Layton Lillas: Promoters Association President on Live Nation acquiring Electric Avenue

The country's largest music festival, Electric Avenue, has been bought by Live Nation. 

The multinational entertainment company announced the acquisition of festival producer Team Event, which owns the two-day summer festival held in Christchurch's Hagley Park each February.  

Promoters Association President Layton Lillas told Mike Hosking that given the tough environment festivals are facing, this is good thing for New Zealand.  

He says Live Nation is going to put some financial might behind the event and secure big name acts.  

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
Christ success train rolls on. The American multinational Live Nation
has gone and bought Team Event. Now that's the company
behind Electric Avenue. You know Electric Avenue. Last summer's festival
delivered Christ Jutch as big as visitors spend in a decade.
Lton Lili's president of the New Zealand Promoters Association and
is with us late in morning.

Speaker 2 (00:17):
Good morning, Mike, how are you today?

Speaker 1 (00:19):
Very well? Thank you? Is this a classic business movie?
Start something, you grow, hope that someone big comes along
and gives you money. Is that how it works? All?
This is just one of those weird things that happened.

Speaker 2 (00:28):
I think it's a sort of a happy coincidence. I mean,
I think we just have to give credit where credits due.
This festival's part of I guess the arts renaissance and
crisis that's happened over the last decade or so, and
it's just expanded and expanded and clearly gotten on the
runway of Live Nation. Who have gone. You know what,
we can add something to this festival, we can safeguarded

(00:51):
into the future and yeah, keep it going for a
long time to come and have to say, in the
environment we've had in the last few years with festivals.
It's actually a good thing I think for the New Zealander.

Speaker 1 (01:02):
I was going to ask you about the festival to
come to that in the moment. But Live Nation being
an international, does it just become another thing a commodity
as opposed to what it was, or they can bring
heft that will enhance it.

Speaker 2 (01:15):
Well, that's the million dollar question. I hope that this
very unique festival that has been born out of christ
Church somehow keeps its local feel to it and it
doesn't just become another homogeneous international version of something that

(01:35):
Live Nation do us where. But I think what they're
going to do is they're going to put some big
financial might behind it. The biggest thing festivals have a
problem with is securing these big name acts to actually
pull the punters, and that's what Live Nation will give them.

Speaker 1 (01:50):
I guess yeah, that festival thing. So in Australia you
can't buy a festival for love nor money. Something's gone
wrong with festivals. Is that the same here or do
you need to have something in it that's different or
what's going on?

Speaker 2 (02:02):
It must be because Australia is having huge troubles with it.
Yet for the longest time, England have had these run
of long running festivals and you know what, for years,
if you go back, New Zealand had major problems with festivals.
You know Sweetwaters way back when I was a child,
the Neon Picnic all went went bust. But in recent years,
starting with Rhythm and Vines and that, we've managed to

(02:24):
figure it all out again. Yeah. I don't know. The
New Zealand public must like something about America. Maybe it's
Hagley Park, It's going somewhere unique to watch great music acts.
Whatever they've done, whatever they's secret sources, it's working and
you know they obviously have got a plan to make
it get even bigger.

Speaker 1 (02:44):
Fantastic. Good on you late and appreciate it very much.
Late in Littlis, I was just trying to work out
whether I got boot electric avenue, and I can't remember
if her electric avenue. Kadie and I hosted an event
in christ Church a couple of years ago. I think
I might have been Christmas in the parkle so I
can't remember. Anyway, a couple of winers got onto the
local rag and they said, Hospit is coming to christ
and we know we're gonna But I think my reception

(03:05):
was reasonably good. I did get boot at Deepak Chopra.
That was a funny night. Now I might say that
till after eight o'clock. Just I'm just thinking about lux
and getting booed at the Nitball, which I don't even
know he did get boot at the Nitball. To be honest,
if you listened to the noise, it was a lot
of background kind oh yeah, yah yah, like you know
what I mean, after the netball, the game's over. I
got properly booed. I mean, you know, I got boot

(03:26):
better than LUCKX and got I got booted better at Chopper,
then Luxe and got boot at the netphilk boot by Deepak. No,
Deepac loved me. Me and Deepak got on like a
house on fire, which was the ironic thing because people
are misinterpreting some people don't like me, just just just
to give us some background, some people don't like me,
and so this got a bit carried away. At this
I was hosting an evening with Deepak Chopra and I

(03:49):
came out on stage and people started booing. I thought, well,
the hell's this is Deepak Chopper. For God's sake, you's
supposed to be spirits and loves and be at peace
with each other, and a bunch of I'm sure they
were saying oom, exactly a bunch of losers in the
audience getting all eggra. In fact, I called them losers.
Probably didn't help them. That's why the booing sort of achrise.

Speaker 2 (04:09):
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