John Meglen

John Meglen has been in the touring business for four decades. A hustler with a sense of humor, he was responsible for putting Celine Dion in Vegas. If you want to know the inner workings of the touring business, this is the place.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:04):
Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.
My guest today is the co CEO and president of
Concerts West John meglan Don. Good to have you, hello,
Bob could be here, okay, So tell me how you
ended up deciding to put Celine Dion and Vegas. Oh
my god, right to it. Um, Well, number one, it

(00:27):
was actually her idea. Well really I didn't know that.
Oh yeah, the idea was hers. I mean she went
and saw. Oh it was when she had retired, kind
of took time off because she was going to go
have a kid and all that, and she went and
saw oh. And after she saw it, she basically said
to Renee, when I come back, I'd like to do

(00:49):
something like that. And Renee being Rene and her husband
and Rene Bian really the brilliant guy that he is,
was um, you know, he he had that Elvis Colonel
Parker mentality that it was a it was a belief
in him. Of of he loved the colonel. He really

(01:12):
loved the colonel when he loved the way the whole
Elvis sing in Vegas. So that was a big part
of it for Renee. So instinctually he knew how to
put it together. Okay, So you've been working with them
before I had, Well, I hadn't been working with them before.
I had been working with Lloyd Brow who worked for them,
And Lloyd originally worked for Donald Kay Donald up in

(01:36):
Montreal when I was working for Michael Cole. So that's
how we knew each other. I heard about the thing
and thought it was a brilliant idea, but didn't have
the money to do it. And at the time, what
was happening at the time is that there was a
man named Arthur Goldberg who was the president of Caesar's Palace,

(01:58):
and Arthur and Renee we're going to do this steel themselves. Okay,
there was no outside person. Arthur unfortunately passed away. When
Arthur passed away, and the new president, I think it
was a guy named Tom Who it was? Guy named
Tom Gallagher was the CEO of park Place Entertainment. They
owned Caesar's at the time. Um. He said, look, we'll

(02:22):
build the building, but we're not in the show business,
you know, find somebody else to do the show. So
that was our window. Okay. So how many years did
you make the deal for originally? Uh? Two? How many
didn't end up running? Uh? Sixteen, almost seventeen, and you

(02:47):
had an exclusive on the building, right absolutely, which just ended, Yeah,
just ended. Well it will end July one. And you
know some of these things you may or may not
be able to want the answer, how can we decided
not to renew the building? Well, wasn't that necessarily that
we didn't decide? I think that one there was a

(03:08):
miscommunication between our organization being involved in the arena at
MGM UM and that had something to do with us
operating the colisseum and that so um. But at the
end of the day, you know, they picked their horse

(03:29):
after all these years. I don't know why exactly, but
you know we're not happy about it. Okay. So the
original deal she did how many dates a year? Well,
the original deal was two hundred shows a year, which
was unheard of, and it was for two years, and

(03:50):
it was five shows a week, forty weeks a year.
We were keeping two weeks for maintenance of the theater
or the show, and then we wanted to go out
and find someone else to do the other ten weeks. Now,
that other ten ultimately turned out to be Elton, correct,
and he did all ten um initially. Yeah, I mean

(04:13):
at the very beginning, it was only Selene and Elton,
you know. Oh, I'm sorry. And then there was you know,
a few weekends of Jerry Seinfeld. Okay, So the building
was essentially open, like nights a year. Not only that,
we would program Asian shows for New Year's Eve. Uh,

(04:39):
I'm sorry for Christmas Eve Christmas Day a different type
of holiday for them. So I mean we tried to
book that building as much as we could. But yes,
that building was full all the time. Not to what
degree was your company at risk? M Well, we're at
risk for all of Well initially, I mean you're talking

(05:01):
hundreds of millions of dollars um one. Nobody thought it
would work. So you told me the famous story of
Martyr looking, why do you tell the audience? Oh? Man, Marty,
it was great, Barty. I think it was at the
Grammys about a year after we had opened, and Marty
walked up to me and he said, you know, Magdalen,
only two people in this business I ever thought this
thing would work. You and I still haven't met the

(05:23):
other one. And of course Marty is the longtime manager
of Barbara Streisan. But when you went into Vegas, no
other rock pop stars were there right. No, I mean
at the time, it was you know, it was Circus
l A and Siegfried and Roy. That was it. And

(05:44):
to what degree did the tickets sell? You know, it
was it was a roller coaster at the beginning. Okay. Uh,
the initial sales were great just because of such a
tremendous fan base and and I swear Canada could have
carried you know, the first one shows um, but it

(06:09):
took a while. We kept saying to ourselves, this is
not as sprint as the marathon. That was our That's
always been our line. These aren't sprints. These are marathons.
It's got to build over time, you know, don't try
to do everything at once. Spread it out a little
bit and it seems to work. So did business stay

(06:29):
steady all the way through the run? No? Uh, we
all everything dropped in two thousand and eight with the
economic crash. Yeah, that went kind of across the board.
Her popularity. No. The The amazing thing is it's stronger
today than it ever was. Now. Yes, we're doing the

(06:53):
end of the tour or end of the run in
Las Vegas, but you know, we just began pre sales
this morning on her tour and they were massive. We
were rolling into multiple arenas in many cities this morning
just on you know, the American Express and the team
Selene pre sale. So people have always underestimated this lady.

(07:17):
And then how about the other acts that went in there,
like Elton? How did they do? Elton was? He was
a dream? I mean Elton was you know again, you're
looking at somebody that was only doing at that time
forty shows a year versus slid to two hundred shows
a year. So Elton was virtually sold out the entire time.

(07:39):
And um, and he kept with the theme of of
let's create a show. Okay, let's do something. See what's
happened today has kind of changed it, and it's kind
of to me, it's a little bit depressing because one
of my lines to artists was always, look, remember all

(08:00):
that stuff you wanted to do but you couldn't take
on the road. It was too big to travel with.
This is the place you can do at all. And
you know, and we wanted to make it a show
that you could only see here and the only place
you can see that artist become a bit bastardized to

(08:21):
a degree where people are just driving through with their
tour in shows and nothing special about it. So to
what degree is Vegas a factor in your business? Now? Wow?
I think it's become a big factor in everybody's business.
The number of artists today that want to do residencies,

(08:43):
let alone the ones that exist. Think about there's probably
five for everyone that has one, there's five more that
want one. You know what I mean. Everybody's looking for
quote the residency I, and it is maybe we're maybe
there's no MORATORI and maybe we just do residencies and

(09:05):
festivals and that's it. Well, certainly we probably have a
lot fewer drug overdoses if the fans came to see
the bands. This is true, Okay. Um, anything that hasn't
worked in Vegas, whether it be yours or competitors, it's tricky.
I've always found that the Broadway stuff, it's really tricky.

(09:29):
It's almost like the stuff that Clive Barnes trashes in
New York should be in Vegas and it will do great.
I remember years ago, uh, Jimmy Dean Atlanta jujor Jimmy
a good friend about it week. He took me to
Will Rogers Follies at the Palace Theater and Broadway, right,

(09:50):
and and the show just got panned. And I'm sitting
there going, it's a great show. I'm like all American
guy going, I love this show. You know, the fact is,
if that show had been in Las Vegas instead of
on Broadway, probably would have been a hit. So the
Mama MIA's the Jersey Boys, you know, that type of
stuff is good. I don't think people go to go

(10:15):
to Las Vegas. He's Phantom of the Operas, per Se
or or Cats or you know. I think it's a
little more. It's got to be more of a show
and more musical. So generally speaking, what does the promoter
do m in Las Vegas? In general, we take risks,

(10:36):
we put up the we put up the risk capital.
We believe that we could sell enough tickets to pay
the bills, pay the band, and there's something left over.
It's no more complicated than that. Well, you know, I
know a guy works for Black Rock and New York

(10:56):
big investment firm, and he said he hadn't gone to
bed without being at risk for decades. So do you
ever worry? Like you ever, you know, lie awake at nights, say,
holy funk, this better work? Oh, I mean, look, you
know what's the worst thing about getting tour is get
the tour. I mean it's like talk about buyer's remorse. Okay,

(11:21):
you get you know, you get into this competition, especially
today with the dumpers that are thrown out there today.
You know, it's like it's almost like monopoly. I mean,
it is like monopoly money, you know. And and yeah,
I mean one thing about Gongore and I We've always
always that's your partner, that's my partner. We've always always

(11:46):
we were taught at the beginning. You act like, you know,
you're you're risking your own house here your mortgage, which
by the way, we both did for a while. You know.
So once you know that feeling of what it's like
to really risk your own money and go, you know,
wait a minute, I'm gonna lose everything, and so go
ask mom and dad from my room back and get

(12:07):
a job at McDonald's. That's what a promoter is. Okay.
So let's assume you have something that's not an instant sellout.
How do you move the tickets? How do you make
your money back? Mm hmm, Well, it depends on what
what you're involved in. Okay, we are I like to

(12:30):
think that we have a long term artists perspective, okay.
And this goes back kinder to our upbringing, which was
way back to the Jerry Wine Troub concerts West Management
three Days, where you had guys like Tom Hewlett and
Terry Bassett, Jerry Wine Trout amazing mentors, but they managed

(12:57):
the artist and we toured the art. Yes, And so
there were times I remember John Denver tours where you know,
he had a hit record, he sell every ticket. The
house didn't have a hit record, He sold half the ticket.
And I did one tour where all I did was

(13:17):
go out in front and quote paper of the house. Uh,
because John never played in front of an empty house.
So I've always believed that if you make the right
decisions for the artists, for the long term of the artists,
if you do that, the money is going to follow. Okay. Now,

(13:38):
there's many ways to get out of it quickly, Okay,
I mean, and that's unfortunately probably of our business. A
zillion ways to get out of them. Give me a couple. Well,
the secondary market on ticketing, people have been using that
they've been you know, ticket rebates. It goes all the
way back to you know, had n caterie bill for

(14:02):
five hundred bucks. Okay. Uh, you know what happens with losers.
It creates a system of insights of people, you know,
making a little money here on the side, making a
little money here on the side. You know, Fred Rosen
started making a nickel right, right, So it was five

(14:22):
sets of ticket back then. Okay, So it's uh. The
way people now protect themselves is by other sources of
revenue that they tried to to me hide from the artist,
or hide from the business equation or you know, no,

(14:44):
and they've got a lot of valid arguments. I meant,
if a guy invest money in a venue, you should
be able to get his money back right and make
a profit on his real estate investment. Okay. Now, generally speaking,
on these really big tours, your competition is Live Nation.
What it does it? What do you find someone all

(15:07):
to an act makes their decision on in terms of
who to go with, Well, make it on basically two things, right,
who's going to do the right job and how much
they're paying me. The unfortunate thing is how much they're
paying me. It most of the time, you know, is

(15:30):
the deciding factor as opposed to who's going to do
the right job. Okay, let's go back to the beginning
for my audience. So you grew up where as an
army brap but kind of beaute Montana and then the Northwest, Okay,
in Washington. Okay, you know we're sitting here in Hollywood.

(15:51):
Those places seem like backwaters relative to hollydood God, and
they're very attractive, by the way, and it's where I'd
like to be. No, I mean they are, but but
part of that was we learned how to do everything
back then. I mean I was running by high school
dance committee. Oh really, So you got into it that, Yeah, yeah,
I did. I put my first concert on my junior

(16:12):
year in high school don Zaga Prep and spokead and
I saw this magazine in Father Gobel he was the
head of our He watched over our dance committee and
we did all city mixers in Spokane. And I'm in
Gobs office one day, that's what we called him. And
he had this magazine and they're called Performance Magazine. And
I start flipping through it and I go, hey, Gobs,

(16:34):
this has all the big bands and look it says
where they're going, and it's got a phone number there,
it says b A. And he said that means booking
age and John and I went, well, I had this band.
I just got their first record, you know. And the
look they're up there playing in Seattle. Let's call the number.
What was the Okay? Sold out two shows of the

(16:59):
high school Jim Days and we made fifteen hundred bucks. Okay,
But let's go back to the begetting. Did you call
the agent? Yes, and you said what happened? I? I
mean I just I called him and I said, hi, uh,
I run a dance committee at a high school. It's okay,
And and I see your band is in Seattle and

(17:20):
you know what are they doing on Saturday night? And
he took you seriously? Yeah, well I had I told
him that father Gobel was with me, so I had
my priest with me. It was pretty good, okay. And
do you think you got ripped off? No, it was
actually we paid them. We made money, So it wasn't

(17:42):
about that. Back then. Remember it was all flats. You know,
they showed up. You had to have you know, a
p A system and some lights and uh you know,
you had addressing room. And it wasn't even before riders,
you know. So it was fun that when I went

(18:03):
to college. Did you do any more shows in high school? Uh?
Because after that I went off down to Washington State,
um and uh and they know they had more of
the college concert committees there all right. And in the
mid seventies there was a lot of guys, a lot
of guys that are around today came from that program.

(18:26):
But um, they didn't have a coffeehouse things. So I
started one. I started a radio station, I started a festival.
I mean that's what. That's a lot of stuff. Yeah,
that kazoo is now the number one station of Pullman, Washington.
And my roommate and I started that thing. It was
what do you call it? Ten want class D Remember

(18:50):
those I remember you could hear like three miles away. Yeah, exactly,
not even that you know, but um, the they have
when where I went to college, but it was there
before I got out there. So you're basically an entrepreneurial guy,
you know at Hart of course that's what this is about. Okay,
how many kids in your family? Five? And what do
the other four do? Uh? Well, they're all girls too old,

(19:13):
too older and too younger ones of c p A.
There are three of them are married to guys from Montana.
So that's the good thing is we've got we've kept
the Montana thing alive. But they're they're all over the country,
and uh, they're all doing great. I mean they have
the same personality as you. Like. You know, I'm gonna
make it work for myself. Um, i'd say half at half.

(19:37):
There's two sisters that are definitely that way. They're there
two that well, there's one that's completely happy living in Dila, Montana,
never wants to leave. That is where. It's about sixty
miles south of Butte. And what's there, um nothing Uh, Canyon,
Ferry Reservoir, people river, the Big Hole River, Um, the

(20:02):
salmon fly hatch if you're fly fishermen, those are all
important things. So do you How long do you go
to Washington State? I went three years? Yeah, I quit
in my senior year. And why did you quit? I
got hired by Concerts West, I thought I did. Okay,

(20:26):
we'll tell that story. Well, Um, there was a guy that,
believe it or not, worked for Irving Dennis something anyway,
artists touring so something I forget what it was called,
but it was one of Irving's agencies and Irving off
of course and Irving at the time, Uh, managed Tim Wiseberg,

(20:48):
remember the of course and the duel and that. Yeah, okay,
So what year were in nineteen seventy seven? All right?
So I was the block booking coordinator in the Northwest
for the college campuses, and Tim Wiseberg just really caught
on up there, and in fact I was doing to

(21:11):
cut down and read it with Tim Weinsberg. So in
five six thousand seats in Poland Washington, Tim Weinsberg still alive. Yeah,
he's a great guy. I haven't thought of him so long. Yeah,
you know, he's really good. Was it Dan Fogelbergelberg Wisberg?
Different mothers, twin SuDS, different mothers or something like that?
That was another There was a part of the plan

(21:33):
with what was no the Great Song? Yeah, I think
it was part of the plan. Uh yeah, it was. Okay,
So you're booking a book at Tim Weisberg and this
guy Deists were just a little bit slower. You're where
You're still at Washington State. Yeah, and you're booking for
other places too. Yeah. How did that? Well? I got

(21:54):
an office in the student union building and my roommate
and I out, I guess I gotta back up a
little bit. We first figured out that all these dorms
and fraternities and sororities all had to book two or
three bands a year for their little you know, uh
proms or whatever they call them, their their little balls, right,

(22:17):
So we started a little thing called the Student Booking Service.
And what we did is we got one agent up
and spoke in Washington, and we gave him an exclusive
and we signed up all the dorms and the fraternities
and sororities, and so the agents would all split their
commissions with us, and we would book and we because
we would tell the every year as a new social

(22:38):
director fraternity and we're like, hey, guys, we don't want
you to get ripped off. We know what the band's cost.
We'll get you good deals and all of that. So,
you know, fast forward to their we started, you know,
block booking, and we called it so I'd get the
guy in Bellingham, Washington to buy a show. Guy it

(23:00):
you know huge its sound to buy a show, and
the guy at Idaho State to buy a show, and
the guy in Missoula to buy a show that was
clip Mitchell, by the way, the way you were He
was the guy in Mizzoula, and uh yeah, we just
put all these together and then this guy called one day,
this agent he worked for Irving. I remember that. He said,

(23:22):
you know, you need to work for Concerts West. And
Concerts West brought all their shows into Pullman because we
had a pack eight thousand seat arena, and up in
Seattle they had a seven thousand seat civic auditorium. So
the big shows would come down and play Pullland and
they had to go through the students. How far as

(23:43):
Pullman from Seattle sixty miles south? Not from Seattle, Seattle
three miles. It's on the Idaho's close to boise O.
It's close to Spokane. Uh, court a Lane. You know,
if you go down from Spoke candad cord a Lane
sixty miles you have Pullman in Moscow wide. Okay, yeah,

(24:05):
at Washington State University and the university about it? Okay,
where were we a lost tracks? Okay, so you're block booking,
you get tracked on by this guy says you should
work at Conscience West. Yeah, so I got an interview.
Uh and in fact, this is the first time I'd
ever been on an airplane, and I go up to

(24:27):
Spokene and a guy said, and me, remember when you
got a prepaid ticket? Yeah? Right. I sat all day
long and Spokene Little Airport waiting for my prepaid ticket
to go through. Okay, I'm a kid in college, right,
and I'm thinking, and my buddy's gonna pick me up
and when I get there and drive me to this interview.

(24:47):
And I go and have an interview with this guy
named Tom Hewlett. And this is weird. Is in Seattle.
So I flew over to Seattle, right and uh Cascade Airline, yeah,
with this Cascade alleghany almost and it was like I
go over there and I get I had this interview.

(25:08):
I remember I wore I think I looked like the
guy at Midnight Cowboy because I had on like a
you know, like a tan like almost crest velvet pants
vest right actually vest jacket, uh boots and and you
know the collar out right. And I meet this guy
Tom Hellett, and he's like, oh, yeah, I got all

(25:30):
these tours going on, and I got this air Clapton tour.
I I think I could use you on that, right,
That's what he says. So I leave, I go back
to school. I quit college I load everything in my
car and I drive out to Seattle and uh move
in and uh living on the floor by I had

(25:51):
four buddies. They had a two bed of apartment, so
I was a fifth guy. So I slept on the
floor out in the you know, the couch around the
living room. I've done that, yeah, I mean that's how
it's art. And I would go every day and show
up at this office. Right, So Conscience West had an office. Yeah,
it was in Bellevue, Washington, and you had Paul Gonda. Weare, um,

(26:14):
Tom Hewlett, Bassett, Terry Bassett. I mean it's a really
great Dan Fiala, um uh, Bill Leopold, I mean some
great names. We're all out of that office. They were
all out of the Bellevue office, all those guys. And

(26:35):
then Terry went down and started the Dallas office. Sims
Scott hired, he went out, he started the Atlanta office.
And but no, I started showing up. But I didn't
have a job. I mean I would sit there and
I could tell Hewlett after a few days to be
walking in and whisper to people, go who is that kid? Right?

(26:56):
And I just kept doing things and walking around and
asking people if they anything to do until I got
like became whatever I was there, and I finally after
about two three weeks, got the courage to walk into
Bill mackenzie asked if I could get paid? And what
are he's saying? He said, yeah, no, he was good
by that, and I started two a week. That's what

(27:19):
it was, um. And when you're on the road, you
had twenty dollars a pretty and you Concerts West had
a cool thing back then called show pay and it
was like a sixty bucks show if you're on the road,
but it was like the tour director's decision how to

(27:39):
split the sixty bucks. So if you're like the guy
out with Gong, were like one of the ones I
started with second right, you know, he'd split it with you,
no offense, Sims. But if you're out with Sims, you've
got ten dollars, you know. And so what happened is

(28:01):
you generated a brotherhood with these guys. But what was
so cool about Concerts West is we were never really
local promoters. You know, we didn't do We weren't in
that club theater business, and every local promoter was. We
were like a arena up touring company, you know, and

(28:28):
it was just so cool to be back there and
see that at that time. Now, that was all Jerry Weintraub, right,
was Wintroub. It was Bassett, It was Irving and his
relationship with Bassett. It was Bill McKenzie and and the
relationships were deep, you know, they were Like the first
thing I worked on was Swan Song. That's what I

(28:51):
was assigned to. So and that was Peter Grant and
Clive Coulson and so you worked on Bad Company, but
if David went out, you had to work on David still.
And like Paul and I were, we were putting the
Zeppelin tour on sale when Bottom died. After that, I
had to do the firm, which was you know, Jimmy

(29:13):
and Paul Rogers. But I never got to do led Zeppelin. Okay,
how much of the time are you in the office
and how much of the time are you on the road.
Back then you were on the road. I don't know,
nine months sometimes, I mean you could be on the
road for fourteenth straight months. We'll break for Christmas or

(29:34):
something in that. And back then we did five shows
a weeks. It shows a week traveled and the bus
has slept sixteen guys today they sleep six at all different.
It was different time. And were you ever making any
money or just in for the experience at that point? Oh? No,
you're for the experience. I mean, look, the first tour,

(29:57):
first big tour idea was with Gaga were the nineteen
seventy eight Bad Company Desolation Angels, and that was multiple arenas.
It was fact then as big as you got in
the rock and roll. And I remember I'd ever been
in Las Vegas, played the Aladdin in Las Vegas, and

(30:20):
one night I lost everything I made on the tour.
And are you still a gambler? No? No, I just
like it was. You know, it was just stupid, you know,
but but you didn't care. I mean it may sounds
really weird. This is again all give part of this
as a Gaga wear line. Okay, we don't think about

(30:42):
the money, we really don't. We think about what's the
right thing to do, and if you do the right things,
the money will follow if you start and this is
where God, if you start thinking about the money, you're
going to compromise the decision making. So maybe that's why,
you know, we just kind of live in our own

(31:03):
world the way Paul and I do but it's pretty
simple to us. No, that's a cool project. Here's how
you could do it, here's how you could make it work,
and let's go do it or not do it. Okay,
So you work for Concerts West for how long thirteen years?
It was? There were variations. It was called you know,

(31:25):
it ended up being called Wine Traub Entertainment Group. But
really from seventy eight to nine I was at concerts
and then what happened. Then Michael Cole hired me to
go up and I was the director of touring for CPI.
This was right after right at the end of the

(31:46):
steel wheel wheel right, and so I went up there
and they kind of figured, I mean Michael told me
and Arthur told me. They just said, look, you know,
we're going to be at the story business. We figured
we needed to hire a Concerts West guy because they do.
They knew we We've grown up in that, in that environment.
So I started there. My first day was July one.

(32:11):
It was very funny though. I had this marketing kid
named Jeff Shabon that was going to be working for me,
and I knew him from before I think it worked
for John Stall. And they put me in like one
of those old court apartments and he and his little
marketing buddy from Lobats comes over to pick me up,

(32:32):
a little marketing buddy, little marketing buddy, Michael Repeat, and
they take me out on a boat on Lake Washington
Head where there's this DJ who Joey Scolari was. Yeah,
it was like you know, and by the way, what
a great time. I mean I loved every minute up

(32:56):
there and probably would have stayed if they you know,
I hadn't moved down to Hamas or Perview to wherever.
I mean, that was really the factor for me. So
how many years were you there? Almost seven? Okay, six
seven seven? And what was your responsibility there? Well, I

(33:19):
was kind of I was the operations director of those
tours citizens you know, we routed those tours. I did
all the building, deal did all the tickety tickety was
very different then than it is today with hard tickets.
Back then, um so really routed, did the deals and

(33:43):
of course the they did the stones. Who else were
you doing it that we were doing? We did Pink
Floyd's last tour, Vision Bell did Paul Simon. It was
that was a great tour. What of the greatest bands,
diversity of My Life. Uh, Stones of or Its Foodoo
Lounge Urban Jungle Tours. Uh. David Bowie Uh did Bowie

(34:08):
Bowie Nail's Tour. That was an experience. That was a
tough tour. Bowie Morrissey with Morrissey walked off the tour
halfway through it. Uh, and they were look and it
was right at the beginning of the YouTube relationship. But
I left a very very beginning. Uh. Well, they sold
the company and they went to Bahamas for tax reasons.

(34:31):
What happened to you? I got married someone you met Toronto? No, no, somebody? Well,
actually I met her while I lived in Toronto, but
she was a Uh. She was directed a show for
Disney that we were touring, and it was called Disney
Symphonic Fantasy. Uh. One of the mean an amazing show.

(34:54):
But we were allowed to play arenas because of the
Felt contract. Really yeah, the Feld contract prohibited Disney from
producing a competitive touring attraction, right whatever. So we tried
to see if we can put this in amphitheaters and
that big mistake and the reason we actually did it,

(35:14):
I remember because you know, Michael was doing a lot
of you know, bus and truck Broadway stuff. Very very
successful up through Canada and even into the States do
cats and all that kind of stuff. So we wanted
to get the bus and truck rights for you know,
Beauty and the Beast. That was the first Disney Broadway

(35:38):
thing they were doing, and Disney was kind of inferring that, well,
if you do this tour for us, said you'll be
in line to do the bus and truck. Of course,
we did the tour, lost money, and they decided to
do the bus and truck in house. But I got
a wife out of it. Uh. We lost a million
dollars on the tour, so worth it, but it wasn't

(36:03):
your million a Yeah, okay, so they move away. You're
now getting married. What's your next step? Well, while I
was over in um that was the only this is
the only time you've been married. Yeah, twenty five years
coming up this September. Pretty rare in this absolutely, I know,
it's pretty pretty amazing. Well we got married later, so

(36:26):
and on the road, everybody got their old fantasy exactly
exactly thought about him. Um. So, Brian Becker started calling
me while I was over in London with Bowie and
he started going, hey, we want to get into touring business.
Wherever you want to live, if you want to live
in This is when he's running Live Nation is when

(36:49):
you know, this is when he's running Pace Pace concerts.
And then you know, he said, come on and we'll
start this touring group. You and Louis are tight, so
we came. I agreed to go work with them. Uh God,
Ironically at or it just happened. Shelley Dyan is like,

(37:13):
oh God, there's nothing. I just love that. I meant
anyway right it at the last minute, Shelly calls me
and gets my wife and I had to fly down
in San Francisco because they're like, why did you come

(37:34):
and start GPS story. Now, ironically both of them got
bought by the same time, so I guess it would
ended up the same place. But um yeah. They flew
us and wine and dined us and all of that
down at San Francisco, and very funny. The last night there,
my wife got we were staying at the CASTLEMA drone
out in Sasolito. Last night. We're gonna fly back to

(37:54):
Toronto and go across streets some Italian seafood place. My
wife has seafood us and by two o'clock in the morning.
We're in Barren County General the worst food poison. I'd
see him my life. It was terrible. But that's not
why I picked Pace over GP. But uh so, anyway,
I ended up doing the Pace Storian thing and Louis

(38:16):
and I kind of got together on that and we started.
I remember we started oz Fest, then we did the
first Fleetwood mac Reunion tour, and Louis started this sig
called the George Straight Country Music Festival. And honestly, that's
that's what kicked it off for him. That's what really

(38:37):
got him to be in country. Louis. You know, good
for that. We all knew Louis the rock promote Texas
right and um, and we're I mean, Louis and I
were having a great time because you know, I was like,
I'm more the business structure operator kind of guy, and

(38:59):
I mean he is greatest salesman over see it. He
really is. I mean he's like, you can't beat Louis
and the two of us would go in a room.
I mean, I didn't think we could get beat. I
really didn't. But then the sellarman thing comes along at
s f X buy his Pace and Pace story wasn't
even two years old. And to be honestly, with the Bubber,

(39:25):
I really hated seeing that happened, you know, And maybe
that's maybe I had it like in my head ahead
of time that I was going to get out of
there anyway because of the consolidation and all of that,
and I just hate that. And but I didn't. I didn't,
you know, I didn't get along with the guy that

(39:46):
question about that. I mean that was everybody knew that,
and that's what I knew, you know, I got to
get out of here now, and well everybody was running
into this place. It's really weird because, yeah, I'm going, okay,
I'm gonna quitting my job. My wife and I are

(40:10):
adopting a baby from Romania, and I'm buying a house.
I've been living at Gaga Ware's house, right and all
of this at the same time, You're making all these
commitments with no incoming nothing. Yeah, it was all I
used to call it outcome. Then we're looking for income

(40:32):
right now, it's all going out. Um. But you know,
thank God for Paul, you know, like my like my
big brother, and you know, he came to me and said,
come on, let's go be the other guys. No, uh,
they're just we could just go out. We thought of it.
We'll just go out there and maybe we'd be able

(40:52):
to get one or two tours, you know, just say, look,
we're the personal you know, the quality over quantity, hands
on all the time, dona dada ah. The way we
do Tori, it has never changed. We're doing Tori today
the way we did it back to the concerts West,

(41:14):
which is everything goes to the pool. It was a
real easy line back there, which was I'd rather make
my back then it was I'd rather make my of
it a hundred times and steal all of it once.
And that was always our thing, so we always put
everything out on the table with the artists. It was

(41:35):
always about the right decisions for them. So Paul and
I thought, well, there was that's missing, you know, and
we should be able to go out. And I think
it more personally wanted to do that because of our lifestyles.

(41:56):
That makes sense. It's like, I mean, didn't we get
into the music business because we didn't want to wear
a suit, I didn't want to cut our hair, I
didn't want to work five. I mean, now, why is
everybody pushing for that. Why is that, like you couldn't
agree more even if this late date, I know it's

(42:19):
and it's there. I mean, you know, but it's like so,
but that's really what's see two be That's what's cool
about it is that as things consolidate, it also means
things will fracture. And I'm always a guy. I've always
be one of the fractures. I think, whatever, but and

(42:41):
I think it's because one guy. But we're dealing with art, Okay,
our job. What does the promoter do? We marry art
with commerce in the live business, that's it. I don't records.
We just do live. We sell tickets, and we know
how to do that right and how to control your
expense is and how to do it your way. Okay,

(43:03):
but I'm not getting off topic here. You know how
you're talking about Pace Consulting, SFX and how you decide
to go independent with Gongaware. It was we just felt
like something was missing, okay, and we felt like what
was bussy was really exactly what what we do, which is,

(43:24):
you know, does anybody care about the artists in this
equation in the life side. And I'm not trying to
be idealistic or anything. Or I'm just trying to say
that it's a perspective that you could take if you
take them, because we learned that from Gerry Wantrump. Okay,
you know, if I didn't do what was right for
his artist, they got fired, right. Okay, that's that's simple.

(43:47):
So I look at it that way today. If I
don't do what's right for Seline, she should fire me.
If I don't do what's right for the Rolling Stone
Paul and I Doe, they should fire us. Okay. I
want to make sure what we're doing is the right
job up. So that's what we felt like was missing,
and we felt like that's what we enjoy doing. Okay, Yeah,

(44:10):
I was talking to about this earlier today. What we
really love doing is is doing what we love doing,
and what we love doing is fighting a project and
going out there and making sure we're doing it better
than anybody else's trying to think through everything we could
possibly think of. Every artist is different. How could how

(44:32):
can you do the how do you take this tour
model for this other artist apply to that artist? I mean,
you can't look at it that way. You gotta look
and say, Okay, this artist and they want to do live, right,
let's just start there and then let's work it backwards
from there. Um. When on our tours, the best type

(44:56):
of touring deal is the deal that the guarantee is
the last thing you get to, you know, because what
it means is everybody's worked together. Okay, should be playing
these kind of places? What should the ticket prices should be?
How much we're gonna spend on production that? Who? What
are we trying to achieve here? What's it going? Do

(45:18):
you want to bundle the record? You not want to
all these different things? Okay? What what is right for you?
And then you sit down and go, okay, I'll bet
on then I'm going to do it right. But it's like,
go through the numbers, and here's what doing it right does,
and I'll give it to you that. Okay. So what

(45:46):
was the first tour you've got with Gone? I think
it was it was but Shelly is West Coast for one,
And and you know why we got it, everybody was

(46:09):
we dynamically priced the first fifty runs let's go, and
that generated a half a million dollars bore and our
numbers were that much bigger. Whose money were you using? That? One?
Was ours? Ok that one was like, uh, but we
found uh uh. Then we did Beriah and the Dixie Chicks,

(46:32):
where our next two tours I might have been Dixie Chicks,
said Mariah, one way or the other. Um. And for
that we had found a guy up in outside of Portland, Oregon,
Alan James Bless his soul passed away. Um kind of.
He was from Wilbur, Washington, which, believe it or not,
that's a summer camp that I worked at high school. Okay,

(46:56):
and nobody would know anyway, think about it was on
it you took a y across an Indian reservation to
get okay, so um, and he did like low budget films,
and Paul and I explained our whole thing to him
and Darren Libanatti, the kid at the time was that

(47:16):
Thomas and Mac and he called us and said, hey,
you should beat this guy. He's doing boxing promoting and
he's doing some low budget films. And Paul and I
went in and our you know, our whole thing is
very we're very transparent. So our deal with investors was
always looked the money gets half right and the work

(47:37):
gets the other hand. Okay, And that's really how we
conducted our business. Paul and I were responsible for all
the people that work for us, So Paul and I
didn't Paul and I with his funny we put ourselves.
We had two fifty dollar weeks salaries for our first year,
just so we'd have insurance and stuff like that, because

(47:59):
anything we may basically gave to the employees. And then
you ultimately sold that company to a G. Yeah, and
and a godfather of that to us was irving, of course,
and he saw it. Uh. Ironically, Paul and I were
actually beating with SMG because part of our whole pitch. Remember, Paul,

(48:22):
we started a little company called Arena Network back and
it was part of uh a fact his fuddy story.
Back then, we couldn't afford to fly, so we drove
back and forth to Vegas for meeting. It's right, so
we're driving. I went to I got the name he
said for this RITA thing. He said what I said

(48:43):
as Rita's for excellence. And I would have been right.
At the same time, it would have been great explain
what Arena Network is. Rita Network and it still exist. No,
we sold it back to the members. I don't know
a number of your ago now, but it was it
basically came from the concept that the arena managers retired

(49:06):
to waken up and seeing that an act was seen
in the Sunday paper that an act was playing at
an amphitheater down the street and they never even got
a phone call because their local promoter in the marketplace
on the amphitheat So this was created to really protect
the arenas. Concerts. West, I guess was always an arena

(49:27):
company just because you know, the first ones who had
amphitheaters were the needer Landers and there weren't that many
of them, Okay, so uh we felt that those guys
needed a you know, a voice. And at the same
time there were a group it was Brad Mayne, it

(49:49):
was Tim Ryan h Kevin tuwig Hat Spokane, Darren Libanoni.
That's how we got tied with Darren um I'm sure
I'm forgetting somebody Jim from San Jose. They were like
the core guys and they were like, look, our owners

(50:09):
are our owners are you know? They're not happy with
this situation? What's going on with these amphitheaters. Okay, what
people forgetting our business is that because you've been around,
you've seen a lot. Okay, you and I grew up
with civic and university facilities. Okay, it was Spokane Civic Center,

(50:30):
was University of Tennessee Arena, whatever. It was. Okay that
the Amphitheaters came along as a cheap outdoor venue, you know,
kind of the Dead Landers. And then they were owned
by promoters, owned by promoters, right, But then the arenas
went private, which the Palace gunned. Those were like the

(50:54):
first And when the owners of the NBA and the
NHL team said hell, I'm gonna go build my own places,
that was another paradigm shift, okay, and that's what we
kind of exist there today. Um, you know, the amphitheaters.
Let's put it this way. I don't think the amphitheaters

(51:16):
are as popular today as they were. They're not. I
think a repeenum would agree with you owns most of
them now. Hollywood Ball it's not anything. I know, it's great,
you know. I mean I wouldn't call that at the Amphitheater,
No I would. But because there was stuff that would

(51:37):
sell at Hollywood Bowl before they turned tore down the
Revine meadows that wouldn't that would lose money at Refinement correct, correct?
You know? Well, I mean again they started back then
there mixes. So at a certain point, I guess we
all called it, ah, the Jimmy Buffett deals. We're paying

(51:57):
a hundred and five percent of growth or whatever it us. Right,
that was another that was the shift. Okay, So I
don't know. Okay, so you're sold to a G. So
what is the mission for Concerts West at this point?
It's really funny the well, the bishop for Concerts West

(52:18):
today is very different than the biship for a E
G presents all of that because Paul and I we
we were the original block of it. UM. We had
touring and kind of golden Voice in our minds um,

(52:39):
but we did have regional offices in our plan. And
then if I go back to the original business plan
that Irving Paul and I presented to Phil and his
guys in Las Vegas, it had all that in it. Okay,
but we said we wanted to start with the touring.
UH actually wanted to buy a Golden Voice because of

(53:03):
their relationship with developing artists. Okay, Coachella was not Coachella
at that time. Because Paul Goga and I, you know,
we're helping back Paul t Um after his first year.
The first year they did it, they lost, they lost everything, okay,

(53:24):
and then and Paul came. Then there wasn't the one
the next year. And then Paul Ty came to our
office and asked Goga and I if we take a
ride out to the desert with him, and God, wear
was like he got it immediately. He was like, hey,
it takes three years to get these things to happen.
So we backed them. Irving was part of that. UM

(53:45):
lost money. But then when we sold the company, they're
going like, what's this Coachella thing? You're throwing your ship
at the deal here and you know, um, but our
vision back then was always to be equality over quantity, guy,

(54:09):
and I hope that is what it is today. In fact,
I I forever telling people that were you know, in
our group and all of that, and when they get
into this competition thing, and I'm always like, don't compete.
It's just a waste of your energy. Be different, be yourself,
be you know you've got something to offer. You know,

(54:30):
in our business, there's always horses for courses, you know
what I mean. And when you're when when you have
to match people up with personalities and not just the artists,
but also the other personalities around them. A lot of
times that are handling it. Sometimes it's simple as just
having the right person, you know. So to Paul and I, here,

(54:55):
I'll tell you what this is. Here's our mission statement. Okay,
this will say what we want Concerts West to be.
It's exactly this. I don't want to buy companies. We
want to hire good people. We want to empower them.
Empowerment means that if you give somebody responsibility, you give
them authority, you give them the resources that they need,

(55:17):
whether it's the money, back office support, et cetera. And
the most important thing to get the funk out of
their way. Okay, and it's so hard for people to do.
Everybody wants to listen. I know it's listen. I watched
Jim Allison and John Nelson first Legal the job that

(55:38):
they're doing on Selindi on right now, and there they're
the ones doing the job. Okay, so you're working on
Selene now, you're working on the Stones. We've got Asia's
you know, we've got Edgar and running all over Asia
right now. Uh uh. Seline is finish it at the

(56:01):
at the policy and there's only sixteen shows left. That's
pretty amazing, and there's some other tours were working on.
I mean right now, my focus right now with Selene's
tour and um, because it's we're an on sale week okay,
so you're still an arena company looking for complete tours, correct, Okay?
And a globally it doesn't happen us. We're stadiums too.

(56:27):
I think we have a bunch of experience stadiums worldwide.
Is anybody if not more? Okay, tell the story of
how he got the stones? Oh god, it's better Paul
telling the story. Uh he was the one that sat
on Joyce's doorstep and that's their attorney manager. Correct And

(56:47):
uh well at the time they had Dainty in Australia. Yeah,
and I you know, I don't know. I can't really
say what happened why that fell apart. I think they
have to do with my But you know that's look,
I mean, that's why above all you got you love

(57:09):
Phil Answers. Okay, I mean, if you really look at it,
why are we able to get the rolling Stones because
we have Phil Answers, somebody who's willing to write to
check and who gets it and his guys get it. Okay.
I mean when you really look at it. I mean
dand becker By, Ted Vick Ray, Todd Golts, the Jay Barciato,

(57:31):
Ted Tanner, the guys right there around Phil. They're really
good guys. And the interesting thing is we say this
internally that, but every single deal that I've brought to Phil,
he has said yes, wow. And and that includes telling

(57:57):
this guy about a thing called Seline on the show
in Las Vegas and heard her husband want to do
and everybody in the world thinks it ain't gonna work.
And he says, well, how much are we risking here?
And I said, rofully, a hundred and fifty billion dollars
that ballpark is someone and he and he just looked
at me and said, you know, John, I think we

(58:19):
should do it. Okay. I mean, there aren't that many
guys out there like I mean, that is like and
to have, honestly, you know, I mean, it fills a
much more conservative regular guy than the rest of us. Okay,

(58:41):
to have the patience to put up with all of
our crap. I mean that alone. You know, he's good.
But I think Phil loves what's been created, like I
think of it. I tell people this, it's like a playground. Okay,
if you look around a e g. There's so many
cool things to play with, and if you come up

(59:02):
with something cool and it makes sense, Phil will say,
let's go do it. The Bangkok arita that they're all
working on like Strasbourg in Denver or there in the
Mission ballroom, etcetera. But going back to the stones, Okay,
you know, talking generally and act like that, how do
they let you make money? You're putting up all this money.

(59:25):
They have a legend of take of getting these guarantees.
Do you say, hey, you know, uh, we gotta make
our expert sentage or how does it work? Uh? We
put up in big guarantees. But I mean it's Look,
they're very fair people. They understand. Look, they know this business.

(59:45):
Well is anybody Okay, I give you a brother. Have
no one been doing it and doing it at that
level for as long as they've been doing it. And
they have nothing but amazing people behind them. Choice or
manager Tim Woolley who produced is all of the tours,
all the financial supporting them, everything to do with that Opie,

(01:00:06):
their production at Patrick Woodruff and then all of the
people on our side, uh that are out there working
these things. Um, what's so cool about the Rolling Stones
is that every time they go out to another tour,
do you look around the organization? Maybe one person changed.

(01:00:26):
I mean, it's like everybody's still there. Everybody wants to
be there. It's as professional as you can be at all.
So but there they're they're fair guys. You know, they
get it, you know, and and Enjoyce gets it, and

(01:00:48):
you know, I think, yeah, they they allow us to
make money. They want us to make money, okay, but
they know that our first priority is, you know, to
do the tour the way they want their tour done. Okay.
So famously, although you mentioned you did it earlier in

(01:01:09):
your career when the Stones came back after their fifty
you've been doing dynamic pricing. So explain the motivation and
how that ultimately works. Easy motivation. Um, we had an
open ticket, which I define as as soon as you
sold it to the consumer, they were free to do
whatever they wish with it. And uh, we were watching.

(01:01:36):
We would sell a ticket for a hundred dollars and
watch it get resold for five. It went, that's wrong, okay, Uh,
you can't stop supplying to that, okay, So we said, wait,
a minute, that money belongs to the artist. But he doesn't,

(01:01:58):
you know, And again I always say the artists, because
what we make is based upon what the artist makes.
The artist makes more I make, So I look at it,
I go, wait a minute, that money belongs to the artist.
So it has been a concern. I know everybody is
aware of it now. As you know, this has been
a concerted effort of ours now for over a decade, okay,

(01:02:20):
that we have been figuring out how to get that
money that used to exist in what we call the
secondary market. How do we get that back over onto
at least the side of the fence of the industry
be it goes to the artist. But even you guys
are your building to get it back on your side

(01:02:41):
of the fence. Don't have these outside guys they have
they have no right to be in our business to
the degree that they are today. Um. And and it's
our own fault because we look at but now the
stones legendarily starting decades ago, UH would charge with the

(01:03:05):
the real price of the ticket, okay, the secondary market price.
Do you think it call market value? Market value? Absolutely? Uh?
Do you think of the who's other acts? Developing acts
or acts with different issues of credibility to charge less
or should everybody charge what the market will bear? No, No,

(01:03:27):
I think it's a gad go back to the individual artist. Okay. Um,
for the Rolling Stones, what they don't have is time. Okay,
they're only gonna do X number of shows. If you
remember when Paul and I did Princess Musicology tour, Okay,

(01:03:49):
we had no scalping problem at all. We had no
secondary ticket problem at all. Why because we kept at
each shows so we were able to keep our price down,
and we were at each show after show after show.
And even Prince said back then, he said, look, if
we've sold four Philadelphias and we think we can only
sell a half of another one, we're already set up.

(01:04:12):
Let's do the show. We'll figure out a way to
take care of underprivileged kids and stuff like that with
the rating tickets. So we never had the twenty one
nights and London we never had a It was the
theory behind the fifty Nights of Michael and Michael Jackson.
That's the way you keep your ticket price down, and
it is important for artists to keep your ticket price down.

(01:04:34):
Younger artists should keep it down, but they have to
play more. Okay, an older artist who can't tour as much,
who's going to have less frequency on the road, has
got number one a bigger you know, there's going to
be more demand because there's less supply. And then if
you get to let's call it, the artists have been

(01:04:57):
around for four or five decades. Their generation is also
at the time of their lives where they have money.
I got a great analogy for that. I heard this
when I was over in London a couple of weeks ago.
You know, we always talk about how it's the boomer
generation can afford all these hype prices. Somebody from the
eighties came up to me and said, hey, you know what,

(01:05:20):
I don't mind paying two hundred and fifty dollars a
ticket to go see Duran Duran for being my wife.
And I just started laughing at I loved it. It's
great because that the only problem is that generation so smaller. Right,
So going back to the stones, tell us how the
dynamic pricing works? Well, um, oh yeah, how do I

(01:05:50):
I don't know, you know, what's a henway. I mean,
it's it's hard to explain. Let's just assume for the
sake of numbers. You have an arena that's twenty people,
the big arena, but let's just use that number and
you go on sale, forget any pre sales. Whatever, you
go on sale. How many of those tickets would actually
be on sale at the beginning or do you just

(01:06:12):
put a certain number to figure out what the price
would be. Two things you've heard, like Marcus talk about it, uh,
which is slow ticketing. Right. Okay, you kind of got
to decide up front what you want to do. Okay.
You can't say, oh I want quick ticketing and it
didn't work, and then later you said, oh I really

(01:06:33):
wanted slow ticketing, That right could get sucked up. Okay.
So slow ticketing is something for where you don't mind
taking the time to sell all of the tickets, but
you're gonna be able to learn more and and the
technology is all there today. You're gonna be able to

(01:06:55):
learn more over a slower process and be able to
adjust your prices. So, like Ticketmaster has a program called
price Master today, and if you use price Master after
you're on sale, it will say, hey, see those two
roads of tickets that you have a hundred seventy Well,
if you drop them to a hundred and fifty, they'll
all sell in three days, or they just do its algorithms.

(01:07:19):
So they know that here's here's a good way. I
look at the ticketing world today. Okay, we just went
through I don't know, maybe it was a couple of decades,
but at least one decade figuring out the technology, right, Okay,
so you have to go today, and you've got to
go the technology exists today to do whatever you want

(01:07:42):
to do. Okay. So it's not about technology, it's about
business rules. Okay. So that's going to be the challenge next. Okay,
because there is transparency, we know that we could follow everything,
so you can't hide anything anymore because a lot of
people are like, I haven't explained now why they hid

(01:08:05):
things a long time ago and why they hit them all. Um.
Problem with lyon as you've got to remember them okay. Um.
So it's become a very transparent world. Okay. We can
see what the supply and demand is today on anything, okay,

(01:08:26):
and we have the technology to do it anyway we
want to do it. Okay. So it's really good to
put the onus back on the business rules. Should I
allow one company to exclusively sell all of my tickets?
Should I do it a bunch a bunch of companies?

(01:08:47):
You know, if I have one company sell all my tickets,
maybe they'll give me more money. But I think we're
I kind of think we're passing the big check from
ticket Maaster. You know, well, well the ticket master a
lot of times they have an exclusive with a building.
That's so you don't have the option to use other

(01:09:08):
ticketing companies. How do you think Coca Cola would have
done if they could only sell a Ralph's stores? They
would not have done well? And why have we been
doing that for all these years? Now? I'm not saying
you're wrong, I'm saying, say, do you believe the buildings
themselves will not take that curate? I think it's either
them or the artist. Okay, I think ultimately it's there.

(01:09:33):
I mean I should guess I should be able to
say it should be the promoter to since we're putting
up the buddy. But remember we put up all the
money and we're still at the very bottom of them
food here. Yeah, but either the venue control the tickets
because they have a civic responsibility, or the artist controls
their ticket They're fucking their tickets. Okay, it's like we

(01:09:58):
go back to Pearl's head, we go back to ever
we want. Okay, I mean Pearl jab never went in
and asked a simple question of can we sell our
tickets without service charges, to which at the time Terry
Barnes would have said, sure, here's how much it cost.
Nobody wanted to talk about that, you know, so think
of it as a leaky bucket, right, and the leaky

(01:10:20):
bucket was really bad at the secondary market. Okay, Now
we've started to learn how to close up our bucket,
but we still need open distribution tools to not have
open distribution for our product. Well, I know, if I'm
talking to someone in your organization, they made a deal
in Amazon sold some tickets for them, and they sold tickets.

(01:10:44):
You know that they couldn't reach through the traditional ways. Correct.
That was that over in London and worked beautifully. Okay.
I mean, well, we all know there's giant communities out there,
online community, these other it's just communities, right, and so

(01:11:04):
why shouldn't we be reaching out to those people? Okay?
We want you know, you try to get your music
out to everybody. You try to sell your records everywhere
I used to. But why aren't we make making our
tickets available the airlines? Do I mean? Do you think
American Airlines and United dislike Orbits? Of course they hate Orbits,

(01:11:27):
but they liked that. But the only one that's independent
is Southwest. Yeah, but everybody else I understand your point. No,
my point, Okay, they have They're on Expedia, they're on Orbits,
are on their own site. Because you never know where
the customer might be. That happens to be all the time.
I tell people to the Southwest, I didn't know well
because it wasn't on Orbits and it wasn't on Expedia.
It's like a buddy A Biden told me the story

(01:11:51):
about uh to Me and Costco and how to Me
said they would never ever put their product in Costco.
They had a two thousand and eight they had a
bunch of orders they couldn't get rid of. Called Costco
and said you might taken some of it, and Costco said,
how much do you have? We'll take it all. Guess

(01:12:12):
who sells more to me than anybody else today? And
I think to me just made a deal with Amazon,
to one of those companies. Of course, otherwise you're putting
yourself out of business. How about premium ticketing? Anything we
haven't covered here well previously. Listen, here's what I think. Okay,
it's because everybody gets really confused. So there's a couple
of ways to look at this real simply, there's primary

(01:12:34):
and their secondary. Okay, primary to me means and I'll
use an old analogy, but what prints out on the
ticket is what they paid. In other words, I have
never in my life. I have never scalped a ticket
of my life. I've never sold a hundred ticket that
says a hundred dollars on it to somebody for five dollars.

(01:12:58):
I have sold five tickets and they say five. I
have sold packages, and those packages might be fifteen hundred
dollars and include a five ticket, but they explain that. So,
in other words, our responsibilities to keep things in the
primary sale and keep things out of quote the secondary market. Now,

(01:13:21):
secondary market always wanted to exist, you know, but I
don't want them taking the lift as they have been
for the last decade. I'm fine with them taking ta
Then they're my orbits, got you, Okay, So how do
you decide to walk us through the process of premium ticketing. Um,

(01:13:45):
premium ticketing is at a reserved house, preferred locations, preferred roads,
live nations, doing it now where you can pay extra
to get the aisle. I pist I did come up
with that. Um, you know it's uh because we live

(01:14:07):
in the sliced up world today. You can slice it
up and you can take little I mean, I haven't
seen it yet, but I was told that you could
buy seats sitting at a cocktail table on the stage
at Lady Gaga's she does her jazz. And I'm like, okay,

(01:14:30):
that's what premium ticketing is. Okay. So if you have
a show, if we get the stones with the dynamic,
how many you were in an arena? How many tickets
do you use for premium ticketing? It varies, you know,
obviously it's gonna be more your majors. It could be
how much should it be? It's probably running about well

(01:14:52):
for us. I'm trying to run as hive a percentage
of that as I can five inventory. I hope eventually
we are in looking at our entire inventory in that
way because we're capable of it. Okay, So um uh
pets on the artists and the pets odd obviously the

(01:15:15):
demand okay, how with the scarcity is going to be okay?
And at what areas also could we diedabatically lift? Okay?
In other words, we all know the front row of
any balcony anywhere, it's usually a pretty cool seat, right,

(01:15:35):
I mean like the front row the Dodgers, a front
row of the first balcony Dodgers cap. It's a great seat, right. Okay,
So we're applying that now, a lot of that just
because we can so. But premium or platinum as it's
called on Ticketmasters is about the more special. It's like

(01:15:59):
you've got great car, gold card, platom card and the
black one, right, So it's the same thing. It's first class,
it's business class. It's a one term sweep. It's a
one better sweet with a balcony. Okay, But do the
perks matter? People just buying the tickets? Uh? I think

(01:16:21):
it used to be, honestly, just the tickets of the location.
Where does it sounds? I think everybody's really getting into
the perks. Tell us some of the perks you've used.
Oh god, I think the greatest perk was and continues
to this day, that Shelley started with the Paul McCarty
sound check package. I bought what myself get to sit

(01:16:48):
and watch Paul McCarty to do a sound check for
an hour. He acts back right right, all right, right
right right right, and that you get an amazing seat.
I bought two. I mean, you know, I mean it's
a great experience. Okay, So um, I think kids today

(01:17:09):
are bored to that experienced stuff. We are we think
of experiences because we're old parts. We think of these
experiences like like paying for first class. Okay, capture experiences,
but capture it so everybody could capture it. That's where
you make the money. Now switching gears again, we have

(01:17:33):
an endless issue with the ticketmaster fees. Ticketing fees. Public
hates them. StubHub included them and their business went back down,
and they would what's the future of the ticketing fee?
Mm hmm, gotten way up there? Um, okay, what is it?

(01:17:56):
We all now know it costs nowhere near that amount
of money to sell at it. Okay, I mean we
know that. Really, Come on, you're not even making anything now, okay,
everything electronic? All right? Yes, I believe somebody should be
able to make a profit at what they do. But

(01:18:18):
I think by adding charges, creating charges, increasing charges, putting
things on top, as they call it, Oh, push it
on top, put the credit card charge up on top,
and all of that you hurt of your product. Okay,
because at the end of the day, you know, who

(01:18:40):
are you fooling if you if if you say selling
my tickets for a hundred dollars, but when the person
shows up, they're paying a hundred. Trust me, the guy
who paid a hundred forty five paid a hundred forty five.
It's the other guy who thinks the only sold it
for a hundred rightly sold tickets for a hundred dollars. Yeah,
but he's playing on or fifty by the time all

(01:19:02):
the charges are on top. Again, I think transparency is
going to kill a lot of that, you know, I mean.
And there's nothing wrong with choices, okay, Like you know,
you want to go online shopping Costco or Amazon. You
want the jungle chip, You want the jungle chim delivered tomorrow.

(01:19:24):
You want two guys to set it up. Oh, you
can do that for X amount of money. So our
business is now capable of doing all these Okay, But
it's kind of back of well did you get into music?
Business because you wanted to be a computer geek. I

(01:19:48):
I was just reading about that today. They were reviewing
a book in the Wall Street Journal because they were
talking about money ball, you know, the scouts as opposed
to stats. And no matter what I mean, he says,
you know, the facts have to come from somewhere. So
I don't know. I mean, this becomes a because you're
when you do arena tours. That's the top of the business,
arenas and stadiums. And we grew up in an era

(01:20:09):
when the record company supported the clubs, which they certainly
don't do anymore. And the clubs don't exist. And I'm
talking about a real club for undred fifty people. Now
they'll say club. That's not a club, that's a theater
of my book. So but uh, you know, the developing
acts the other things you talk about in terms of
selling tickets to different places, that's another issue where there

(01:20:29):
are acts that sell out arenas that most people never
heard of. You know, the message doesn't get out there.
Let's stay on the technology for one more minute, though,
the paperless. What's the future of that? Oh, it's mobile
ticket like so it's so the ticket will be tied
to the person who pushed it wanted, Yeah, it's got

(01:20:51):
to be closed by clothes. I mean, just the same
way you can't sell your hotel room or somebody else
what's the hotel says it's okay or whatever. In other words,
what I was making my point about the business rules.
Our job is going to be the business rules. I'm
not saying what those are today, but I'm just saying

(01:21:12):
that that is good to be what we have to
deal with. That makes sense. Okay, So in today's uh,
you know, you got into the business. I got into
business because music really drove the culture. Music was everything,
And despite some younger people saying otherwise, it does even
though it's ubiquitous, it doesn't hold the same mind sure,

(01:21:32):
the same place in the mind that it did when
you had your transistor radio and your stereo and that's
all you had. So obviously you're very excited by the
business end of it. Are you still excited by the music? Yeah?
But I gotta find what I like? Okay, like because
I'm a I'm a contrarian by nature. Okay, I'm not

(01:21:55):
a big I'm not a big hip hop fan. Man,
did I love R and B? And when I hear
that in it. I love that, okay. Um. I think
country is the one that's got a little click track
ish myself. Um, it's like they all and that one's
sounded a little too much alike to me, And I

(01:22:17):
think there needs to be some branching out there. But
then I look for the branching out. Okay. I'm one
of those guys who everybody's saying rock and roll is dead.
That that energizes me, okay, because I'm the guy who says,
you know, the time to buy when you hear about
buying gold, that means it's over exactly. I'm a big

(01:22:39):
believer in I'm a country area too. Let's just go
You mentioned that you got involved with Coachella, it took
three years to ultimately make money. What do you see
as a festival business in the health of it or
the future of that in America today? There's one side
of it I like, okay. But the side I like
is the community side, Okay, that they're all going out

(01:23:01):
enjoying the live experience. I don't know if the festivals
today are the um the roller rink um what we
call them pop shows back in the sixties when when
you know you had Buddy Holly and and you know
you had multiple acts. Um, it kind of represents that.

(01:23:27):
It does represent this experience thing. Okay, I mean, um,
but it'll always it's like anything else. The strong will survive,
the week will die. There will be you know, there
will be those that look like the bar business, which
is you go down the street and buy the dump.

(01:23:51):
You turn it into a hot place. A second it's hot,
you sell it. You go down and buy it. So
there will be a contingent of guys that go and
do that, and there will be the wrong that survived.
The ones that I think that will survive though, will
be the ones that have a strong community based too.
It sounds weird, but I see that more of coming.

(01:24:11):
I see there's more. The festivals carry the greatest social
message that we have in our business. Okay, I mean,
without talking about the lyrics are the words of a song.
But I'm just saying, where else do we have a

(01:24:32):
better communal experience than a festival? Right? Okay? And if
we loved it when we were kids, absolutely amenities and
and and our concerts were almost festivals anyway because we
had jay floors, okay, and and it was a whole
Billity Jays ran around, so I that's an important thing

(01:24:55):
to keep live entertainment alive. But then, but then Brian
Becker's story and holograms and the selling tickets to Boom
is it. Yeah, well certainly the first one. Roy Orbison
in the UK did relatively well. So this has been wonderful.
We could talk for hours. Anything you didn't come, we
didn't cover that. You have to say, oh, um, since

(01:25:18):
we're talking about concerts West, we're talking about Goggle and
all of that. Concerts West is Honestly it's about our people.
My g and A and is nothing but overheads, mating salaries. Okay, Um.
We have the most incredible people who we lived by
those lines. I mean the the the ladies and the

(01:25:39):
gents that work at our place. They just love what
they're doing. And Paul and is aug Is we could
keep having fun to it this we're gonna do it.
And corporate wearing a suit stuff always scared. I agree
with You've been listening to John Meglin on the Bob
Left Sets podcast. You were fantastic job. Thanks for coming.
Thanks Bob