [in the Highlands and Islands],” he says. “We go out on tour with them and we build relationships.” Hicks has promoted acts including Mumford & Sons, KT Tunstall, Newton Falconer and Stornoway, and was also behind the first tours of The View on their road to UK chart success. “Bands are telling other bands they have to come north,” he says.

“I can’t remember an act that came up and just treated it as another series of dates.”

Significantly, Hicks continues to book for Scotland’s only combined industry and showcase event, Go North, which began a decade ago in Aberdeen and now takes place in Inverness. Funded by Highlands and Islands Enterprise, it has provided a bridge between artists from the region, and UK and international business.

Representatives from SXSW, Musexpo, Music Export Norway and Eurosonic are regular attendees and since 2007 it has boasted a stage at Rockness, which also provides a platform for a handful of international acts.

“It’s a huge focal point for the year and is integral to the success of everything we do,” says Hicks. In partnership with the event’s organiser, Shaun Arnold, and Creative Scotland’s Youth Music Initiative, he recently launched a

lose more shows to Paris and “ We Manchester than to our [Scottish] rivals. ” – Geoff Ellis, DF Concerts

programme to give budding professionals and emerging bands valuable hands-on touring experience.

The proliferation of festivals and tours in the region appears to have helped stimulate demand for live music, which is also reflected at the 8,500-capacity Aberdeen Exhibition and Conference Centre. “When we started in 1990 we hosted three music shows, now it is around 20 per year,” says the venue’s PR and marketing executive, Louise Duthie. “Our team works actively to attract music events and we have built a good relationship with promoters.” This year’s gigs feature a wide range of musical offerings including Motörhead, The Script, Biffy Clyro, The X Factor and JLS. And Duthie points out that a significant number of ticket sales are made outside the Aberdeen area, with concerts attracting guests from as far away as the Shetland Islands. The venue is currently considering packages in partnership with local hotels, reflecting a growing awareness of the rise in music tourism.

Conversely, DF Concerts and PCL have capitalised on the influx of visitors during The Edinburgh Festival Fringe, augmenting the musical offering of the arts extravaganza more widely associated with comedy and theatre performances. Until 2008, their gigs came under the banner of T On The Fringe, but re-branded as The Edge Festival when brewer Tennents withdrew its sponsorship. While this year’s big names included Mika, Beirut, Amy Macdonald, Dizzee Rascal and Plan B, it also provided a platform for

Top Left: AECC Arena Above Left: SECC, Glasgow Above: Scottish National Arena (artist’s impression)

Scotland emerging local acts such as Carrie Mac, Found, Withered Hand, and Aaron Wright & The Aprils, to perform in front of a wider audience.

In addition to The Edge, many Edinburgh-based artists and promoters have begun taking advantage of the opportunities offered during August, with events such as Forest Fringe, Retreat, Acoustic Edinburgh and the electronica-based Ultrachip festival all enjoying capacity audiences. This reflects the wider DIY culture which has flourished throughout Scotland, usually spearheaded by artists or their friends. These enable young acts to gain touring experience in a wide geographical area thanks to like-minded promoters.

Independent operators include Limbo, This is Music, Ten Tracks and Hidden Door in Edinburgh; Dirty Hearts in Aberdeen; Define Pop and Pinup in Glasgow; and the recently opened Jäger Room on Stornoway, which also promotes.

Pioneers in this trend are two musicians based in the Fife fishing village of Anstruther: Johnny Lynch (aka Pictish Trail and half of Domino-signed Silver Columns) and Kenny Anderson (aka King Creosote).

The duo have built a loyal audience for their Fence Collective operation, which includes the Fence Records label, the pair’s own musical activity, and occasional nights in Edinburgh and Glasgow. However, on the live circuit they are best known for their springtime Homegame Festival, which features a weekend of gigs throughout Anstruther.

In September, they launched the sell-out Away Game festival on the island of Eigg, and Lynch believes that the reputation they have built, as well as their good connections in the musical community, has enabled them to punch above their weight in attracting acts (Marina & The Diamonds, Four Tet, The Unthanks).

“Homegame has always paid its own way and we have never lost money,” he says. “I don’t think you need sponsorship or funding, if you have something good you can rely on ticket sales. We also run our own bars and sell merchandise.”

Lynch identifies a growing trend within the Scottish media in championing new local talent, ranging from blogs and internet broadcasters, to mainstream organisations including The Scotsman, the

are telling other bands they have “ Bands to come north. I can’t remember an act

that came up and just treated it as another series of dates.

”

– Robert Hicks, Beyond Promotions

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I Q Ma g a z i n e Nov 2 0 1 0

News Of The World and BBC Radio Scotland. And he believes that audiences are becoming more diverse in their tastes, which in turn is having a positive impact on smaller events. “There is less musical snobbery; these days you can like Eurodiscopop and folk,” he says. “We are aware of that in our audience and I’m aware of that in myself.”

The eclecticism felt throughout the country is echoed

by Katch Holmes, co-organiser of the 3,000-capacity Knockengorroch Festival, which has its roots in the folk scene but this year included a stage programmed by Edinburgh’s Limbo night, best known for its diverse booking policy that includes everything from acoustic acts to avant-garde electronica. “Since Top: Muse at T in the Park, 2010

we started programming a broader range of genres, there has been a steady increase in people contacting us looking for slots,” she says, adding that the event’s loyal audience can be a double-edged sword when it comes to being nominated for festival awards. “We have people saying we are not going to vote for you as we don’t want the festival to get too big.”

This trend of festivals finding their niche is also evident with Belladrum in the Highlands and Wickerman in Dumfries, close to the border with England. Unable to match the booking power of T in the Park and Rockness, they have carved out a reputation as ‘family friendly’ events, often displaying imaginative bills that include heritage acts, newcomers and traditional bands. Paradoxically, Scotland’s largest music event in terms of attendance, is still regarded as appealing to a niche. Celtic Connections, which takes place from the middle until the end of January, focuses on a broad range of traditional, acoustic and world music, with over 200 shows selling in excess of 100,000 tickets. It incorporates Showcase Scotland, which is organised by leading booking agent Lisa Whytock,

don’t think you need sponsorship or “ Ifunding; if you have something good you can rely on ticket sales. ” – Johnny Lynch, Fench Collective

managing director of the Active Events agency based in Paisley.

“Celtic Connections is largely responsible for the resurgence of traditional music and it shows there is a huge audience for folk and world music,” she says.

“Representatives from 180 festivals from around the world come to look at Scottish acts to programme at their own events.” Whytock echoes the belief that tastes and influences are increasingly blurred among artists, as well as the public. And she points out the opportunities that this offers. “Working traditional acts opens up the arts centre circuit and rural touring.

There are a lot of places to go,” she says, “The audiences tend to be a bit wealthier and are willing to pay £12 [€14] for a band they have not yet seen. They also tend to spread across all ages.”

While diversity of style is proving beneficial, diversity of ages continues to be problematic, particularly when it comes to letting under 18s into shows. “I try doing as many shows as possible for all ages, but licensing boards are not keen, and if you need to sell drink to cover the costs, then the more under 18s you have at a gig, the harder it becomes,” explains PCL’s Cardow. This is a particular blow, as he is highly regarded by many insiders as having the ability to spot the most exciting acts from the UK and abroad.

Cardow plans to develop his multi-venue Stag and Dagger festival in Glasgow, and is also looking for Top: Revellers enjoy world music vibes at Knockengorroch in May

Scotland

opportunities to combine music with other art forms, in particular cinema. Larger operations, Fence Collective and Edinburgh’s Ten Tracks are all following a similar route. Robert Hicks has booked a 17-date tour for Irish comedian Ed Byrne, while DF Concerts recently added the logistics for the Pope’s Glasgow visit to a non-music portfolio which includes Glasgow On Ice and Santa’s Kingdom. “It is silly not to make yourself available if you have the expertise,” says Geoff Ellis, who also plans to capitalise on the Ryder Cup at Gleneagles and the Glasgow Commonwealth Games taking place in 2014. “I have 30 staff and I need to ensure that they are kept in work.”

While there is an overall consensus that Scotland’s music scene is at its healthiest for a generation, there is also a growing recognition that the increased demand for live music is vulnerable to the economic downturn.

traditional acts opens up the arts “ Working centre circuit and rural touring. There are a lot of places to go. ” – Lisa Whytock, Active Events

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CPL founder Donald McLeod, who owns Glasgow rock venues The Garage and the Cathouse and organises the charity Tartan Clef Awards, chose to close down his CPL Live operation when losses threatened the rest of the business. “The costs are huge and the potential losses are frightening,” he says. Nevertheless, McLeod continues to promote shows through a stand-alone company, Triple G Music, which has carved out a niche in the rock sector promoting shows by both heritage and emerging acts.

At larger operations, sustaining a working business may well depend on reducing risk by spreading activity across non-music events, or, like Rockness, seeking outside investment by multinationals. Promoters will also surely continue to enhance the overall gig experience while exploiting commercial opportunities around it. This could even involve working more closely with organisations in the tourism sector, which has yet to fully capitalise on the marketing potential offered by festivals and gigs.

And while smaller towns and venues continue to get in on the action, and Scotland’s grassroots network continues to incubate talent, Page may well have more reasons to be proud in 2011.

Top: Paolo Nutini played Glasgow’s King Tut’s in February to mark the venue’s 20th anniversary

Ian Thomas

#4

#5 Jo Maj

Nyree Stidston

#3

Ed Grossman

#2

Gillian Park

#1

Taxspotting An article By Greg Parmley

They might not be able to tell you about ‘that crazy time with...’, but when it comes to rock ‘n’ roll accounting, MGR has more than a tall tale to tell…

O

pen any biography of the music business during the 60s or 70s, and it’s littered with stories of unsuspecting artists having their pockets fleeced and bank accounts drained.

The adolescent business, before trials and numerous errors led gradually to what we know today, was awash with unscrupulous characters, to the point that Elvis Presley once said, “I have no use for bodyguards, but I have very specific use for two highly trained, certified public accountants.” Born from necessity, rock ‘n’ roll accountancy firms soon took a leading role in many an

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artist’s career, and one of its principals, Martin Greene Ravden (MGR), has now operated at the heart of the business for three decades.

It was Lionel Martin, a musician and songwriter, who identified a gap in the market early on. “Musicians needed financial advice,” he says. So embarking on a career that would ultimately pay for many more bags of groceries than his songwriting, Martin qualified as an accountant. “No one else understood that a musician didn’t want to feel he was going to see a bank manager when he went to see his accountant,” he says. “No one else appreciated that a

MGR

musician didn’t know what advice he needed, and needed people to speak English as opposed to jargon. I wanted to provide a firm that did everything I knew musicians, bands and writers needed.”

In 1980, Martin joined forces with David Greene.

The pair had trained together at the same firm in the late 60s (they even tried to write songs together) and the merging of both practices was named Martin Greene.

Early clients included a new wave of British music: The Undertones, Madness and The Teardrop Explodes.

“There was no one else giving all-round advice in the music business so we expanded unbelievably,” Martin says. “We went from three people to over 50 by the end of the 80s.” The ‘r’ in MGR was added in the late 80s and brought its own tales of success: David Ravden had built up his own firm between 1975 and 1985, but after his partner left the company, he threw in his lot with Martin and Greene in 1988.

“It was an interesting marriage,” says Ravden, who brought 20 staff with him and clients including Van Morrison, Apple Corp., Tina Turner and Rod Stewart. “I had lots of established acts and relationships in America, and they had a lot of the current acts of the day like Tears for Fears and Level 42. It was very complementary.”

Ravden also brought a specialism in royalty auditing and

T

hroughout the late 80s and early 90s, Ravden claims MGR outperformed the mushrooming industry by staying focused on its raison d’être.

“We were always the people that campaigned for the artists and never for the corporate,” he says. “We built a reputation for being the flag carriers for the talent.”

This artist-centric view was even reflected in what was effectively the firm’s signing policy. With new artists unable to afford its services, MGR frequently took punts on potential paying clients of the future.

“We had to be A&R men and decide whether we’d take on a new artist and whether we’d ever get paid, and frankly, we quite often didn’t,” Martin says. “In the 80s, the hit rate was about 70%, but it dropped to about 30%, which reflects the state of the industry now. Speaking the same language helped a lot, and we did everything for these bands – ran their bank accounts, did their tax returns, their touring – because we had to and no one else could.”

But despite investing their time and services from the outset, when a band did make it big, the firm only ever asked for a set fee. “Working on a percentage was done in America, but never here,” Martin says.

In many ways the marriage of accounting and music has always been problematic, and certainly with regards to the two very different languages spoken. Ian Thomas

o one else appreciated that a musician didn’t know what advice he “ Nneeded, and needed people to speak English as opposed to jargon.”

– Lionel Martin

had imported the notion of business management – the full service concept that can mean anything from paying the babysitter to negotiating million dollar deals – back from North America in the 70s, taking the lead on an otherwise open field. “For quite a few years, myself and one other firm were the only players in town. Then others started springing up,” he says.

Another early addition to the team was Ed Grossman who had worked with Martin previously, and built his own practice in the 70s, also providing business management alongside other services. Grossman signed up in 1983 and was made a partner the year after. “It was like going from a two litre car to a three litre car. We zoomed away and it really exploded,” he says. “At the time, touring was considered a chore by those doing it and those having to bean count it.

The important people made records and did deals and many of them ignored the audience.”

joined the firm as a qualified accountant in 1986, and despite being a music obsessive, it still took him some time to get comfortable. “You gradually come to terms with how all the different income streams fit together,” he says. “It’s working out the difference between PRS and PPL and understanding advances and recoupment. It’s a totally different language that you have to learn.” But from the artist side, Grossman says that explaining the finer financial points got gradually easier. “From the 80s, musicians were going to university before they got into bands, so the IQ level went up. Suddenly I was finding myself talking to a university graduate who was better qualified in English and Math than I was!”

So, while it may be a business built on numbers and facts, according to Ravden, MGR grew because it could communicate, and because it built the right relationships.

“Once you’ve had a successful project with the big

MGR

business management companies in LA and New York, they pick up the phone to you for the next act,” he says. “You deal with the agents and promoters and they get to know you, and recommend you to managers. It’s all about the relationships that you build.” And as MGR’s boom period tailed off in line with the rest of the industry, it was those solid relationships that saw it through.

“It all started to change,” Ravden says. “The amount of business to be had by anyone reduced. You couldn’t just rely on the same business model to continue to deliver the income you were generating before. Royalty audits were the other big part of our business and by the time we came into 2000, the majors had all been audited by all their major acts and they’d got their act together and improved.” The answer was adding several new strings to their bow, and MGR’s 90 staff can today offer a far more diverse range of services than ever, including financial planning; accounting and business support; forensic services, and HR resources. The client base expanded decades ago, but these days, in addition to music, film and television (as MGR Media), the firm looks after everyone from sports stars and fashionistas to city corporates. But one wing of the London-based empire is still focused on the original target market: MGR Touring, which was set up in 2005.

“I started specialising in touring around about the end of the 90s, and by about 2000 it had really accelerated,” Grossman says. According to Thomas, it was the spread of withholding tax across Europe, and the opening of the UK’s Foreign Entertainers Unit that necessitated specialists in the area. “We’d always done touring work and fitted it around other things,” he says.

“But by 2004/2005 we had a critical mass of work which meant I couldn’t do anything else.” While Grossman looked after the big American artists coming to Europe, Thomas was initially the only other touring specialist. In the department’s first year he clocked up 999 shows, doubling the figure in 2006 before demanding extra hands. With Gillian Park and Nyree Stidston on board, the number had hit 3,000 by 2008, roughly the same number predicted this year.

“Gill and Nyree paper chase, get the documentation in order, and Jo Maj sets up applications and the VAT work,” Thomas says. “By having a dedicated department you learn and establish your credibility much more quickly.” And Grossman is pragmatic about why a touring artist might call. “It’s empathy,” he says. “It’s being able to take the problems from their shoulders so they can do what they

Mike Gillespie – The Sunday Club I have a huge amount to thank the MGR team for and in particular Ed Grossman – who, in the world of tour/tax accounting, is the don of all dons.

Geoff Meall – The Agency Group The second time I ever met Ian Thomas, which was at an ILMC, he greeted me by taking off his glasses and then placing them in the hand he used to shake hands with me…and of course I snapped his glasses in half during the shake.

Filip Bultynck – Live Nation Belgium Apart from all the professional stuff, the folks at MGR Media show a real love for music. There are few people on that side of the business who recommend new artists and even fewer who can discuss the use of flute in rock music while applying for a tax exemption for Midlake (thanks Gillian!).

Colin Stone – Global Merchandising Services Their knowledge, dedication and enthusiasm has provided us with truly excellent advice and support.

They have supplied us with a 24/365 day service widely beyond anybody’s expectations. They deserve a lot more than these few words.

Martin Nielsen – Live Nation It seems like helping the artist to lower the taxable amount is getting more common and important for every year that passes. This is often very time consuming and you frequently find yourself missing vital documents several weeks after the artist has left. However, working with professionals such as Gill makes this extra workload so much easier. Thanks for that and keep up the good work!!

Paul Clegg – TM, Gogol Bordello Everyone on the MGR team – namely Ian, Gill and our confidante extraordinaire, Nyree – has gone beyond the call of duty for us on numerous occasions; and as a company, they helped guide, nurture and advise us as at every step of the way as we graduated from shows with 50 people to 5,000. Their hard work and insight has saved us literally a small fortune over the years while their attitude and camaraderie has made the world of international taxes almost fun!

Cynthia B. Herbst – American International Artists, Inc. The more complicated the tour, the more we rely on MGR – it works out perfectly every time!

were always the people that campaigned for the artists and never “ Wfore the corporate. – David Ravden ”

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MGR

Ed Sargent – TM, Joan Jett and the Blackhearts I was first introduced to MGR in 2007 at the beginning of a European tour when we toured with Motörhead and Alice Cooper. From the first conversations, Ian, Gillian and the gang persevered on our behalf to maximise the greatest benefit available. The comfort of knowing you have people in your corner you trust and are on your team is the best possible scenario.

Carlos Gómez – Primavera Sound S.L. Gillian Park takes care of all the legal documentation we need from some artists, especially regarding taxes. She represents those artists who don’t have a manager or an accountant that can pay the required attention to these matters and, believe me, I’m very happy she’s there. It’s a pleasure to work with her and if all our artists could count on people like her, my work would be a lot easier!

Bill Tannenbaum – Nigro Karlin Segal & Feldstein LLP I’ve worked with MGR’s touring department – specifically ‘Uncle Eddie’ Grossman and ‘Princess’ Gill Park – for too many years to mention.

From my baby bands to my Rock ‘n’ Roll Hall of Fame artists/bands, they do a fantastic job of getting taxes reduced and keeping their costs down when I need them to ... all whilst keeping us informed and laughing.

Donald & Cree Miller – managers (Jackson Browne; Crosby, Stills & Nash) With MGR, we feel secure that our clients’ tax liabilities (VAT and withholding) are being taken care of and that they will be paying what they should be, and no more. We dearly appreciate the work they’ve done for us.

Estelle Bremaud – Gérard Drouot Productions MGR are efficient, reliable and friendly people; and there is always someone ready to help and do their best – which is priceless nowadays.

Henry McGroggan – Central European Organisation The only way not to have to think about money is to let MGR deal with it.

25 years later I am not thinking about it and MGR are still dealing with it. That must say something.

do best while we worry about the beans. Sure, I might save them a hundred thousand dollars in tax, but that’s not the real reason; it’s because we keep them out of trouble.”

“We’ve built up a relationship with more promoters and agents than other firms,” says Park, who has worked remotely from Spain since 2008. Park is adamant that her new location is appreciated by the promoters in mainland Europe (“they like that I’m on the same continent as them,” she says.), although she still finds time for dressing up as a fluffy dolphin for the odd show

by The Flaming Lips, or belting out songs during the Delegates’ Jam at the ILMC, just as Thomas himself does. However, as far as hilarious show business anecdotes from over the years go, there are relatively few.

Back when blonde fringes were all the rage, British boy band Bros came in for a meeting, sparking a riot of schoolgirls outside the front door as mounted police were called. But in the main, the world of rock ‘n’ roll accounting is far more the latter than the former. And given how much more legitimised and grown up the business became, it has to be. “If you fuck something up and you cost a client money, you’re negligent,” Grossman says. “We’re living in a highly regulated world. What we do is great and we love it, but it’s not as much fun as it used to be.”

“Nowadays it’s a tighter, more disciplined, more conventional firm. Which it probably has to be,” says Martin, who retired as MD four years ago to consult for bands. “Few of the entertainment firms survived – there are only two or three that specialise in music left.”

Looking ahead, Thomas predicts the focus of his department changing to keep pace with the industry.

“It’s about not putting all your eggs in one basket,” he says. “Touring’s been great for the last few years but whether it will be forever is another thing. For UK artists, we can’t just offer this one service and not the rest, and I want to be presenting the firm on all fronts for music.”

Stidston only joined four years ago, but she’s keen to qualify as an accountant and add yet another string to the MGR bow. “We’re often asked whether we know any tour accountants, and it’s something I’d really like to get into,” she says. “I think it’s something MGR could offer eventually.” But whether MGR’s future lies in touring or a 360° approach remains to be seen.

“The wider music business is now well out of hibernation,” Thomas says. “I’ve immersed myself in touring for the last five years but we’ve now got to get out there and try and repeat the same process in other fields.”

t was like going from a two litre car to a three litre car. We zoomed “ Iaway and it really exploded. – Ed Grossman ”

In Session

It’s rare that a small supper club in a provincial town attracts the cream of international talent, but then AVO Session Basel is a rare breed itself. Adam Woods reports...

Good live music isn’t hard to find, but truly memorable shows are a much rarer thing. A festival needs the latter if it is going to compete in the big league, and in its 25-year lifetime, AVO Session Basel has had its share of them, hosting unforgettable appearances by Miles Davis, Nina Simone and James Brown, to name a few. Co-founder and president Matthias Müller hasn’t forgotten them and he can forgive those game-changing artists anything for the magic they have brought to Basel and to his festival.

Which is just as well, given the trouble they caused.

When Müller objected to Miles Davis’s refusal to sign a contract, even as the hall was filling up, he took a sharp kick to the shin from the croaky old genius’s agent; Simone treated the international CEO of the presenting sponsor with haughty disdain; Brown threatened to pull his show if his favourite shoes weren’t located. “’No shoes, no show,’ he said,” remembers Müller, recalling the 40man shoe hunt that ensued. Such is the price you pay for true greatness, and as Müller and his team prepare their own silver-jubilee celebration, it is clear that shows like

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those are the foundations on which AVO Session Basel’s current status as one of Europe’s best-loved boutique events has been built.

By most modern definitions of the word ‘festival’, AVO Session Basel remains an unusual one – an indoor, mostly seated, three-week concert series at the Congress Center, Basel or Messe Basel. The fees are not lavish, the nightly capacity is just 1,500 and the city is beautiful but hardly a world centre. Yet the festival that represents the uncontested highlight of Basel’s musical calendar once again has a sell-out in prospect and an array of worldclass musical talent on its schedule. This year, Jamiroquai, Mary J. Blige, Robert Plant, Sheryl Crow, Anastacia and

“ The show itself didn’t feel like TV at all, just like a regular gig. The audience comes first.” – Ian Anderson, Jethro Tull

AVO Session Basel

Ray Davies are among the star turns of a 13-night programme that began on 22 October. Meanwhile, artists of the commercial and critical calibre of Razorlight, Justin Nozuka and Roy Ayers are all content, it seems, to provide the support.

Bringing big artists back down to a small venue is a clever trick. And although its organisers would be too modest to boast as much, it is one at which the AVO Session team has become expert over the course of 25 years, with its combination of small, close-up crowds and, crucially, mass-penetration TV coverage. “I understand how an agent whose act normally plays the Hallenstadion [in nearby Zürich] might sit in his office and say, ‘I don’t really care about this offer to play a 1,500-seater hall’,” says Müller. “But if he has seen people sitting at supperclub tables and rising as one man when an act comes onstage, he knows it is a concept that works. That is why we invite a lot of agents to the festival every year.”

In reality, it is a package of attractions that gives AVO Session its pulling power for artists. “We are able to convince them to do something very special,” says Müller, one of three founders of the festival, with Enrico Bonometti and Stephan Werthmüller. “All of the shows have a 1,500 capacity, which is very rare, very intimate. The artists like the television coverage we can provide, all over the world, in 40 countries, and they like the range of genres we have.”

Cult Agency’s Derrick Thomson says there is no mystery in its appeal. “The big acts that play there obviously don’t need a festival like that for their career, but it is a great opportunity for them to play in front of a small audience,” he says. “For the smaller artist who isn’t headlining, it obviously offers great coverage within Switzerland, plus the whole TV coverage they have through Swiss national TV and the wider network of European channels.” CAA’s Paul Franklin boils it down still further: “It’s always very well run and the artists always enjoy the shows,” he says.

One such artist, Jethro Tull’s Ian Anderson, agrees having played the festival in 2008. “My first impression, when the offer came in, was that it might be TV, Eurostyle – a bit smooth and a bit Las Vegas,” he says. “But when we arrived, there was a very relaxed atmosphere about the place; an ease and a confidence which is infectious. The show itself didn’t feel like TV at all, just like a regular gig.

The audience comes first.”

Panning back 25 years, the festival didn’t start small so much as different. Before the arrival in 1998 of longterm headline sponsor AVO, the Swiss cigar brand, it was known for 13 years as the Rheinknie Session. Its acts in the first year included Telecaster master Albert Collins, jazz piano legend Oscar Peterson and formidable blues woman Koko Taylor. The second year brought Fats Domino and Buddy Guy to north-western Switzerland.

There were hitches in the early days. The founders’ decision to spread their wares across Basel at a variety of venues in the first couple of years is now wryly acknowledged to have been a mistake. “We had five shows, five different venues, which was really not the best idea,” says Müller. “We had high costs and a lot of trouble putting everything in the right place, so we decided to focus on two places. We used to have a club and the Messe Basel, and then it became one, and we have been here for 23 years.

The festival gets a face if you are always in the same venue.”

AVO Session Basel has touched on most genres of music in recent years, as it has embraced a far wider range than its earlier years ever portended. These days, it draws old and young crowds for acts of every vintage and many styles, from Ray Charles (1999) to Deep Purple (2003), and from Sir Elton John (2006) to Katie Melua (2007).

But it has only credibly achieved that range by first learning how to specialise, as it once did, in jazz and blues. And back in the early, formative years of the event, it was Miles Davis who is credited as its single most important show. “To have Miles in only our third year was a huge step,” says Müller. “It was above our level, but that was the point where certain people started to say, ‘Oh, wow! That is something really special – how did they do that?’.”

Witnessing the Davis show in 1988, Claude Nobs, founder of the Montreux Jazz Festival, a rather larger Swiss event in a similar vein, acclaimed it one of the best Miles Davis shows he had ever seen, and took a seat on the board for the next five years to help the newcomer along. His patronage came just as things were falling into place. After Davis, Dizzy Gillespie, Herbie Hancock and Michel Petrucciani all followed as Rheinknie Session consolidated its place in that section of the market. “I always say, if a new festival has a great success in its first year, that doesn’t mean anything,” says Müller. “The second year, when the invoices come in, you come closer to the reality of things. The third year, you usually can say whether the festival will survive or not. If that is a success, it means the promoter has found a formula for financing everything. It is all about controlling costs.”

Left: The Festival Hall of the Basel Fair Right: (l to r): Matthias Müller, Pink & Beatrice Stirnimann

AVO Session Basel

The festival developed its local reputation over the course of the 90s until, in the final years of the last millennium, it took its next big step forward, making the decision to break out of its routine, package itself as a television property and, in Müller’s words, “go international”.

And having invested heavily in TV infrastructure and international relationship-building, it wrestled with large losses for three years straight. “It was very risky, a huge investment, and we had a really tough time – there was a certain point where we were not sure if we could make it,” says Müller. Fortunately, the TV proposition took off and gradually attracted a swathe of talent that broadened the festival’s programme and, in the process, its generational appeal.

“Until James Brown in 2000, funk was not in our range,” says festival CEO Beatrice Stirnimann. “Then we added hip hop and started also introducing hard rock. By 2006, we had Sugababes, who had a very young appeal, and Pink as well, who was very important because she was on a stadium tour, and in between she had a show with us.” With AVO Session Basel long since on a solid financial footing, Müller and Stirnimann pride themselves on the festival’s ongoing investment in its facilities, and particularly its highquality broadcast set-up. Swiss TV and radio record all of the concerts and many are broadcast across five continents.

“Every year, we invest some money to make the venue better,” explains Stirnimann, who says that up to CHF500,000 (€380,000) is reinvested annually. “We are trying to pimp up our VIP section at the moment, because it is very important our sponsors are happy too. We work very hard to make sure the act, the agent, the TV people, the radio people, the front-of-house are all happy. That is our formula. So then they all want to come back.”

It goes without saying that the festival’s TV partnerships have given AVO Session a platform as an international showcase event for major new releases. This year, pop-funk hat-wearers Jamiroquai will open the festival, using it as a springboard for the promotion of their seventh album, Rock Dust Light Star, due in November. Indeed, it was the live broadcast of Elton John’s concert across Europe – AVO Session Basel’s biggest international television coup at the time – which took the festival up another level again.

In 2007, the first of a projected series of DVDs was released, featuring Solomon Burke’s performance from 2003. Another DVD, featuring Jethro Tull’s 2008 performance, was released last year (the DVDs sell a few thousand copies each and are primarily designed for PR value). “Matthias and his team have an outstanding marketing approach,” says Elmar Kruse, managing director at C Major Entertainment in Berlin, which distributes the event’s TV content internationally. “AVO Session is a very professional, reliable partner.”

Andrew Zweck, managing director of Sensible Events, which books Mark Knopfler, says the uniqueness of the

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property, combined with the power of the TV coverage, make for a compelling proposition. “As there is increasing difficulty these days of getting TV airtime, AVO Session is an extremely important TV promo outlet, which a lot of switched-on managers and agents have got their artists to support,” he says. And with stations signed up in 40 countries across five continents, it offers a powerful medium.

Against the multimedia background, the job of actually selling tickets becomes relatively straightforward. Given the size of most of the acts, a good number of the notquite 20,000 tickets go within minutes of the September sale opening. “Everybody knows that the tickets will be hot,” says Müller, “we sell out half the festival within a couple of hours.” Demand is largely due to the disparity between the size of the talent and the size of the room, and while AVO Session certainly owes a debt to its various sponsors (most of whom are sizeable Swiss businesses) it also has a secret weapon in getting the numbers to stack up.

“For the most expensive acts, we have a special members’ club,” says Müller. “There are 40 or so very rich people here in this town – people who support the festival, who like to see music come to Basel. Every year we are able to present those people with three or four acts we can’t finance from our regular budget and they support us. We get a very, very high number of acts paid by those guys.”

Investments in high-definition broadcast technology will be the major focus in the next year or two, but there is also a jubilee project to create a high-quality book commemorating 25 years of jazz, blues, soul, funk and all sorts of other music in Basel. Printing around 10,000 copies, the project looks to cost close to CHF200,000 (€151,000). Typically, it isn’t directly a moneymaking scheme, but a calling card designed to strengthen and promote this stylish live music brand. “We don’t want to sell these books, because it would be much too expensive for most people to buy,” says Müller. “So we are going to do competitions so people can win them. It is a huge investment, but we firmly believe it will be a very strong statement, for TV, agents and managers, of how far we have come and how special the festival is.”

Top: Rufus Wainwright

In Focus 1) G eoff Meal of The Agency Group picks up the gong for Agent of the Year at the inaugural Live UK Music Business Awards, held on 7 October at the Radisson Blu Portman Hotel, in London’s West End.

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2) R eeperbahn Campus attracted 1,500 industry professionals to Hamburg in September. The Alive and Kicking panel discussed live music formats. L-R: Lars-Oliver Vogt (The Sponsor People), Jan-Philipp Schlüter (DASDING), Meike Klingenberg (ZDFtheaterkanal/ARTE), Norbert Grundei (N-Joy) and Beatrice Stirnimann (AVO Session Basel). Photo: Stefan Malzkorn 3) C arlos Fleishmann (Creative Talent) and Rob Berends (Network Europe) tussle over the mic during IQ’s Too Many Tours panel at Reeperbahn Campus. Also pictured (from third right) are Rob Challice (Coda), Günter Linnartz (Karsten Jahnke), Stephan Thanscheidt (FKP Scorpio) and IQ’s Greg Parmley. Photo: Philipp Szyza

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4) M usic conference Mama attracted a number of international delegates to Paris for its 15/16 October event. Panelists discussing ‘Do we have the right concert places for our music?’ included (L to R): Marcel Albers (Synco Network Europe), Brigitte Metra (Metra et associés), Michel Martin (Zénith) and Koen Melis (Global Spectrum Europe). Photo: Christian Ravel 5) Th e return of Popkomm in September was marked by ringing a giant gong. L-R: Samuel Harfst (artist), Klaus Wowereit (Mayor of Berlin) and Hans-Joachim Otto (Parliamentary State Secretary).

The music trade fair took place as part of Berlin Music Week, which attracted 14,000 visitors.

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6) B luesfest director Peter Noble and GM Annika Oman celebrate winning best event at at the Australian Event Awards at Sydney’s Olympic Park on the 7 October. The 20,000-capacity Byron Bay event beat off competition from the Australian Open Tennis 2010, Peat’s Ridge Festival and the 2010 Good Food and Wine Show.

7) Th e artist liaison team from End of the Road festival hangout backstage after a sold out 5,000-cap event in September in Dorset, UK. Clockwise from top left: James Simmons, Danny Black, Luke Joyce, Dave Grinnell, Emma Thomas, Amanda Singer, Natasha Haddad, Sally Finigan and Sofia Hagberg.

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7 Do you have a photo for inclusion? email info@iq-mag.net

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Insight

HEY, YOU IN THE BLACK T-SHIRT

“I

Australian promoter Michael Chugg has just published an autobiography charting 40 years in the touring business Down Under. He gave IQ this exclusive excerpt…

f trauma was uppermost in my personal life, earlier that year it had a dramatic effect on my professional one as well. Guns N’ Roses had been to Australia once before, in 1988, and the tour had gone off without too much stress attached, even if dealing with guitarist Slash and singer Axl Rose could be a test of patience at times. Rose’s behaviour prior to his arrival for the Guns N’ Roses Use Your Illusion tour in 93 had everyone running scared.

That was mainly because on the preceding leg of the band’s world tour, in South America, he was out of control.

I’d get up every morning and pick up the paper or switch on the TV to see what mess the band had got themselves into next. Usually, Rose was at the centre of it. In Buenos Aires, he walked naked through a hotel lobby. In Chile, 178 fans were arrested after the band turned up three hours late for the gig and Rose kept walking off, threatening to end the show. He was charged with endangering human lives a few days later in São Paulo, Brazil, when he threw a chair at a bunch of people.

They were supposed to go to Asia before Australia. I tried to convince their English agent not to let them go, because if Axl had carried on the way he was doing in South America I feared he could get himself shot. They did three shows in Tokyo. There were only two gigs in Australia, one at Eastern Creek Raceway in Sydney on 30 January and the other at Calder Park Raceway in Melbourne on 1 February.

Their reputation preceded them, however, and by the time they were supposed to arrive even the police were nervous. I worked hand in glove with Blacktown police to get that Sydney show happening at Eastern Creek.

Apparently they even had a plain-clothes guy following the tour in South America just to see what was going on before they got here.

When they landed in Australia from Tokyo, there was a two-week gap before the first show, so Axl – being Axl – went home to America. The rest of the band went to Port Douglas for ten days to relax, much like Bon Jovi had done at the end of their tour a few years before. I went up there for a couple of days, but I left tour manager Jon Pope in charge for the rest of the time, along with Robbie Williams.

I also left my son Nick up there. He loved it, of course, hanging out with a famous band and their gorgeous girlfriends, some of whom weren’t much older than he was. He would stay in the house they had rented and hang out with the girls while the band went off and played golf, although one day he went with them. Slash hooked a drive and it went straight through someone’s lounge-room window. The irate owner came out in a fury. It was John Farnham. Nick knew John, introduced him to Slash and all was well.

All the time they were up there, everyone, including Guns N’ Roses’ management, the band and all of my colleagues were convinced that Axl wasn’t coming back. I started to believe them. All of the papers had picked up on it, predicting mayhem and disasters.

Meanwhile, the remaining band members were going down to the local pub in Port Douglas at night and doing a few songs for the stunned locals.

By the time the shows happened, Axl had returned, but the media were still in a frenzy. These were the two biggest rock shows of the year. For the Eastern Creek gig, which attracted 75,000 fans, the crew built Nick a little nest up on one of the lighting rigs, where he had the perfect view. I grabbed a bit of posterity for myself, unwittingly, when some of the fans started running towards the stage and I did my bit at the microphone. ‘Hey! You in the black T-shirt, slow down!’ Hundreds stopped in their tracks.

Of course, all of the press the next day described it as a boring event because no one got killed, no matter that all 75,000 punters were having the time of their lives. Calder Park wasn’t quite so successful, but only because it rained.

Overall, it was a fantastic couple of days. Nevertheless, when it was over, it came as a relief.

It was a successful tour, but that didn’t stop me from passing on the next one and handing it to Paul Dainty, who landed a $1million profit. I just couldn’t be bothered after that one, going through all that pain, all the aggravation Axl caused. I just couldn’t do it again.

On reflection, I’m an idiot, but sometimes you get to the point where you just can’t face the hassle.

”

Hey, You In The Black T-Shirt: The Real Story of Touring the World’s Biggest Acts by Michael Chugg with Iain Shedden is published by Pan MacMillan Australia and can be purchased online at www.chuggentertainment.com/store.

Your Shout

“ What are your best collective nouns for the different parts of the music business?”

If you would like to send feedback, comments or suggestions for future Your Shout topics, please email: info@iq-mag.net

TOP SHOUT!

Bryan Grant – Britannia Row

A shark’s pool of agents A bleat of accountants A nest of promoters A worry of production managers A drone of sound techs An oops of stage hands A mince of lighting techs A woe of video techs A distance of record company execs A bugger of camera crew Andy Lenthall – PSA

An Axl of delays A margin of agents A tightening of budgets An improbability of riders A pomposity of managers An absence of Axls An attitude of artists Dave Wilson – Artist Ticket

A front row of secondary ticketing agents A dynamic pricing of Rob Halletts Andrzej Marzec – Andrzej Marzec Concerts

A mockery of critics A reek of roadies An album of photographers A stampede of dancers A spa of singers A rehab of rockers

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Charlie Shun – consultant

Roger Barrett – Star Events Group

An arrogance of agents A beam of follow spots A convoy of trucking companies A fluff of pop pickers An itinerary of tour managers A mess of caterers A mix of recording studios A wave of sounds A number of accountants A street of pirate merchandisers

A catering of riggers A whinge of truck drivers A whinge of bus drivers too!

Jim Frayling – Wembley Stadium

A boutique of festivals A clipboard of council employees A grunt of roadies An exaggeration of promoters An overhead of venues Jon Corbishley – The Safety Officer

A profusion of promoters A menagerie of managers An antithesis of agents A barrier of security A case of lawyers

Alia Swift – ILMC

An unkindness of accountants A muddle of managers A murder of agents A plead of promoters A confusion of artists A competence/incompetence of tour managers A misnomer of production managers A babble of bus drivers A whinge of truck drivers A presence of liggers A glut of caterers An understatement of IT professionals A takeover of record companies A rash of publicists A frenzy of lawyers A libel of journalists