Rick Mueller

because that reflects who they ultimately are. You're from North Cow right correct to grew out in the East Banna town called Lafia, just on the other side of the Berkeley Hills, Lafayette. It's like what, I don't even I didn't even know the name Lafiat. Pretty much grew up in the suburban dream, deep suburbs of the San Francisco Bay area. My dad was an executive at Chevron. I grew up going to high school like thousand people, pretty

much the American dream. I think your father was an executive at Chevron doing what do you have any idea? He worked in chemical additives division, and so he did. I mean, so when I go to the Chevron stage and it says you want to buy show run because of tech Ron. He's that guy. He is. Indeed, he would oftentimes at the dinner table tell me what you know additives did to gasoline. I couldn't recount any of that today, but you know, but he was passionate about it. Yeah.

He was a hard working guy. He was smart guy. As a trained chemist from m I T and worked his way in the executive side and finished his career living in Singapore managing and building a refinery and doing deals in the Pacific. Room thought your parents remained married. They just had their fiftieth winter in anniversary. Okay, so they moved to Singapore after you were out of the house. They did after my freshman year. I went to school

at Santa Barbara. They left I think that spring and my first year of college, and they spent the next seven or eight years there. Okay, so you're the only kid. How many kids in the family, two kids, older brother he went to Santa Barbara as well, and then went to business school at U T in Austin and then never left Austin. What does he do? He and his wife had their own mortgage brokersh company. Okay, so you're

living in northern California and are you into music. Grew up on music, So music because you're parents, role, your older brother, your personal passion, personal passion. Early just I was a Kinnectic kid. Music resonated with me so early on. My mom got me enrolled in drum lessons because I don't know if I just you know, she saw me

like an animal from the Muppet movies. I was a bit for sure growing up in this day and age, I would have been diagnosed as they like the A D. D kid and probably put on adderall or something to like calm me down. But she got me involved in a lot of sports. She signed me up for drum lessons, and these were all kind of outlets to get the energy out. But I really resonated in music early on.

And then as I got into high school, they had a high school radio station, so I signed up for that and we used to broad a little bit slower. So how old were you when you started to play drums? Eight? Ten years old? Okay? Did you ever play with bands? Try to played through the jazz bands in high school. A few failed attempted rock bands that they never got far. There wasn't really much of like a rock band music scene in the suburbs. Of this would have been eighty

eight to ninety two ish. And do you have a drum set today? I do not? I uh in college, I took it with me to Santa Barbara. I played a little bit, and this is right as I was getting into concert promoting at school at Santa Barbara, and I decided that I was just better at promoting events than I was a drummer. I think many concert promoters and people in the music business are failed musicians, so they got onto the business side of the absolute We all try yeah, and then woke up one day and

realized we didn't have What a total failure. Where are those drums today? Sold long gone. I'm not a big keeper of stuff, so like if I'm done the opposite, I'm around my girlfriend crazy. But in any event, you're in high school, you're in the band correct playing the drums played jazz band, and the drums had to do the orchestra band as requirement to get into jazz band. Hated that, and we just put on headphones and play along with rock tracks at home. At the time. What

music were you listening to at home? I think the first really big band to me was the old Van Halen the David Lee Roth Ara van Halen is like the first thing that really what do you think about Van Halen is they were a big band. These played the star Wood, which no longer exists, and I went to the Santa Monica Cific. This is a couple of months before the first album came out, and they were the opening band for Nils Loft Grin who came and he would do his little flip on the mini tramp whatever.

And you laughed because people listen to the podcast may not be old enough to remember this band, Black Oak, Arkansas, but the leader Jim Dandy, who had the same stick as David Lee Roth, the long blondier the open Street and I was laughing. And then of course the record came out with Running with the Devil, and you go, wow, this is great. Well, it just came down with the guitar plane right right exactly, but it was it was beyond that. Even the people who poo poo that sound

said that Eddie was a great guitar player. Okay, so you were into uh van Halo, van Halen and and that era of hard rock heavy metal at the time, and then you know, I think around my junior year of high school junior going to senior high school, Kurt Cobain put out, uh, never mind, and that turned me on my head. I went deep into the alternative scene. As soon as I got to college, I got turned

onto hip hop. Um, and that was where I just kind of got to see a lot more music happening when it was, you know, once I got to school at Santa Barbara. Okay, So when you're in high school, you have no dream of being in the music business, or do you. I don't know that headed dreams for anything. At that point, I was just finding my way. I enjoyed doing music. I enjoyed doing the radio station. Um, okay, so what I mean? But this was much more sophisticated

than my era. There was a high school radio station casey e Q Rock of the Dons. And how far away could you hear it? At least to the parking lot. You remember how many watts it had? I don't. I I remember, like, I'm not sure you could have gotten it at the other side of town. It was really not it was it was more of a of a hobby than it really was. We were actually entertaining anybody out there. But um, I pursued it with a lot of passion. We definitely worked on my playlist every day.

So how often what were the hours of the station? It would run from, you know, like late periods of the afternoon into I think the last show ended up at like ten o'clock at night really, so it was like a regular way to Yeah, you're a kid, you had like a two hour shift, maybe three hour shifts something like that. But you must have been pretty passionate to be involved. Loved it, loved it. I think it was the president of the Radio Club or whatever they

called it at that time. So you go to Santa Barbara with a you know, once one goes to college, it's a reset and you can join or not join. What did you then do to further your music career? First? Did you? Did you join the radio station? I did not. I looked at it. It was a little too um at that point. It was a little too alternatives that the right word. It was just a little too left for me with the political views and it with the snobbery of the music and that kind of stuff. It was.

I just didn't get the right vibe from it when I first checked it out, and I didn't really kick the tires that hard because you also had to start out with shows that were like at two in the morning, because it was put in your dues and I probably wasn't that interested in it. Um. Actually further the music interest kind of on accident. So my freshman year of college, I went through fraternity rush in the spring and I hated it and it just wasn't my scene. I didn't

like it. And at that point I was looking around what to do, and my friend who lived on my floor at the door and said, hey, come check out the programming committee. Um, there's some jobs open there. My buddies on it. They do all kinds of stuff, And I said, why not. I went down and checked it out and filled out an application. It was hired on as the movie coordinator, so I booked movies that would happen on campus every year. But as soon as I got in the door for that, I fully locked in

on the guy who was booking concerts. I said, what's that's all about? I was super interested in it still right in. It's how I learned to use Excel to do budgeting. Um, I learned how to you know what the poll star thing was all about and start so you go at the end of your freshman year, did you book movies? I did, and that would be just what would be the economics of that? That was more for what I think for most colleges, it was more

of just a lost leader of entertainment on campus. We charged a couple of bucks to get into the IV theater um and we do you know, new releases. A lot of the movie companies would say, hey, we want a premiere this movie, and they do free premiers to kind of get the word of mouth going with college kids. And then we'd also run you know, second run films in there that kind of had some you know how much marketing and promotion was there for those films. It was a lot of hand to hand. It was kind

of good early early concert promoting training. I did a lot. I did a lot of walking around campus with flyers and putting up posters. Still probably have a couple of staple guns in the garage. Okay, so how long before you start to become active in the contract end of it? Uh? The following year when they opened up the concert promoter job, I applied for that and got that, So I ended

up promoting shows. You became the concert promoter. So there was you know, there was a concert promoter job within the program where there was a movie program or a concert promoter, a production guy, a marketing guy, uh, you know, kind of what would be a business affairs type person who would handle the contracts and the organization internal organization. So I applied for the concert promoter, which is really becoming the buyer. But I really immersed myself in the

whole thing. One would think that would be a desirable job, that other people would want that job. There was a bunch of people who were into it. The guy who had the job became before me. I became friends with really quick and just kind of I was all over him my first year when I was doing the movies about concerts. And I don't know if I was a natural, but I was certainly like chasing that thing pretty vigorously.

So I think there were a few other people that applied for it, but at that point I had had the experience in the tenure on the program board and lit and behold, they got the job. Okay, So, so you really didn't work on concerts before you got that job. Lets, so you got the job, what's the first thing you have to do books and bands. So so you know many I went to a small college and there were certain times a year when they booked named talent. It

was like three times a year. How many slots were there. At UCSB, we had more of a pot of money, and whatever the pot was, we could book bands until we were out of money, and at the end of the year whatever, some amount of money was all back for the big spring show. So if we book shows and we figured out how to make money or lose less on them, it was we had to keep going. So um I started booking bands. If we made money

on shows, we put it back. So the first year you did In the second year, how many shows did you actually book? Probably did about four or five shows in my first year. Okay, so knowing people in the business, you're dealing with a middle agent to book those shows, No, sir, just for those people don't know a lot of colleges, they don't deal directly with W M. E or CIA. There are people who who are middle men who booked

those shows. But you didn't do that. No. I I don't know if it was as much of a scene was in college, but I never they had they had some middleman type agencies called Nakpa that would like he could go. Well, that was a convention where you could go and you could see all the talent and meet all the people. Correct, it was Nacka, not na Um. But uh I called I got up polls Star, and I called up Frank Riley at are your peninicial Artists and said, we'd like to book Fish at UC Santa

Barbara And they were doing a college tour. Do you remember just would have been nineteen four, okay, relatively early in Fisher's tenure. Correct, So the the programming committee already had a subscription to poll Star. That's how you were aware of that. Correct. So you call up Frank and Frank says, what UH send in the offer? We're doing a college tour. Get me these dates. So put together everything facts in the offer because it was pretty email.

Uh probably called Frank once a week for the next three four or five weeks, just probably mostly annoying him because there was no answer. They just hadn't finished routing and pulled part of your personality, how much does your relentlessness figure into ultimate success? Well, in this particular case, it probably almost figured into my failure because I think Frank was getting tired of hearing from me at the time. But um, eventually we confirmed the date and it's sold

out and which was how many people people? Four thousand people played the events center there. Do you remember how much you charged? No if I had a guest somewhere around twenty bucks and you booked Fish because you were a fan or you knew they would sell uh, because they were So I was not a huge jam guy, but I mean it was well aware of Fish and somebody maybe somebody turned me onto the opportunity that they were gonna be touring. So I just started chasing it down.

And so you have that's your first gig, so you must be feeling like a million bucks. Well yeah, until the show played and then we got overrun by Fish fans. I was not very popular on campus after they played, because you know, Fish is actually very prepared band, even even in the early days. They had great road people and they did pretty thorough security advances because of the scene. You know, it was very grateful dead esque and people who have followed them on the road, and we had

a bunch of you know, new age hip. He's taken over you see Santa Barbara Campus and I don't think the police department was particularly I don't know, it's probably an extra thousand people around realized that didn't get into the show. Yeah. Yeah, but the show was a financial success. Where do you go from there? It was a winner. So we did that and then I did shows with We did Ben Harper, we did G Love I did

you know? At that point, I think I had started in turning the Golden Voice in the summer, So that's another Southern California promote. At one point I met Mitch Oakman, um, and we started booking No Doubt, who was already a pretty successful Southern California band in that scene. They were playing and selling out thousand clubs throughout Southern California before Tragic Kingdom came out. Um, So we had them on sale and then Tragic Kingdom came out and just a

Girl was blowing up and so that sold out there. Um. And they're actually the first band I did from clubs to selling out twenty two thousand seats at Shoreline. Okay, did you do anything that didn't work? Uh? Did we do anything that didn't work? We had a pretty good track record, did we Oh, we booked a Sponge show. I got bullied into booking Sponge one point in time, by whom the agent think just kind of like, hey, we'll sell you some other stuff, but you got to

do this one. It's a big college tour. It's really important to us, and and that one didn't work so well, and we had a widespread panic show that didn't work so good as well. Okay, now you're starting from zero and it's a bullying business, so you must have learned a few lessons along the way there in college. Yeah. Honestly, when you're in college here it's a you could be a bit more irravulant because I wasn't at that point

thinking of it as a career. So it was sometimes easier to say no to certain agents as opposed to you know, in the relationships where we have with a William Moore associated now, where you want to be full service and try and help them out with a lot more even though you know or don't feel it's gonna work. So what were the lessons you learned promoting in college? I think really how to be utilitarian about it, so you know, we'd go out and hand out flyers, try

and sell tickets. I learned about ticket printing. You know, at that time it was still a hard ticket business on campus. It was an electronic system. So I had to learn a little bit about the ticketing business. I had to learn a little bit about production. I had to learn a little bit abou settlement and get myself proficient enough to come off as we were quasi professionally presenting these concerts. And at what point do you wake up and say, WHOA, this might be a career. It's

very clear moment for me. So spring of nineteen nineties six, we're in your college career, my senior year, so I'm going to be graduating. Uh. That June I went to the career center on campus and I remember flipping through this binder and they have the companies that are coming to interview on campus and what kind of jobs they have.

And I was flipping through, flipping through, flipping through, and then I said, you know, if I leave right now, I can go and work on that budget for the three leven Farside cypercill tour that Caro Lewis had called me about. And uh, I closed the book and went and did that and never did anything. At that point. I was all in on concerts. Okay, so you graduate, what is your next job? I started it at Bill

Graham Presents three days after I graduated. How did you get the gig so um backing up before that my after my junior year, I or spring of my junior year, and uh and some that summer I had talked my way into an internship with Paul to let Rick van Stanton a Golden Voice. So I cut class three days a week in the spring and drove to l a and would work out of the Golden Voice office. And then as soon as classes friends couches that I do in l a UM and so I'd work for them

in the spring and and and then the summer. And which was like the best next step for learning because had I intern at a company like Bill Cranbers, because Bill gran Presents, I would have been in the back and their poster archives finally posters all summer, wouldn't wouldn't have had the access sitting literally right in between Rick and Paul. I got to prepare offers for them. I

got to see how they do settlements. I got to see watch them do a lollapaloos a year um, you know, out of the field, and really get hands on and get real jobs. I got to work the box office Duke box office settlements. It was way more access than a college kid was getting to professional concert promoting at that point in time. So, um, you had Paul to Lett, who ultimately went on as well. Both he and Rick co founded Coachella and was as a visionary in our business.

But you had Rick and Paul and Moss Jacobs, who I worked with again now all these years later. Um, I got access to these guys and how they were promoting their styles, and it was just an incredible learning experience. So then I went back to Santa Barbara. We actually ran the concert program in the Black the whole year, uh that following year, and I think we probably did close to twelve to fifteen shows that year for for concerts, I mean, sorry for our college promoters, quite a bit

of shows. Um. So, as I was decided to try to get into this business, I went to see Paul t as they were opening up the Glass House out in Pomona and gave them the big pitch that I wanted to be in the business. And at that point in time, they just weren't in a fine financial position to hire me on full time, and I said, great, if you can give me a reference as I go hunter round for whoever else is out there, I'd appreciate it. So my production managers girlfriends father was friends with Greg

pearl Off, who was running bill Gram Presents. So it's all about the connections, all about the well anyway, I've i've i've, you know, fact in a resume cold the Bill Gram Presents. Uh. One day and UH to Greg and UH said, hey, I'd be interested in working here. And I know, uh, your friends, uh daughter who knows my production manager, and I really love concerts, and I'd like to work at bill Gram Presents and send in

with my resume. And I remember on a Friday afternoon, I got a call from Greg when I was probably you know, two beers, two beers or into the afternoon and eating a bowl aposta in my apartment and uh and you know, as you often did at the UC Santa Barbara, and uh he flew me up for an interview, and I went up there to interview. Uh. This is obviously in the spring of nine. I had a good interview.

I brought, you know, I brought my my show file from the Big Fish jo a done and having worked the summer Golden Voice, I felt like I had a real, you know, professional looking show file, which it was probably

it was probably in a pretty good shape. And I remember sitting in an office with Greg pearl Off, Sherry Wasserman, and Lee Smith, and Sherry looked through the Fish show file where they're asking me with questions, and she told me years later that one of the reasons they hired me is because I had kind a better deal than they did on Fish. They had done the U. C. Davis show themselves, and I got Santa Barbara. So she said, you know, you actually looked like you know what you're

doing for a college kid. So worked out pretty good. Okay, But you know you said, Golden Voice couldn't afford you. It couldn't for me. They just weren't. They weren't. They just weren't in a position to hire. It wasn't like I was negotiating. Was just like, we don't understand, but B G P had an opening or they made an opening for you. Uh, maybe a little bit of both.

In a sense. I think there had been some talk about hiring somebody young that they could bring in as an assistant and groom into a booker for the department, and I presented the right opportunity in case at the right time, and it was the gig. I started out as Lee Smith's assistant in the booking department, and I

was pretty active about um learning everything I could. When I got to Bill gram Presents, uh, you know, listening on all his phone calls, whether he knew it or not, and uh learned how he talked to agents, learned about booking bands, kind of learned what different agent styles were about, and again kind of further further to my knowledge base of you know, how they how they process contracts, how they built show budgets, how they you know, executed shows,

and the Bill Graham way of doing things. Now you start in the spring of at the end of nine s comes the famous roll up by Sillerman into Clear Channel where he buys multiple promoters within they bought Bill Graham. Correct. It was It was about a year, about a year into my tenure there that Bob Stillman came along and he, you know, I think we were bilgram Presents was probably in the middle of the middle of that row of acquisitions.

Somewhere in there. I don't but you know it wasn't at the very beginning, but it certainly wasn't the last of them either. Okay, so you worked there for a year and you slowly gained more responsibilities, I would assume. Yeah, about a year and a half in they started letting me book my own shows. Um I think I was a full time talent buyer there. Okay, could you book at any of their venues or you do? It's got

specific venues to book. Uh. You know, when you first start out, they give you a kind of maybe the less desirable agents to work with. Um. I booked a lot of third party venues. Michael Bailey was pretty much the exclusive booker at the Fillmore on Warfield at that point where they're which is where their main two clubs. Um So I didn't really do anything there, but I think one of the first shows I booked for Bill

Represents was BB King at the Paramount Theater. Um. But it was it was actually kind of a good, uh good way to cut my teeth because I learned how to book R and B and blues, I learned how to book Lyle love It and a lot of the M O R stuff, you know. Coming out of college, it was a kid who loved Nirvana and indie music and hip hop like learning these other genres of music that I wasn't really that turned onto. Uh. It was a good way to become a more well rounded promoter

and understand the business. Okay, so you're working at Bill Graham, it ultimately gets brought by Sillerman. How do you end up working what results as Live Nation today? For me, it was just pretty much a steady arc through all of that that I call I always generally refer to it as the consolidation roller coaster. So Bob Stillerman and the original SFX came in and bought all the promoters. He flipped that to Clear Channel Radio. Clear Channel Radio stuck with it for a number of years and then

will eventually spun that company off into Live Nation. The big reason Clear Channel Radio spun off Live Nation is that when they acquired it, it was all on the concept that there's going to be synergy between sponsorships of what we can sell in the concerts, and we'll be able to take our clout with artists and help generate more concerts, will generate more sponsorship, and we'll grow the

business that way. At the time, the business wasn't predictable enough that you know, concert promoter years could be very spiky in terms of revenue and profitability, and for a public company at that point in time, it was really difficult for them to get their head around it because Clear Channel was kind of a straight line of growth and at that time what was either Clear Channel Entertainment or that part of the division would be very up

and down year over year in that economy. So I think there became a frustration that they weren't it was hurting the overall Clear Channel performance. UM. Their frustration grew within that because nobody UM seemed to be able to kind of get their arms around and get a consistent

result out of the concert company. So they spun that off and that was around the same time that uh, Michael Roppino came in and took hold of what them became Live Nation UM when they finally gave it the new name, and Michael has done a great job with its sense. So you were at Bill Graham, how do

you move up the food church just buying shows. I've been fortunate of a lot of good circumstance and opportunities, so I've put in a lot of hard work but so I came into the department and Lee Smith and Sherry Ossman were booking most of the shows throughout San Francisco, and that was from everywhere from theater stuff up to

Shoreland Amphitheater and the stadium shows. Um I'd say right around the time I got promoted, UM, Lee Smith had kind of a change of heart in terms of what he was focusing on, and he left the day to day booking department to go work on new business development. So it then became mean Cherry Wasserman booking most of the shows in there, and at that point Sherry was probably focused a bit more on passion projects and interesting

projects that she was on day to day stuff. So I was essentially the you know, nine to five guy in the office picking up the phone. And I just was so in love with getting out offers and promoting shows that it was really this wide open opportunity for me to promote as much as I could in my career. So not a lot of people get there. I mean, you hear far more stories about people having to compete

for their lane. I had a different opportunities that, you know, this unique opportunity where I didn't have to compete with people within the company to get my you know, my lane of talent. And I just got to do a ton of shows across a lot of different genres, and I had the support of Sherry. We would work together and whatever Greg was working on, And those guys turned me onto their relationships of people they had worked with a long time and probably some of the fun most

fun I've ever had in the business. And how do you end up in the main office in Los Angeles. So as the consolidation happened and it rolled out, UM Greg and Sherry left around two thousand three to start another Planet Entertainment. Um Lee came back out of the out of the business development world of what he was doing UH and was running the office. I was working

with him booking shows. I eventually got promoted to run the San Francisco office UH there and in two thousand eight, Jason Garner, who was running Live Nation for North America at the time and as a friend of mine who I had started doing Latin shows with in San Jose when he was a local promoter in Northern California, UH, recruited me to come down and oversee the Los Angeles office. In addition, to still having some oversight of San Francisco. So in two thousand and eight, I had the opportunity

to come to l A. Uh. My wife is from Redondo Beach. We talked it over and it's kind of a good time in life. With our daughter about to go into the school, going to school, she was four years old. We said, you know, we've been in San Francisco for a while. It's spent my entire life except for college, up in in Northern California, and it just felt like the right time to make a move. And

it was a good job opportunity down here. So you work for a Live Nation how long, well, if you count their early days counting Los Angeles, how long you in Los Angeles two thousand and eight to two thousand eleven for a Live Nation? Okay, and then you leave to go to a g correct And what is the job they're offering you at a When I was leaving Live Nation at that point, the economy kind of rode the economy down when I moved to Los Angeles. You know, the bottom fell out in two thousand eight, and it

was pretty bad. You know, it was a tough time in the concert business from eight to two thousand eleven, a lot of belt tightening going on at a public company in terms of there was ten percent layoffs of couting back staff weren't selling. They weren't selling and um. You know, that was the early days of the Ticketmaster merger, and there was a little bit of competition I think between A's Off and Rappino, and being right in the middle of that l A got to be a tricky navigation.

So I just was a little bit burnt out on that part of the job and running that business UM and wanted to start working on different projects and step away from the scenario that I was in. So I called Paul to Let who I used to intern with, and we started talking about opportunities and he UM he helped facilitate a discussion with a g which owns Golden Voices, and I went over there to start working on projects

with Paul and the Golden Voice team throughout. So he did not go all over as any kind of hands on booker. You were going over with what to go. I went over to book and do create new projects. And I also they needed some help organizing their UM some of their venue platforms and stuff in l A, so I came UM to help them a little bit run the Golden Voice business and really to focus on new projects. Okay, and then how do you end up

being head of North America. So in two thousand and thirteen, I think Randy Phillips was let go and so was Tim Lowicky Ja Marciano was brought back from running the O two in London to oversee a G Live at the time, which now presents UM, and he put myself UH in as President of North America. So I had kind of come in saying I want to get out of running the day to day operations and budgeting and forecasting and the business side of UH of Concert Pony and focus a little bit more on events UM. I

did that for a year and a half. Two years the change happened in management and Jay said, hey, I'd really like you to take on this role overseeing the entire country. I had connected with Jay when he came back to a G just in a very social way and we we connected. So when he asked me to take the job, obviously it's a very good job. It's back to more towards what I had been doing it liveation. But I wasn't opposed to it, and I felt good about jumping right back in. We're having a good time

talking about the music business. Rick Mueller and me. Let's pause for a moment, get right back into it. Thanks for listening to this week's edition of the Bomb Left Sets podcast. If you want to see photos and videos of my guests arriving in the Dude in studios here in Venice, California, check out tune in dot com or at tune in on Twitter and Instagram and now more with a G presents North American President Rick Mueller. So, I know that part of your job is to scout

and sign new venues. Correct, how much of your time is that? Probably spent a third of my day thinking about venue deals, where we're going to open them, where new markets we can get in um acquisitions, or if we're gonna build them from the ground up. So how many have you either purchased or started building on since you've had this gig a dozen eight new venues? And how do you decide um? There's a lot of variables. I think what services in a marketplace? So some you

know there's an example of the venue you purchased. So we bought two clubs in Richmond, Virginia and uh Norfolk called the National and then orv a beautiful rock clubs. So they existed pre existed. UM. The guys who built

them did a great job. I think they were probably more visionary than they were business people, and they had trouble with covering the financing and the debt was catching up with them, and we started talking about with them about UM coming to join a g and we looked at that and in that case, we purchased two existing clubs and we put our infrastructure behind it, and the

clubs are doing great today. UM. We just bought the Agora Ballroom in Cleveland, Ohio, which was kind of a storied one of the storied rock rooms in the early days of rock and roll that has fallen off and being you know, it's become a little bit dilapidated, and we're renovate current renovating it right now and we'll reopen it this uh the spring. We bought that building as well. It turns out real estates in Cleveland is still more

affordable than Los Angeles. UM. And then we've done other deals where we took over at lease at the Shrine Auditorium here in Los Angeles where um after the Universal Lampitheater went away and became a Harriet Potter ride. There's obviously a hundred shows a year that uh, we're going on up at the Universal Lampatheater that we're going to be up for grabs. You know, they're really not making a whole lot of new six thousands the venues in

Los Angeles these days. So we decided, uh, you know, to go start having discussions with the shriner about taking over that room. And I mean, ultimately, if you dig down, there's a pretty storied history of rock and roll at the Shrine as well. So I like old classic rooms

that you can be refurbished. When I had moved down to Los Angeles for a two thousand eight for Live Nation, I inherited the Palladium renovation which Brian Murphy, who was the long time Avalon Tractions promoter, was working for Live Nation and they SFS had acquired Avalon le Brian had gotten the lease on the Pladium and there was a renovation going on there. So I got to be barely hands on on renovating the Hollywood Platium, which was absolutely amazing.

So when you make a decision, how much do you believe, look into what the market can sustain, what the competition is. What are the factors that go in to decide before you put down your money. Well, number one, is it a good room? You know, we've we've opened some good rooms, we've opened some bad rooms. And there's nothing worse than having to book a bad room once it's open, once the you know, the word is out on the venue and it either feels cold or it isn't well received.

So I do my best to make sure I feel good that whatever the project is going to be, it's a good room. Then you're gonna be looking at what's the competition in the market, and that's going to dictate how much you can spend either renovate, rent by the venue, and how good of a business opportunity it's going to be for you. You say clubs, Now, in the old days a club was somewhere between a hundred and fifty and four hundred. What do you can sit? Now? They

called the Wilterner Club, which is almost two thousand. Do you these these clubs that you talk about our what size anywhere from twelve to three thousand seats? I would think, okay, let's just go below that to what degree are you involved in under twelve hundred seats at ag Uh, We've got so. I mean we we have a lease on the Roxy on Sunset Boulevards. So that's probably the smallest club that we operate in Los Angeles that ultimately falls under my world. UM So we do everything from We

don't have a lot of those. We've got them in l A, Denver, New York. Okay, so you're booking the Roxy. Can you make at the end of the day, can you make money at the Roxy? You can make a few bucks. You have to be really tight and you

have to be very disciplined on it. But in l A where it's very competitive and you want to get in early with artists and you want to um so, you know, we call it building a vertical and get them on the path through your venue system so you can grow the band and stay with them through their career. The Roxy's iconic. Um it's a great room for a band to start out and have a first play. That is call it more R and D. From our side of the equation, we don't really look at it as

a huge profit center. We make a few bucks on it. It's not what you know, I guess it's to our budget every year for sure. Okay. Now, in the old days, meaning the seventies, prior to the crash of two thousand and Napster, the record companies supported all these clubs. They bought tickets, they bought drinks, and that is how you got act started. A that economic support doesn't exist anymore, correct for the most part. Yeah, okay, but what do

you believe? I you know, I grew up in the pre Internet era where you were staring at the four walls and I gotta go out. I gotta have to go here a band, okay, whereas today all the entertainment is at home if you go back to the pre BlackBerry area, so I have to go home and check the email. But if I'm sitting at all, I have Netflix, I have all these other things. Is there a business? Is there an attraction of people going to hear either

unsigned or marginal talent in a live setting? Are you asking the question is people want to just go out for the sake of going out? Well, I'm actually asking all of the questions. I want to end your your business.

Had I look at it this way? Okay? It used to be in the seventies eighties, you went out, certainly on the weekend, the bar had a band, The band was tended to be covers unless they were a known entity, and then there was a sheered, clear delineation between those bands and bands that had record deals, where today anybody can make and release their music. So if I went to a bar now, chances are they would have a DJ.

I want to hear recognizable music as opposed to just going to hear some unsigned band play their new music. I don't think there's that strong as desire to do that because there's so many other opportunities to entertain yourself. I think it's a little bit different now because with streaming services and where music is so ubiquitous that you can find it anywhere, that bands are happening now before

you realize it. So when I first got into the concert business, the l a Weekly in San Francisco, the SF Weekly, and even the Chronicle Sunday Pink section with the strip ads of what was playing at the film wore was hugely important to kind of knowing what was going on in town. And as you know, as the smallest room that we ran in San Francisco was the film where we look at what was playing Slims, we played music Hall, Rick shall stop. In the smaller rooms,

you pay attention. You'd work the guys who booked those rooms to what was selling out, what was hot. You stay in touch with the agent so you'd have a better understanding what then presented the film are. Um, Now there's bands that can self promote their way into selling out a night at the Roxy before most promoters are even aware of it. Right, So we'll rent the room to anybody who wants to come in and promote a show and there, um, for the most part, that doesn't happen.

We have buyers to go in there. But now you don't rely on the l a weekly. There's there's a headline show for all of these bands that are essentially baby bands. They don't need the label support to sell five tickets at the Roxy anymore. Okay. Two things. So you're saying, at this level the band has a built the audience, absolutely, Okay, what if you do not have a built in audience? Were not as much and we're

not booking in cover bands. But but but but forgiving you, I'm just talking about looking at the business at large. If someone the old concept of Hey, I'm going out. I'm going to my local bar. I hear a band, they're good, I start to follow them. Does that even exist? I think the closest it really comes. You see a

lot at the House of Blues. They book like a lot of Journey cover bands and and you know other different style cover bands that are kind of like party night of rock and roll, and they can do pretty good business. Um, we don't do a lot of that stuff because we're not just trying to do the turnstyle business through our club, So we're really focused more on actually asking in societal change. I understand the business, but do you believe that on a raw percentage basis, fewer

people are going out in search of marginal live. Marginal's got its own connotation, marginal live talent as they were before. I mean, I think I think they're going out because they're going to go see the band they want to see. I don't think they're going out just to explore music for a night. Okay, so the bands they want to see have built they're following online. Do you remember the name of anybody you've booked at the Roxy who you

were unaware of? That comes with their own audience We sold out two shows with Russ on the on sale before anybody knew who Russ was. And Uh, one of our guys who books hip hop uh at Golden Voice, you know, put these shows in there. Same with the artist Black. These guys just blew out shows, um, long before they were internet sensations, long before they were on on radio. And how do your buyers become aware of them? We've got a couple. Uh, We've got a lot of

buyers who just have their ear to the ground. That's the new part of you know, the same way that when I was twenty one coming out of college, he had to work hard to keep your ear to the ground and talk to the right people who were in the scene, and study CMJ and study the that's a

college music journal. That was an old tip sheet and twenty years ago, you know, read the European magazines and find out what was happening abroad and what you could bring over and and now it's SoundCloud and various sites that people go to. And Okay, so let's say one of these acts plays the Roxy. What is the journey

for them? Well, the journey for them is we try to help steer them through our venue vertical and and get as many as we can in with their We also out of Los Angeles, we have you know, Golden Voice owes and operates Coachella. So you know, ultimately we're trying to encourage bands to kind of be on the path to Coachella. But do you believe any of the bands that play in the afternoon, not on the main stage get a real benefit from playing a festival? A

festival or Coachella. Let's start with Coachella. I do think bands get a benefit from playing that. Is that based on being on the poster or is that based on the actual performance? Both make no mistake. It is not an easy set to play at two o'clock as a young band in the desert if it's you know, one of those hundreds green days out in the desert. But you know, if you can bring it and put in a notable show, I think where the mouth starts growing from there. I won't say that that's the same one

every festival. Can you name two acts that you feel benefited from that? Coach call me on the spot. No. The reason I mentioned is I don't really I can't think of a single act that is broken from a festival doesn't mean they haven't gotten some notoriety, but people say, oh, you know, I think the festival is almost like the new south By Southwest, although you get paid. Okay, Now, if you have an investment in the act and you have the vertical and you're gonna put him in the

l Ray whatever, that's a different thing. But I have not seen any man get a buzz at a festival then ultimately become bigger. There's some acts that have general buzz that have never boken through, like Gary Clark Jr. And he plays all the festival, but he already had visibility by time he played Coachella. Well, look, Stacy V who works with Paul, has this phrase of that Paul has been very good at buying cream bananas, so he buys the banana when it's green, and by the time

Coachella plays, it's yellow. That visibility in the meaning the visibilities happened. And a good example that be would have been Gautier. He bought Gautier for an incredibly little amount of money to play both weekends of Coachella, and then the big song happened, and I think at that point he had the number one single uh in the country. The tent was packed, so you know, Gautier started happening despite you know, before Coachella, but he had his eye on there, so you know, did he break it? I

don't know that, Paul. That was a huge record that Coachella was sure on top of the cake at best. Correct, But fast forward that or changed that timeline by three months, and you'd say he's breaking out of Coachella. Well, let's I mean, I don't want to go down because we have so many acts in so many years, but let's make it different terms of breaking an act today. Well, I will also say, but the act was already broken and known. But the legend of Daft Punk is because

of that set they played at Coachella twelve years ago. Yeah, but it was a headlining set. Well, but I'm standing like, from how big Daft Punk was at that time to the general public, how big how big they are today? I agree totally. Are we at peak festival? Are there any more festivals to be built? I think there's lots of festivals to be built. I think the question is how big they will become? How big in terms of will they grow or will they intentionally be seen as

smaller niche festivals. So we just did the One Love Festival down in Long Beach at the Queen Mary and the Great Lawn they have out there. Um did fifteen thousand people a day with a mixture of different reggae bands. And again I would not have guessed that the reggae scene was the strong enough in this day and age to have sold out fifteen thousand tickets a day in two thousand and eighteen. Just doesn't seem like there's a scene for that kind of music. So I think there

are niche festivals. You look at what Tim Sweetwood is doing with the Shakingese Festival down in Atlanta, where it's all guitar driven rock. There's no hip hop, electronic, other genres within there. It's really kind of stays true to guitar driven rock kind of build. Does he do He's you know, I don't know for sure because he doesn't report, but I'm going to guess he's in the mid twenties.

With the sales. I don't know if in this day and age, with the popularity of rock with youth culture, if he's going to get to fifty thou people, but if he's making money at twenty five people and he's servicing the niche. I think that that's the future. If he can make money at that, that's really smart. Okay, let's break it down the fifteen thousand who went to

the reggae festival. How was the experience? Were you selling food and obviously you're always selling food, but how much was the band's on stage and how much was the environment. I think the music is driving that one more because nobody had been I mean, they the festival took place once last year, but for the most part, people aren't going to buy into the specific experience, So I think

that is being more musically driven. You know, Coachella is more about the all companies experience Coachella, Lolla BLUSA and maybe Austin city limits and maybe outside the lands which those are established, those of go out Forever Coachella, the brand name being the progenitor of the Granddaddy Lalla Blues are the great location in Chicago. Once we move from those four locations at that level, okay, where you're trying to get, certainly in access of fifty people a day,

how many can our countries support. I think we're approaching the plateau, right and the fact that I'm generally speaking, let's leave Cogella a little bit aside, because it's really kind of unique. But generally speaking, all of these festivals have the same headliners now, so it used to be you had to travel cross country to have the experience. Now it's coming closer to you. I'd agree with it, but I put the distinction as so Outside Lands is

an incredible experience, The site itself is incredible. Coachell is an incredible experience, Lalla Blues is an incredible experience in that park, Austin city limits, Austin an incredible party town, Zilka Park is amazing. But past that, you know, like Bonnaroo, I think it's ruggling a little bit because it's a pure camping festival and in the heat and Tennessee, Um, maybe it's lost a little bit of its identity as a camping festival and it's been a little bit up

and down the last couple of years. Doesn't mean it's by means in the in the toilet are going away. I think there's a huge following for Bonnaroo, but what does it stand for and is the site special? Uh? You look at one of my favorite festivals, his Electric Forests, which a company that a g owns Madison House Productions. Madison House Presents produces in partnership with the Soomniac. So that one is up in uh up in uh Ro Rothberry, Michigan, and I think is one of the most unique festivals

presented in America today. It's electronic music meets jam bands, so string, cheese and based nectar up there. But it is so experiential in terms of what goes on in the forest because the for those who haven't been, it's a festival that has three or four stages scattered throughout the site that is intermixed with a lot of trees and forestry there. So it's you're you're really weaving in and out of an experience all day. And for me when I go there, it's almost like, oh, there's a

there's bands playing. It's so much fun to wander in. Let's see the art that Jeremy Stein, who who produces the festival, puts in every year. He brings in you know, Carni traders who have like you know, I could take my cell phone and you know leave with a bow and arrow if I want to like trade my way through the the trading shop the trading post shop and he is producing an experience every Saturday night as the Pittical Moment with string cheese that is fireworks and acrobats

and it's really immersive for the weekend. So you know, if you're into that kind of camping festival, that's that's a festival that's growing. You know, we've gone for one weekend selling out a month in advance to adding a second weekend. So I do think that there's growth. But I think you have to really stand for something. I think your site has to be great. I think the

experience has to be great. Um, otherwise it's going to be harder to achieve the scale to get up to where kind of these you know, highly law at festivals. Let's go back to Bonaru. Did Bonaro lose cashe and audience because it muddied the water of what it was

about it? Originally it was a jam band festival, then it just became another festival with bands in Tennessee, It's possible they pivoted from jam bands pretty early on to I mean, if you're gonna be a jam band festival, the talent pool is pretty shallow of headliners that can really drive people to your festival. So I think Bonro

did a good job of pivoting into general use. I think, but when they were at their height, there was nothing else throughout the south there, and now there's so much more.

You've got you know, Okachobes, and you've got the Hangout Festival down in Atlanta, You've got uh down to the Gulf Shores, You've got Shaking Knees and Atlanta, you've got you know, festivals to the north of you know, gov Ball and Firefly, and there's stuff litter all over, so you know, you're competing for a lot more So how does Bonnaro distinguish itself as a festival from these other things? Because Chance the Rapper, you know, is an act the

people will point to play a lot of festivals. Last year, you know, Florence and the Machine had played a lot of festivals. Outcast play a lot of festivals. L c D shows up on a lot of festivals. So you're right and that these bands are playing a circuit of festivals and it's great, but doesn't mean the festival experience can't be great. So okay, So as we move forward, is it going to be a hundred thousand people in a field seeing headliners, or is it going to be

more about each festival is branded based on the experience. Well, I think the bigger ones are going to be all about the experience, and they're gonna have to be great musically and have to stand for something, but they're also going to have to have a great experience to kind of sustain at that hundred thousand person level, because if you're just talking about a band selling a hundred thousand tickets, you're really talking about stadium shows, right, I'm not talking

about that. Let's go back to the festival. I remember this is probably six or seven years ago. Headliner night to at Coachella was Radiohead. They came, they brought their arena show, which means it's small for an audience of sixty people, and they host to audience. Everybody was going to the Sahara tent for the electronic music, dance music, ETCETERA question becomes in the festival experience. How important is the DJ the electronic music experience depends on your festival,

I suppose. I mean, there's no doubt that electronic music is incredibly popular at Coachella. But you know, back going back to my reference of Timmis Sweetwood. It well, let's put it this way there, Coachella and I only focused on this primarily because it's your company. Uh. Coachella had a long history of reuniting legendary rock bands. So in the last last year, in this year, there seems to be a pivot to more modern acts. So the question would be, have we seen the sunset on festivals of

old acts and is it really now about present day acts? Okay, so in the last three years, a C d C and Guns and Rose's headline coach Ella, Yes, but that was two years ago. Last year, Uh, And my point, you know, most of the eventional wisdom that A C d C was a bust, and when you go last year it ended up being Gaga, and this year it's Beyonce. That's a far cry from A C d C and Guns and Roses. So you're in a very short period

of time there have been rock bands headlining. No, I believe you know, I discussed this when you discussed with Paul. You know, I believe two or three years ago, two years ago, Bieber should have been the headliner, and everybody said, no, that's crazy. I think if you were willing to do it and I said, hey, Biber is gonna be the headline today. It would be a matter of negotiating the money.

I think they look the interesting part in the tricky part, and this is certainly don't speak for Paul because he's done incredible job curating Coachella for twenty years. But also Coachella sells out with no lineup announced. But if you don't do a good job every year and it becomes stale, people will move on. He's you know, we're still selling out in advantage. But let's not make it about coach. Let's just make it about a change of the audience. Sure.

I think that the important part to focus on air is that as hip hop has become more popular and pop has become more popular because music is so ubiquitous an easy to get hold of, like a pop act as a hip hop act, and hip hop act could be a pop act there collaborating together. The boundaries between genre are much more gray now than they were, But it's very different from reuniting an act from the sixties,

seventies or eighties. It seems like there's a giant transition between the heritage acts and the acts of now, and that this is the summer when the festival. People are saying, no, if you're an old act, you can play the areena, you can play your own audience. But it comes to the festival, it's a younger audience and they want to see these younger acts, whether they be hip hop or pop. Well,

there's no doubt. I mean, I don't know if there's as much of an appreciation for some of the classic rock stuff from what's generally called it the millennial generation as previous generations before that. You know, I mean even Radioheads a classic rock band at Coachella, right, But you know, relatively recent Radiohead and Coldplay and Dave Matthews Beings were the last bms to break through on v H one for the whole thing blew apart. They were there. They

were beneficiaries of the monoculture. But let's let's switch gears a little bit more. Okay, so I'm a concert goer, let's explain the economics of the con business generally speaking, or Michael Rapino's head of Live Nation, he would say, if I don't pay the act, somebody else will. There's always someone who will pony up without money a casino

or something. Do you agree with that, Yes, okay. They will also say that generally speaking, once we get to a name talent, let's not talk about the bands that are selling the roxy or even playing these clubs. But once you're getting to an arena level act that generally speaking, all of the money for the ticket revenue meaning not the not the up charges, but the ticket revenue is

essentially going to the act. Correct. Okay, So explain the economics to my audience, because you obviously have a business. We're making money, right, I guess as a general statement, the bigger the act is getting the more of the lion's share of the ticket revenue they can command and a deal with either a SARTA Live Nation or any promoter throughout the world. Promoters are making their money if they own an operative venue off of peanuts, popcorn and

parking for them at part um. If we don't own venues, we try to make deals that scale up with artists, so we produce a Rolling Stones tour worldwide. So scaling up meaning what uh I mean? We're we want to do all the dates with a band as opposed to the traditional way. Um twenty years ago, was maybe even thirty years ago. Is that acts were sold more market

by market to the local promoter by an agent. And in this day and age of concerts, most artists sell tours that are arena size a bigger to a single promoter who produced their tours uh nationally or internationally. So if you're gonna make less per show on doing an artist because of the amount of money that the artist commands, you want to do more shows to grow your business

and reach your budget every year. Let's assume you have a international tour with one of these acts, you pay them a lump sum such that if there's some acts some dates that are very successful, others that are marginal losers, it all comes out in the wash. I think every company has got their own model only I think Live Nations of a company and is very revenue driven. We're maybe a bit more bottom line driven as a company. You know, we approach everything at a g as can

we make money on this act. I don't think we're necessarily looking at anything coming out in the wash. But by no, make no mistake, we don't win on every show that we go ahead and book. I mean it's very much a risk business and it takes a big stack of chips to sit at the poker table on those games. But I say let's do them. I'm coming, I'm act X, and I make a deal with you for fifty million dollars. You're gonna pay me that fifty million dollars and then a g Some some dates maybe

do better than others. Correct. If you own the building, you have all the concessions, the parking, etcetera, etcetera. If you don't own the building, explain to my audience how

the ticketing fee revenue is split up. So we'll work with the artist to set the ticket fee structure and what tickets are ultimately going to cost our function of you know, what the artist is trying to make, What it costs to operate the arena on a given night, what's marketing, backstage catering, security, stage hands, and so forth.

So you're trying to generate a certain amount after you pay off all those expenses, and you know, grows as much as as much money as you can to make as much money that you can split up with the artist. If you do a good job with it, here's money to split up and everybody's making money. If you do a bad job of it, you've guaranteed an artists a floor on that deal, and you're gonna be paying them

whenever you guaranteed them and come up short for the night. Okay, let's just say a ticket is a hundred dollars and there's twenty five dollars in fees. Where might those fees go? Well, the fees go depend on the ticketing companies. Some buildings own their own ticketing companies. Ticketmaster will make deals with buildings where they will give them advances or help them pay for capital projects, and in terms of keeping more of the fee themselves, they'll rebate it to the to

the building. Sometimes the building will then incentivize either the artist or the promoter to come there with some of those fees. It's just a different source of revenue that comes into the game of how deals are made. Okay, but generally speaking, that's where the profit is the promoter and then extra of the fees oftentimes yes, but uh, but as you're talking about huge grosses and if you do uh, you know, we did a really successful tour

with Holland Oates and Tiers for Fears last year. There was there was plenty of profit beyond ticketing fees with the shows. Every show has made money at the end of the day. And in those deals, well, you do an international tour, national tour, there's a guarantee. Is there also a percentage of upside? Correct? They get a split at the back. Okay, let's go there, You and me. You may or may not remember we're famous as a manager. Bruce Allen and Bruce Allen manages, amongst other people, Michael

Bubley and Brian Adams. He's based out of Vancouver. This happened to be Canadian Acts. And he said, hey, Bob, I'm always and Bruce a very smart guy. And Bruce said, I'm trying something. I'm putting out Brian Adams with uh, what's his name? Did uh? One bourbon, one Scotch and one beer? Church there? Okay, right, and you said it's not gonna work. Okay, What works and what doesn't work. That's the intangible of being a successful concert promoter. I'll

go back to the hollow notes. Teers refers to her when that opportunity came across my desk, I looked at it, and when it came across you was already hollow, notatees and tears for fears. The bands were talking they wanted to go out and to her. Their agent was out shopping the tour and discussing it with people, and I was doing my homework. When the opportunity came up. We talked internally about what we thought we could sell, did

some homework in various markets. Uh, And there was a lot of people sitting on the fence, you know, like it's it's not very hard to like identify that Beyonce is going to sell a lot of tickets for their It's how how you can manipulate and maximize the deal for the artist and to get earnest she's going to do the business. Everybody knows Beyonce is gonna sell tickets on hollow notes and tears for fears. It was a bit more of a question of it was didn't seem

like an automatic to everybody at first. So if they say up front if they wanted to play big rooms, yes, they were clear they wanted to go out and do arenas, and you know, then they had a price tag of what they were looking for. And in a competitive marketplace, you can't just assume that the other guys are going to pass and you can low ball your way into a deal. So we have to really do your research and feel confident about the bet that you're going to

put down. Okay, so walk us through the experience. So we we threw our hat in the ring. Live Nation had done the previous tour with Hollow notatees in the amphitheaters, but it was a bit of a different model, lower ticket price, it wasn't grossing as high. Going into the arenas can come with more risk because they tend to be more expensive to produce the shows. Um, we went ahead and made the bid and came out on the

right side of getting the deal. Um. At that point I jumped in with Hollow Notates manager and and Tears and Fierce manager and went ahead and got the marketing plan together and launched that tour and ultimately people reacted well to the chemistry of the package. I mean, Hollow Notates three years ago was more or less playing theaters. Um, and that would be how many tickets, uh, you know, I think they were playing anywhere from two to four thousand seat venues. And you know, they had a success

in the circuit. Um and they changed agencies to Pete pop Lardo at a g I and Pete had a bit more vision of how to get these guys back because they were very successful arena band in their day. Um. He grew them uh and and really pushed forward to push them into the amphitheaters to get them in front of more people. I think they went out with Sharon Jones and the Dap Kings and Trombo and Shorty that year.

Good package did business, not huge grosses um, but it was ultimately trying to get them back into an arena level production and performance. I think that's what the band ultimately wanted to get to. It's what he pitched them on. So they came up with the Tears for Fears package, uh, and that was I think that was Pete's ideas or

Jonathan's who manages uh Hollow Notes. So they had been discussing it already when it came to me, and then when the opportunity came to us, we like the package, made the bet um and then worked really closely with the Hollow Notes camp and teers Fers and like, how can we maximize and promote this and launch this big and let everybody know it's coming because neither Neat well teers re Fiers hasn't had music out there still making new music hollow notes is not making the USI so

you really have to kind of help create the story. Uh. And Jonathan is a former PR guy and is a great partner in terms of getting the word out and made sure John and Darrel were on the phone doing phoners in every city and oh yeah they were out they were out there working at how much was late you know buying walk up business on that tour? Uh?

You know what, we had a good start and slow and steady wins the race, you know was you know, you know, a big night on that tour was two or three d tickets to night a show, which is not good. I mean it's not bad by any means. It's not you know, phenomenal based off of what some bands can sell day of but uh, but you know, I think we averaged close to eleven thousand tickets a show on that tour and it was so what do we learn ultimately good packaging? Look, a classic rock is

hot right now? I mean hasn't it always been hot? No? No, no, I mean rewind ten years and you'd find more spotty classic rock tours out there, you know, wasn't you know, Let's put this way, Tom Petty's Uh tour that he did right this past year before passed on. It was a home run. Um, he was making more money than

he's ever made in his career before. But you could rewind back to two thousand to two thousand and ten and Petty's businesses up and down and he'd have good years, bad years depends on how far he was away, how long it was away. Thanks for listening to the Bob Left Sets podcast. I hope you're enjoying the episode so far. There's only so much I can get into a podcast.

But if you simply can't get enough and want to know more of my thoughts on the future of the music industry, technology and current events, you'll want to subscribe to my newsletter. Now I'm not shameless promotion. Let's dive back into the interviews. Let's go back. If you look at the amphitheater business, there are certain acts that go every year. Def Leppard goes every year, Sticks goes every year. How does that work? Well, the country acts to the

country is a different business. Let's start with these heritage acts. They're not making new music to anybody's listening to were very hardcore fans. Why are people going. I think the nostalgia, I mean, but every year, I don't know if that they're going every year. I guess some of these juggle if they change an act this year it's Aureo Speedwagon on I mean, I mean literally Deaf Leppard, I believe has been out every year. Sticks is absolutely out every year,

and if they get it packaged right, it works. You know. The first big one that came out like this was Journey def Leopard years ago toured together and I was at Live Nation then and everybody was a little wary of how it was going to do, but everybody poning up the money um HK managed the act and drove a hard deal. So it was you know, it wasn't the cheapest show um to get at the time, but

it did phenomenal business. Outperformed everybody's expectations, basically sold out every amphitheater in the country that summer, and I really think that kicked off the era of classic rock packaging. UM So you're seeing a lot more packaging and they're doing they're being far more aggressive about getting people out for those summertime shows that the amphitheaters now Okay, but now that package is playing stadiums. It is what do

you predict there? I don't know how people. I mean, they just went out last summer and did really well in the amphitheaters and business was huge. I don't I haven't paid too close to attention to how many stadiums they're playing this summer, but it's a big bet. Stadium aren't cheap to produce that does that audience want to go to the stadium. My opinion is I don't think that the core classic rock audience wants to go to a stadium. They'll go to a stadium for big events.

But if you give them their Druggs, the smaller the venue the better to them, because everybody wants to buy a seat close up. They want They don't want to deal with traffic and whatnot. But if package correctly and you create enough excitement, you know, stadiums have a big communal feel to them and it can be done. You know, you can drive people there. Okay, so where are we going? It used to be five or six years ago pop acts would have a number one record. They play the

House of Blues. Now pop acts play arenas. In addition, hip hop not only sells arenas, it sells festivals. Are we at a tipping point here? Yeah? Well, I think everything is more accelerated right There. Used to be much more of a developmental path where an artist might play a club to start, and then play a venue like the Novo or the will Turn, work up to the Greek and then be playing Staples Center, form Hollywood bol

or something like that Los Angeles plays. Now you're seeing bands that are accelerating so fast they skip right past the initial steps. So they might play a club underplay to launch, and then it gets so big so fast, you're going right into arenas, which um can work sometimes and maybe not. Okay, you know, if you go back to the MTV era, there was the uh, the cliche that yes, MTV will blast you to the moon, but you'll fall back just that fast. So these acts play

arenas very soon. Do you think that hurts the longevity of their career? Not if they keep putting out good music. Well, it's more competitive than ever. But let's you know, let's segue to the hip hop acts, because they put out a lot of product and they're continuing to go. So what how do you envision the future of the hip

hop business? I think it's going to continue. I mean, look, Spotify and streaming services have made this a singles culture, right, So if you look at an act like they're not hip hop, but the Chain Smokers, they their success is putting out a series of singles. Um. To a large degree,

Drake is about putting out a series of singles. UM. So it's timing those announcements and and what their plan is to promote whatever brand artist or group together and and what's the strategy for this cycle of touring, this cycle of music. And I don't think I think the album has become irrelevant. I don't think you know, call kids today, but kids today don't really care about your album. They care about the songs. So but let's say you're

an act that has a couple of songs. Can you then and there's a huge bus, can you then sell an arena? It reacts a little bit different. But so that's reading the tea leaves. You gotta read how hot something is and will people make the bet on you? And then there's playing promoters will make the bet, But you have to kind of understand how hot you are. You're looking at a young artist like Khalid who's gone

from barely playing clubs and theaters right now too. He's out doing amphitheaters this summer, UH for Live Nation with a package which is, you know, really ambitious. But he's got a huge following already and the kids are are chasing him. So he may have success the summer. I bet you he will. Um, but you know what does that mean for the future. I think he's got to come back with more good music if he wants to sustain. But you say the album is irrelevant, someone will say

there's a monster hit song. I'll go to the show just to hear that monster HITNG think so yeah, I think it takes a few monster hit songs to get to an arena level success. But I don't I don't think anybody's were like, oh man, I really hope they're playing track seven. Okay, so then let's go back. You talk about doing these tours with the top line acts all encompassing. Okay, we make an international or national deal, Why does that act be the major depending on who

their manager is and what other services. I think if you look at what if you talk to Geiger at William Morris there putting together deals with that artist that encompassed so much more than just the live experience, right, So they're tying in sponsorship brands into the live experience, or tying in movie deals not necessarily to the live experience with their tying the movie deals and potentially um brand launches, integrating all of these things into their total

relationship with the artists. So I think that as the artists get bigger and bigger and command more revenue and business lines, that that if the agencies are servicing them all, they have a very important value in the equation. And since you brought up sponsorship, how big is sponsorship part of promotion for a g Oh, it's a big part of what we do. It's it really drives our venue platforms, which allows us to be aggressive with these that we pay artists. So yeah, it's a big part of our business.

How about any tour where you are not uh, well you don't own all the buildings, will you have? Will you put together a sponsorship deal for that tour? We try to. It depends on, you know, can we find the right artists that's excuse me, the right sponsor that's suitable to the artists, and while the artists accept it, and can we get a deal put together in time to kind of make it worthwhile to take the cash

and do the tour. I mean a lot of times tours come together not last minute, but shortly before they go ahead and launch the on sale cycle. So sometimes brands are spending their money long before and acts decided, you know, what their tour plan is. So what's going on with the country business, because these country acts are out every year and some of the business got a

little bit soft. Look, a lot of the artists have been out doing the same thing for years and years and years, and it's starting to wane a little bit. But I just think you also went from you know, when I was at Live Nation probably left in two thousand and eight, there was probably eight country headliners. I think the country music has blown up so much more. There's far more headliners out there, and there's competing for not the same dollar. I think the dollar has grown.

The audience has grown some, but it's not exponentially grown with the with the number of acts out in the country scene. So the artists that you know haven't been putting out interesting music or have a story to tell might be feeling might be feeling it at the box office when they're not selling quite as much as opposed to a guy like Stapleton, who has been a phenomenon in the last couple of years. And just you know, here's a guy who doesn't fit the mold of country

music of the last few years. He's you know, Luke Bryan's essentially a pop act right and has pop appeal and whether you want to calm you know, bon Jovi style to what you know bon Jovi was, to Rocky is the country. Um, those are all great things and that service a certain audience and it's scales up nicely. Uh. Stapleton was the singer songwriter and had this pinnacle moment on uh the A M A's or C M A

s with the like and it was phenomenal. I mean, we had him on sale at the l Ray, which is an eight hundred seat love in Los Angeles with I think we're sitting after a month with three tickets left to sell on the show, so it wasn't knocking down the doors. And he had that performance in those shows, those tickets sold in about thirty seconds and we're going for three sho of the next day. And his rise

has been phenomenal. Sin there I'm a huge fan, So I just think that he's putting out incredible music, and really that opportunity opened everybody's eyes is like how great he is because you know, to me, he he fulfills that somewhere between like that southern rock to Tom Petty vibe of rock and roll style with you know, country souls. The fascinating thing about Stapleton is on every metric he's victorious.

When he had that moment and he won the award, he's the favorite of everybody in Nashville who are playing the game when he isn't. But in addition, his consumption numbers and sales exceed everybody else's, even though he until recently hasn't got much radio played, which seems to say, hey, we want this credibility. It's like the inmates, you know, who feel that they're incarcerated in the walls that don't exist, so we can't break out. But look at this guy

who broke out. Now, why is it? The country is play stadiums more than any other genre. Taylor Swift originally was country. Kenny Chesney goes out every year of country, you know, Jason Aldan, they go out with packages, but they're the ones we're pushing the limits on stadiums. Well, I think country is still largely driven by country radio,

which is of that format still pretty healthy. UM, so they've had a pretty Country music has had much more of a developmental system in place, um relative to rock, pop or the other genres, and it has kind of propelled these guys. And as country music has become crossed over a bit towards pop, it's it's really gone mass appeal. So the genre is very accessible right now. I'd say that's a big part of the reason you're seeing more

stadium shows with artists like that. But I'm I'm just thinking that you're starting to see more classic rock tours and stadiums again. You're seeing more you know, the Beyonce's and jay Z's and Eminem's having played stadiums recently. I don't know that countries out pacing a lot of other genres, right I think the other ones are coming in. There were not many people going up and failing. They just weren't even going into that marketplace. So as we look forward, Hey,

is rock dead? No, it's not dead. What I just it's just not as popular as it used to be with a younger demographic right, so classic Roc Hotter and ever doing some of the best business. So again you're retretting on nostalgia there, but it's still very much alive that people are enjoying it. But you have you know, we just put two shows with cretiv on Fleet on sale this morning and blew them out in two minutes. Okay there, uh John Anson Ford amphitheater here and that's

very small first place in reality. If Geiger said how big can we go? I would have said, like, let's put it at the Greek Theater and we would have sold six thousand tickets in a day. It's they're playing anywhere from hous and theaters. How about some of these acts that have renowned but have not broken through mass consciousness, like the War on Drugs not compelling enough? I guess, I mean, I love the War on drugs, but it just hasn't resonated at a level that Well. A great

Evan Fleet, which the record is certainly original. Hep is great, and it's it leads up when retread. Can you name one or two other acts that are burgeoning in that way? Burgeoning? No, there's I mean, rock is not developing a ton of superstars. I mean, you've seen Portugal. Demand is a rock band that's been around a long time, had a huge hit this year, great rock band, and they're just finally starting to break through. It might take longer to get through it.

That's kind of a poppit. That's that if someone did not someone did not know Portugal the man, they would not say this is rock music. Fair fair enough. I mean, I don't think gret Evan fleets and a novelty act, but you can say that's a novelty song because it's got such thing. The interesting thing with Greta van Fleet is the original people created that music. The classic rockers were listening to the blues masters, where the tracks, the

songs were somewhere between years old. It's been more than thirty or fifty, forty or fifty years since Creams, since led Zeppelin, So on some level, younger generation picking up on that, we could see the same paradigm. I don't know if it's ultimately going to play out, but uh we saw a dip in two thousand and ten with live business. Anything gonna happen, but what do you foresee. Look, I think that dip was the economy was was in

the worst recession since the Great Depression. I mean, discretionary income went out the window. So I think that in large part I wasn't like all of a sudden people became less interested in music. I think people have less dollars to spend. Flip it over. There's many people who believe that it's all about experiences now and then the only place you can get it is that the live show.

So that's driving business. Certainly, the live business is king in this day and age, you know, in a sense of I think two thousand seventeen was the first year that recorded revenue for two years. Yeah, so you know, the live business revenue has been growing for for years and been growing rapidly since the economy picked up in two thousand and twelve, and the live business has been phenomenal.

You read a lot of articles and you hear a lot of things about everybody wants the experiences, and I think that is true to a large degree, and the festivals have helped propel that culture where it's music is computal right, So when you are by yourself listening to music, it's one thing, and when you want to spend time with people, and as we spend more and more times in our homes with our big screen TVs or iPads and our Netflix and all of those things like how

do you get your communal fix? I think that the live experience in large part supports that. Now the number one talking point amongst attendees is the availability and price of tickets. Where do you stand on should the fan be able to get in at a cheap price or should tickets be whatever the market value is. So a few years back, Neil Young did a theater tour and I got myself in trouble responding to the left sets letter.

So Neil was out there and I think he was charging close to to in her fifty dollars for the top ticket at his theater tour, which Neil Young should not be playing. If it's if you're just talking about the demand in a given market, Neil Young consent saw out a theater and any town he goes to, the minute it goes on sale, it's it's a what you generally call it underplaying our business. So Neil plays it.

He's charging to seventy five and people are a gas because, um, they feel they should be paying whatever fifty bucks thirty five bucks whenever they felt the right Neil Young price, which is those prices are probably what you call the

bore traditional uh rock and roll ticket prices. But the reality is scalpers for years have been getting tickets and reselling them on the secondary market, whether that was Barrious tickets back in the day or today stub Hub or Vivid or any of the other Internet platforms that are driving the market. So at the time I replied back to you and said, you know, I actually think Neil Young is doing the right thing because this is a flying demand economics. Um, this show is going to sell

it instantly. If Neil Young prices them at seventy five dollars, there's going to be people that are professional scalpers, and you know, weekend scalpers in a sense of the get tickets say wow, I could make you know, I got I bought two tickets or four tickets or so many five They can sell two of them for two hundred and fifty bucks and either pay for my night at a show, or you know, put profit in my scalping business.

And ultimately, who's not sharing in that Neil Young's not sharing in that, the promoters not sharing in that his manager doesn't share, and that that lift of the scalper is keeping. So I said, look, if the market value is two hundred fifty dollars for a Neil Young ticket, I'm okay with them charging it because people are happy paying nobody's nobody's upset that they spent two hundred fifty dollars.

If you if you get the seat you want. And that's how stuff help came to prominense because the constant industry for years was under pricing their tickets right. So I'm a big fan of market pricing your tickets correctly, and that's that's gonna work two ways. And a smaller venue with Neil Young, there's not gonna be a lot of cheaper tickets in that experience as a venue gets bigger. Um jay Z. There was a lot of talk about

jay Z's tour, whether it's a success or not. And from what I gather, they had really respectable grosses and he was selling tickets, but he had tickets going from you know, five hundred to a thousand dollars maybe all the way down to like twenty in the back of the arena. So to me, if your expectations, I want to pay twenty dollars and sit in the front row and arena to see jay Z. Well, that's gonna be a little unrealistic. But if I want to go see jay Z live and I want to spend twenty dollars,

there's a place for you in that scenario. So I think you're seeing more and more price points within arena which have really existed for years, because if you think about it, we would roll out uh any kind of concert. Take your pick a Tom Petty show. Um, if you put that show on sale, we might have picked four or five price points. You could go to StubHub the next day and look at all the people who were speculating on reselling tickets and there would be a thousand

different price points. But but they did not go under the nosebleed price. That's not always the case. No, No, they did as they approached the show correct but not the next one. One would say, I don't want to make this about you, but this is a relatively recent phenomenon to drop the price of the nosebleed seats to a very low price in music, not not in like it's been going on for sports. You gotta lose your team.

People are like, you know, I've gotten to plenty of baseball games where you know, you just buy some tickets on StubHub for the upper deck at Dodger Statium for ten bucks. You know, like I don't, I don't even know what the face was, but you can you know anybody is paying for a nupper back ticket at Dodger Stadium for more than ten bucks is like I guess the Yankees are in town or whoever is super popular. But in concerts is happening more and more, especially as

you're pushing the price. So if it's not a hot tour and people need to sell those tickets, and there's more and more speculators in the game now than there ever was. The Stones, who are one of your racks, legendarily flex price. They change the price during the core so the on sale correct. What is the future of that? I think dynamic pricing is already here. It is that, I mean the future is already here. It's you're seeing more and more shows being priced dynamically based off of

what the market demand is. So if you know, if a front row seats worth a thousand dollars, you're going to see it get charges thousand dollars. And if it's not moving at that. It might move down, um, and a price might a price point might move up. Basically email from people who are piste off. I paid to fifty and now the seat next to me's on sale for a bucket a quarter. Uh you know, it's like an airline price. The only thing is everybody hates the airlines.

It's just the models, supply and an end pricing though. Right, yeah, we have we have a couple of things going. I'm not saying that the first row shouldn't be a thousand dollars, right, I'm saying that when I have a seat that I paid five for and the person next to me paid two and fifty dollars for, I'm not happy about that. I accept it with the airlines, I have a model, But the airline business is different from going to see a live music at so you paid five. This is

my hypothetical. The number one ticketing site on the Internet

is stubb Hub, right, and the music business. For a long time they were hated because they were seen as the scalping site, right, But from a consumer perspective, they love it because a lot of people are frustrated going to Ticketmaster not being able to get the ticket that they want when they are there promptly at ten am for the on sale and they type in you know b O B L and the entire lower bill sold out before you can type the rest of your last

name right. So they're upset, or it's like six months before the show and they don't know where they're going to be. They really want to go see their favorite band the hell, you know, like, who who would want to do buy the ticket? In that experience, it's a terrible selling experience as opposed to, uh, three weeks before the show, I really want to go see my favorite band. I'm going to go to stub Hub quickly found a seat in the tenth row. It's five bucks. Cool, I'm

happy with five hundred bucks and get the seat I want. Honey, let's go out. It's date night. Let's let's rock. Um. You might be sitting to somebody who got through on their initial on sale when the ticket was two or fifty bucks, and I agree with everything said, And let me try to break the points across. Let's start with the first point. Does it hurt the act charging what the market value is? The market value is going to charge what it is regardless of the act. Different issue.

There's a whole guy wrote a whole essay. I think it happened to be in poll Star one of the economists that said in terms of longevity of act, and I always felt the opposite, that to charge what the market will bear actually hurts the longevity of the act. You're saying leaves some meat on the bone, right, don't

don't you know, don't kill your audists. You never attacks him, No, No, My point is the perception will be that you're fan friendly, even though these third parties will be making bank and it won't go to you. But in the long run you will have a longer career. I mean, it's it's a premise. I don't think the Stones have charged less over time, and they're and they're still doing okay because it's started with tickets were under ten. Next question becomes,

where does paperless fit in this equation. Well, look, there's two paths that you're going to go down to as far as the purchasing experience. A. There's market value, right, which is gonna drive up the best seats um at the you know, at the highest price, and try and get the maximum yield out of that. And some of it may yield cheaper seats in the back, but it's really going to fluctuate as to what true market pricing

demand is. The second option is there's a lot of bands out there who feel I don't want my fan basically following up what we were talking about paying more than thirty five dollars for this ticket. And maybe a great example would be Adel who topped out her ticket prices of a hundred fifty dollars. So she used paperless ticketing, which is a format of ticketing that you don't actually get a physical ticket. You have to show up with your I D and a credit card and then go

right into the venue. And what that is intended to do is prevent um a secondary market from transferring the ticket to another party. So I think it's technology gets better. Artists should have the ability to not to limit or control the pricing on their ticket. Right now, scalpers and technology have far outpaced the industry and their ability to thwart systems like paperless ticketing from working at a high success rate. So you know there's our company, ticketing company

Access is working on ideas. Ticket Masters hard at work on ideas on how you can secure the ticket. And there's a lot of other reasons to talk about securing the ticket because as you see UM attacks happen over in Europe at the Ariana Grande show and in Paris where the people came, well, that was charging through. But like to know who's in the building UH at any given time and have that customer data handy is becomes

much more valuable as well. So will a ticket in the future become much more transferable to person to person and you'll be able to track that ticket. I think that's where the technology is going. Okay, then also talking about UH, you know, let's go back, so in terms of prices changing after the original on sale goes on, do you envision that happening more? And then there's very

little transparency. The average person sitting at home believes when the on sale goes on Saturday morning that all the tickets are available, when in reality may be less fewer than ten percent of the overall UH ticket availability. So first explain where all those other tickets go. Usually there's you're seeing far more stage staggered on sales as I would call them. So you're seeing artists fan club preise

sales as you're seeing UH sponsor pre sales. American Express sponsors a lot of pre sales, will contribute marketing dollars to help promote the show. So if you have an ann X cards, you'll have access to buy tickets early. For there's venue pre sales, there's radio station pre sales, they're Spotify pre sales. How those choose to get rolled out are really a decision between both the artist promoter

and everybody in the business side of the equation. And some people feel they're great because they help them sell more tickets and get more people access to the tickets, and then there's other people who don't participate in them

because they feel it limits the access to tickets. Well, I can say is a lot of this although baked into the business for historical reasons, not fan friendly in an Internet era where a site that is not the unfriendly usually is you know, bombarded with criticism and might go down. So what is the future We're just going to continue to have this opacity or is it going to change? Well, look, I think you're gonna see slower

on sales. I think you're going to see what the demand is for, you know, for artists that want to maximize the gross and are really focused in on how much I can gross the concert and get what the real market value is for this concert. You're going to see a mix of technology supporting that, and you may see a slower rollout of tickets in a sense of not every ticket may go on sale at the onset

while you're determining what market pricing is. And then on the flip side of it, as you be able, as we are able to buckle down the technology to the point where you can really control transferability of a ticket, then the artist that it's very important to that their fan don't pay over a certain price point will be able to do that as well. And really technology is going to drive this. So one of the two biggest challenges you have in your day to day job, Um, well,

we have a very big business. We do over twelve thousand shows a year. So one of my biggest challenges, just as I generally call it cat hurting, I have a lot of details to follow up on a day, and so staying organized and focused on the goals of the month, the year are it's probably my number one challenge. But um you know, we we we compete every day

against the biggest conscert phone in the world. So I have to sharpen the knife and come with a lot of focus and try and move quickly to uh to uh, you know, fight for our piece of the pie that day. And one or two things you've learned in years? Two things, um, that I've learned in twenty five years, Um, that I don't always want to meet every artist I used to admire because you don't have time or they're disappointing. You were what Sometimes they disappoint you, you know some Sometimes

I've I've loved a band less after meeting them. It could be a big fan of a band, and I've I've met an artist or have done business with them and or other people to the point where it kind of put a little tarnish on my view of the band and enjoyment of the music. So I think the old adage is careful, careful about meeting your heroes. Right. Have you ever met anybody who's lived up to the legend? Uh? Yeah, I look, I've met a lot of great artists along

the way. UM. I mentioned earlier that one of the first bands that I promoted kind of from big are Small to Big was No Doubt And the guys in no doubt. Tony Canal and Adrian and Tom are all good friends of mine and like I just I root for them and any project that they do. So um, I've got a special place in my heart for for them in that band because uh, you know, they were they were with me in the early days. I was with them in their early days, so it was went

through the war together. Yeah, and and they're and they're good people, so they deserve all the success that they had. Well, you know, one of the biggest acts who lives up to the legends, Steven Tyler. The moment I met him, he is that guy. He's the rock star. He's very quick with the language, you know, whereas there other people very disappointing. Yeah. Well, and and look, I've been really fortunate because I want to say, I don't want to

say it's bad meeting artists. It's been great. But you know, when you get to meet you know, I get to meet a lot of artists in the business, and that's a fun part of it. And when you go to a party with friends who aren't in the business, that sounds incredible. And I don't really care who I meet for the most part. For day to day but every once in a while, like you know, I got to George Landau introduced me to Bruce Springsteen after a benefit show and I had to make small talk with Bruce

for what was What was the nature of the small talk? Uh, he was performing at the Shrine. I talked about some of the renovations we had done at the Shrine and the nature of the benefit. And you know, he was coming to do the River that that next year at the Sports Arena, which we were producing. So we talked, you know, for a minute about that. It was three minutes of that. But as you know, you're just sitting there the whole time, like I'm sitting three ft from

Bob having this converse. Imagine he was Bruce Springton and the whole time Bruce is talking to me. I'm trying to sound not sound like an idiot going fucking Bruce Springsteen in front of me. The factor actually having a conversation is what I'm focusing on. Because frequently, you know, frequently they give the limp musician Handshakeen, that's it, We're all start talking to you have They have no idea who I am. They don't care about it. But when

you're actually engaging in the conversation. Your heart pitter powders circumountain. Yeah, it's it's amazing to watch some artists. I tell this story a lot is um We've produced Katie Perry's last few tours and uh sheep, you know, on the on the two tours ago, Uh, we were getting hit left

and right with uh meet and greet requests. So she ultimately made the decision that she was only going to um do meet and greets for kids that were in bad he make like make a wish style requests, and it limited it because you know, it would be an endless stream of people, uh that wanted to meet her. And at st Staples was ended up being one of

her tour sponsors that year. So when she did play Staples Center, there were some you know Staples executives that were part of that and a few other people, and so it kind of broke the rule for that night and there was a row of people meeting there and my my daughter at that time, was probably around ten years old, and I set it up with Steve Jensen, Katie's manager, to meet her, and so we were standing there at the end of the line, you know, watching her do the meet and greet with the kids and

working her way down and you know she I just watched her and she was so locked in instantly on what every kid was saying to her. Uh, and she connected with them in a way that I was like, wow, Like it wasn't surprised to me why she was such a big star, you know. And we were towards the end of the line and she, you know, she she walked up to my daughter, whose name is Katie, and said, your name is Katie, My name is Katie. You know, made a big to do about that, started talking about

instantly locked in on what my daughter was wearing. And they had a nice little chat for like maybe a minute and a half, and you know, you get your courtesy picture and I go to take I take up my phone to take a picture of the tomb, and she grabs my phone and she flips it around and she shoots the selfie with my daughter and like a kid my daughter's age, that's far more valuable than like the fact that it was shot selfie style, and it was so smooth and so connected in and I go, man,

she is just locking in this fans, Like she's just like that personal connection is that that that charisma and touch that she had. I was just like, I was so taken with how she each one of those things. And I mean that line had to be for two people long, and there's a lot of artists that will do even more than that, and like she just connected with each other. And I go, man, that is that is amazing? And the you see, you know, the artist

personal touches. For years, the country rule has been, you know, you go out on the road, you're the first to three on one of those country packages in the MP theaters and the openers up at the concessions, sorry, the merch stand selling T shirts and sign an autographs for everybody there. And I you know, it's it's interesting the bands that will put in the work to go connect with people, um and talk to him, because I think that breeds a lot of loyalty and longevity, you know, right.

Speaking of your daughter, we've talked about this before. She's a huge Hamilton's fan, Yes, and you've seen Hamilton's a couple of times. Is that a unique property? Does it have lessons for the rest of the business. Look, I think Hamilton's a great example of it's just great music, right, So lin Manuel made an incredible score. I before we went to go see it, I had listened to that soundtrack no less than three hundred and fifty times uh

in a year period. We listened to it every day. UH. And so when we when we got tickets to it, it it was a big exciting thing. But you know, I thought it was my daughter at first, who's she had a predisposition to musicals, and she's into the Broadway seeing. She's performed in a few kids theaters and things of that nature. So I didn't think that much of it at the time, and I just liked the soundtrack myself.

As we got closer to going to see the play at the end of the year in New York, UM, I was paying more and more attention to what was going on with with Lynn, and I just hadn't opened my eyes wide enough, and I realized what a phenomenon was and how it was, you know, one of five albums that year to sell over a million copies, UM, which I think is saying something Broadway soundtrack of all

the pop records with no hits. And where it really blew my mind is we uh were on a family trip after the New Year, and I uh in Vale, Colorado, and we were I met up with a friend that I had went to high school with, and she brought up her two daughters and we all the families hung

out for a few days. In the first night, at dinner, the the kids were talking about Kay brought up how we went to go see Hamilton's over the hall days, and they started, everybody loved Hamilton's, And all of a sudden, there's three kids and units at the table start word for word wrapping the first, second, and third songs like

I just it was. It was, And then as it kind of pushed Katie on more and more of her friends, like it's a It was just a phenomenon through all these junior high kids that were just fully into a musical of hip hop about warning the about one of the founding fathers. I found it fascinating even so much like Uh. This past Valentine's Day a few days ago, I came home and I was looking at her lunch box and one of her friend had made Hamilton's Valentine's Day.

It was like Linn Manuel and it says, I'm not going to waste my shot on you with a little hard around it. So like it's It really is kind of a phenomenon of how this musical has like all the way down to like young kids. Wow, it really sustains. Now you've been doing this for twenty five years, you like music as much I love it. I love it. In fact, I was last weekend just making mixed well you know, make masage, make playlists now, but it was

making playlists and digging around. And that's what one of the things I love about Spotify is that my music collection is so much bigger now so it was. It's way more fun than when I was eighteen in my bedroom with limited by how much I could afford to buy of music in a given day. Well, Rick, this has been wonderful. We've covered a lot of ground both for the people on the inside and on the outside. You missed the pra seed before we turn on the

mics where we discuss chocolate chip cookies and soda. We'll have to have a comeback for that. But thanks so much for doing the Bob left Sets pods for having me Bob. That wraps up this episode of the Bob Left Sets Podcast with my guest Rick Mueller of A G Presents. I really enjoy getting to hear his path through the music business. But I know, based on the fact that so many people listen to and comment on the Nathan Hubbard podcast, that this ticketing conversation is an

interesting one. If you want to take a deep dive into ticketing, go back to episode two with the Thin if you haven't already and get his perspective. Don't miss an episode of my podcast by subscribing on tune in, Apple Podcast, or your app of choice. Until next time, I'm Bob left steps. He reason don't know exactly one must be it's out of this seas