Touring
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Last spring, executives at Onex, AEG’s private equity partner in facility management company ASM Global, notified AEG leadership of their plans to trigger a clause in their agreement that allowed Onex to sell its 35% stake in ASM. Under the terms of the deal, AEG could either buy out Onex or match competing offers.
AEG officials instead elected to get out too, and over about half a year worked with Onex to identify a buyer for all ASM Global. On Nov. 3, Onex and AEG jointly announced that Legends Hospitality was buying ASM, the country’s leading venue management company.
Onex CEO Bobby Le Blanc told investors on a Nov. 10 earnings call that the decision to sell its ASM ownership stake for $2.3 billion was prompted by the company’s rebound in value, quickly recovering in the post-pandemic period after seeing its value dramatically drop when concerts shut down from 2020-2021 due to COVID-19.
The final sale price would double what ASM Global was worth in 2019 when AEG and Onex merged their SMG facility management holdings to create the world’s largest facility manager, Le Blanc confirmed.
Still, AEG’s decision to sell surprised many in the touring industry who had followed the company’s growth in that space.
For one, the sale made AEG a much smaller company, reducing its global footprint from 350 facilities under management to just nine — all of which AEG either owns or partially owns. And unlike Onex, as the world’s second largest concert promoter, AEG was able to enjoy significant synergies from owning ASM that other companies could not. AEG could more easily book its touring shows at ASM-managed facilities, expand its AXS ticketing platform to ASM-managed venues and sell sponsorships through its global partnerships division.
AEG and Onex merged their facilities holdings 14 months after Onex acquired SMG, AEG’s longtime facilities rival. In so doing, ASM Global became the world’s largest venue management company, with little to no competition for potentially large lucrative government contracts. Facility management has long been a predictable contracts business, in which city and county governments would pay SMG or AEG a fee to manage publicly owned venues and split any profits the private companies helped generate.
Merging the industry’s two largest competitors into ASM Global gave Onex and AEG unprecedented scale in the capital-intensive space and access to lucrative contracts. But the honeymoon didn’t last long. Oak View Group, which was founded in 2015 by former AEG CEO Tim Leiweke — who made his own failed bid to buy SMG — began growing as a serious competitor, and peeled away a number of big-name management clients away including PPG Paints Arena in Pittsburgh, the BOK Center in Tulsa and the sprawling McCormick Place convention center in Chicago. While the concert business’ post-pandemic boom has brought impressive profits, a source in facility management says that increased competition and inflation have been eating up ASM’s margins. Additionally, rising interest rates have made it difficult for firms like ASM to offer up capital investments in return for long-term management contracts, and much of the business’ growth was coming from new international venue projects, which were more costly to service.
Most recently, the bulk of AEG’s growth has been in its tour promotion business globally and through its theaters and clubs division. Since the end of the pandemic, both AEG and Live Nation have been looking to expand their network of smaller venues that they manage exclusively.
The company’s sweet spot is “locations with capacities of 1,500 to 5,000,” Rick Mueller, president of AEG Present North America, told Billboard last month. While most arena management deals do not include exclusive booking agreements because no single promoter can provide arenas enough content on their own to sustain a large facility, exclusively programming a club or theater can be much more profitable due to the leverage the contract holder has over other promoters wanting to book the venue, requiring promoters to cut them in on show deals. Now, AEG likely has more than an extra billion dollars to invest in this strategy, should it choose to do so.
A little more than three months ago, Christopher Anthony Lunsford, aka Oliver Anthony Music, was still working his day job in outside sales. In a little under three months from now, he’ll kick off his 40-date Out of the Woods world tour in Stockholm.
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It’s heady stuff for Lunsford, who’s never traveled much beyond the southeastern United States and is awaiting the arrival of his first passport. The tour, which begins on Feb. 1, comes on the heels of the breathtakingly rapid success of his raw, blue-collar anthem, “Rich Men North of Richmond,” which bowed at No. 1 on the Billboard Hot 100 in mid-August, a little more than 10 days after radiowv posted the video on YouTube of the six-foot-six, red-headed Virginian playing the song in his woodsy backyard.
“The last 90 days have been a little crazy,” Lunsford, a 31-year-old father of three, declares in a major understatement, during his first non-podcast/TV interview. Calling from the DMV in, believe it or not, Richmond, Lunsford comes across as smart and forthcoming. Even though he’s had to quickly navigate fame and the music industry, he’s already media-savvy enough to know what not to say — including declining to name the prominent producer he is in discussions with to helm his first full album, coming early next year, since the deal isn’t yet done.
Lunsford, who is self-managed and has no plans to sign with a label, seems extraordinarily grounded for someone who transformed into a household name almost overnight, even becoming such a cultural touchstone that his song was referenced during the first Republican presidential debate. Despite the far right’s initial embrace of his music and the left’s early rejection of it, he has declared that “I sit pretty dead center down the aisle on politics, and always have.”
Booked by UTA, his tour will weave through Norway, the Netherlands, United Kingdom and Ireland before the U.S. portion begins with two shows at country music’s mother church, Nashville’s Ryman Auditorium, and then heads into amphitheaters and arenas, including Jupiter, Florida’s Abacoa Amphitheater and the Greensboro (N.C.) Coliseum. Venue capacities average around 1,900 seats in Europe and 7,000 seats in the U.S. For the vast majority of the shows, tickets will range between $25-$45, excluding Ticketmaster fees. Fans can register for first access to tickets in select North American markets at his website, and tickets go on sale to the general public on Friday (Nov. 17) at 10 a.m. local time.
Tackling the ceaseless struggles of hourly-wage workers, who are taxed “to no end” to pay for, among other things, “the obese milkin’ welfare,” while politicians keep getting richer, the controversial “Rich Men North of Richmond” has been viewed more than 93 million times on YouTube and received more than 111 million streams on Spotify. The song is up for Top Selling Song at the 2023 Billboard Music Awards on Sunday (Nov. 19), while Lunsford is also up for Top Song Sales Artist, competing with the likes of Miley Cyrus, Jason Aldean, Taylor Swift and Morgan Wallen.
This interview has been edited for brevity and clarity.
How are you doing?
The last 90 days have been a little crazy. It’s funny because the music side of it has been very calming and enjoyable. It’s all the stuff behind the scenes that’s unreasonably chaotic. My life is actually a lot simpler in some ways, because I’m not working a job and juggling 10 other things with the music. But when you become a full-time musician, you’re essentially a business owner and an entrepreneur and a lot of other things, too. And those are things I’m not quite used to yet.
How long had you been in outdoor sales?
Pretty much the last decade. I dropped out of high school, had a GED, I was doing factory work and then I had a bad head injury in that factory. I was unable to work for a period of time, and then I moved into sales. I’ve spent the last 10 years having real, authentic conversations with hardworking Americans who are very transparent about the way they feel about things. It has, in a sense, given me the ability to maybe create music that’s so relatable to those type of people. Being on job sites and talking with so many people, I realized how similar everyone is as far as our personal struggles and our personal ambitions. We’re all dealing with a lot of setbacks and frustrations. … I hated the sales side of things. I just went out and did my thing every day. I’m not so much a big crowd person, but I do appreciate people individually.
You may say you’re not a big crowd person, but you’re about to perform before some big crowds come February, and you’ve already played some shows that drew thousands of people.
My first paid gig ever was 12,000 people [on Aug. 13] at Johnson Morris Farm [in Barco, N.C.], where Jamey Johnson showed up. That was my first time on the stage [other than] some open mics.
Many of your songs are topical. How do you educate yourself about issues?
It’s a mix of things. If there’s any kind of books, I probably was consuming Audible versions of them while I was in the truck driving around. In the last five years, I’ve listened to quite a bit of podcasts and YouTube videos. We’re a commodity to big companies, and all these companies spend all their time trying to manipulate their systems to be as addictive as possible, so when you get on Facebook, you’re gonna fall into this trance where you’re gonna scroll for like two hours. I’ve done it before myself. I’ve just tried to do everything I can do to not fall into that bubble, and instead try to spend my time educating myself.
Your first big interview was on Joe Rogan’s Spotify podcast. Are you a fan? Is that why you went on the show?
I guess I’d say I’m a Joe Rogan fan. I don’t watch every podcast episode. If I’m a fan of anything of Joe Rogan, it’s his style. He runs his whole podcast not around what’s culturally relevant, or what’s going to get the most views. He only talks to people he’s genuinely interested in. When you meet him in person, you’re seeing the guy that you watch online, there is no smoke and mirrors, versus a late-night TV guy. So that’s why I wanted to choose him first. I don’t agree with everything he has to say, of course. Nobody agrees with everything everybody says, but I like his style.
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Your first full album is coming next year. What can you reveal about it?
I don’t know if I can say who I’m recording with or not, but he’s one of the best in the business. In my opinion, it’s probably going to blow away everything else I’ve done so far, because everything has been recorded with just the internal microphone off of an about broken-in-half Android phone with a cracked screen. Even the radiowv videos used very basic equipment, so I had never had anything recorded with studio-quality equipment. So even just the vocal quality should absolutely knock people’s socks off, compared to what they’re used to hearing.
I want everything to still be authentic, and I want it to be me playing the music and not like a whole group of people involved. Everything now is just so carefully refined and edited and so we won’t have any of that. If anything, some of the songs are going to be recorded on older equipment from the ‘40s, ‘50s, ‘60s.
That ties into the concept of your name, Oliver Anthony Music, right?
I adopted the name because I didn’t want my real name associated with the music, because I’ve got a lot of songs about a lot of things that I wouldn’t necessarily want an employer to hear. In the very infancy stages of things, like a couple years ago, it was right after my grandpa passed away. He was the only other one in the family that’s 6’6” and redhead, and he’s like my second dad in a lot of ways. So, it’s an honor to him. But then the reason I stick Music on the end of the name is because it really is supposed to be a representation of music that would have existed in his era when he was alive, living up in the mountains. They had dirt floors, they were scrounging to survive, they didn’t have electricity. I’m trying to represent that type of music [and] maintain the simplicity that would have just been necessary at that time. It’s not going to sound like something that’s going to be on country radio, by any means.
Are you going to record in Nashville?
We’re actually going to be in a studio in Georgia. I’m never going to be in Nashville sitting with people co-writing, ever. Most anything I put out is going to be something I write just by myself and if I do co-write something with somebody, it’s going to be with another artist and we’re going to be singing the song together. I don’t ever want to sit in some writing circle somewhere and have somebody in khaki pants and a collared shirt figuring out what my words are from my song. There’s a million other people that can go do that. I’m not one of those guys.
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Is Jamey Johnson going to be on the album?
I don’t know if he will be or not. He just came to one of the shows. … I’ve had just so many artists reach out, kind of trying to — I don’t know if “protect” is the right word — but just kind of mentor me early on, because I kind of got into this so quick, they didn’t want me making wrong choices. He was just trying to be supportive, and come and introduce himself, and be somebody I can lean on for guidance.
John Rich also reached out and offered to work with you.
John Rich and I talked a little bit early on. I haven’t done anything with John Rich, we’ve just had a few casual phone conversations. See, this is kind of one of those gray areas where I don’t know if somebody wants me to mention their name or not in an interview, but I guess if I can make a statement about it at all, I would just say that there are a lot of really good people, not just in country music, that have been very supportive. We did the Blue Ridge Rock Festival and Louder Than Life, there were a lot of those rock bands that I met, they were super supportive and awesome. I’ve gotten to sing onstage with Shinedown and Papa Roach, and all those guys are just incredibly supportive. I’ve made contact with 20 or 30 different artists. A lot of them will reach out through Instagram.
You’ve said you believe that divine intervention has put you in this position. In the last few months, have you gotten any clarity on why this happened to you, and what God wants from you?
I mean, there’s no question that I don’t deserve any bit of any of this, so there’s no other explanation to be made of what happened the way it happened. There’s a gazillion, billion, trillion other people out there that are posting music that in my mind is better than mine. I’d had a decent online following before “Richmond” was ever written. I’d already started to have A&R people reach out from songs like “Doggonit” and “Ain’t Gotta Dollar.” I’d known for probably six months before “Rich Men North of Richmond” was even written or recorded that I’d probably end up full-time in music, but I would have never guessed it would have happened like this.
I think if there’s a message at all that needs to be spread, it’s probably that we just desperately need to connect on a personal level with each other. As a society, I think we rely too much on communicating with each other through the internet. The difference between talking in person and a text message is totally different — things get misunderstood and misrepresented, and when that’s done on such a large scale, like social media, and then there are things like bots and trolls, and probably the government influencing things and what gets said and what doesn’t get said, people form way too many opinions based off of internet-related content. Everyone’s looking at the top to fix a lot of what’s broken at the bottom, but we have to start at the bottom. It doesn’t matter who’s elected president, a lot of our problems are on the ground level.
You have been fearless when it comes to speaking truth to power, such as posting a video after the first Republican presidential debate declaring that those candidates are the very ones you’re singing about and distancing yourself from.
I don’t have anything against conservatives. I think there’s a big difference in today’s time between a conservative and a Republican. If you look at what conservative values are, by definition, I would say none of those candidates, maybe one of them, represents anything close to what a conservative is. When I knock those people, then the immediate attack that came back after me was like, “Oh, he’s against conservatives.” But most conservatives I know, at least in Virginia, would never vote for anybody that was up on that stage.
It’s funny, if I got any backlash at all from that statement, it was people misquoting me, trying to make it seem like I was against conservatives or somehow for, like, Joe Biden. What I’m against is corporate-owned politicians. The whole idea of us having a government and electing representatives is so they can represent us, because we obviously can’t all go to D.C. at one time and have our voice heard. And what’s happened is like, 90% of those quote-unquote “representatives” no longer represent us. They’re all bought out by whatever big corporation and they’re given stocks and given benefits, and they’re all filthy rich, and they do what they say, not what we say. It’s not a right or left issue. It’s more of a class versus corporate issue.
[Lunsford momentarily stops the interview, because a fan recognizes him at the DMV.]
You just got recognized. How are you adjusting to fame?
It’s been cool. I mean, everybody’s been super polite out in public and even at the shows everybody’s been very respectful. Everybody’s been just overwhelmingly well-behaved about everything.
There was a photo of you with Robert F. Kennedy Jr. and his wife, Cheryl Hines, on social media. Are you going to endorse him for president?
No, I was very clear, even when I talked to Bobby, that I don’t want any affiliation with him politically. Whether he becomes president or not, he’s very involved in this idea of a healing center, which is basically a way of combining regenerative agriculture and mental health together. We met specifically to talk about that project, because I’m looking to implement something very similar at my property. We were very clear upfront that there wasn’t any sort of political affiliation there with him. He’s been very respectful about that.
That’s kind of my long term ambition: getting people back in nature and teaching people how to grow their own food and raise animals and do all that stuff. We’ve become very disconnected from each other [and] we’ve also become very disconnected from nature. Everything’s fake and phony and plastic now, so getting away from that would really benefit, especially, our youth.
Yeah, as far as a candidate goes, I’m not really interested. I probably won’t vote for anybody. As a joke, I’ve made some Oliver Anthony 2024 signs, and I actually drive down the road and see quite a lot of them, which is pretty cool. But I’m not even old enough to run for president.
How do you even wrap your head around some of this? A year ago, you would not have been saying, “I said to Bobby,” referring to RFK Jr.
I’ve gotten open invitations from everybody, even the former president and all, and I’ve been careful about how I want to handle those because, I mean, if I wanted to go meet with Trump, no one should be upset about that. He was the president of the United States. Just historically, we’ve always respected anyone who was. People do just blow everything out of proportion.
You are the first person to debut at No. 1 on the Hot 100 chart without ever appearing on any other Billboard chart. Did that mean anything to you?
I think the most special thing about it being on the chart at all is that it made it to the chart without some big, corporate schmucky schmuck somewhere pumping a bunch of money into making it get there. It actually got to the top of the Billboard because people genuinely wanted to listen to it and support it. I think if people realized how much money record labels pumped into getting songs to become popular in the first place, they probably would never want to listen to the songs to start with. To just be a couple of dummies out in the woods with a laptop and a microphone and a guitar and [the song] ended getting there completely organically, that’s really saying something in and of itself. That’s what I proudest of.
There’s a lot of exciting things to come, but the most important part of all of it is just gonna be the opportunity to travel the world and connect with a lot of people. If there’s any mission statement out of any of this or any purpose, going back to your question before about what I’ve been called to do, I really hope if I accomplish anything out of my career in music, it’s just to give the voiceless a voice.
Out of the Woods tour dates
February 1 – Stockholm, SE – Cirkus
February 2 – Oslo, NO – Sentrum Scene
February 5 – Utrecht, NL – TivoliVredenburg
February 7 – Glasgow, UK – Barrowlands
February 8 – Manchester, UK – Albert Hall
February 10 – London, UK – O2 Shepherd’s Bush Empire
February 12 – Belfast, UK – Ulster Hall
February 13 – Dublin, IE – Vicar St.
February 21 – Nashville, TN – Ryman Auditorium
February 22 – Nashville, TN – Ryman Auditorium
February 29 – Plant City, FL – The Florida Strawberry Festival (on sale Dec 7 8AM ET)
March 2 – Jupiter, FL – Abacoa Amphitheater
March 3 – Estero, FL – Hertz Arena
March 8 – Alexandria, LA – Rapides Parish Coliseum
March 9 – Brandon, MS – The Brandon Amphitheater
March 16 – Queensland, AUS – CMC Rocks QLD 2024 (on sale now)
April 4 – Ft. Worth, TX – Billy Bob’s Texas
April 5 – Round Rock, TX – Round Rock Amp
April 6 – Lubbock, TX – Cook’s Garage
April 12 – Tupelo, MS – Cadence Bank Arena
April 13 – Jonesboro, AR – First National Bank Arena
April 19 – Albany, GA – Albany Civic Center
April 20 – Savannah, GA – Bulls, Bands & Barrels
April 26 – Greensboro, NC – Greensboro Coliseum Complex
April 27 – Duluth, GA – Gas South Arena
May 3 – Huntington, WV – Mountain Health Arena
May 4 – Beaver Dam, KY – Beaver Dam Amphitheater
May 10 – Corbin, KY – The Corbin Arena
May 11 – Pikeville, KY – Appalachian Wireless Arena
May 17 – Doswell, VA – Atlantic Union Bank at the SERVPRO Pavilion
June 14 – Marion, IL – MTN Dew Park
June 15 – Camdenton, MO – Ozarks Amphitheater
June 16 – Council Bluffs, IA – Westfair Amphitheater
June 22 – Canandaigua, NY – CMAC
June 28 – Pittsburgh, PA – Stage AE Outdoors
July 19 – Cullman, AL – Rock The South (on sale now)
August 16 – Lewisburg, WV – State Fair of West Virginia
August 21 – Put-In-Bay, OH – Bash on the Bay (on sale now)
August 23 – Indianapolis, IN – Everwise Amphitheater at White River State Park
August 24 – Saginaw, MI – Dow Event Center
September 1 – Palmer, AK – Alaska State Fair
September 13 – Allegan, MI – Allegan County Fair
K-pop giant JYP Entertainment has signed a multi-year global strategic pact with Live Nation to produce tours for all artists on JYP’s roster, it was announced Monday (Nov. 13). Under the deal, Live Nation will produce tours for established JYP artists including TWICE, Stray Kids, iTZY, Xdinary Heroes (XH) and NMIXX as well as emerging […]
It’s a cruel fall for Taylor Swift fans in Argentina … at least for the day. The pop superstar announced on Friday (Nov. 10), just hours ahead of her second show at the Estadio River Plate in Buenos Aires, Argentina, that the concert would be postponed.
“I love a rain show but I’m never going to endanger my fans or my fellow performers and crew,” Swift began her written message in an Instagram Stories post. “We’ve rescheduled tonight’s Buenos Aires show for Sunday due to the weather being so truly chaotic it would be unsafe to try and put on this concert. Good news is I get to stay in Argentina later!”
Though she had to delay her show, it wasn’t a bad day for the 12-time Grammy winner. Earlier on Friday, The Recording Academy announced the nominees for the 2024 awards, with Swift receiving six nods. Among the awards she’ll be competing for are record and song of the year (“Anti-Hero”), as well as album of the year (Midnights). She has not yet shared a reaction about her latest nominations. Besides the Grammys, Swift is also the lead finalist with 20 nods for the 2023 Billboard Music Awards, which will stream Nov. 19 on BBMAs.watch and via Billboard and the BBMAs’ social channels.
Swift kicked off the international leg of her Eras Tour a day earlier, on Thursday (Nov. 9). During the show — also held at the Estadio River Plate — she delivered her nightly two surprise songs. For her first show in Buenos Aires, the “Maroon” singer offered up “The Very First Night,” followed by “Labyrinth.”
It was the second song that had fans giddy. Video captured by concertgoers show the pop star smiling as she sang the chorus, which goes, “Uh oh, I’m falling in love/ Oh no, I’m falling in love again.” Swifties flooded X (formerly known as Twitter) with their reactions, convinced that the star was singing about new love interest Travis Kelce.
“MY GIRL IS SMITTEN,” tweeted one fan. “WHAT HAVE YOU DONE TRAVIS KELCE.”
“travis kelce tysm for your service,” added another Swiftie, who was one of many who credited the Kansas City Chiefs’ tight end for Swift’s performance of the Midnights deep cut.
Though fans may think Swift was singing about the NFL star, Kelce wasn’t in Buenos Aires to catch the performance. Instead, the football player was back in Kansas City, attending Chiefs quarterback Patrick Mahomes’ charity gala. But according to NBC News, Kelce is planning to see Swift perform in South America.
When Taylor Swift announced in June that she would be performing in Argentina for the first time ever as part of her Eras Tour, tickets to her three shows sold out within hours. Excitement has only grown since then, and finally, on Thursday, Nov. 9, the wait came to an end as 70,000 sang along during her first show, where she performed nearly 45 songs spanning her entire career.
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The show, the first of three at Buenos Aires’ Estadio Monumental (also known as Estadio River) and produced by DF Entertainment (the company owned by promoter Diego Finkelstein), featured Argentine artist Louta and Sabrina Carpenter as opening acts. It began precisely at 8:42 p.m., when Swift appeared on an elevated stage singing “Cruel Summer,” after “Miss Americana” played during the intro. Following the opening performance, she shouted, “Buenos Aires, bienvenidos a The Eras Tour!”
Here are some highlights of the night.
Six Months Camping
Thousands of fans waited impatiently for 3 p.m., the exact time when security was scheduled to open the gates to allow access to the field, the closest location to the main stage. Some Swifties camped outside the stadium for six months to be close to the front of the field, and the minute the gates opened, they sprinted the 100 meters to get the best standing room in the house.
Taylor Gets on Stage
Finally. Swift sets foot on the stage of Estadio Monumental singing “Cruel Summer.” The audience screams, and Taylor speaks to her happiness at being in Argentina for the first time. “Buenos Aires, bienvenidos to The Eras tour!” she shouted. “I am so very lucky because they very first time I decided to visit Argentina, you decided to sell out three shows […] They way you are dancing, the way you are singing, this is on another level.”
The Nerves of the Moment
Swift kicked off the fourth block of the show with “Champagne Problems,” a track she’s performed hundreds of times before. However, when time came to play it at the Monumental, the superstar lost her place at the piano. Far from making it a negative, she found humor in the situation. “This is what Argentines do,” she quipped.
Two-Minute Ovation
Weeks before, Swift’s fandom, via social media, had agreed to do different actions during her show, including lifting posters in certain songs, or reflecting the Argentine flag with their cellphones. Another planned moment was a two-minute ovation to thank Swift for performing in their country. At that point, Swift took out her in-ears and said, “I can’t believe it.”
Emotion Til the Very End
The show is a roller coaster of emotions. For example, Swift gave her hat to a little girl during “22,” and at one point, she stopped the show completely to listen to the crowd roar. But the end of the show will be memorable to all Argentine Swifties. Screams, applause, wristbands high and our country’s message to Taylor: “Argentina loves you. Come back soon.”
Several years ago, Miami-based Loud And Live CEO Nelson Albareda tried to book Brantley Gilbert for a country festival there — but, he says, Gilbert’s agent wouldn’t even pick up the phone. Though Albareda would grow to be a giant in the Latin touring community — he was named Billboard’s 2023 Latin Power Players executive of the year — at that time he was still building his company.
“I called my accounting team and said, ‘Wire $300,000 to William Morris and put Brantley Gilbert on it. And an agent called me and said, ‘Hey, why’d you wire me $300,000?’ and I said, ‘Exactly for this. We’re on the phone. I want to make a deal.’” And that’s how Loud And Live booked Gilbert for 2016’s one-day Tequila Bay Fest, which also featured Montgomery Gentry (in the duo’s last show before Troy Gentry’s death) and Kip Moore, among others.
But Albareda had much bigger plans on his mind. He was keenly aware that country music appealed to Latinos — a Country Music Assn. study showed that Hispanic country music listeners increased 25% between 2006 and 2016 — and that the Miami market was highly underserved by country music tours, which tended to stop in Palm Beach, Fla. — located 75 miles north — instead.
Flash forward seven years and Albarada is realizing the dream that started so many years ago with this weekend’s two-day Country Bay Music Festival. Kicking off Saturday (Nov. 11), the festival, held on the Miami Marina Stadium grounds in Key Biscayne, Fla. near downtown Miami, will feature headliners Sam Hunt and Thomas Rhett, as well as Lainey Wilson, Chris Young, Lee Brice, Elle King, Blanco Brown and BRELAND, among others. For some local flair, Miami-based Latin acts Alexandra Rodriguez and “Cuban Cowboy” Orlando Mendez are also on the bill, as well as country duo Neon Union, which includes Miami-born Leo Brooks.
This time, Nashville agents were all in. Albareda says he had a phone call with 60 agents to talk about the festival and that former agent Gilbert Paz, who now works for Albareda, visited Nashville at least three times over the last two years to meet with agents and managers.
One of those meetings was with The Core Entertainment, whose clients Nate Smith and Josh Ross are playing the festival. The company’s co-founder, “Chief” Zaruk, remembers meeting with reps from Live And Loud several months ago. “They came to [Nashville] with the purpose of saying, ‘Here’s our concept,’ and to explain to people what their vision was for this festival. They did it very smartly,” he says.
The idea of playing to a more diverse audience immediately appealed to Zaruk. “The Latin scene is massive, so if there’s an audience there that we can tap into that also loves country, we’re excited about the opportunity to get into a new fan base,” he says. “It’s only going to help country music and it’s only going to help personally our artists and we’re really excited to see the reaction.”
Fans can attend the festival via land and sea. The Miami Marine Stadium grounds hold around 25,000 people, but eventgoers can also enjoy it from their own boats with the purchase of a BYOBoat pass. “One of the things we want to do is capitalize on what Miami is all about,” Albareda says. “The venue and the way that it’s laid out has a whole view of downtown Miami. Miami Marine Stadium was originally built as a stadium for boat races, so the stadium faces an entire marine basin. Through the years it’s become an iconic place to anchor your boat. What we’ve done for the first time is secured the permits to close the basin and issued permits for you to bring your boat.”
Albareda adds that the festival’s more than 100 boat permits have sold out, with prices based on how many feet the boat measures. Tickets for landlubbers are scaled from as low as around $144 for a one-day pass to two-day platinum VIP tickets priced at more than $1,000.
Sponsorship dollars are also rolling in, with Zelle serving as the primary partner. “We are 300% above what our original budget was,” Albareda says.
To build awareness for the festival, which Loud and Live is presenting in conjunction with its South Florida-focused live events division, EngageLive!, the promoter held a series of pre-parties at the VIVO! Dolphin Mall featuring free concerts by such acts as Frank Ray and Austin Snell and is slated to hold a kick-off party on Friday night (Nov. 10).
Albareda sees tremendous similarities between the Latin and country genres, including the loyalty of the fans to the artists, the tight-knit industry, the emphasis on family and songs that rely on storytelling. “When you look at country music, it’s all about the story, when you look at Latin music it’s about the story. They’re about ‘I’m in love’ or ‘I’m gonna have a tequila’ or ‘I’m gonna have a beer.’ Those cultural relevances are very similar between Latin and country so that is something that has really attracted me.”
Therefore, Albareda views Country Bay Music Festival as more than a one-off event. “I believe that Loud And Live is not only invested in Country Bay, but in figuring out how do we continue to grow within the country genre,” Albareda says, adding that the company is looking at promoting individual country shows within Miami beyond the festival and then building from there to other cities.
Country Bay’s biggest local competition comes from the three-day Tortuga Music Festival, held every spring in neighboring Ft. Lauderdale, Fla. (this year’s edition, which occurred in April, featured Shania Twain, Kenny Chesney and Eric Church, among others). But Albareda sees the two events as more complementary than competitive.
“The festivals are far enough apart and we wanted to differentiate with our diversity. Miami is a diverse city, we wanted a diverse line-up,” Albareda says. “The idea was to [be] reflective of what’s happening overall with music and even with country. Also, if you’re going to have it in Miami, you should reflect the diversity of a market like Miami.”
While it’s too early to know for sure how successful Country Bay will be financially, Albareda is bullish on country music’s overall future in Miami. “We expect hopefully to make money and, if not, to break even,” he says. “Whether it will be profitable or not, we have a multi-year internal commitment to build the festival. We are already picking talent for next year.”
Jared Leto is reaching new heights — literally. To announce his band Thirty Seconds to Mars‘ upcoming global tour, the 51-year-old singer-actor scaled one of the most iconic buildings in the world, New York City’s Empire State Building.
Leto took on the challenge with nothing but an orange jumpsuit and ropes, as seen in footage taken by helicopter circling the landmark. The artist specifically climbed up the narrow base underneath the tower’s antenna, the top of which clears 1,454 feet.
“I’ve had a fascination with the Empire State Building, the ‘world’s number one attraction,’ since I was a kid,” wrote the Suicide Squad star on Instagram, sharing a video of his otherworldly feat. “Not sure if it was Guinness world records, King Kong, but something about this iconic structure always captured my imagination. Built in just 13 short months, in one of the greatest cities in the world it has always been a powerful symbol to me of all the possibilities in life.”
The Thirty Seconds to Mars’ 2024 Seasons World Tour kicks off March 15 in Latin America with festival performances at Lollapalooza Chile, Argentina and Brazil. The trek will support the band’s September album It’s The End of the World But It’s a Beautiful Day, which bowed at No. 76 on the Billboard 200.
“In a lot of ways, this album is about following your dreams and pushing yourself to do the seemingly impossible,” Leto continued in his post. “Climbing the Empire State Building certainly falls into that category for me. As does touring the world with my brother and sharing these unforgettable concerts and experiences with you all.”
The House of Gucci actor also shared a video of himself and his bandmate/brother, Shannon Leto, performing their song “Seasons” at the top of the Empire State Building, the concrete jungle’s landscape sprawling below them.
Pre-sale tickets for the North America shows go on sale Friday (Nov. 10) at 10 a.m. local time on the band’s website. General on sale kicks of Nov. 17 at 10 a.m. local time.
Watch Leto climb the Empire State Building below, and scroll through his post for tour dates:
The owner of one of the country’s most recognizable independent venue companies has agreed to accept a petition on behalf of its bartenders, ID checkers, ticket collectors and floor staff to unionize.
Dayne Frank, president and CEO of First Avenue Productions which owns the famed First Avenue venue and operates six other venue locations in the Twin Cities area, was presented with petition from more than 200 employees earlier this month asking the company to recognize efforts to unionize as part of UNITE HERE Local 17, Minnesota’s hospitality workers’ union. UNITE HERE has about 300,000 members nationwide and is a member of the American Federation of Labor and Congress of Industrial Organizations.
“We recognize that our employees are a key to our success,” Frank said in a statement sent to Billboard, “and it is why we have continually worked to provide them competitive pay, health insurance for anyone working more than 25 hours per week, 401k matching contributions, and more. So when bartenders, service, and event staff expressed their desire to form a union, there was only one answer, which is why we will voluntarily recognize the union, and are committed to bargaining in good faith.”
Employees at First Avenue Productions, which include staff from 7th Street Entry, the Fitzgerald Theater, the Palace Theatre, the Turf Club, Fine Line and the Depot Tavern, began organizing earlier this year through the city’s Restaurant Opportunities Center as part of an effort to address staff disagreements over pay, scheduling and training.
On Nov. 2, more than 70% of the company’s employees voted in favor of moving forward with unionization through UNITE HERE. Frank is expected to begin contact negotiations with UNITE Here in the coming weeks.
“Bargaining in good faith will require everyone to look at the challenges we face as a whole, and how we can strengthen our workplace, incorporate more perspectives, and ultimately move forward together,” Frank said. “While this might be difficult, and will inevitably result in change, I am committed to working together to address those challenges.”
Frank is also a founding board member of the National Independent Venue Association and as the group’s former president led successful efforts to petition the federal government for billions of dollars in relief aid for thousands independent venues facing closure due to COVID-19, including those managed by First Avenue Productions which received more than $17 million from the Shuttered Venue Operator Grant program. The federal aid program is widely credited with preventing the collapse of the independent venue industry.
Sphere, the stunning venue that has transformed the Las Vegas skyline and redefined the concert-going experience, generated $4.1 million from U2’s first two concerts in September, its owner, Sphere Entertainment Co., reported in its quarterly earnings release on Wednesday (Nov. 8).
The $2.3 billion Sphere is a 366-foot tall, 516-foot wide spherical venue with a wrap-around video screen that envelopes a seated audience of 17,600. Sphere’s external skin — called Exosphere — is covered in 580,000 square feet of programmable LED exterior lights that advertises the venue’s technological capabilities.
Sphere also made $2.6 million in additional revenue, primarily from advertising on the Exosphere that began in September.
With only two concerts under its belt through the end of September, Sphere’s earnings release was about the venue’s potential, not its revenue to date. “Our journey with Sphere is just beginning,” said executive chairman/CEO James Dolan during Wednesday’s earnings call. “And while it will take some time for Sphere to realize its full potential, we’re off to a great start.”
U2’s original 25-show residency has been extended by an additional 11 shows that will occur in January and February 2024. The company expects to host two additional residencies in the second half of the fiscal year that ends June 30, 2024, according to Dolan. “We’re having conversations with artists across a wide variety of genres, including discussing runs of varying lengths,” he said.
Sphere had an adjusted operating loss of $83.1 million in the quarter, an increase of $19 million from the prior-year period. It also had $2.8 million of venue operating expenses in the quarter and $2.2 million of event-related expenses. An additional $2.1 million in advertising costs were related to the Oct. 6 launch of The Sphere Experience featuring the film Postcard from Earth by Darren Aronofsky. Selling, general and administrative expenses amounted to $84.2 million.
The Las Vegas venue is the first of what Sphere Entertainment expects to be multiple Sphere venues. Dolan was light on specifics but said there is “a great deal of interest and substantive discussions” in several additional markets. “I will say that it does look like Sphere will be a global brand,” he said, “and so we should expect the expansion globally rather than just in the U.S.”
Sphere Entertainment had total revenue of $118 million in its fiscal first quarter ended September 30, down 4% from the prior-year period. MSG Networks contributed $110.2 million of revenue, down 10% year over year. MSG Networks, which operates two regional sports networks, joined Sphere following a spin-off of MSG Entertainment in April. That same month, Sphere reached an agreement to sell its stake in Tao Group Hospitality to global luxury lifestyle company Mohari Hospitality for about $300 million.
Shares of Sphere Entertainment fell as much as 8.4% to $30.58 on Wednesday morning before recovering to $31.90, down 4.4%, by mid-afternoon. The stock price took a bigger hit on Monday, however, dropping 9.6% following the company’s announcement late on Friday that CFO Gautam Ranji had left the company. Dolan attributed Ranji’s departure to Sphere being a new type of business. “It’s pretty challenging,” he said. “I think we both came to the conclusion that it probably wasn’t a great fit.”
Financial metrics for the first fiscal quarter:
Total revenue of $118 million, down 4% year over year.
Adjusted operating loss of $57.9 million, up 88% year over year.
Net income of $66.4 million, up from a $44 million net loss in the prior-year period.
Sphere revenue of $7.8 million.
Sphere event-related revenue of $4.1 million.
MSG Networks revenue of $110.2 million, down 10% year over year.
Dreamliner Luxury Coaches has acquired Hemphill Brothers Coach Company, combining the two private bus and coach tour operators into the largest provider of entertainer busses in the world.
Formed just three years ago, the Nashville-based Dreamliner now boasts a fleet of 190 high-end luxury coaches, servicing approximately 50% of North American arena and stadium touring market, CEO Jeremy Maul estimates. The high-end bus company specializes in leasing and servicing artist and headliner buses with a client list that includes Beyoncé, Justin Timberlake, Drake, Jonas Brothers, Chris Stapleton, Olivia Rodrigo, Zach Bryan and more.
Hemphill Brothers was launched in 1980 by Joey and Trent Hemphill, Tennessee-based brothers who toured in the family Gospel band and eventually bought out their father’s two-bus leasing company. In 1995, Hemphill Brothers opened their current 55,000 square foot office complex and shop facility on 15 acres of land near Nashville.
Dreamliner was founded in late 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic by businessman Rich Thomson, managing partner at Caprice Capital Partners and Jeremy Maul, Thomson saw the revival of the touring business as potential investment opportunity for his LA based private investment firm focused mainly on small cap companies with at least $2 million in EBITDA.
The bet on Dreamliner was fairly simple – while the pandemic had completely devastated the touring and concert business, the industry was expected to come back strong in mid-to-late 2021, as evidenced by ticket purchases during the pandemic and pent-up demand. Artists returning to the road would encounter a shortage of high-end luxury buses due to a pivot in the transportation industry away from concert touring.
The tour bus shortage, coupled with the explosion in demand, caused the leasing price for tour buses to nearly double overnight and created a backlog of demand for the industry, Maul explained.
Dreamliner’s first tour was the Jonas Brothers’ August 2021 tour. In June 2022, Dreamliner purchased Diamond Coach leasing from founder Kyle Ervin, growing the company’s fleet from 12 buses to 75 buses while establishing the company’s headquarters in Nashville.
Maul told Billboard that the Hemphill purchase took approximately one year to finalize. The combined business is expected to generate $100 million in business in 2024 from a fleet of 190 coaches, Maul said.
That puts Dreamliner ahead of Encore Luxury Coach, which briefly held the title of largest entertainment coach leasing company in North America following its acquisition of Nitetrain in September.
“As we further our goal of redefining the art of tour travel, we will leverage the strengths and experience at the heart of both Dreamliner and Hemphill to become the industry’s largest and most sought-after resource for high-end tour coaches,” Maul said in a recent press release.