Latest / The Bob Lefsetz Podcast / Jim Koplik

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Jim Koplik · The Bob Lefsetz Podcast

• 0:02
  Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets podcast.
• 0:06
  Speaker 1: My guest today is concert promoter Jim Koplik. Jim, you
• 0:11
  Speaker 1: promoted Watkins Glenn. What were you thinking there?
• 0:15
  Speaker 2: No, I wasn't really thinking otherwise they would not have
• 0:17
  Speaker 2: done it, to tell you the truth, but we were
• 0:20
  Speaker 2: thinking of a nice little concert up in Watkins Glen,
• 0:24
  Speaker 2: New York, a day in the country, get all the
• 0:26
  Speaker 2: people out of New York City and spend a day
• 0:29
  Speaker 2: up in July twenty eighth and beautiful Watkins Glen, New York.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: Put only three acts on the show. The band The
• 0:36
  Speaker 2: Grateful Dead, the Almond Brothers thought we draw a hundred
• 0:39
  Speaker 2: thousand people, and little did we know what we created.
• 0:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, I was actually there, and I remember the night
• 0:47
  Speaker 1: before the Grateful Dead did a sound check and we
• 0:52
  Speaker 1: listened to it for hours. We came out and they said,
• 0:55
  Speaker 1: it's a free concert. Now, when did you decide that
• 0:58
  Speaker 1: it was going to be freed? Weren't going to worry
• 1:00
  Speaker 1: about tickets?
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: Well, when you're right, we decided on Friday, when so
• 1:07
  Speaker 2: many people were coming up to the show, we couldn't
• 1:09
  Speaker 2: hold the gates. We were hoping to sell fifty thousand
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: tickets at the door. We sold one hundred and fifty
• 1:14
  Speaker 2: thousand tickets in advance, but we brought up fifty thousand
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: ticket tron tickets. We have a ticket tron yep, yep,
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: and we got I got my ticket. Oh good, I'm
• 1:25
  Speaker 2: glad you paid. Thank you right, all of ten dollars
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: with no service charge. I the guests back in that day,
• 1:32
  Speaker 2: but we realized that we were unable to collect tickets.
• 1:36
  Speaker 2: And as soon as we were realized we were unable
• 1:39
  Speaker 2: to collect tickets, we decided we should just open the gates.
• 1:42
  Speaker 2: We're not going to make any more money by selling tickets.
• 1:44
  Speaker 2: We thought the process would be a lot easier if
• 1:47
  Speaker 2: people were able to just walk in rather than try
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: to collect tickets from everybody.
• 1:52
  Speaker 1: So the Woodstock legendarily lost money. Did you make money
• 1:58
  Speaker 1: or lose money?
• 2:00
  Speaker 2: We made a half a million dollars?
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: Okay? And how come you never did it again?
• 2:07
  Speaker 2: Well, we tried to do it in nineteen seventy four
• 2:13
  Speaker 2: out at Ontario Motor Speedway and we had Crosby Stills
• 2:17
  Speaker 2: in Nash and Young Beach Boys, Jesse Colin, Young Joe
• 2:22
  Speaker 2: Walsh and somebody else. We had five acts on the show,
• 2:27
  Speaker 2: and I get a call from Brugby and we put
• 2:31
  Speaker 2: tickets on sale. It was going to be in August.
• 2:33
  Speaker 2: Being a Connecticut boy, I had no idea how dumb
• 2:37
  Speaker 2: I was trying to do a summer show in Ontario, California,
• 2:42
  Speaker 2: not realizing it's really part of the desert. Didn't realize
• 2:46
  Speaker 2: how hot it was going to be. And I went
• 2:48
  Speaker 2: out to k LOS and spoke to the program director
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: and said, what am I doing wrong. It's a great show,
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: It's CSNY, it's everything that's Southern California, Joe Walsh, beach Boy, Jesse,
• 3:00
  Speaker 2: Colm Young CSNY. I thought I'd put the perfect package
• 3:04
  Speaker 2: together for Southern California, not realizing that in August people
• 3:08
  Speaker 2: don't want to watch the show all day in the desert.
• 3:11
  Speaker 2: And that's what the program director of KOs told me.
• 3:16
  Speaker 2: So I came back to Connecticut and I spoke to
• 3:19
  Speaker 2: my partner Shelley. I said, we're fucked. We can't sell tickets.
• 3:23
  Speaker 2: There's no way to change the weather. And I got
• 3:26
  Speaker 2: lucky Neil Young at that time, it's married to Carry Snodgrass,
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: the actress. She lived in England. He flew over to
• 3:35
  Speaker 2: England and I get a call from John Podell, who
• 3:40
  Speaker 2: is the agent, and Johnny says to me, while we
• 3:43
  Speaker 2: only have three of the ford, Neil's not coming back,
• 3:46
  Speaker 2: so we're going to take one quarter of the guarantee
• 3:49
  Speaker 2: you off. The guarantee was two hundred thousand dollars. We're
• 3:52
  Speaker 2: gonna take one quarter off and we're gonna charge you
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: only one hundred and fifty grand and you'll get crosty
• 3:58
  Speaker 2: stills in Nash. I had two thoughts on my mind.
• 4:01
  Speaker 2: First was always how the hell do I get out
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: of this show because I'm going to lose a fortune.
• 4:06
  Speaker 2: But the second thought that came to my mind is
• 4:08
  Speaker 2: Neil Young is more than twenty five percent of CSNY.
• 4:12
  Speaker 2: But I said to Johnny, sorry, that doesn't work. I'm
• 4:15
  Speaker 2: not doing it well. The other boys thinking again, fifty
• 4:17
  Speaker 2: k apiece I can't budge. So I canceled the show
• 4:21
  Speaker 2: on them, and I sued them. I proceeded to sue them,
• 4:27
  Speaker 2: and we hired John Branket at the time to sue
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: him because we knew he was a big time attorney
• 4:32
  Speaker 2: out in la and thankfully Steven Still's manager thought we
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: were right, and in turn he created a settlement where
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: we only we got one hundred and fifty grand. That's
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: what we sued him for two hundred grand. We got
• 4:45
  Speaker 2: one hundred and fifty grand. Neil wouldn't pay, even though
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: it was his fault. He wouldn't pay, and we settled
• 4:52
  Speaker 2: for one hundred and fifty grand. Canceled the show. So
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: I did try a second time after Watkins. Then I
• 4:59
  Speaker 2: did try third time. I also failed at that. We
• 5:02
  Speaker 2: had led Zeppelin.
• 5:04
  Speaker 1: But before you get to that, before you get to
• 5:06
  Speaker 1: the third time, because not everybody is ultra sophisticated. You
• 5:11
  Speaker 1: booked the show, you know, it's usually uh, pay or play.
• 5:17
  Speaker 1: So what happened to the other acts?
• 5:20
  Speaker 2: Oh, we paid them. We paid fifty percent depositive. We
• 5:23
  Speaker 2: paid the other acts. But back in those days, the
• 5:25
  Speaker 2: guarantees are really small. I mean the headline is Csnway
• 5:29
  Speaker 2: got two hundred grand. They ever got to back together.
• 5:32
  Speaker 2: They get five million for the night. So when you're
• 5:36
  Speaker 2: talking about the Beach Boys, they were getting fifty thousand dollars.
• 5:39
  Speaker 2: Chllye and I put out of our pocket another total
• 5:42
  Speaker 2: of fifty thousand dollars to buy out of the other acts.
• 5:46
  Speaker 1: Okay, so tell us about third time.
• 5:49
  Speaker 2: Third time was led Zeppelin and Bachman Turner Overdrive. We're
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: gonna put them in the West Palm Beach Raceway Again.
• 5:58
  Speaker 2: I was dumb, which I've proven over and over again.
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: It seems right at the beginning of this, I can't
• 6:03
  Speaker 2: imagine how the next few hours is going to go.
• 6:05
  Speaker 2: And we put the show on sale. It was in
• 6:09
  Speaker 2: Florida in the summer again, and tickets weren't selling. And
• 6:15
  Speaker 2: we were partners with Concerts East. Phil Basil of Conscience
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: East Fame, who is a mafia guy, didn't know it
• 6:22
  Speaker 2: at the time, but he said, we need feet on
• 6:25
  Speaker 2: the ground down there. I wasn't going down to West
• 6:27
  Speaker 2: Palm Beach for two months. I said, how do we
• 6:30
  Speaker 2: find somebody to go down to West Palm Beach And
• 6:33
  Speaker 2: he goes, I know a guy in New Orleans I
• 6:34
  Speaker 2: could kidnap. I said, you kidnap people. He goes, yeah,
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: it's part of my plan. I kidnapped people. So he
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: knows his fellow named Louis, and he goes down to
• 6:45
  Speaker 2: New Orleans and arranges for this guy named Louis Messina
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: to be kidnapped and literally driven in a car down
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: to West Palm Beach and told you better stay here.
• 6:56
  Speaker 2: Run this show. And I'm sure if you speak to
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: Louis at some point, I remember being kidnapped and brought
• 7:01
  Speaker 2: down to West Bond Beach. I like to tell Louis
• 7:03
  Speaker 2: I gave him his first job. I forced it on him,
• 7:06
  Speaker 2: but I gave him his first job. Tickets still weren't selling.
• 7:09
  Speaker 2: It's good at promoter. As Louis has become, he wasn't
• 7:12
  Speaker 2: good enough to change the weather again. I paid one
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: hundred thousand dollars to led Zeppelin to get out of
• 7:18
  Speaker 2: the show, and I ended up canceling that show too.
• 7:21
  Speaker 2: I gave up after that. I thought, two out of
• 7:24
  Speaker 2: three strikes, I'm not doing a third strike. I knew
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: it was good one time. I guess I got lucky
• 7:29
  Speaker 2: because I tried the festl business in seventy four and
• 7:32
  Speaker 2: again in seventy five, and you know what, I realized,
• 7:35
  Speaker 2: you can't be a festival promoter and a concert promoter.
• 7:38
  Speaker 2: It's two different gigs. So I stayed being a concert promoter.
• 7:42
  Speaker 1: And why are they two different gigs?
• 7:45
  Speaker 2: Because the festival is an all time job. It's an
• 7:48
  Speaker 2: old day job, all twenty four hours. You can't start
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: speaking at different ages about different shows. The amount of
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: work of putting it together operationally is way too much
• 7:57
  Speaker 2: and keeping an eye on it. Vessel that's going to
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: draw two hundred thousand people versus a concert back in
• 8:03
  Speaker 2: nineteen seventy four that might draw ten thousand people, which
• 8:08
  Speaker 2: was a job that I thought I could handle both.
• 8:11
  Speaker 2: But I couldn't handle both. There's not enough time in
• 8:13
  Speaker 2: the day to handle both. And I had a pretty
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: good concert business going, so I decided to drop the
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: idea of doing festivals going forward.
• 8:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, led Uppelin manager was Peter Grant, and he could
• 8:27
  Speaker 1: be intimidating, violent whatever what were your experiences with him?
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: I sent my mafia guy, Filled Basile after him. I
• 8:37
  Speaker 2: didn't I was smart enough to do that because I
• 8:39
  Speaker 2: know he picked me up and slammed, dunkd me on
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: the floor and give me a body drop. I was
• 8:44
  Speaker 2: afraid of Peter Grant, that's for sure. So I Filled
• 8:47
  Speaker 2: Basile handle it, and he handled it quite well. I
• 8:49
  Speaker 2: guess he scared Peter Grant, one of the few people
• 8:51
  Speaker 2: that could scare Peter Grant.
• 8:54
  Speaker 1: Let's go to today. There's this news about blue dot fever.
• 9:00
  Speaker 1: What is demand in general in the concert business today?
• 9:03
  Speaker 1: How's business?
• 9:05
  Speaker 2: I think business is good, you know. I find that
• 9:08
  Speaker 2: we don't get affected by a bad economy as much
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: as other businesses do. People still want to go out,
• 9:13
  Speaker 2: get tribal, have a good time. Blue dot fever is
• 9:17
  Speaker 2: a figment of what I consider the Internet. There's been
• 9:21
  Speaker 2: blue dot fever a whole career. It's just when ticket
• 9:24
  Speaker 2: mas to change the manner in which they sell tickets,
• 9:26
  Speaker 2: it changed how people look at it. Most shows have
• 9:29
  Speaker 2: empty seats, and I think this is just something that
• 9:33
  Speaker 2: is gaining traction today that has no real meaning to it.
• 9:37
  Speaker 2: I really believe that if you go to real strong shows,
• 9:40
  Speaker 2: there'll be empty seats. They're all They're very rarely you
• 9:44
  Speaker 2: get Olivia Rodrigo that sells out the day you put
• 9:47
  Speaker 2: shows on sale. There are now three hundred shows on
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: sale at one time instead of thirty shows on sale
• 9:52
  Speaker 2: at one time. It's a much broader business, so much
• 9:55
  Speaker 2: busier market. It's tougher to sell shows out these days.
• 9:59
  Speaker 2: But just because is blue dots in the seating chart
• 10:02
  Speaker 2: doesn't necessarily mean it's an unsuccessful event. It just means
• 10:06
  Speaker 2: there are seats available.
• 10:08
  Speaker 1: Okay, from the other side of the fence sitting in
• 10:12
  Speaker 1: the audience. It seemed you know, I just remember the
• 10:15
  Speaker 1: late sixties and seventies, it seemed like it was hard
• 10:18
  Speaker 1: to get a ticket. Were there seats available at those
• 10:22
  Speaker 1: shows too? Were the prices lower? It was the market
• 10:25
  Speaker 1: different that those dates went clean to a greater percentage
• 10:29
  Speaker 1: than today's.
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: I think it's a combination of two things. I think
• 10:33
  Speaker 2: you're right on the first thing. I think there are
• 10:38
  Speaker 2: more shows that sold out in the old days. But
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: I think it's because the ticket price is number one,
• 10:42
  Speaker 2: as you just mentioned, but also the choices are much greater.
• 10:46
  Speaker 2: I mean, you could have ten shows on sale that
• 10:48
  Speaker 2: appeal to you. You're not going to buy ten shows
• 10:50
  Speaker 2: in the older days. If I did seventy five shows
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: in Connecticut over a year, that was a big year.
• 10:56
  Speaker 2: I have one hundred and fifty shows on sale in
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: Connecticut right now. I do about two hundred and fifty
• 11:02
  Speaker 2: shows in Connecticut every year. It's a much busier market,
• 11:05
  Speaker 2: much more competitive market, and the ticket prices are much higher.
• 11:09
  Speaker 2: People are's definitely much more choosy on what shows they
• 11:12
  Speaker 2: go to.
• 11:13
  Speaker 1: Okay, we know that once we came out of COVID,
• 11:17
  Speaker 1: demand was super strong. I'm talking about general. Let's not
• 11:20
  Speaker 1: get into the specific blue dots whatever, blah blah blah.
• 11:24
  Speaker 1: Has that demand sustained or has it fallen off.
• 11:27
  Speaker 2: A little bit? I think it's fallen off a little bit.
• 11:31
  Speaker 2: I definitely see it being more difficult today than it was. Okay.
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: I've always considered one of the great successes of our
• 11:39
  Speaker 2: business is a tribal mentality everybody. I went to Bruce
• 11:42
  Speaker 2: Springsteen Saurday night at Madis Square Garden. I sat in
• 11:45
  Speaker 2: the audience the whole show, and it was a community experience,
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: a tribal experience, something that I felt so strongly. It
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: felt so comfortable with with people, all of us singing
• 11:58
  Speaker 2: the same words to the same song along with the
• 12:00
  Speaker 2: lead singer. I think coming out of COVID, we needed that.
• 12:04
  Speaker 2: We were alone for two years essentially, and I think
• 12:08
  Speaker 2: that's worn off. So I think we're back to regular
• 12:11
  Speaker 2: business again.
• 12:13
  Speaker 1: Okay. There have been some changes in the marketplace a
• 12:17
  Speaker 1: number of years. You came up in the days as
• 12:20
  Speaker 1: I did, were acts started small and grew. Now you
• 12:26
  Speaker 1: have these acts that can do arenas. I remember c
• 12:28
  Speaker 1: Smith opened in Arenas. As you go down the marketplace
• 12:33
  Speaker 1: with venues that hold somewhere between two hundred to one
• 12:37
  Speaker 1: thousand to fifteen hundred to three thousand. Is demand still
• 12:41
  Speaker 1: the same or do people just want to see the superstars.
• 12:46
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's a question of demand. I think
• 12:49
  Speaker 2: it's more a question of cultural habits these days. I
• 12:53
  Speaker 2: am working on a project and Bridgeport right now where
• 12:57
  Speaker 2: we're going to put a three thousand seat club, a
• 13:01
  Speaker 2: thousand sea club and a comedy club in the arena
• 13:07
  Speaker 2: that's in Bridgeport that's closing up and we're going to
• 13:09
  Speaker 2: try to take it over. And I wouldn't do anything
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: under one thousand seats in a club anymore. I think
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: that if the act isn't popular enough to draw a
• 13:18
  Speaker 2: thousand people, people will stay home. They'll watch what they
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: do on YouTube, they'll watch what they do on TikTok
• 13:27
  Speaker 2: or wherever. I don't think clubs have the same appeal
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: and alcohol doesn't have the same appeal. And part of
• 13:32
  Speaker 2: going to a club and seeing a new band was
• 13:34
  Speaker 2: having a couple of drinks and getting a slight buzz
• 13:38
  Speaker 2: enjoying some new music. I think culturally that's completely changed.
• 13:42
  Speaker 2: I would never invest in a club under a thousand seats.
• 13:46
  Speaker 2: I don't think the popularity the artist is great enough
• 13:49
  Speaker 2: and the demand is great enough to make them leave
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: their house anymore and go see a club that's under
• 13:55
  Speaker 2: that size.
• 13:57
  Speaker 1: Okay, And if I was speaking to developing acts, what
• 14:02
  Speaker 1: would you tell me to do to get to the
• 14:05
  Speaker 1: point where I could sell a thousand tickets.
• 14:08
  Speaker 2: Be an opening act on a big show. I think
• 14:11
  Speaker 2: that's the answer. Appeal appear in front of in front
• 14:14
  Speaker 2: of as many people as possible. You clearly can do
• 14:17
  Speaker 2: that with TikTok and YouTube. It's broad. Club business is
• 14:22
  Speaker 2: not broad, but the arena business is broad. So I
• 14:26
  Speaker 2: would sell the artists, and we've seen it happen. Riley Green,
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: Whiskey Myers are a lot of good new artists that
• 14:33
  Speaker 2: came up as opening acts, but they came up as
• 14:35
  Speaker 2: opening acts on big shows, not in clubs anymore. I
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: missed the old days on that. It was fun building
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: the Jay Guiles band out of Boston, Massachusetts that come
• 14:45
  Speaker 2: down and they would play, you know, our clubs in Connecticut,
• 14:49
  Speaker 2: and they broke because they were great live artists, just
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: the old days. And I tried to put I always
• 14:55
  Speaker 2: say to Michael Rappino, I have one foot in the
• 14:56
  Speaker 2: twentieth century, but the other foots in the twenty first century.
• 15:00
  Speaker 1: Okay, when I was growing up in Connecticut and Fairfield,
• 15:03
  Speaker 1: which is just the other side of Bridgeport towards New York,
• 15:07
  Speaker 1: we would go to New York for shows. There was
• 15:10
  Speaker 1: nothing in Bridgeport. There was Wolsey Hall in the New
• 15:14
  Speaker 1: Haven Arena, which doesn't exist anymore in New Haven, and
• 15:18
  Speaker 1: there was the Bushnell in Hartford, and in the summer
• 15:21
  Speaker 1: there was Oakdale. Okay, but most of the market was
• 15:26
  Speaker 1: really New York. What's the status of the Connecticut market today.
• 15:32
  Speaker 2: Well, that's a great question. Because I grew up in Westchester,
• 15:35
  Speaker 2: I grew up in New Rochelle, and I live in
• 15:36
  Speaker 2: Stanford now. So I lived the life you led back then.
• 15:40
  Speaker 2: And I went to the Garden to see Bruce Springstey,
• 15:42
  Speaker 2: and I don't go to Connecticut Sea Conference. I still
• 15:44
  Speaker 2: go to New York. I go to the Beacon, I
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: go to the Garden, and I go to shows in
• 15:50
  Speaker 2: New York because I'm the same way. I'm a New Yorker.
• 15:52
  Speaker 2: I watched Channel four. I don't watch NBC. At a Hartcer,
• 15:56
  Speaker 2: I watched Channel four, so I'm in New York. I
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: read the New York Times. I don't read the Heart
• 15:59
  Speaker 2: of current. I'm a New Yorker and so I feel
• 16:02
  Speaker 2: the same way you do. But we did change the
• 16:04
  Speaker 2: dynamic a bit with Bridgeport because people from Stanford will
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: go to Bridgeport and we open up the Amphitheater on Bridgeport,
• 16:11
  Speaker 2: which hopefully when you come back east, he'll come to
• 16:14
  Speaker 2: and you'll see what it is, and the club will
• 16:18
  Speaker 2: be in Bridgeport. But once you get above Bridgeport, you're
• 16:22
  Speaker 2: really in Connecticut. But when Bridgeport, Fairfield down, you're really
• 16:25
  Speaker 2: in New Yorker. And we recognized that we still can't
• 16:28
  Speaker 2: draw up people out of west Chester County to go
• 16:31
  Speaker 2: to Bridgeport. They can still go to New York and
• 16:33
  Speaker 2: I find that pretty amazing. It's thirty minutes to Bridgeport,
• 16:37
  Speaker 2: it's an hour into the city. They still go to
• 16:40
  Speaker 2: the city. I can't change that habit.
• 16:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, Bridgeport, it was a depressed city for decades and decades.
• 16:49
  Speaker 1: They say, my father always say it's coming back. Now
• 16:52
  Speaker 1: they say it's coming back a little bit. But there
• 16:54
  Speaker 1: were the Bluefish, the minor league team that went out
• 16:57
  Speaker 1: there was High Liyon Milford, which is the other side
• 17:00
  Speaker 1: at a Bridgeport that went out. You're talking about the
• 17:03
  Speaker 1: arena went out, was this mismanagement or what is the
• 17:06
  Speaker 1: market really like there.
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: The reason the arena in Bridgeport went out is because
• 17:11
  Speaker 2: of the Mohegan Sun Arena. We Egan Sun Arena has
• 17:15
  Speaker 2: seventy five to eighty concerts a year and they have
• 17:18
  Speaker 2: the casino money. They have the best untilry income you
• 17:21
  Speaker 2: could come up with. Not only do they have what
• 17:22
  Speaker 2: we have, food and beverage, you know, ticketmaster money, sponsorship boxes,
• 17:29
  Speaker 2: all that side money that the artist doesn't share in.
• 17:32
  Speaker 2: They get the ticket money, but they also have the
• 17:34
  Speaker 2: gaming and when you have gaming and hotels, which they
• 17:37
  Speaker 2: have also they have the ability to pay more money
• 17:41
  Speaker 2: than a normal promoter like Live Nation would have. So
• 17:45
  Speaker 2: the arena in Bridgeport was very It was very difficult
• 17:47
  Speaker 2: to get artists to play there because Mohegan Sun would
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: always outdid them. And that's really why the arena didn't
• 17:53
  Speaker 2: work in Bridgeport. It really took the place of the
• 17:55
  Speaker 2: old New Haven Coliseum or in the New Haven Arena,
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: which at first shown eticut was traffic at the New
• 18:01
  Speaker 2: Haven Arena. And I don't think an arena other than
• 18:05
  Speaker 2: the People's Bank Arena which the old Hartford Civic Center
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: can exist because that's got twice the capacity, so that
• 18:13
  Speaker 2: money could be equalled that Mohegan Sun pays at People's
• 18:16
  Speaker 2: Bank arena, but you can't in the arena in Bridgeport.
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: It's only ten thousand seats, same size as Mohegan Sun.
• 18:25
  Speaker 1: So how far away do you have to get for
• 18:28
  Speaker 1: mohegan Son where it's not a factor.
• 18:32
  Speaker 2: Well, I think bridgepat works. You know, we book mohegan Son.
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: I've just in fact, we just signed a new ten
• 18:38
  Speaker 2: year agreement with them, So we've been with them for
• 18:41
  Speaker 2: twenty five years and now we're going to do another
• 18:43
  Speaker 2: ten years. I'm trying to convince them that Bridgeport doesn't compete.
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: We have the geographics of where they sell tickets and
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: where we sell tickets, and there's a slight movement from
• 18:56
  Speaker 2: Fairfield County up to the Mohegan Sun, but very very small. Well,
• 19:00
  Speaker 2: Mulligan Sun is a destination spot hotels, gaming, restaurants, you
• 19:06
  Speaker 2: know Bobby flay Tao all great restaurants in that place.
• 19:10
  Speaker 2: So it's difficult. It's very hard to compete against Molegan Sun,
• 19:13
  Speaker 2: even in Bridgepoard. It's hard.
• 19:15
  Speaker 1: We try our best, okay, So what exactly is the
• 19:27
  Speaker 1: relationship with Live Nation and mohegan Son.
• 19:31
  Speaker 2: We're the exclusive booker for concerts other than comedy.
• 19:34
  Speaker 1: Okay, so how does that work financially? Is it just
• 19:38
  Speaker 1: like a building your rent or is it a unique deal?
• 19:40
  Speaker 1: How does it work?
• 19:42
  Speaker 2: It's a unique deal. We are the booker, we're not
• 19:44
  Speaker 2: the promoter. They are the promoter. When I first sat
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: down with them twenty five years ago, they said they
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: want as many concerts as possible. I said, then, you
• 19:52
  Speaker 2: don't want me deciding if I can make money or
• 19:54
  Speaker 2: lose money on a concert, because you might love the
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: idea that so and so it's going to play a room.
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: The guarantee, so I am not buying the show. So
• 20:02
  Speaker 2: the best way we can do it is you buy
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: the show. You decide what you want to book. We'll
• 20:07
  Speaker 2: book it for you, we'll do our best job, we'll
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: cover it for you, we'll settle the show for you,
• 20:12
  Speaker 2: and then you pay us a fee. And that's how
• 20:14
  Speaker 2: we do it. We got a fee for every show
• 20:16
  Speaker 2: that we book. There.
• 20:17
  Speaker 1: Okay, just getting a little bit more micro. You're looking
• 20:20
  Speaker 1: at a year. However far out do you come to
• 20:24
  Speaker 1: them and say, here are the possible bookings, or do
• 20:27
  Speaker 1: they tell you who they want to book?
• 20:30
  Speaker 2: We go to them with every single artist we get offered.
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: That's part of our agreement with them. They get the
• 20:35
  Speaker 2: first right to make an offer. So it doesn't mean
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: the act has to play there, Bob. That doesn't mean
• 20:40
  Speaker 2: it means they get the first shot at the act.
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: If the act says yes, hallelujah, and usually they do
• 20:46
  Speaker 2: because of the money they pay. They pay good guarantees.
• 20:48
  Speaker 2: If they don't say yes, then we can have the
• 20:50
  Speaker 2: opportunity to bring it to other venues in the market.
• 20:53
  Speaker 1: Okay, So generally speaking, if I don't have an overall
• 20:58
  Speaker 1: tour deal, I'm gonna get paid more at the casino. Yes,
• 21:05
  Speaker 1: And just because this is your area of familiarity. How
• 21:08
  Speaker 1: many rooms do they have at Mohegan Sun.
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: Well, they have a ten thousand seed arena, that's the
• 21:13
  Speaker 2: only thing we booked. They also have a five hundred
• 21:16
  Speaker 2: seat room called the wolf Den, which is a free room.
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: So they'll put the Marshall Tucker Band or America or
• 21:23
  Speaker 2: something in there. They'll pay fifty thousand dollars and they'll
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: have a free show and that will just draw up
• 21:27
  Speaker 2: people to the casino. But they don't charge admission.
• 21:31
  Speaker 1: Okay, So if it's a ten thousand ceed arena and
• 21:34
  Speaker 1: they're sweeter in sixty five days in a year. How
• 21:37
  Speaker 1: many days do you have shows?
• 21:40
  Speaker 2: We have about eighty shows there. Now the Connecticut Sun,
• 21:44
  Speaker 2: the WNBA team is moving out. They're moving to Houston
• 21:48
  Speaker 2: next year. The Houston Rockets team owner paid three hundred
• 21:53
  Speaker 2: million dollars to Mohegan Sun to buy the team. So
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: they're going to have sixty open dates next year and
• 22:00
  Speaker 2: they hoped to fill fifteen to thirty of them with concert.
• 22:05
  Speaker 1: Okay, looking at your overall market, you as Jim working
• 22:10
  Speaker 1: for Live Nation, what venues do you book or how
• 22:14
  Speaker 1: wide is your region?
• 22:16
  Speaker 2: Well, I used to be in charge of the New
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: York market, the Philadelphia market after Larry Maggott left the
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: New York market, after Bruce Moran was back to Latin America,
• 22:30
  Speaker 2: Upstate New York and Connecticut. I did that for four years,
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: handled all that. When I was sixty two years old,
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: which was fifteen years ago, I went to Michael Rapino
• 22:42
  Speaker 2: and I said, I really don't want to live this
• 22:45
  Speaker 2: life of a night in Philadelphia, a night in the city,
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: and two or three nights in Connecticut or upstate New York.
• 22:51
  Speaker 2: I did it for four years. I'd like to get
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: out and just handle upstate New York and Connecticut, which
• 22:57
  Speaker 2: is what I handled before I took over New York Andhiladelphia.
• 23:00
  Speaker 2: He was great enough to me, he said, give me
• 23:02
  Speaker 2: six months to find somebody in each market, and I said, great,
• 23:06
  Speaker 2: happy to do that, which he did. He found people
• 23:09
  Speaker 2: to take my place in Philly and New York.
• 23:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, so now you still do upstate New York.
• 23:16
  Speaker 2: Yes, they do upstate New York and Connecticut, other than
• 23:18
  Speaker 2: Buffalo and Rochester. That is it. Nate put that in
• 23:21
  Speaker 2: the Great Lakes region post COVID. Pre COVID, I have Buffalo, Rochester, Syracuse,
• 23:28
  Speaker 2: all of East Saratoga, and all of Connecticut.
• 23:32
  Speaker 1: Okay, but other than Buffalo and Rochester, he still have Syracuse.
• 23:36
  Speaker 1: He still have Saratoga. Yes, okay, Saratoga. You're talking about
• 23:41
  Speaker 1: SPACK the Performing Arts Center.
• 23:43
  Speaker 2: Yeah. I brought that on board back when it was SAX.
• 23:46
  Speaker 2: In the year two thousand. I went up to Saratoga
• 23:50
  Speaker 2: and I met with them, and they were getting very
• 23:53
  Speaker 2: itchy because guarantees were getting very high, and they did
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: not like taking the risk as a five oh one
• 23:58
  Speaker 2: C three organization. So I made an offer to them
• 24:01
  Speaker 2: to pay them a million dollars rent, which is what
• 24:03
  Speaker 2: they were making anyway, and I'll take over the business.
• 24:07
  Speaker 2: And took about two months to make the deal. And
• 24:10
  Speaker 2: we've been with Saratoga now for twenty six years generally speaking.
• 24:15
  Speaker 1: Forget the issue was sponsorship and all that. How is
• 24:19
  Speaker 1: business in the sheds?
• 24:22
  Speaker 2: Excellent? Excellent? You know, it's great for Live Nation because
• 24:26
  Speaker 2: we get the food, the beverage, the parking, sponsorship, premium seats.
• 24:31
  Speaker 2: As far as attendance is concerned, they're it's really good still.
• 24:37
  Speaker 2: But what I'm finding is the level of artists that
• 24:41
  Speaker 2: used to play sheds are now playing stadiums. The stadium
• 24:44
  Speaker 2: business has exploded. And when you see Post Malone and
• 24:49
  Speaker 2: Jelly role play together, they each would have played an
• 24:52
  Speaker 2: amphitheater in the old days. They're combining and playing stadiums out.
• 24:56
  Speaker 2: I think that's for the amphitheater business to a degree.
• 25:01
  Speaker 1: Okay, when Michael came on twenty years ago or so,
• 25:05
  Speaker 1: the amphitheater business was softening. So is that something you
• 25:09
  Speaker 1: experience in what's causing it to be better now?
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: Well? I think that it is getting better because we've
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: gotten smarter about what we do We're now building amphitheaters
• 25:20
  Speaker 2: with more seats, less lawn. I think as the audience
• 25:24
  Speaker 2: gets older, they don't want to sit on the lawn.
• 25:25
  Speaker 2: I'm finding that with, for instance, on Dave Matthews. He
• 25:29
  Speaker 2: was a total lawn artist in nineteen ninety five the
• 25:31
  Speaker 2: first time I booked him up at the Meadows in Hartford.
• 25:34
  Speaker 2: Easy to sell the lawn, hard to sell the seats.
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: Now it's easy to sell seats, harder to sell the lawn.
• 25:39
  Speaker 2: I think it's the audience ages. We need to put
• 25:43
  Speaker 2: more seats in amphitheaters and less lawn, and I think
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: Live Nation we are opening up a new one in
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: Kansas City, and I think they new Dynamic is eight
• 25:52
  Speaker 2: thousand seats and he used to be five to six
• 25:55
  Speaker 2: thousand seats, and the lawn used to be twenty thousand.
• 26:00
  Speaker 2: I think we're knocking it down to eight to ten thousand.
• 26:03
  Speaker 1: There was the issue once again about twenty years ago,
• 26:08
  Speaker 1: of people perceiving amphitheaters as tired. Does the environment make
• 26:16
  Speaker 1: a difference in attendance?
• 26:20
  Speaker 2: Absolutely. I think people like going to nice places to
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: see concerts. I think that's part of the magic of
• 26:26
  Speaker 2: the Garden in New York It is a beautiful arena.
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: It is just wonderful. It's and I think the seats
• 26:32
  Speaker 2: are real comfortable. I'm a strong believer that the artist
• 26:35
  Speaker 2: is ninety percent, but the venue is ten percent. And
• 26:39
  Speaker 2: the secret to this business on seventy five percent of
• 26:42
  Speaker 2: the artist is getting fence sitters. You need to get
• 26:45
  Speaker 2: fence hitters to go to our shows. There are no fences.
• 26:48
  Speaker 2: Olivia Rodrigo amusing her as latest example because she's opening
• 26:52
  Speaker 2: up her tour in heartsd for two nights and sold
• 26:55
  Speaker 2: out in minutes both shows. There are no fence hitters.
• 26:58
  Speaker 2: We don't need fence hitters. The p ones great for us,
• 27:01
  Speaker 2: but when you're dealing with an artist like the Black Crows,
• 27:04
  Speaker 2: there are p ones that love the Black Crows. But
• 27:05
  Speaker 2: I got to get the fence itters. In traffic matters,
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: Do I want to fight the traffic? Is there a
• 27:12
  Speaker 2: roof on the amphitheater? I don't want to sit in
• 27:14
  Speaker 2: the rain. I don't want to sit in the heat.
• 27:16
  Speaker 2: We have what we call big ass fans in our amphitheaters,
• 27:19
  Speaker 2: so if it's hot, we turn on our big ass
• 27:21
  Speaker 2: They're literally called the big Ass Fans. That's the brand
• 27:23
  Speaker 2: name and we put big ass fans in there, so
• 27:27
  Speaker 2: we make it as comfortable as possible, because I do
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: believe there's that fence hitter situation where seventy five percent
• 27:34
  Speaker 2: of the artists need to get the fence hitters, the
• 27:37
  Speaker 2: P two s, the P three people that are thinking
• 27:39
  Speaker 2: about going to the show, and plus I think women
• 27:42
  Speaker 2: make decisions on going to concerts more than men. I
• 27:44
  Speaker 2: don't know if you have that feeling with yours. I
• 27:48
  Speaker 2: have that feeling. My wife wanted to go to a
• 27:50
  Speaker 2: show I went. If I wanted to go to show something,
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: she's going to go with your friends. So I try
• 27:58
  Speaker 2: to make my venues female appealing. Parking has got to
• 28:03
  Speaker 2: be closed, seats have to be comfortable. Three times as
• 28:06
  Speaker 2: many women's rooms as men's rooms. Figure it out. Make
• 28:10
  Speaker 2: the women like your venue, you'll get better attendance.
• 28:14
  Speaker 1: Okay, So in Connecticut, to the degree you can say,
• 28:19
  Speaker 1: off top of your head, what are all the venues
• 28:21
  Speaker 1: you book?
• 28:22
  Speaker 2: Oh my goodness, well book Toad's Place, which is well.
• 28:26
  Speaker 1: That's a real club, legendary club.
• 28:28
  Speaker 2: That is a real club. We don't own it, but
• 28:30
  Speaker 2: we are so proud to book. It's got a great history.
• 28:34
  Speaker 2: In fact, We just had the Food Fighters play there
• 28:37
  Speaker 2: last fall, so that was great, uh. And we booked
• 28:40
  Speaker 2: the Oakdale, which Live Nation owns. We put some shows
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: in the Bushnell still, we put comedy shows in the
• 28:46
  Speaker 2: Bushnell and the meadows are Amphitheater in Hartford, which we
• 28:51
  Speaker 2: have exclusively, the Mohigan Sun Arena exclusively, and we have
• 28:56
  Speaker 2: the Bridgeport Empathy, the Health Health Hertford Healthcare Amphitheater exclusively.
• 29:01
  Speaker 2: What I've done in Connecticut as as I'm getting old
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: or older and I'm getting closer to retirement or death
• 29:08
  Speaker 2: which it becomes first, I am trying to set up
• 29:11
  Speaker 2: the business for Live Nation for the next twenty years.
• 29:14
  Speaker 2: So we own Oakdale, so that set. We have a
• 29:17
  Speaker 2: twenty year agreement at the Bridgeport Amphitheater, We have a
• 29:19
  Speaker 2: new ten year agreement at Mohegan Sun. We have a
• 29:23
  Speaker 2: long term agreement at Toad's. And so I'm trying and
• 29:27
  Speaker 2: I have a twenty year agreement now it's Saratoga. We
• 29:30
  Speaker 2: have a six year agreement up at our Amphitheater in Syracuse.
• 29:33
  Speaker 2: So what I'm trying to do is create long term
• 29:36
  Speaker 2: agreements so when I move on, Live Nations business is
• 29:40
  Speaker 2: all set up for the whoever takes over for me.
• 29:43
  Speaker 1: Okay, when you got started totally entrepreneurial business, the business
• 29:50
  Speaker 1: is flipped to be corporate. Live Nation is publicly listed,
• 29:53
  Speaker 1: age's probably held, but gigantic. So in terms of the
• 29:59
  Speaker 1: people who were in it, let's say you moved down
• 30:01
  Speaker 1: the line. What kind of people are in the pipeline.
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: Well, that's something that bothers me a little, to tell
• 30:09
  Speaker 2: you the truth, there are a lot of bookers, but
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: not promoters. Promoters are entrepreneurial, you know. I look at
• 30:15
  Speaker 2: the Larry Maggots and the Don Laws, and the Jimmy
• 30:18
  Speaker 2: Kopp Looks and the John Shears and all the people
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: that really created their own venues. I've always loved that
• 30:26
  Speaker 2: part of the business. I love to try to create
• 30:29
  Speaker 2: new venues and I still do you know, I'm working
• 30:32
  Speaker 2: on as I mentioned, I'm working on this Bridgepoort venue.
• 30:34
  Speaker 2: I love business development. But what Live Nation did which
• 30:37
  Speaker 2: was really smart, is they have a business development department
• 30:41
  Speaker 2: to find these things. So holfully, they're smart people in
• 30:44
  Speaker 2: every market that could turn the business development people on
• 30:47
  Speaker 2: to the projects they think are worthwhile. I'm hopeful that
• 30:52
  Speaker 2: the next generation, the forty and fifty year old people
• 30:55
  Speaker 2: had that entrepreneurial instant to find new business for Live
• 30:59
  Speaker 2: Nation because there's always new business out there. You just
• 31:02
  Speaker 2: have to look and see. And you're right, we're entrepreneurs.
• 31:05
  Speaker 2: We created a business. But not only did we create
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: a business by booking artists. We created a business by
• 31:11
  Speaker 2: Bill Graham opening up the film well, Larry Mackett opening
• 31:14
  Speaker 2: up Electric Factory, me, John Scherer opening up the Capital
• 31:17
  Speaker 2: Theorem PI se me opening up the meadows, whatever it
• 31:20
  Speaker 2: might be. The new generation has to do the same thing,
• 31:23
  Speaker 2: and I'm hopeful they do, but I'm a little worried.
• 31:27
  Speaker 1: Okay, how did you decide to sell your business to
• 31:31
  Speaker 1: what was then SFX that became Live Nation.
• 31:35
  Speaker 2: Well, the first company bought by SFX was Ron Delsmith's
• 31:39
  Speaker 2: company with Mitch Slater. They it was SFX Broadcasting at
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: the time. It was a radio group. They owned seven
• 31:47
  Speaker 2: radio stations in Hertford, Connecticut. So Mitch, I'm sitting in
• 31:52
  Speaker 2: Metropolitan's office. John Cher and I were partners and Ogden
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: owned the company at the time, and I get a
• 31:59
  Speaker 2: call from Mitch. He couldn't use his name. He used
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: a guy named Michael Ray Richardson. Which was a nick
• 32:05
  Speaker 2: at the time in New York knick at the time,
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: and if Michael Ray called, I knew it was Mitch
• 32:09
  Speaker 2: Slater calling. So I pick up on Mitch and he said,
• 32:12
  Speaker 2: we want to buy you. We owned seven stations in Hartford.
• 32:15
  Speaker 2: We want to buy the Meadows. I said, okay, I said,
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: but I want to keep working with Metropolitan like John
• 32:23
  Speaker 2: chare for friends, longtime friends. I'll sell you the Meadows.
• 32:27
  Speaker 2: John did not own the Metals, just Shelley and I
• 32:29
  Speaker 2: and the Nita Lander organization. We were partners. We opened
• 32:32
  Speaker 2: up the Medals before I partnered with John Share we
• 32:35
  Speaker 2: still owned it, and Mitch wouldn't let me do that deal.
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: He said, no, we want you to go to Connecticut
• 32:40
  Speaker 2: and we want you to run Connecticut for us. Well,
• 32:44
  Speaker 2: that was sort of enticing to me, Bob, because I
• 32:47
  Speaker 2: always lived in Connecticut and I had to drive to
• 32:50
  Speaker 2: New Jersey every day and that was difficult every day
• 32:53
  Speaker 2: my kids were growing up. I drove down over the
• 32:57
  Speaker 2: tabn Zee Bridge, down the Garden State park Way, blah
• 32:59
  Speaker 2: blah blah, and the idea of working in my own
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: state really was very enticing to me. So I decided
• 33:07
  Speaker 2: that I would sell the meadows, and I got very
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: good money for selling the meadows. That certainly was an
• 33:11
  Speaker 2: ingredient to my choices whether to sell or not sell.
• 33:15
  Speaker 2: But the reason I sold was the money. The reason
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: that I went over to Delton Slater in SFX was
• 33:21
  Speaker 2: because I thought the commute would be a lot better
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: for me and healthier for my family than driving to
• 33:26
  Speaker 2: New Jersey every day.
• 33:28
  Speaker 1: Okay, do you have any thoughts about when you sold
• 33:33
  Speaker 1: and when you got how much you got paid. Do
• 33:36
  Speaker 1: you ever think, well, I sold at the right time,
• 33:38
  Speaker 1: or I should have held out till they bought a
• 33:40
  Speaker 1: few other things.
• 33:43
  Speaker 2: My big regret, and I live with this regret regret forever,
• 33:48
  Speaker 2: is when I went over to Mitch and Ron the
• 33:51
  Speaker 2: very first day, they took me out to lunch with
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: Bob Silomon, who was the major DOMO of course of SFX,
• 33:59
  Speaker 2: and they said, we will also want to buy Metropolitan.
• 34:03
  Speaker 2: Now Shelley and I aren twenty percent of Metropolitan. Still
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: even though I had left, I said, okay, great. I
• 34:08
  Speaker 2: saw another payday coming. I got a payday for the Medals,
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: and I saw another payday coming for Metropolitan, and I
• 34:15
  Speaker 2: love the people in Metropolitan, and I worked with them
• 34:18
  Speaker 2: for six years and many of them still remain my friend.
• 34:22
  Speaker 2: So they said, what do you think they would want?
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: I said, no, I have no idea. They said, come
• 34:26
  Speaker 2: back up to our office. I went up to Mitch's
• 34:29
  Speaker 2: office with Bob and with Ron, and they put together
• 34:32
  Speaker 2: three offers. One it was still SFX broadcasting, One was
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: for thirty million dollars worth of SFX Broadcasting stock, one
• 34:42
  Speaker 2: was for forty million, and one was for fifty million.
• 34:45
  Speaker 2: So Mitch said, I'm gonna call John and I'm gonna
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: have lunch with John, but I don't want you to
• 34:51
  Speaker 2: be there because I left John. John wasn't happy that
• 34:55
  Speaker 2: I left, and I'd fully understand why he wasn't happy
• 34:57
  Speaker 2: that I left. And and the Bob Silimon are going
• 35:03
  Speaker 2: to meet with Richard Avalon, who owned Ogden at the
• 35:07
  Speaker 2: time and h O ran Ogden at times there better
• 35:10
  Speaker 2: saying because it was a public company. Met with John
• 35:13
  Speaker 2: at a restaurant. Silomon had three envelopes in his pocket
• 35:19
  Speaker 2: and he looks at John. This I was told the
• 35:21
  Speaker 2: second it was not at the lunch, but it came
• 35:23
  Speaker 2: back and told me I thought I was about to
• 35:25
  Speaker 2: be really rich after lunch. So they come back after
• 35:29
  Speaker 2: lunch and Mitch says to me, I don't believe your
• 35:32
  Speaker 2: ex partner. I go, what he turned the money down?
• 35:35
  Speaker 2: He goes, no, he said we're not for sale. I said,
• 35:39
  Speaker 2: you never got to offer thirty, forty or fifty million dollars.
• 35:45
  Speaker 2: He is no. It seemed like he just loved saying
• 35:48
  Speaker 2: to me we're not for sale. Well, that was a
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: big mistake because SFX Broadcasting at the time was a
• 35:56
  Speaker 2: thirty dollars stock it's a public company. They end up
• 35:59
  Speaker 2: selling the company to AMFM Radio at seventy five dollars,
• 36:05
  Speaker 2: so the money went up two and a half times,
• 36:07
  Speaker 2: and that anybody who owned SFX Broadcasting stock got the
• 36:11
  Speaker 2: equal shares of stock in what was then going to
• 36:15
  Speaker 2: be called SFX Entertainment. So that thirty forty or fifty
• 36:20
  Speaker 2: times two and a half times two because he got
• 36:24
  Speaker 2: equal stock and broadcasting. So I would have had a
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: lot more money. John Share would have had twice as
• 36:32
  Speaker 2: much he owned forty percent. John Share would have probably
• 36:34
  Speaker 2: over one hundred million dollars. And John wouldn't sell the company.
• 36:39
  Speaker 2: That's my one regret. I do not regret selling SFX
• 36:43
  Speaker 2: Telling to SFX at all. But I regret is John
• 36:46
  Speaker 2: Share not looking at the offers and making a deal.
• 36:50
  Speaker 1: Okay, couple of things. One, Whatever happened to your twenty
• 36:54
  Speaker 1: percent in Metropolitan?
• 36:57
  Speaker 2: Well, Mitch Slater ends up leaving SFX when it got
• 37:02
  Speaker 2: sold to clear Channel, and Eric Zukman took over. Who's
• 37:06
  Speaker 2: a great friend and a great guy. And Mitch then
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: goes over to Metropolitan, speaks to Ogden and says, I
• 37:16
  Speaker 2: want to buy it. COVID come not COVID. The the
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: the tech boom crashes. The year two yeah, and then
• 37:28
  Speaker 2: nine to eleven happens right after that. So what was
• 37:33
  Speaker 2: offered to us at thirty forty and fifty million dollars,
• 37:36
  Speaker 2: Mitch later offers us two and a half million dollars
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: to buy the company. That's it. So they come to
• 37:44
  Speaker 2: me first. Ogden comes to me. Shelley and I are
• 37:47
  Speaker 2: twenty percent. We agree to sell it. We had made
• 37:50
  Speaker 2: a lot of money on the sale of the Meadows.
• 37:53
  Speaker 2: We missed out on the big deal. I had nothing
• 37:56
  Speaker 2: to do with Metropolitan anymore. I'd rather take my twenty
• 37:59
  Speaker 2: percent of that and be happy. John Cherer would not
• 38:03
  Speaker 2: sell it. He did not agree to it. We outvoted
• 38:06
  Speaker 2: John Share I owned twenty percent. I'm done on forty.
• 38:11
  Speaker 2: We sold it, So Shelley and I each got two
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: hundred and fifty thousand dollars for selling Metropolitan. Mitch later
• 38:18
  Speaker 2: got eight and a half million dollars for selling Metropolitan
• 38:23
  Speaker 2: from UH. It was actually Mitch later first borted to
• 38:28
  Speaker 2: two and a half million, and then that was done,
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: and then Mitch sold it to Live Nation for eight
• 38:33
  Speaker 2: and a half million eight months later. So Mitch later
• 38:35
  Speaker 2: made a quick six million dollars.
• 38:38
  Speaker 1: Okay, your original sale was that in cash or stock stock?
• 38:44
  Speaker 1: So did you you got the two and a half doubled?
• 38:49
  Speaker 2: Yes?
• 38:50
  Speaker 1: Okay, and that you know that went through various iterations.
• 38:56
  Speaker 1: Do you still own the stock or what time did
• 38:58
  Speaker 1: you sell and how did you decide to.
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: I owned most of the stock up until COVID, and
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: during COVID I started to let go of some of
• 39:08
  Speaker 2: the stock.
• 39:10
  Speaker 1: Just to be very you're talking about Live Nation stock.
• 39:12
  Speaker 1: Live Nation stock crashed in March of twenty twenty, and
• 39:16
  Speaker 1: then very quickly thereafter started to go back up. Did
• 39:21
  Speaker 1: you time your sale? Well?
• 39:24
  Speaker 2: I timed it well, but not as well as I
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: could have.
• 39:26
  Speaker 1: Well, you know that's a nature of the stock. Market,
• 39:28
  Speaker 1: you get too greedy, doesn't work in your favor. So
• 39:32
  Speaker 1: you were an entrepreneur. You're now to use the vernacular
• 39:36
  Speaker 1: working for the man. It's been different men, but certainly
• 39:40
  Speaker 1: now it's Michael Rapino. What is it different being total
• 39:44
  Speaker 1: entrepreneur at your money as opposed to working for Live Nation.
• 39:52
  Speaker 2: Well, I'm not going to say this because I'm working
• 39:53
  Speaker 2: for Live Nation. I find Michael Rappino to be the
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: father of the twenty first century content company as Frank Barcelona,
• 40:02
  Speaker 2: in my opinion, with all due respect to Bill Graham,
• 40:05
  Speaker 2: is the father of the twentieth century contract business. But
• 40:10
  Speaker 2: Frank Barcelona did. He set up the system. He set
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: up the league. We were like the NFL. We got
• 40:15
  Speaker 2: as you know, we got franchises. I got the Connecticut franchise,
• 40:19
  Speaker 2: Shelley and I got the Connecticut franchise. Donald got the
• 40:22
  Speaker 2: Bosston franchise, Howard Stein got the New York franchise, and
• 40:28
  Speaker 2: it was set up great for the twentieth century. But
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: we made money only on tickets. But Michael Rippino did
• 40:33
  Speaker 2: was created all this other avenues of income, whether it
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: be sponship, premium seats, food and beverage, anything you can name.
• 40:41
  Speaker 2: He created the new model of the twenty first century
• 40:45
  Speaker 2: concert business. He's always let me do what I wanted.
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: He's never turned down a deal that I've ever brought
• 40:50
  Speaker 2: to him. Thankful, Lam's still batting a thousand, so he's
• 40:53
  Speaker 2: never lost a deal. I find him to be incredibly bright,
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: and I think that I'm better off having somebody like
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: him oversee me than me myself oversee me. He's smarter
• 41:08
  Speaker 2: than me.
• 41:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, how'd you meet get involved with Shelley?
• 41:14
  Speaker 2: I met Shelley in nineteen seventy in Dayton, Ohio. He
• 41:17
  Speaker 2: managed a band called Hammer, and I had a traffic
• 41:21
  Speaker 2: Mountain show in Dayton, Ohio, and Shelley comes and he's
• 41:26
  Speaker 2: the opening act and he's from Brooklyn and I'm from
• 41:29
  Speaker 2: Westchester and we're New Yorkers, and we clicked and we
• 41:34
  Speaker 2: didn't speak much after that, and I go to I
• 41:39
  Speaker 2: end up leaving Ohio State. I had a concert business
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: in Ohio State, at private one, not at the school,
• 41:45
  Speaker 2: but I was going to New York law school. I
• 41:47
  Speaker 2: had real trouble going to law school and covering doing
• 41:50
  Speaker 2: conference in Columbus, Ohio. I wasn't smart enough to be
• 41:53
  Speaker 2: able to balance that, so I had to give up
• 41:56
  Speaker 2: my concert business in Ohio. So I walked over to
• 42:00
  Speaker 2: two agents that I was very close. So the first
• 42:02
  Speaker 2: one was Barbara Skydell, who worked at Premier Talent. Can
• 42:06
  Speaker 2: you do me a favor and sell me shows in Connecticut?
• 42:08
  Speaker 2: I still lived in west Chester. Says, we have a
• 42:11
  Speaker 2: promoter up there. No good, we have somebody up there.
• 42:15
  Speaker 2: So I went to my other best friend, Johnny Podell,
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: Will you sell me a show in Connecticut? Because yeah,
• 42:20
  Speaker 2: I got the Olmer Brothers still looking a tour November
• 42:23
  Speaker 2: nineteen seventy one. I'll sell you the Olmer Brothers at
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: the New Haven Arena. November nine, nineteen seventy one. I
• 42:29
  Speaker 2: get my first show in Connecticut. I'm so excited. A
• 42:32
  Speaker 2: week before the show, Dwayne Only gets in a motorcycle
• 42:36
  Speaker 2: accident gets killed. My first show in Connecticut gets canceled.
• 42:40
  Speaker 2: Hell of a start. So I go up. I decide
• 42:46
  Speaker 2: I'm going to go up to the New Haven Arena
• 42:47
  Speaker 2: because Sir jeth row Toe was playing there. Who was
• 42:50
  Speaker 2: Barbara Scottell's at And I played jethro Tell ten times
• 42:54
  Speaker 2: in Ohio. And I was going to go to Derek Sutton,
• 42:57
  Speaker 2: who was the tour manager and try to steal the
• 42:59
  Speaker 2: act whoever was doing the show. I go backstage and
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: who's standing at for Shelley Finkel. I go up to
• 43:07
  Speaker 2: Shelley said, what are you doing here? You don't manage
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: anybody on the show. He goes, No. I ended up
• 43:11
  Speaker 2: not being a manager anymore. I'm now a promoter and
• 43:14
  Speaker 2: I'm the Premier Talent promoter through Barbara Schadel in the
• 43:18
  Speaker 2: state of Connecticut. I go, oh, you're the reason why
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: I can't get from Premier Talent, so he said. I said, well,
• 43:26
  Speaker 2: I'm still going to law school, but I'm trying to
• 43:28
  Speaker 2: start a business in Connecticut. And he was great. He said,
• 43:32
  Speaker 2: to me, go to law school, let's become partners and
• 43:35
  Speaker 2: just come up to my office after law school and
• 43:38
  Speaker 2: we'll work from two to six together. Because I went
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: to law school from ten am to two pm, took
• 43:43
  Speaker 2: the subway up to Shelley's office and we became partners.
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: And shortly after that, I had so much fun being
• 43:50
  Speaker 2: a concert promoter. I had to make a choice, so
• 43:53
  Speaker 2: I continue doing concerts to go to law school, and
• 43:56
  Speaker 2: I decided to continue doing contract in right. BEFOL Final
• 44:00
  Speaker 2: was my first year of law school.
• 44:09
  Speaker 1: Let's go back to the beginning. Where do you grow
• 44:12
  Speaker 1: up in Westchester?
• 44:14
  Speaker 2: I grew up in New Rochelle, New York. My first
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: concert was the Beatles at Carnegie Hall.
• 44:20
  Speaker 1: What did your parents do for a living?
• 44:22
  Speaker 2: My father was a dentist, My mother was a housewife.
• 44:25
  Speaker 1: And how many kids in the family.
• 44:28
  Speaker 2: I had a brother. My father was a Park Avenue dentist.
• 44:30
  Speaker 2: Had a lot of stars, Broadway stars, movie stars as patients,
• 44:35
  Speaker 2: Eliza men Elie, Peter Allen, Don de Luiz, a lot
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: of stars living in New Rochelle, that back in the
• 44:41
  Speaker 2: sixties was the country. Two people lived in the city.
• 44:44
  Speaker 2: Where you lived up in Westport was the boondocks far
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: right back then, And so they would spend the weekend
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: up at my house. So I met a lot of
• 44:54
  Speaker 2: stars back in when I was a teenager, and they'd
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: slept over at my house and they would sit in
• 44:59
  Speaker 2: our back yond and stuff like that. So every time
• 45:02
  Speaker 2: that I would go to my dad's office to get
• 45:04
  Speaker 2: my teeth fixed, he would say, see that office over,
• 45:07
  Speaker 2: that's going to be your office. You're going to grow
• 45:09
  Speaker 2: up to be a part gaving your dentist and be
• 45:12
  Speaker 2: the dentist to the stars. Well, I didn't really want
• 45:15
  Speaker 2: to be a dentist, and I didn't know how to.
• 45:18
  Speaker 2: You know, back in the day he talked back to
• 45:20
  Speaker 2: their dad. Right, none of us ever talked back to
• 45:22
  Speaker 2: our dad. We did what we what our dance tells him. Abs. Yes,
• 45:27
  Speaker 2: So I went to Ohio State and I.
• 45:30
  Speaker 1: Wait a second, your brother is older or younger?
• 45:34
  Speaker 2: He's five? He was five years younger, and.
• 45:36
  Speaker 1: Whatever, what did his life turn out to be?
• 45:39
  Speaker 2: He ended up running my security company. But then he
• 45:42
  Speaker 2: died at the age of thirty five years old. So
• 45:45
  Speaker 2: in nineteen ninety he died.
• 45:49
  Speaker 1: How did he die?
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: He got an abonia and never took care of himself
• 45:54
  Speaker 2: and stop breathing. Wow, got all clogged up and stopped breathing,
• 45:59
  Speaker 2: and his wife calls me, Bobby's not breathing. I ran
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: over to his house and he was dead by the
• 46:05
  Speaker 2: time I got there. His body was called actually.
• 46:09
  Speaker 1: Wow.
• 46:10
  Speaker 2: Yeah, it was very very I still remember touching him
• 46:14
  Speaker 2: thirty five years later.
• 46:16
  Speaker 1: Okay, So your father, however good a dentist he is,
• 46:24
  Speaker 1: to get that caliber of patient is not easy. Did
• 46:28
  Speaker 1: he have an entrepreneurial bent that you saw in action?
• 46:33
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes he did. He also was a dentist for
• 46:36
  Speaker 2: the New York Jets from nineteen sixty to to nineteen
• 46:39
  Speaker 2: seventy seven because the doctor was his patient, so Monday
• 46:44
  Speaker 2: mornings he'd keep the office open for the New York Jets.
• 46:48
  Speaker 2: So when I graduated high school, I'd come in every
• 46:51
  Speaker 2: Monday morning and see all the New York Jets come
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: in to get their teeth fixed for your charge. There
• 46:55
  Speaker 2: was a broken jaw that he deal with that, so
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: he was always out looking for things. He's Jets dentists,
• 47:02
  Speaker 2: big Broadway guy. He would do. Dom Deluis became his
• 47:06
  Speaker 2: close friend because dom had no money, and Dominic would
• 47:10
  Speaker 2: end up paint He was a painter on the side.
• 47:13
  Speaker 2: He ended up doing portraits of me and my brother
• 47:15
  Speaker 2: in order to pay my father. So I saw how
• 47:17
  Speaker 2: my father was entrepreneurial in that effect. It wasn't always
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: about money, it was about relationships. And I still maintained
• 47:23
  Speaker 2: to this day. Money has certainly moved up in the
• 47:27
  Speaker 2: in the cattle call, for sure, but still relationships do matter,
• 47:30
  Speaker 2: not as much as they used to. But I saw
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: my father created relationships. I got very friendly with Johnny Podell,
• 47:37
  Speaker 2: Frank Barcelona, Dennis R. For all the agents I got
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: very friendly with, and in the sixties and seventies, relationships
• 47:45
  Speaker 2: is what mattered, whether anything, not the money.
• 47:49
  Speaker 1: Okay, So what kind of kid were you like growing up?
• 47:52
  Speaker 1: Be the life the party? Were you a lone or
• 47:54
  Speaker 1: a good student? Bad student?
• 47:57
  Speaker 2: I was an underachiever. I did not like school. I
• 48:02
  Speaker 2: was pretty quiet. I was an athlete. I played sports,
• 48:05
  Speaker 2: but I was pretty quiet. I never drank. I still
• 48:09
  Speaker 2: don't drink. I don't like Is there a reason you
• 48:13
  Speaker 2: don't drink. I don't like the taste. Okay, don't get
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: me wrong. I take the buzz, but it wasn't worth
• 48:19
  Speaker 2: the taste to get the bus. So I've never drank.
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: I don't drink. I don't have any urge to drink.
• 48:27
  Speaker 2: So it was a little hard to party with people
• 48:29
  Speaker 2: who drank. But during the seventies everybody to drugs. So
• 48:34
  Speaker 2: my currency was partying with the bands before the agents
• 48:39
  Speaker 2: or the managers, before the show or after the show.
• 48:42
  Speaker 2: That was the currency I used.
• 48:44
  Speaker 1: Okay, how did you end up going to Ohio State?
• 48:46
  Speaker 1: And was that culture shock?
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: Yes, it was culture shock, especially when I had a
• 48:51
  Speaker 2: swastika put on my door six months after opening up
• 48:54
  Speaker 2: my own concert. Business. I had never seen any anti
• 48:58
  Speaker 2: semitism in my life until I went out to Columbus, Ohio,
• 49:02
  Speaker 2: and it was culture shock. I roomed with somebody who
• 49:05
  Speaker 2: was the president of the Young Americans for Freedom, which
• 49:09
  Speaker 2: was a Republican conservative group, and I was a liberal Democrat.
• 49:13
  Speaker 2: It was very hard for me and I met Farmers.
• 49:18
  Speaker 2: There was so much blonde hair out there. I never
• 49:20
  Speaker 2: so much blonde hair in my life was out there.
• 49:23
  Speaker 2: It was absolute culture shock for me. But I got
• 49:26
  Speaker 2: friendly with people from Cleveland. I found that the people
• 49:29
  Speaker 2: from Cleveland were more Northeast than anybody else. So just
• 49:33
  Speaker 2: by sheer nature, I started hanging out with a lot
• 49:36
  Speaker 2: of people from Cleveland, and I found my Cleveland friends
• 49:40
  Speaker 2: were very much like me.
• 49:43
  Speaker 1: So how did you end up becoming a concert promoter?
• 49:47
  Speaker 2: I was working for Robert F. Kennedy and I ran
• 49:50
  Speaker 2: students for Kennedy for the State of Ohio in nineteen sixty.
• 49:53
  Speaker 1: Well, well, how does that happen?
• 49:55
  Speaker 2: I'm politically, I'm a political freak. I'm a music freaking
• 50:00
  Speaker 2: political freak. Those are the two things that I love
• 50:02
  Speaker 2: the most, and sports. Those the three love to have. Sports, politics,
• 50:06
  Speaker 2: and music. And so I went down to the Kennedy
• 50:11
  Speaker 2: office and offered to work for students for Kennedy. And
• 50:15
  Speaker 2: I'm not sure how I got the president's job, but
• 50:18
  Speaker 2: I was the president of the Students for Kennedy. And
• 50:20
  Speaker 2: I was good at gathering crowds around and getting people
• 50:23
  Speaker 2: to do things, so I got buses together. We went
• 50:26
  Speaker 2: to Indiana and campaigned for Robert Kennedy Indiana, and I
• 50:30
  Speaker 2: had a great story. I met Robert Kennedy in the
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: in Indiana and I I'm in the hotel room with him,
• 50:37
  Speaker 2: and he asked me if i'd go to the drug store.
• 50:40
  Speaker 2: He said, sure, What do you need? He says, I
• 50:42
  Speaker 2: need you to buy that stuff that puts gray in
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: your hair. I said, why he goes because the people
• 50:49
  Speaker 2: in Indiana don't like young people. They want old people
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: to be the president. So I go after the drug store.
• 50:55
  Speaker 2: I buy this silver gray hair for men's stuff. And
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: I watched him streak his hair with a little gray.
• 51:01
  Speaker 2: Started to realize that everything's not the same everywhere. And
• 51:06
  Speaker 2: even though he campaigned in New York two weeks earlier,
• 51:10
  Speaker 2: he looked young and vibrant, when he went to Indiana,
• 51:12
  Speaker 2: he had to look old. And it really made a
• 51:15
  Speaker 2: real impression on me that you can't be the same
• 51:18
  Speaker 2: person to everybody. It's one thing Robert Kennedy taught me
• 51:21
  Speaker 2: how you have to change as to who you're talking
• 51:25
  Speaker 2: to and how you say it. And so that's how
• 51:29
  Speaker 2: I got involved with Robert Kennedy. He invited me out
• 51:32
  Speaker 2: to LA. I'm so glad I didn't go to LA
• 51:34
  Speaker 2: where he assassinated. It would have been tragic. But he
• 51:36
  Speaker 2: invited all the presidents of the Young Students for Kennedy
• 51:40
  Speaker 2: out to LA because that was going to be his
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: final primary until the Chicago convention in August. So thankfully
• 51:49
  Speaker 2: I didn't go out there. But then he was assassinated.
• 51:53
  Speaker 2: And my best friend in high school said, well, your
• 51:55
  Speaker 2: other love his music. Why would become concert promoters? I go,
• 52:00
  Speaker 2: I mean like Bill Grant And he goes, yeah, like
• 52:02
  Speaker 2: Bill Graham. I said, okay. So I didn't know where
• 52:06
  Speaker 2: to go. I only knew the name William Morris. So
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: one summer afternoon we go into the city and I'm
• 52:15
  Speaker 2: eighteen years old and I go to the bottom floor
• 52:19
  Speaker 2: of the William Mars Agency and I said, can I
• 52:22
  Speaker 2: see an agent? I'm looking to book a show. Back then,
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: it was the beginning of the business. Estello by the
• 52:28
  Speaker 2: name of David Krebs was an agent at William Morris.
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: He was as I say to David Still, I said,
• 52:35
  Speaker 2: you would and Steve Lieber they both ran to William
• 52:37
  Speaker 2: Morris department at that time. They were about five six
• 52:41
  Speaker 2: years older than me. And I come up and he goes,
• 52:46
  Speaker 2: what do you want to buy? I said, I want
• 52:47
  Speaker 2: to buy a show for Columbus, Ohio. It's this theater
• 52:50
  Speaker 2: downtown clubed Thatt's memorial. What do you have to tell me,
• 52:53
  Speaker 2: because I'll tell you Steppenwolf for thirty five hundred dollars.
• 52:55
  Speaker 2: I said, well, I'd never promoted a show before. He goes,
• 52:58
  Speaker 2: there's this guy in columb I said, hands has a
• 53:01
  Speaker 2: ticket agency. Call this guy Ben up and it'll help
• 53:04
  Speaker 2: you promote your first show. That's what I did. I
• 53:07
  Speaker 2: bought Steppenwolf for thirty five hundred bidway, let me just
• 53:10
  Speaker 2: go back.
• 53:10
  Speaker 1: Because I don't want to go. It's nineteen sixty eight.
• 53:14
  Speaker 1: We all hate Johnson, but first most of the students
• 53:19
  Speaker 1: win for McCarthy. Now, ultimately, when RFK got in, it
• 53:24
  Speaker 1: was clear that he was going to win until he
• 53:26
  Speaker 1: got killed. How did you decide to go with RFK
• 53:30
  Speaker 1: as opposed to McCarthy.
• 53:33
  Speaker 2: I think it was the magic of Kennedy, which I
• 53:37
  Speaker 2: still see an artist today. I think I just had
• 53:40
  Speaker 2: this sense of this magic and certain people. You know,
• 53:46
  Speaker 2: I see Bruce Springsteen and this magic, Billy Joel, John
• 53:49
  Speaker 2: bon Jovi. You know, I'm talking of my generational generation
• 53:53
  Speaker 2: of artists. I can I can feel. I told Joe
• 53:56
  Speaker 2: Namath because I was friendly with Joe because of my father.
• 54:00
  Speaker 2: When he walked into a room, the room just shut down.
• 54:03
  Speaker 2: Was all about Joe Namath. Robert Kennedy had the same charisma,
• 54:07
  Speaker 2: and I think his charismatic personality is what drove me
• 54:11
  Speaker 2: more towards Robert Kennedy than Eugene McCarthy.
• 54:15
  Speaker 1: Okay, you know, Ohio was a couple of years and
• 54:19
  Speaker 1: a couple of changes behind the New York area. But
• 54:23
  Speaker 1: when I went to college, and I'm a little younger
• 54:24
  Speaker 1: than you, you could literally point out who the Republicans
• 54:28
  Speaker 1: were on campus and when.
• 54:30
  Speaker 2: Yeah, they wore glasses and that short hair, right.
• 54:33
  Speaker 1: And when I started to meet people in the nineties,
• 54:35
  Speaker 1: young people in college, they said they were Republicans. I
• 54:37
  Speaker 1: didn't think that was possible. What is difference in your
• 54:41
  Speaker 1: political junkie amongst the younger generation of today, that they're
• 54:45
  Speaker 1: all not left wingers.
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: I think they're scared of the future. I think they're
• 54:51
  Speaker 2: scared they can't do as well as their parents or
• 54:54
  Speaker 2: their grandparents. In my case, I think that they have
• 54:57
  Speaker 2: this great fear. I think there were Republicans have scared
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: the shit out of them, that Democrats only care about
• 55:05
  Speaker 2: four people and black people and Latin people and immigrants
• 55:10
  Speaker 2: and things like that. And I think the young are
• 55:13
  Speaker 2: not understanding what America is really about, which is anybody
• 55:16
  Speaker 2: can be successful if you're good. You just have to
• 55:19
  Speaker 2: get the right shot, and you have to be lucky.
• 55:21
  Speaker 2: I think they turn Republican because I think they believe
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: the con man in the White House has convent into
• 55:26
  Speaker 2: believing this.
• 55:28
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's go back to the narrative. This is what
• 55:31
  Speaker 1: year nineteen sixty eight, sixty nine.
• 55:34
  Speaker 2: My first show is in sixty eight, November first, sixty eight,
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: steppenwil So.
• 55:38
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's let's break it down. Doesn't sound like a
• 55:43
  Speaker 1: lot of money today, but thirty five hundred dollars was
• 55:46
  Speaker 1: certainly worth more than you had to pay a guarantee
• 55:50
  Speaker 1: to the building. Where did the money come from?
• 55:53
  Speaker 2: Well, you're right, I thought my business with twenty five
• 55:56
  Speaker 2: hundred dollars of my barmits for money and twenty five
• 55:59
  Speaker 2: hundred dollars in my friends bar mits some money, we
• 56:01
  Speaker 2: start our business with five thousand dollars. And you're right.
• 56:04
  Speaker 2: I had to get seventeen hundred and fifty dollars to
• 56:06
  Speaker 2: William Marsh to Steppenwolf, I had to get five hundred
• 56:09
  Speaker 2: dollars to the building for a deposit. But I didn't
• 56:12
  Speaker 2: have to go past that because I got enough credit
• 56:15
  Speaker 2: through the ticket agency to buy my own advertising time.
• 56:18
  Speaker 2: Now listen. Advertising time then was six dollars a minute,
• 56:21
  Speaker 2: So even if I had come up with a few
• 56:23
  Speaker 2: hundred dollars, I could buy advertising on their local radio station,
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: which is w COL at the time. And I was
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: able to give one hundred dollars to the disc jockey
• 56:31
  Speaker 2: and the program director to make sure that Magic Carper
• 56:34
  Speaker 2: Ride was going to be number one the week of
• 56:35
  Speaker 2: my concert, to make it work. It didn't work because
• 56:40
  Speaker 2: it was this fellow by the name of Mike Michael
• 56:43
  Speaker 2: Belkon and his brother Jules Belkin, that all of a
• 56:46
  Speaker 2: sudden realized they have a competitor in the market. I
• 56:49
  Speaker 2: was completely unaware of competition at the time. And the
• 56:53
  Speaker 2: next so, November one, I had Steppenwolf at That's Memorial.
• 56:57
  Speaker 2: They decided to put the doors in November second for
• 57:00
  Speaker 2: two shows and put Peter, Paul and Mary in the
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: same venue. On November three, they crushed me. I had
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: the number one single in the market and I broke
• 57:10
  Speaker 2: even on the show. And I go back down to
• 57:15
  Speaker 2: Bend the guy, the ticket guy, and I go, I
• 57:18
  Speaker 2: don't know what to do. These guys are gonna crush me.
• 57:20
  Speaker 2: He goes, well, you know they're big time, but they
• 57:22
  Speaker 2: live up in Cleveland. They don't love coming down to Columbus.
• 57:25
  Speaker 2: So I called Michael Belkin. May he rest in peace.
• 57:28
  Speaker 2: I called Michael Belkin. I said, do you really like
• 57:30
  Speaker 2: coming down to Columbus and covering shows? He goes, no. Now,
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: remember it's only a three thousand seat room. Ticket prices
• 57:37
  Speaker 2: were five six dollars. You're talking about three of profit
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: on the show was three thousand dollars. We made three grand.
• 57:44
  Speaker 2: So I said, I would happily cover the shows. If
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: you split the shows with me, I'll book the shows.
• 57:49
  Speaker 2: You don't have to worry about Columbus. Let's just stay
• 57:51
  Speaker 2: in touch. Tell me what you're booking at Cleveland. I'll
• 57:53
  Speaker 2: tell you what I'm booking at Columbus. Maybe we can
• 57:56
  Speaker 2: marry the bookings. I'll cover the Columbus shows and I
• 57:58
  Speaker 2: get fifty percent. He immediately accepted my deal. So that's
• 58:03
  Speaker 2: how my first partner in the business were the Belkan brothers.
• 58:06
  Speaker 1: Okay, So, just to go a little deeper, you're in
• 58:12
  Speaker 1: partnership with the Belkan brothers. Is it still your money
• 58:16
  Speaker 1: booking in Columbus?
• 58:18
  Speaker 2: Yes, you rarely lost money in those days. Ticket prices
• 58:22
  Speaker 2: were really cheap. Artists guarantees were really cheap. It was
• 58:26
  Speaker 2: a burgeting industry. I would say I could go a
• 58:29
  Speaker 2: full year without losing money on a concert.
• 58:32
  Speaker 1: Okay, So you do your first show with step In Wolf.
• 58:36
  Speaker 1: What happens in the ensuing year. How many shows do
• 58:38
  Speaker 1: you do?
• 58:40
  Speaker 2: Well? My second show was Blood Sweat and Tears and
• 58:44
  Speaker 2: Brooklyn Bridge and I Brooklyn Bridge shows up, Blood Sweat
• 58:49
  Speaker 2: and Tears gets It was David Clayton Thomas, Blood Sweat Tears,
• 58:53
  Speaker 2: not Al Cooper gets fogged in in Chicago in January,
• 58:57
  Speaker 2: it's snowed in. They weren't showing up, so I only
• 59:00
  Speaker 2: had an opening app. Thankfully, a fraternity brother of mine
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: who had graduated Ohio State by the name of Jeff Franklin,
• 59:09
  Speaker 2: owned the agency ATI. He was at the show because
• 59:12
  Speaker 2: Brooklyn Bridge was represented by Jeff Franklin. He helped. He
• 59:17
  Speaker 2: was a fraternity brother of mine. We were both Sammy's
• 59:19
  Speaker 2: at Ohio State, so I had a friend there. So
• 59:22
  Speaker 2: I went over to Jeff. I said, what do I do.
• 59:24
  Speaker 2: I don't have a headliner. He said, play the Brooklyn Bridge.
• 59:28
  Speaker 2: Keep the people's money and we'll work on getting Blufod
• 59:32
  Speaker 2: Sweat and Tears back. I said, but you don't represent Blood,
• 59:35
  Speaker 2: Sweat and Tears. Don't worry. I'll help you out. So
• 59:38
  Speaker 2: with the good help of Jeff Franklin, I was able
• 59:41
  Speaker 2: to rebook the Brooklyn Blood, Sweat and Tears, and I
• 59:45
  Speaker 2: made it a free show for people who had tickets. Again,
• 59:47
  Speaker 2: of course, like five thousand dollars Pluswat and DearS didn't
• 59:50
  Speaker 2: charge me, so I only have five paid five thousand
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: dollars to the building and advertising. It was worth it
• 59:56
  Speaker 2: to get my name back in the right frame of
• 59:59
  Speaker 2: min for the people that go to my car.
• 1:00:01
  Speaker 1: Oh okay, but let's let's just go. I paid a
• 1:00:04
  Speaker 1: sheet blood sweat tears. Blood sweat tears doesn't appear. You're
• 1:00:08
  Speaker 1: telling me what's happened behind the stage. But I paid
• 1:00:11
  Speaker 1: my money. How do you deal with me?
• 1:00:14
  Speaker 2: So? I remember, you only paid five dollars for your ticket. Okay,
• 1:00:17
  Speaker 2: So there wasn't much complaining about not getting two dollars
• 1:00:21
  Speaker 2: and fifty cents back, because it did get Brooklyn Bridge.
• 1:00:24
  Speaker 2: And when I got I never been on stage before.
• 1:00:28
  Speaker 2: And I got up on stage and this this nineteen
• 1:00:32
  Speaker 2: year old kid talking to nineteen year old kids saying,
• 1:00:36
  Speaker 2: I promise you I'll bring back blood, sweat and tears.
• 1:00:39
  Speaker 2: First of all, probably seventy five percent were so stoned
• 1:00:42
  Speaker 2: they didn't give a shit. Tell you the truth. I
• 1:00:45
  Speaker 2: was scared shitless, but nobody complained about it. It was remarkable.
• 1:00:50
  Speaker 2: It was you're right, you're thinking of today's world, not
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: in the old world. People let things go now back now,
• 1:00:57
  Speaker 2: they don't let things go anymore. It's a complaint to minute,
• 1:01:00
  Speaker 2: as you know better than anybody, with the missives you
• 1:01:02
  Speaker 2: much get with your with your emails that you send out.
• 1:01:06
  Speaker 2: I can't imagine what it must be.
• 1:01:07
  Speaker 1: Like okay, so we play it out after blood, sweat
• 1:01:12
  Speaker 1: and tears, and after Jeff Franklin rescues you.
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: Well, then I made the mistake of booking Sly in
• 1:01:18
  Speaker 2: the family Stone. I told you I'm not the swettest
• 1:01:23
  Speaker 2: guy in the whole world. I'm luckiest guy in the
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: whole world. So of course Fly doesn't even show up.
• 1:01:29
  Speaker 2: So I don't know what the hell to do then,
• 1:01:31
  Speaker 2: so I sit with Ben Cowell, the guy, and I go,
• 1:01:36
  Speaker 2: what do I do now? He goes, book it again,
• 1:01:39
  Speaker 2: and everybody hold on to their ticket. So I booked
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: it again. A month later, Fly shows up. A month later,
• 1:01:46
  Speaker 2: I go backstay to meet Fly, and for the first
• 1:01:50
  Speaker 2: time I saw cocaine in my life. I had never
• 1:01:54
  Speaker 2: seen cocaine in my life, and I go, what's that sugar?
• 1:02:00
  Speaker 2: It was a It was a Helman's man man Age
• 1:02:02
  Speaker 2: jar of cocaine. He says, No, that's coke. Me thinking
• 1:02:08
  Speaker 2: it's Coca cola. I go, no, it's not. It's white.
• 1:02:11
  Speaker 2: It's not coke. He goes, Oh, it's coke. Put it
• 1:02:13
  Speaker 2: up your nose, you feel great from it. I go,
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: that's like a giant bottle of it. He goes, it's
• 1:02:18
  Speaker 2: what makes me work? You want some I go no, No,
• 1:02:22
  Speaker 2: I don't want the I'm working. I don't want anything
• 1:02:24
  Speaker 2: like that. So but he went on stage a couple
• 1:02:28
  Speaker 2: hours late and played. So that is what happened at
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: my next show. So I had a lot of hurdles
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 2: to get over to really get my business rolling.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 1: Okay, Well, did you ever say, hey, you know, kind
• 1:02:42
  Speaker 1: of like with the festivals, you know it's going in
• 1:02:45
  Speaker 1: the wrong direction. I've had fun, I'll i'll you know,
• 1:02:48
  Speaker 1: I'm gonna give up.
• 1:02:50
  Speaker 2: Oh, I sure did. That's why I went to law school.
• 1:02:52
  Speaker 1: How many shows did they? How many shows did you
• 1:02:55
  Speaker 1: do before law school?
• 1:02:57
  Speaker 2: Probably about thirty?
• 1:02:59
  Speaker 1: Oh, that's I love you.
• 1:03:01
  Speaker 2: Yeah I did, I did. But you know I was
• 1:03:03
  Speaker 2: a student. I was having fun in Columbus, Ohio. And
• 1:03:06
  Speaker 2: again you have to remember everything was so cheap then.
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: If I paid seventy five hundred dollars for an act,
• 1:03:12
  Speaker 2: it was a big act. I paid the Who to
• 1:03:14
  Speaker 2: play Tommy seventy five hundred dollars. It was just so
• 1:03:19
  Speaker 2: easy to continue going at those in those days.
• 1:03:30
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you were in Columbus, did anybody say, hey,
• 1:03:34
  Speaker 1: complex making money, I'm going to start.
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: No, because I was smart enough to make belk in
• 1:03:39
  Speaker 2: my partner, but no, I realized.
• 1:03:42
  Speaker 1: There were no other Jim Koplics going to Ohio State
• 1:03:45
  Speaker 1: saying I could do this.
• 1:03:47
  Speaker 2: Well, there was, but I didn't know Jerry Michaelson at
• 1:03:49
  Speaker 2: the time. But Jerry was one year behind me. So
• 1:03:52
  Speaker 2: Jerry was watching everything I did. So when I moved
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: out of Columbus to start promoting in Connecticut, guess who
• 1:03:58
  Speaker 2: comes into Columbus. Jerry Michaelson comes into Columbus with Arnie
• 1:04:03
  Speaker 2: and they become Columbus promoters. So, yeah, there was somebody
• 1:04:06
  Speaker 2: right behind me without me realizing that Jerry was right
• 1:04:09
  Speaker 2: behind me.
• 1:04:10
  Speaker 1: Okay, so now you're booking these thirty shows in Columbus.
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 1: To what degree are you involved with the Balkans? To
• 1:04:18
  Speaker 1: what degree do they say, Hey, I booked this person
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 1: in Cleveland, you can have them, or I have a
• 1:04:23
  Speaker 1: relationship or was it pretty much at arm's length?
• 1:04:27
  Speaker 2: It was arm's length. They trusted me, did what they
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 2: liked about me. Jules, I think now is eighty seven
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 2: or eighty eight years old that I'm about to be
• 1:04:35
  Speaker 2: seventy seven, so there's a ten year difference. I think
• 1:04:39
  Speaker 2: they appreciate and Michael their son. Michael's son, Michael was
• 1:04:43
  Speaker 2: about ten twelve years younger than me. So I fit
• 1:04:46
  Speaker 2: the mold at just what they needed, somebody of college
• 1:04:49
  Speaker 2: age that knew what they were talking about. But the
• 1:04:52
  Speaker 2: college kids, like they used me wisely. So we talked
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: about what act for coming up, and they knew a
• 1:04:58
  Speaker 2: lot was going on. Also, I don't want to make
• 1:05:00
  Speaker 2: it look like they were ignorant. They knew a lot,
• 1:05:02
  Speaker 2: but I knew the up and comers. They knew the headliners,
• 1:05:05
  Speaker 2: but I knew who were going to be the headliners.
• 1:05:07
  Speaker 2: So we had weekly calls. And again the business was
• 1:05:11
  Speaker 2: very small at the time. You know, if we did
• 1:05:14
  Speaker 2: fifteen shows a year in Closes, Ohio, that was a lot.
• 1:05:18
  Speaker 2: We didn't do much more than that.
• 1:05:19
  Speaker 1: Okay, tell me a little bit more. Who the ticketing
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 1: company was. Who that person was.
• 1:05:26
  Speaker 2: His name was Ben Cowell. He owned the central Ticket
• 1:05:28
  Speaker 2: Office that was called and he sold tickets down at
• 1:05:31
  Speaker 2: this store, fd Rich it was called. And it was
• 1:05:36
  Speaker 2: a closed store. And I'm up at the campus and
• 1:05:39
  Speaker 2: I said to Ben, we don't want to take a
• 1:05:41
  Speaker 2: bus all the way down to buy tickets. There's no
• 1:05:43
  Speaker 2: other way to buy tickets, I said, can I open
• 1:05:45
  Speaker 2: up the ticket outlet at a stereo store up in Columbus.
• 1:05:49
  Speaker 2: It was an eight track store at the time, and
• 1:05:53
  Speaker 2: he sold sure wild Bill's car stereo was called. So
• 1:05:57
  Speaker 2: what happened was I then took his har tickets and
• 1:06:01
  Speaker 2: brought him up to Columbus, and if somebody bought a ticket,
• 1:06:04
  Speaker 2: I'd call him up and tell him on the phone.
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: I sold two tickets in Row D seats one and two,
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 2: Section twelve, and he'd mark it off on a piece
• 1:06:13
  Speaker 2: of paper just to make sure he didn't sell that ticket. Yes,
• 1:06:17
  Speaker 2: it was very pedestrian, to say the least, and that's
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 2: how we seld tickets.
• 1:06:20
  Speaker 1: Then, so now you go to law school and you
• 1:06:26
  Speaker 1: get hooked up with Shelley. I'm going to jump forward
• 1:06:29
  Speaker 1: before I jump back. How does Shelley get involved in boxing?
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: Nineteen seventy six. We have a very successful concert business,
• 1:06:39
  Speaker 2: and Shelley always loved boxing more than music. He was
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 2: a boxing freak. Goes to Madis Square Garden to see
• 1:06:45
  Speaker 2: the Golden Gloves and he falls in love with one
• 1:06:47
  Speaker 2: of the boxes there, kidnamed Alex Ramos, and he convinces
• 1:06:51
  Speaker 2: Alex that he can do what in boxing, what he's
• 1:06:54
  Speaker 2: done for so many rock stars and make him a star,
• 1:06:58
  Speaker 2: and in turn al this becomes the first client. So
• 1:07:01
  Speaker 2: Shelley and I decide, okay, we're fifty to fifty partners
• 1:07:04
  Speaker 2: in the music business, will be fifty to fifty partners.
• 1:07:06
  Speaker 2: I'll run the music Shelley. We wanted to diversify. Shelley's
• 1:07:10
  Speaker 2: line always was, who knows how long the concert business
• 1:07:13
  Speaker 2: will be around. Boxing's been around for fifty sixty years.
• 1:07:17
  Speaker 2: We don't know how long. The concert business has only
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 2: been around ten years at the time, who knows how
• 1:07:21
  Speaker 2: long to be Let's diversify. I thought it was a
• 1:07:24
  Speaker 2: great idea, and so he ran the boxing business. I
• 1:07:28
  Speaker 2: ran the concert business. He was extremely successful running the
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 2: boxing business. We had a wonderful boxing business.
• 1:07:34
  Speaker 1: Also, just to be clear, in the boxing business, he
• 1:07:38
  Speaker 1: was also a promoter. Or was he a manager? Would
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 1: exactly be he.
• 1:07:41
  Speaker 2: Was a manager. He was a manager. We managed Mike Tyson,
• 1:07:45
  Speaker 2: Evander Holyfield. We managed fourteen world champions. At one time
• 1:07:48
  Speaker 2: we had fourteen world champions. I had very little to
• 1:07:51
  Speaker 2: do with it. I worked harder on the close circuit
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 2: business because I knew the venues and things like that.
• 1:07:56
  Speaker 2: Shelley was ninety five percent of the boxing business. I
• 1:08:00
  Speaker 2: was ninety five percent of the music business.
• 1:08:03
  Speaker 1: Okay, before this corporateization. Music business has a terrible reputation,
• 1:08:09
  Speaker 1: but boxing's reputation is even worse.
• 1:08:13
  Speaker 2: So what can you.
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 1: Gonna tell us anything about the boxing business?
• 1:08:17
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I can tell you that when we took over
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 2: Mike Tyson and his contract after he got out of
• 1:08:23
  Speaker 2: jail for allegedly raping a woman, he says, uh, well,
• 1:08:29
  Speaker 2: I still had this contract with Don King. So Shelley says,
• 1:08:33
  Speaker 2: can we look at it? So Mike goes, sure, no problem,
• 1:08:36
  Speaker 2: but we're fifty to fifty partners. No big deal. We
• 1:08:38
  Speaker 2: look at the contract. They were fifty to fifty partners.
• 1:08:42
  Speaker 2: There was a bad enough deal in itself. Managers don't
• 1:08:44
  Speaker 2: get fifty percent unless you're Colonel Tom Parker. I guess
• 1:08:47
  Speaker 2: you don't get fifty percent. But he got fifty percent
• 1:08:50
  Speaker 2: of the net, Mike, don King got fifty percent of
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 2: the gross. So he said to Mike, Mike, I remember
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 2: sitting there was showing Mike, you're getting fifty percent but
• 1:09:00
  Speaker 2: of the neck. You know the difference between the net
• 1:09:02
  Speaker 2: and the gross. No, I don't, Well, all the expenses
• 1:09:05
  Speaker 2: for the boxing comes off your end. So the training camp,
• 1:09:08
  Speaker 2: the boxers, everything else that you train with comes off
• 1:09:11
  Speaker 2: your end. You're ending up with about ten percent. That's all.
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 2: You're really ending up with about ten percent of the gross.
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 2: So that would tell you about what the boxing business
• 1:09:19
  Speaker 2: was like. Don King was really a total ripoff to
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: his boxers, and Shelley would always say, and you think
• 1:09:27
  Speaker 2: the music business was bad, the boxing business is worse.
• 1:09:31
  Speaker 2: And I think he was right.
• 1:09:33
  Speaker 1: Well, just because you're telling that story, how'd you get
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 1: him out of the deal with Don King?
• 1:09:40
  Speaker 2: He sued Don for the money that he should should
• 1:09:42
  Speaker 2: have gotten and Don dropped him. But Don didn't want
• 1:09:44
  Speaker 2: to work with him anymore. He wanted to because Mike
• 1:09:47
  Speaker 2: was no longer the chance. Don only wanted to work
• 1:09:49
  Speaker 2: with winners. Mike was no longer a winner. He'd just
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: gotten out of jail after I think three years in jail.
• 1:09:54
  Speaker 2: He was going to try to make his comeback. It
• 1:09:56
  Speaker 2: was a new world champion, so he Lennix Lewis was
• 1:09:59
  Speaker 2: the champer at the time. So Mike decided that he'd
• 1:10:03
  Speaker 2: come with us and not with Don King. And Don
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 2: didn't want him anymore. He was old news.
• 1:10:09
  Speaker 1: Okay, just one more step. Mike famously ran out of money.
• 1:10:16
  Speaker 1: Now most managers, etc. They like to keep the money
• 1:10:19
  Speaker 1: separate because so it doesn't come back at him. Are
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 1: these people just not sharp enough? Why do they run
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 1: out of money?
• 1:10:29
  Speaker 2: They spend too much. Shelley was with Mike one day.
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 2: They're driving down from La to San Diego, and Mike
• 1:10:37
  Speaker 2: sees a motorcycle shop and Shelley's driving the car and
• 1:10:43
  Speaker 2: Mike says, let's stop and look at some motorcycles. So
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 2: Shelley pulls off. They look at this motorcycle shop and
• 1:10:48
  Speaker 2: mike'sn't want to buy, so Shelly goes, Okay, which one
• 1:10:51
  Speaker 2: do you want to buy. By the time they left
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 2: the motorcycle shop, he had bought seventeen motorcycles. Wow, that
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 2: says it all they You know, they're poor kids that
• 1:11:02
  Speaker 2: all of a sudden have all the money in the world.
• 1:11:04
  Speaker 2: They want to buy everything in the world. You're right, Bob,
• 1:11:08
  Speaker 2: we did not touch his money. I didn't want to
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 2: get blamed for anything, Shelley. You didn't want to get
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 2: blamed for anything. But nobody says no to Mike Tyson,
• 1:11:15
  Speaker 2: just like nobody says no to rock stars, and nobody
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 2: says no to Donald Trump, the king of the worlds.
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 2: Nobody says no to the king because they're all serving
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 2: the king, and we were all serving Mike Tyson. So
• 1:11:29
  Speaker 2: they let Mike spend the money. But remember he was
• 1:11:32
  Speaker 2: making twenty thirty million a fight, fighting two or three
• 1:11:35
  Speaker 2: times a year, you make one hundred million dollars year.
• 1:11:37
  Speaker 2: Who could ever think he could lose money and run
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 2: out of money, But he did. He ran out of money,
• 1:11:42
  Speaker 2: as most boxers did back in those days.
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 1: Just because you went there, you know, traditionally a music
• 1:11:49
  Speaker 1: contractor fifteen percent management and very occasionally twenty similar in boxing.
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 1: Is what kind of deals did Shelley make?
• 1:11:58
  Speaker 2: We took fees. We really didn't think it was right. Yeah,
• 1:12:02
  Speaker 2: we took fees. Shelley was really smart and how he
• 1:12:05
  Speaker 2: did it. He didn't want the boxer to think that
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 2: we were taking too much. So we pre arranged that
• 1:12:10
  Speaker 2: if you got this much money, we got this much
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 2: of a fee, we got a little more, we got
• 1:12:15
  Speaker 2: more of a fee. We worked on a fee base.
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 2: So therefore, if the if the fighter made, if the
• 1:12:21
  Speaker 2: closed circuit business was enormous, it all went to the boxer,
• 1:12:25
  Speaker 2: it didn't stay with us. We got our fees and
• 1:12:27
  Speaker 2: we made a lot of money. Don't get me wrong,
• 1:12:29
  Speaker 2: we were not crying for money, but we were very
• 1:12:31
  Speaker 2: much into the boxer, the content, the star making all
• 1:12:36
  Speaker 2: the money, and we were we just made the fee.
• 1:12:39
  Speaker 1: We're just staying with the money for a second. Managing
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 1: money can be a full time job. Some people are
• 1:12:46
  Speaker 1: active and lose it all. So with the money you made,
• 1:12:51
  Speaker 1: where did you put it? And have you generally been
• 1:12:55
  Speaker 1: in the black or if you made some bad decisions.
• 1:13:00
  Speaker 2: I think everybody makes bad decisions, and I certainly have
• 1:13:02
  Speaker 2: made bad decisions. But I was smart enough to hire
• 1:13:06
  Speaker 2: a very good money manager after I sold. I never
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 2: needed a money manager until I sold SFX, and then
• 1:13:12
  Speaker 2: I needed a money manager. And I've now got a
• 1:13:15
  Speaker 2: different one because the one that used had a brain aneurysm,
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 2: and I have one I consider even better now. But
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 2: it's not hard to be a money manager with the
• 1:13:25
  Speaker 2: stock market the way it's going today, so I think
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 2: that the test isn't there yet. But I've always had
• 1:13:33
  Speaker 2: my money managed by somebody else. I know I'm good
• 1:13:35
  Speaker 2: at one thing, and that's the music business. I'm not
• 1:13:39
  Speaker 2: good at anything else, okay, And I'm not going to
• 1:13:41
  Speaker 2: try to be good.
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 1: In this heyday of the music business. The economics were
• 1:13:45
  Speaker 1: different sixties and the seventies. There were no billionaires. If
• 1:13:49
  Speaker 1: you were a successful musician, you made as much money
• 1:13:52
  Speaker 1: as anybody in America, a very thin layer, so you
• 1:13:56
  Speaker 1: were doing well. Your father was a dentist, so as
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 1: successful as he is, he's not making twenty million dollars
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 1: a year. You're making money, are you spending it? What's
• 1:14:08
  Speaker 1: your lifestyle like?
• 1:14:11
  Speaker 2: I live in a nice house in Stamford, Connecticut, on
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: three or four acres and a beautiful home. And I
• 1:14:17
  Speaker 2: had a home in Florida that I just sold, and
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 2: I'm going to buy another home in Florida. I have
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 2: enough money for me. My kids will have enough money
• 1:14:25
  Speaker 2: also from me when I pass on. So I feel
• 1:14:31
  Speaker 2: very content. I don't live a very extensive, rich life.
• 1:14:35
  Speaker 2: I have nice cars, but I drive them. They don't
• 1:14:38
  Speaker 2: sit in my garage. But other than that, I you know,
• 1:14:42
  Speaker 2: my girlfriend, which Johnny Podel's ex wife, Monica, has been
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 2: my girlfriend for eight years. My wife died nine years ago,
• 1:14:51
  Speaker 2: and we rent the home in the Hampton, so we
• 1:14:53
  Speaker 2: go to the Hampton's sometimes during the summer, but overall,
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 2: I like working still. I love going to the office.
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 1: Okay, before you knew, before we ate, you know, we
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 1: hit a maturity. Then you're making money. Did you buy
• 1:15:08
  Speaker 1: an expensive car? Did you blow money when you were
• 1:15:10
  Speaker 1: in your twenties? Were you always somewhat conservative and on it?
• 1:15:14
  Speaker 2: That was very conservative? My dad instilled that on me
• 1:15:17
  Speaker 2: because my dad made a lot of money. We were
• 1:15:19
  Speaker 2: one car family. It really pissed me off when I
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 2: went to Ohio State and you wouldn't get me a car.
• 1:15:24
  Speaker 2: I had to take a plane back and forth. I
• 1:15:25
  Speaker 2: couldn't drive around Columbus. My dad would not buy me
• 1:15:28
  Speaker 2: a car. My father was very very strict with me.
• 1:15:33
  Speaker 2: Uh never bought me a car. Wouldn't even get me
• 1:15:36
  Speaker 2: an air conditioning condissier from my bedroom at home. He
• 1:15:41
  Speaker 2: really was tough, and looking back, thank goodness, it taught
• 1:15:45
  Speaker 2: me a lot. I was not happy back then, though.
• 1:15:47
  Speaker 2: I'll say that.
• 1:15:49
  Speaker 1: Okay, you get involved with Shelley because Frank Barcelona has
• 1:15:57
  Speaker 1: already carved up the nation. Tell me about out the
• 1:16:00
  Speaker 1: system and what your experience was working with Frank.
• 1:16:05
  Speaker 2: One of the nicest people I ever met, one of
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 2: the calmest people I ever met, and a very sweet man.
• 1:16:12
  Speaker 2: He made his living through relationships, and he created relationships
• 1:16:19
  Speaker 2: with Peter Rudge, d Anthony, all the old managers that
• 1:16:25
  Speaker 2: Peter Grant, he had led Zeppelin, John Landau, we had
• 1:16:29
  Speaker 2: Bruce Springsteen after Bruce left, William Morris. He was the
• 1:16:33
  Speaker 2: greatest relationship maker I ever saw in my life. I
• 1:16:36
  Speaker 2: could sit in his office for hours in the late
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 2: afternoon into the evening and just talk to music business.
• 1:16:43
  Speaker 2: Working with Frank was one of the great pleasures. And
• 1:16:47
  Speaker 2: every act, no matter if the act was a winner
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 2: or a loser, we'd buy it because we knew in
• 1:16:51
  Speaker 2: the long run, Frank would always make us a lot
• 1:16:53
  Speaker 2: of money. And he came to the Shews. He loved
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 2: New Haven because it's Hallie's. Pizza would always come to
• 1:17:00
  Speaker 2: you would always come to my New Haven shows. He
• 1:17:02
  Speaker 2: had a driver by the name of Frank also ironically enough,
• 1:17:06
  Speaker 2: and every Wednesday he'd send his driver up to Sally's
• 1:17:09
  Speaker 2: in New Haven and bring pizza back. Every Wednesday night
• 1:17:11
  Speaker 2: in New York City, he'd have Sally's pizza for dinner.
• 1:17:14
  Speaker 2: So he made sure that New Haven always got a
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 2: concert from Premier talent.
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, how exactly did it work? Did Frank call you
• 1:17:25
  Speaker 1: and say these are my acts, this is what you
• 1:17:27
  Speaker 1: need to book. How did it work.
• 1:17:31
  Speaker 2: It Frank or one of his agents, Barbara Jane or
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 2: Barry or Kenny Colberger, one of his agents will call
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 2: us and say Jay Giles band is touring this fall.
• 1:17:43
  Speaker 2: Where do you want to play it. They'd actually asked
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 2: where we want to play? I had the New Haven
• 1:17:47
  Speaker 2: and the Springfield mass markets, so I would say I'd
• 1:17:51
  Speaker 2: like to play in the New Haven in Springfield, and
• 1:17:54
  Speaker 2: okay time periods. This time period will say October one
• 1:17:57
  Speaker 2: through fifteen, Here are the available in the arena, and
• 1:18:01
  Speaker 2: Frank's agency would rout the tour and call me back. Okay,
• 1:18:04
  Speaker 2: you've got October twelve in new Haven, You've got October
• 1:18:07
  Speaker 2: thirteen in Springfield. Here's the guarantee. Never negotiated guarantees. They
• 1:18:12
  Speaker 2: were always reasonable, They're always low enough. And as I
• 1:18:16
  Speaker 2: said to you earlier, we always made money. It never
• 1:18:18
  Speaker 2: was an issue. And I think that's the problem of
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 2: today's world. The old people remember ticket prices from the
• 1:18:24
  Speaker 2: seventies and eighties, Well, you know what they were, false
• 1:18:27
  Speaker 2: ticket prices. We were in it for the music. We
• 1:18:31
  Speaker 2: were not in it to make money. The artist didn't
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 2: ask for a lot of money. We didn't get it
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 2: in the artists set to ticket price. As you know,
• 1:18:37
  Speaker 2: and I know it's not me. I'd let rather more
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 2: people be in the house, buy my food, by my
• 1:18:43
  Speaker 2: beverage park and et cetera, et cetera. I want more
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 2: people in that. I want lower ticket prices. I don't
• 1:18:48
  Speaker 2: want higher ticket prices. But you always build your ticket
• 1:18:51
  Speaker 2: price around the guarantee you of the artist. If you're
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 2: paid an artist five million dollars and a ten thousand
• 1:18:55
  Speaker 2: seed arena, you gotta charge five hundred dollars a ticket.
• 1:18:58
  Speaker 2: Just the math works that way. It's not me, it's
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 2: I want more people in the house. I don't think
• 1:19:04
  Speaker 2: the government understands our business. I think we've done a
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 2: poor job explaining it to them. I wish we did
• 1:19:09
  Speaker 2: a better job explaining it to them. But it was
• 1:19:12
  Speaker 2: easy back then. As I said, if Peter Frampton or
• 1:19:15
  Speaker 2: Jay Giles got seventy five hundred, that was a big
• 1:19:18
  Speaker 2: payday for them. I could charge five six dollars a ticket,
• 1:19:21
  Speaker 2: not a problem in a ten thousand seed are not
• 1:19:24
  Speaker 2: a problem at all.
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 1: Okay. Just going back to Frank, could you ever say.
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 2: No, no, there was no reason to say no. I
• 1:19:35
  Speaker 2: always there were still agents today. I still don't say
• 1:19:38
  Speaker 2: no too. There were certainly. Dennis Arfur is a great example.
• 1:19:41
  Speaker 2: I will never say no to Dennis Arpa because they
• 1:19:43
  Speaker 2: know in the long run they're gonna make a lot
• 1:19:45
  Speaker 2: of money from Dennis Arfer. So he sells me. An
• 1:19:47
  Speaker 2: actor is gonna lose money. It's part of the game.
• 1:19:49
  Speaker 2: Call it R and D to my team, research and development.
• 1:19:52
  Speaker 2: Every business has R and D in it. I consider
• 1:19:55
  Speaker 2: losing money on the show with an agent that usually
• 1:19:57
  Speaker 2: sells me winners research and development an R and D.
• 1:20:01
  Speaker 1: Okay, Back in the day before the Live Nation and
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 1: its predecessors corporate, would you ever ask for money back?
• 1:20:10
  Speaker 2: Always? Always, always, And I was very successful at it. Again,
• 1:20:16
  Speaker 2: it's all about relationships. If you know, I knew Wendy
• 1:20:19
  Speaker 2: dial really well. I lost money on Ronnie James once
• 1:20:22
  Speaker 2: I went up to Wendy when she came to the
• 1:20:24
  Speaker 2: New Haven Coliseum. I said, Wendy got murdered tonight, can
• 1:20:28
  Speaker 2: you help me out? Wendy gives me money back. You know,
• 1:20:30
  Speaker 2: if you knew the agent or you knew the manager,
• 1:20:32
  Speaker 2: and again it was back to relationships. I always got
• 1:20:35
  Speaker 2: money back if I needed but I only asked when
• 1:20:37
  Speaker 2: I really needed it. If I lost five thousand on
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 2: the show, I wouldn't complain. I lost fifty thousand dollars
• 1:20:41
  Speaker 2: on a show, I'd ask some money back. I can't
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 2: with Live Nation, though, because Ray Daniels gave me a
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 2: great line when I was helping run Live Nation back
• 1:20:51
  Speaker 2: in two thousand and eight to twenty twelve, when Michael
• 1:20:54
  Speaker 2: put together a board with Jason Garner of Bob rue, Me,
• 1:20:58
  Speaker 2: Rick Franks, and Mark Camana. We were put in charge
• 1:21:02
  Speaker 2: of certain tours. They put me in charge of the
• 1:21:04
  Speaker 2: Rush tour. We didn't do so well on one Rush
• 1:21:06
  Speaker 2: tour in two thousand and two thousand and nine. So
• 1:21:08
  Speaker 2: Michael says, do me a favor. Ask Ray get some
• 1:21:11
  Speaker 2: money back on this show and this show and this show.
• 1:21:14
  Speaker 2: So I called Ray up and I go, Ray, can
• 1:21:16
  Speaker 2: we get money back on these three cities? He goes, well,
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 2: call Michael up and tell them if I buy the
• 1:21:21
  Speaker 2: stock and it goes down, can I get money back? Well?
• 1:21:27
  Speaker 1: I know no one. No one gives money back to
• 1:21:30
  Speaker 1: Live Nation because it's corporate whatever, et cetera. Okay, now
• 1:21:36
  Speaker 1: you got the acts from Frank. What percentage of your
• 1:21:39
  Speaker 1: overall business is that at the.
• 1:21:41
  Speaker 2: Time, Oh, Frank was over fifty percent of the business
• 1:21:44
  Speaker 2: at the time, and ic him was probably twenty five
• 1:21:46
  Speaker 2: percent of the business. Everybody else was twenty five with
• 1:21:49
  Speaker 2: an ATI very close to third place. It was really
• 1:21:52
  Speaker 2: Premiere and then ICM and ATI. There were only three
• 1:21:56
  Speaker 2: real major agencies that really did we did business with.
• 1:22:00
  Speaker 2: Here were some small ones like ABC with Johnny was there.
• 1:22:03
  Speaker 2: Johnny put Out was at ABC, but oh, and then
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 2: Johnny opened up his own company. But overall it was
• 1:22:09
  Speaker 2: a three major agency business, ICM, Premier and William Marsh.
• 1:22:15
  Speaker 1: And what about loyalty in terms of the acts? You know,
• 1:22:19
  Speaker 1: things are different now with tour deals, et cetera. But
• 1:22:23
  Speaker 1: you assumed if you played the act in a small
• 1:22:25
  Speaker 1: building you get them, assuming they grew all the way
• 1:22:27
  Speaker 1: up to arena. Then what was your experience there?
• 1:22:31
  Speaker 2: It always worked. The chain worked. It was it was
• 1:22:34
  Speaker 2: It was really, I guess it was sort of like
• 1:22:37
  Speaker 2: a chain that would be in a business where if
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 2: you made the the nut, you also made the bolt.
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 2: If we played the club back, we also got the
• 1:22:47
  Speaker 2: arena show unless we did something wrong. If we did
• 1:22:50
  Speaker 2: something wrong or we cheated and they didn't and they
• 1:22:54
  Speaker 2: caught us, then we got out. But overall it was
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 2: really a very simple process. I never did anything wrong,
• 1:23:03
  Speaker 2: they never caught me cheating, so therefore everything was fine.
• 1:23:06
  Speaker 2: It worked out.
• 1:23:08
  Speaker 1: Okay. This is a business where the agents pushed for
• 1:23:13
  Speaker 1: more and more. The margins are small to begin with,
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 1: and the accounting can be done multiple ways. Ay, there's
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 1: a subsidiary question here in that it used to be
• 1:23:26
  Speaker 1: guarantee plus percentage. Now the guarantees are much higher. But
• 1:23:30
  Speaker 1: I have certainly seen been in the room with the
• 1:23:34
  Speaker 1: promoters where there are two sets of books. There's the
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 1: set where it goes over and the set where it
• 1:23:40
  Speaker 1: doesn't go over, and they show the act the set
• 1:23:43
  Speaker 1: where it doesn't go over. So to what degree was
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 1: this a fact back in the old days.
• 1:23:51
  Speaker 2: Well, it wasn't a question. I never looked to see
• 1:23:53
  Speaker 2: if they go over. I just cheated, that's all. They
• 1:23:56
  Speaker 2: went over, and I cheated. They still went over. But
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 2: cheating was such little cheating, you know. I tell the
• 1:24:03
  Speaker 2: radio station if I had a Jackson Brown show that
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 2: was losing money. But I had an Eagles show that
• 1:24:09
  Speaker 2: was making I don't want to use Eagles because that's irving.
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 2: If I if I had a Peter Frampton show that
• 1:24:19
  Speaker 2: was making money, I'd say, do me a favorite, right
• 1:24:22
  Speaker 2: on the bill, Peter Frampton instead of Jackson Brown. That way,
• 1:24:26
  Speaker 2: I had no expense one on Jackson Brown's show, and
• 1:24:30
  Speaker 2: I made Peter Franton show a little more expensive. But
• 1:24:32
  Speaker 2: we're talking about eight hundred dollars bills, nine hundred dollar bills.
• 1:24:36
  Speaker 2: At Live Nation, we would never do that. We're a
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 2: public company. My god, we can't cheat. We don't cheat.
• 1:24:42
  Speaker 2: If you cheated, you could blow the whole business, a
• 1:24:45
  Speaker 2: multi billion dollar business. I don't think anybody at Live
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 2: Nation would their cheat. They'd be fools.
• 1:24:51
  Speaker 1: Okay, you said you were a music freak. You know,
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 1: I'm famously said there'll be a point where you don't
• 1:24:57
  Speaker 1: get it. Ay, to what degree you know, as this
• 1:25:03
  Speaker 1: was going on, because it's a business too, to what
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 1: degree were you paying attention and picking the acts? And
• 1:25:10
  Speaker 1: at what point did you give other people chances? And
• 1:25:14
  Speaker 1: what other people did you point did you really trust
• 1:25:16
  Speaker 1: other people to pick the acts?
• 1:25:19
  Speaker 2: Well, you're right, Bob on that, because I always looked
• 1:25:21
  Speaker 2: at Bill Graham as the north Star of concert promoters,
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 2: and he always knew every act. He knew Leonard skinnerd
• 1:25:27
  Speaker 2: was gonna break. But then I realized I googled him,
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 2: and I realized he died at fifty nine years old.
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 2: He died young, so he's still at fifty nine. I
• 1:25:36
  Speaker 2: still had it. I knew what was going on at
• 1:25:38
  Speaker 2: fifty nine years old. I got lucky. My son likes music.
• 1:25:43
  Speaker 2: He wanted to be in the music business. He's forty five.
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 2: He's thirty two years younger than me, and he knows
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 2: what's up and coming. He knows what's up and coming.
• 1:25:52
  Speaker 2: But now he doesn't really know what's up and coming.
• 1:25:54
  Speaker 2: So now I have a thirty year old by the
• 1:25:57
  Speaker 2: name of Kurt Eisley that I hired. So I've got
• 1:25:59
  Speaker 2: a thirty year old, I got a forty five year old.
• 1:26:02
  Speaker 2: And when it comes to Rod Stewart or Bruce Spacing,
• 1:26:05
  Speaker 2: I got me. I've got every generation handled in my
• 1:26:09
  Speaker 2: business unit right now. And by the way, when the
• 1:26:12
  Speaker 2: thirty year old becomes a forty year old, I'm hiring
• 1:26:14
  Speaker 2: another thirty year old.
• 1:26:16
  Speaker 1: Where did you find the thirty year old?
• 1:26:19
  Speaker 2: He? Ironically enough, I found him in New Jersey working
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 2: in the Premium Sea program at Live Nation, and he
• 1:26:28
  Speaker 2: really wanted to become a booker. In his history in
• 1:26:30
  Speaker 2: college was as a booker. But the only way to
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 2: get into Live Nation, he found out, was only through
• 1:26:35
  Speaker 2: the Premium Seat program. So the head of the Premium
• 1:26:37
  Speaker 2: Sea program in the Northeast suggested that I hire him.
• 1:26:40
  Speaker 2: When I told my guy in my office, I'm looking
• 1:26:42
  Speaker 2: for a thirty year old. This guy's great. He's very
• 1:26:45
  Speaker 2: aggressive and he's turned out to be everything I hope for.
• 1:26:49
  Speaker 1: So how many people are in your office?
• 1:26:52
  Speaker 2: I've got forty people in my office because we have
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 2: a sponship team on my office, premium seat team in
• 1:26:57
  Speaker 2: my office, a venue team because I work at at Oakdale,
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 2: so we have a venue team, the gms, the ushers,
• 1:27:05
  Speaker 2: the ops people. We have about forty people in our office.
• 1:27:08
  Speaker 1: And the office is where.
• 1:27:11
  Speaker 2: It's at the Oakdale Theater in Wallingford. I work there
• 1:27:13
  Speaker 2: three days a week and I go to the Bridgeport
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 2: office at the Bridgeport Amphitheatre one day a week.
• 1:27:18
  Speaker 1: Okay, you know there's a famous line with about Disney
• 1:27:22
  Speaker 1: when Jeffrey Katzenberg worked there. If you don't come in
• 1:27:26
  Speaker 1: on Saturday don't even think about coming in on Sunday.
• 1:27:30
  Speaker 1: So is essentially, at this late date, it's still twenty
• 1:27:34
  Speaker 1: four to seven.
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 2: It's twenty four to seven, but not in the office,
• 1:27:38
  Speaker 2: and that bothers me. I hate that we don't have
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 2: office hours and office days anymore. I've actually said that
• 1:27:45
  Speaker 2: to Michael, and I admire what his reasoning is. He
• 1:27:50
  Speaker 2: says that people that make under one hundred grand a year,
• 1:27:53
  Speaker 2: you know, they got used to being at home with
• 1:27:55
  Speaker 2: their kids, and now they maybe can't afford to have childcare.
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 2: So it's up to each separate business unit to decide
• 1:28:01
  Speaker 2: their own office hours and office days. So I admire
• 1:28:05
  Speaker 2: that on him. So I've set my own office hours
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 2: and office days. Locally. Life Nations still doesn't have a
• 1:28:10
  Speaker 2: program as far as universally what the hours are. I
• 1:28:14
  Speaker 2: still come to the office four days a week. I
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 2: don't go on Fridays because traffic in Connecticut on Friday sucks,
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 2: but I still go in four days a week. I
• 1:28:21
  Speaker 2: like the socialization. I think we work much better face
• 1:28:25
  Speaker 2: to face. Some people call me old fashioned. I still
• 1:28:28
  Speaker 2: think the business runs better when you're talking to somebody
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 2: face to face rather than on zoom calls or waiting
• 1:28:34
  Speaker 2: for them to get back to you, or they might
• 1:28:36
  Speaker 2: be on the golf course. I don't know what they're
• 1:28:38
  Speaker 2: doing during the day. I have no idea. I don't
• 1:28:40
  Speaker 2: have a life three sixty app on everybody having on
• 1:28:43
  Speaker 2: my grandkids and my kids. But I don't know what
• 1:28:45
  Speaker 2: the heck my staff is doing. I'd rather than be
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 2: in the office, but it's not the way it is anymore.
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 1: Okay, So we were arranging this and say, oh, yeah,
• 1:28:57
  Speaker 1: I'm busy tonight, I got to go cover a David
• 1:28:59
  Speaker 1: brow In show to what degreed? Do you personally still
• 1:29:03
  Speaker 1: cover shows? And as you say, there might be shows
• 1:29:07
  Speaker 1: that your son are the thirty year old book that
• 1:29:10
  Speaker 1: you may or may not be a fan of, but
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 1: do you have to cover those anyway?
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 2: I've taken covering shows out of my daily grind. Driving
• 1:29:22
  Speaker 2: home at eleven o'clock at night is not the greatest
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 2: because I don't live ten minutes for my venues. The
• 1:29:27
  Speaker 2: closest venue is Bridgeport thirty minutes, but Harford's an hour
• 1:29:30
  Speaker 2: and a half. I don't feel like driving home an
• 1:29:33
  Speaker 2: hour and a half at every show, but I will
• 1:29:36
  Speaker 2: go to most opening shows and venues. I cover probably
• 1:29:39
  Speaker 2: thirty to forty shows a year now, but I have
• 1:29:42
  Speaker 2: three to four hundred shows, and I'll travel as Syracuse,
• 1:29:45
  Speaker 2: I'll travel to Saratoga. But in most cases, Kurt, who's
• 1:29:49
  Speaker 2: my thirty year old, Jeremy's my forty five year old,
• 1:29:52
  Speaker 2: they cover most of the shows. Now, I really don't
• 1:29:54
  Speaker 2: have anything to do there.
• 1:29:56
  Speaker 1: Well, that's gonna be my next question. When you do
• 1:29:58
  Speaker 1: cover a show, why and what are you doing.
• 1:30:02
  Speaker 2: I covered the show to show my face, to show
• 1:30:05
  Speaker 2: my staff that I care, because I do care. I
• 1:30:08
  Speaker 2: really do care. It's more for them than anything else.
• 1:30:11
  Speaker 2: The fans know me from doing concerence in Connecticut for
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 2: over fifty years, and I have a radio show in
• 1:30:17
  Speaker 2: the local radio station, and our ticket club is named
• 1:30:21
  Speaker 2: by me his friends of Jimmy. We have a ticket
• 1:30:24
  Speaker 2: club in Live Nation, and my face is on the website,
• 1:30:28
  Speaker 2: so people know who I am. So I walk in
• 1:30:30
  Speaker 2: the audience, I greet them. I'm sort of like Joe
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 2: Lewis back in Vegas at times, except my mind's better.
• 1:30:37
  Speaker 2: I've been hit in the head as many times as
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 2: he was, so I think the fans like seeing that
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 2: I'm still involved. I think it helps. I think I'm
• 1:30:45
  Speaker 2: an image. I actually take the image away from Live Nation.
• 1:30:48
  Speaker 2: In Connecticut. I think people they know I work for
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 2: Live Nation, but they still mostly think that people that
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 2: are forty and over, they still think it's Jimmy Koplek
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 2: putting the shows on, not Live Nation. I think that's
• 1:30:59
  Speaker 2: good for both me and Live Nation.
• 1:31:00
  Speaker 1: Okay, when you're an agent, they have to cover shows
• 1:31:05
  Speaker 1: for a basic reason, they don't show up, They're going
• 1:31:08
  Speaker 1: to lose the act the manager two. Okay, to what
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 1: degree and we all know there are certain dates that
• 1:31:15
  Speaker 1: are more important for the act than others. To what
• 1:31:18
  Speaker 1: degree do you go when the manager agent is there?
• 1:31:22
  Speaker 1: It was, you know, to cement the relationship. Now it's
• 1:31:25
  Speaker 1: different now with Live Nation buying tours. But over the
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 1: course of your.
• 1:31:29
  Speaker 2: Career, well in the older days in the twentieth century,
• 1:31:35
  Speaker 2: I went to every show that was just a given.
• 1:31:38
  Speaker 2: I went to every single show from two thousand and
• 1:31:42
  Speaker 2: on to twenty to twelve. Those four years eight through
• 1:31:45
  Speaker 2: twelve that I was helping run Live Nation with Michael
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 2: and Jason and the other three guys, I went to
• 1:31:51
  Speaker 2: a lot of shows also because I was I felt
• 1:31:53
  Speaker 2: that was some of the image of Live Nation, and
• 1:31:55
  Speaker 2: we're still a budding company at that point. It was
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 2: the early days of Live Nation. Michael took over in
• 1:32:00
  Speaker 2: two thousand and five, so I really showed up a lot.
• 1:32:05
  Speaker 2: If it's an agent I know that's covering the show,
• 1:32:07
  Speaker 2: I'm always there. I will always be there, not only
• 1:32:10
  Speaker 2: for the business. But I miss them. I don't see
• 1:32:13
  Speaker 2: them as much anymore. I had some great times with
• 1:32:15
  Speaker 2: them in the old days. I was happy, and I
• 1:32:17
  Speaker 2: was so happy to see Mitch Rose at Bruce Springsteen
• 1:32:19
  Speaker 2: on on Saturday Night. It wasn't my show, Bruce does
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 2: his own New York shows. But there I'm online waiting
• 1:32:24
  Speaker 2: to get my ticket, and who's behind me. Mitch Roe's.
• 1:32:27
  Speaker 2: I didn't see Mitchero's in five years. I love Mitch Roe's.
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 2: I was so happy to see him, so it made me.
• 1:32:32
  Speaker 2: It reminded me that Mitch probably doesn't cover a whole
• 1:32:36
  Speaker 2: lot of shows anyway anymore because he's towards my age.
• 1:32:39
  Speaker 2: So he and also agents now have teams. It's a
• 1:32:42
  Speaker 2: different business now. I've noticed what they do. It's they
• 1:32:45
  Speaker 2: don't put one person on an artist. They put three
• 1:32:47
  Speaker 2: agents on an artist. God forbid that one agent leaves,
• 1:32:50
  Speaker 2: the other two can hold on to the artists. So
• 1:32:53
  Speaker 2: I don't think agents are spent as many nights out
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 2: as they used to because they could send one of
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 2: the three team members to a show. So I always
• 1:33:02
  Speaker 2: always ask my production manager find out who's coming to
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 2: the show. If corn capshow's there, I try to be there.
• 1:33:08
  Speaker 2: If Dennis Hoft is there, I'm one hundred percent always there.
• 1:33:11
  Speaker 2: I cover every Dennis Office show. I will always be
• 1:33:14
  Speaker 2: the Dennis Office promoter, whether he does most of his
• 1:33:18
  Speaker 2: tours through Rick Franks and Live Nation, but I want
• 1:33:21
  Speaker 2: Dennis to know I care about his artists, so I
• 1:33:24
  Speaker 2: go to every Dennis Office show. I'll do the same
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 2: on Rob Likes shows. I'm friends with Rob White forever.
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 2: I will got every one of Rob's acts. John Bunjovi
• 1:33:33
  Speaker 2: comes in. Actually they're related now because Rob's daughter married
• 1:33:38
  Speaker 2: one of John's sons, So I go to every John
• 1:33:40
  Speaker 2: bon Jovi show. There are certain artists I'll go to
• 1:33:42
  Speaker 2: every show.
• 1:33:52
  Speaker 1: Okay used to be a cash business because no one
• 1:33:57
  Speaker 1: trusted a check. Was it always cash and when did
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 1: it change?
• 1:34:03
  Speaker 2: Well, it was always cash and it was always hard
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 2: to get cash. But they also paid their bills in cash.
• 1:34:08
  Speaker 2: So it was very strange sitting in a at a
• 1:34:12
  Speaker 2: hotel desk the next morning and watching somebody take ten
• 1:34:15
  Speaker 2: thousand dollars and one hundred dollars bills to pay a
• 1:34:17
  Speaker 2: hotel bill. But it was always cash. You're absolutely right.
• 1:34:20
  Speaker 2: It ended up being checks when we were established, so
• 1:34:25
  Speaker 2: that was probably in the late mid to late nineteen nineties.
• 1:34:27
  Speaker 2: It got to be checks. It's a complete wire transfer
• 1:34:31
  Speaker 2: business now and not the night of the show now.
• 1:34:34
  Speaker 2: Maybe it's because I worked for Live Nation and everybody
• 1:34:36
  Speaker 2: trusts Live Nation will pay. But right now we can
• 1:34:40
  Speaker 2: take two or three days to wire the money because
• 1:34:43
  Speaker 2: it's always a process in a big company to get
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 2: money wired, and nobody ever complains to me. So total
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 2: wire transfer business. Now. We'll have to have some cash
• 1:34:51
  Speaker 2: on the road, but now it's credit cards more than
• 1:34:53
  Speaker 2: anything than even cash.
• 1:34:56
  Speaker 1: Going back to nineteen seventy three, LED's up.
• 1:34:58
  Speaker 2: When is it?
• 1:34:59
  Speaker 1: The Draco would tell they're paid. I think two hundred
• 1:35:01
  Speaker 1: and forty two thousand dollars. It could have been two
• 1:35:04
  Speaker 1: twelve from Madison Square Garden. The money is put in
• 1:35:07
  Speaker 1: the safe. It's stolen, but they go home to England anyway,
• 1:35:13
  Speaker 1: what's your take, was it stolen or did they steal
• 1:35:15
  Speaker 1: the money themselves?
• 1:35:19
  Speaker 2: My guess is they stole the money themselves. That would
• 1:35:23
  Speaker 2: be my guess. First of all, I know Peter Grant.
• 1:35:26
  Speaker 2: I knew Peter Grant. I don't think he's alive anymore,
• 1:35:28
  Speaker 2: but I knew Peter Grant, so I would suspect that
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 2: it was a scamp. How do you walk away with
• 1:35:35
  Speaker 2: two hundred and twelve thousand dollars in twenties? They were
• 1:35:38
  Speaker 2: in nineteen seventy three. One hundred dollars bill was rarely
• 1:35:42
  Speaker 2: seen in nineteen seventy three. It had to be we
• 1:35:45
  Speaker 2: get We paid artists in twenties.
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 1: So just to stay there. You said it was hard
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 1: to get the cash. Tell me about getting the cash.
• 1:35:54
  Speaker 2: We had to bring truck, come parked outside. We wouldn't
• 1:35:58
  Speaker 2: even take the cash in. When it was time to
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 2: pay the artists. I had to bring this guy with
• 1:36:01
  Speaker 2: the gun in a holster, come in with a bag
• 1:36:05
  Speaker 2: of money and bring the money in because I didn't
• 1:36:08
  Speaker 2: want to lose the money. God forbid, And so I
• 1:36:12
  Speaker 2: had to bring trucks sitting outside the New Haven coll
• 1:36:14
  Speaker 2: seume all the time.
• 1:36:15
  Speaker 1: And in your career to what degree of you experience
• 1:36:20
  Speaker 1: rode me in a jurors, whipping out a gun or
• 1:36:23
  Speaker 1: physical activity.
• 1:36:27
  Speaker 2: Not much at all. Maybe it was my personality. I'm
• 1:36:30
  Speaker 2: a pretty mellow guy. There was never any trouble at all,
• 1:36:33
  Speaker 2: no physicality whatsoever, no danger whatsoever. I paid every one
• 1:36:39
  Speaker 2: of my bills. But you got to remember, Bob. Back
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 2: in those days, we were friends. I knew everybody by
• 1:36:45
  Speaker 2: first name. I went to their house. Even the artist
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 2: Mike Love slept at my apartment. The leader, the lead
• 1:36:50
  Speaker 2: sing of the Beach Boys, slept at my apartment. When
• 1:36:52
  Speaker 2: he played for me. He come home with me and
• 1:36:54
  Speaker 2: stay at my apartment. There was no silly stuff going
• 1:36:59
  Speaker 2: on at all at all. But now I can't speak
• 1:37:02
  Speaker 2: for other promoters. You know, I won't names, but there
• 1:37:05
  Speaker 2: were some people that were promoters that were not on
• 1:37:08
  Speaker 2: the up and up for sure.
• 1:37:10
  Speaker 1: And you know, Frank had his system. This was a
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 1: big issue in terms of poaching. Was it just clear
• 1:37:21
  Speaker 1: with Frank, don't go elsewhere and what about non Frank acts?
• 1:37:28
  Speaker 2: Well, I tried that. Once I got smacked down, I
• 1:37:33
  Speaker 2: went up to Boston and I decided I was going
• 1:37:37
  Speaker 2: to do shows at the Boston Music Hall on the
• 1:37:39
  Speaker 2: Boston Garden. Thankfully, the Grateful Dead were very friendly with me.
• 1:37:43
  Speaker 2: The gratefueld Dead sold me two shows of the Boston
• 1:37:45
  Speaker 2: Musical and then show saw me shows at the Garden.
• 1:37:47
  Speaker 2: Johnny Podell saying thing saw me shows, and other agents
• 1:37:52
  Speaker 2: Danny Weiner saw me Bread, Curtis Mayfield. I had a
• 1:37:55
  Speaker 2: lot of shows in Boston for a year after I
• 1:37:59
  Speaker 2: was starting to make in progress. I was no Don Lord,
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 2: Don't get me wrong, but I was starting to make
• 1:38:02
  Speaker 2: some progress in Boston and I got called into Frank's
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 2: office and he looks at me and he goes, Jimmy
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 2: and Shelley, if you don't get out of Boston, Don
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 2: Law is coming to Connecticut. I never went to Boston again.
• 1:38:17
  Speaker 2: I did not want Don Lay in Connecticut. So that's
• 1:38:20
  Speaker 2: how it happened. I literally got threatened with my business.
• 1:38:24
  Speaker 1: And when Jerry starts nationally promoting, what's your take on that?
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 2: Very botheres to me because it was, you know, I
• 1:38:34
  Speaker 2: had worked with Chicago back in the old days, and
• 1:38:36
  Speaker 2: then Jerry got to the Chicago tour. It was very
• 1:38:38
  Speaker 2: bothersome to me. And I was very friendly with Walt
• 1:38:41
  Speaker 2: from the band, and I called Walt at home and
• 1:38:44
  Speaker 2: I said, well, you're not playing for me. You know,
• 1:38:46
  Speaker 2: we used to party together in Ohio, travel with you
• 1:38:48
  Speaker 2: and car to car and city to city. We had
• 1:38:51
  Speaker 2: a great time. It's James will and Gercier was a
• 1:38:54
  Speaker 2: manager and Larry Fitzgerald. I said, it's not my choice.
• 1:38:58
  Speaker 2: I'm just the artist. True, I get it, it's the
• 1:39:01
  Speaker 2: manager's decision. It was very bositising to me. But I'm
• 1:39:04
  Speaker 2: sure people feel that way about Live Nation these days
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 2: when they've worked with artists that are tours throughout the years.
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 2: Also Live Nation buys the tour or AEG. I was
• 1:39:13
  Speaker 2: with Larry Maggot the day that bon Jovi went with
• 1:39:16
  Speaker 2: AEG and Larry was partners with bon Jovi in the
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 2: soccer team in Philadelphia, and Larry was so upset that
• 1:39:25
  Speaker 2: John was deciding to go with AEG. But it was
• 1:39:28
  Speaker 2: a business decision. I've learned to separate business from personal
• 1:39:32
  Speaker 2: and Larry was very upset, understandably, so we would lose acts.
• 1:39:37
  Speaker 2: Elton John. I played Elton John in nineteen seventy one
• 1:39:39
  Speaker 2: at Columbus Ohio, and Howard so many Elton John. I
• 1:39:42
  Speaker 2: have Elton John at Notre Dame University and I had
• 1:39:46
  Speaker 2: Elton John a lot of cities, a lot of places,
• 1:39:49
  Speaker 2: ag gets the tour and never did another Elton John date. Again.
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 2: That bothered me.
• 1:39:54
  Speaker 1: Okay, since you've been around so much, what makes a
• 1:39:58
  Speaker 1: good manager and who were some the good managers you
• 1:40:01
  Speaker 1: work with.
• 1:40:03
  Speaker 2: I've always said that if I was an artist, I'd
• 1:40:06
  Speaker 2: want Irving Azoff to manage me. I want Dennis Offer
• 1:40:09
  Speaker 2: to be my agent. I think they're the cream of
• 1:40:12
  Speaker 2: the crop. I think Irving has the best sense of
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 2: the music business. He's been in every end of it. Ticketing,
• 1:40:19
  Speaker 2: record company, merchandising, managing and with Live Nation promoting. Is
• 1:40:24
  Speaker 2: nothing Irving hasn't done, and he's successful at everything. And
• 1:40:28
  Speaker 2: he's also very reachable. As you know. I'm sure you
• 1:40:31
  Speaker 2: could text him, you can email them, get back in
• 1:40:33
  Speaker 2: five minutes. He might send you email to ten other people.
• 1:40:36
  Speaker 2: You never know about that, but you know he's going
• 1:40:38
  Speaker 2: to give you a quick answer. Irving is a personal friend.
• 1:40:41
  Speaker 2: I have a few personal friends in the business. Irving
• 1:40:43
  Speaker 2: is one of them. I think Irving is the best
• 1:40:45
  Speaker 2: manager in the business, even and his son Jeff is
• 1:40:49
  Speaker 2: easily carrying on the tradition. He's a wonderful manager. Look
• 1:40:52
  Speaker 2: at Harry Styles, but Jeff's done with Harry Style. Dennis Offer,
• 1:40:57
  Speaker 2: best agent in the business, was smart enough to not
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 2: have me call the building to get the rent deal.
• 1:41:04
  Speaker 2: He would call the building. He threatened the building, I'm
• 1:41:07
  Speaker 2: not going to give you. I don't want your deal,
• 1:41:09
  Speaker 2: because the building always gave me a piece of the
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 2: rent on the side. The building didn't want to lose
• 1:41:13
  Speaker 2: the show, so Dennis would other taking my piece of
• 1:41:16
  Speaker 2: the buildings that they would give me and it would
• 1:41:18
  Speaker 2: go to the artist. I'm sorry, Jimmy, but I wanted
• 1:41:21
  Speaker 2: to make sure I got Billy Joel. I had to
• 1:41:23
  Speaker 2: give your piece to Dennis Offer and lower the rent.
• 1:41:26
  Speaker 2: So Dennis and he did it nicely. Dennis is a
• 1:41:29
  Speaker 2: sweet guy. He did it nicely. I think he was
• 1:41:32
  Speaker 2: the best still is the best agent in the business.
• 1:41:35
  Speaker 1: Okay, you know, I was stunned when you had a
• 1:41:39
  Speaker 1: festival in Seaside Park growing up for Seaside Park for
• 1:41:45
  Speaker 1: those who don't know, it's by the water in Bridgeport, Connecticut.
• 1:41:50
  Speaker 1: Not such a good neighborhood. Someplace, this other place a
• 1:41:53
  Speaker 1: little bit better tell me the experience there and what
• 1:41:56
  Speaker 1: the status of it is.
• 1:41:59
  Speaker 2: We we worked with a company called Founders Entertainment. They
• 1:42:02
  Speaker 2: do Governance Ball in New York and they're owned by
• 1:42:04
  Speaker 2: C three, which is owned by lad Nation. So they
• 1:42:07
  Speaker 2: approached me about doing the show. It's it wasn't my
• 1:42:09
  Speaker 2: idea of doing the festival, but I thought it was
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 2: a good idea. I thought it was a good idea.
• 1:42:12
  Speaker 2: So Tom and Jordan knew the two owners of Founders,
• 1:42:18
  Speaker 2: and we did the first year and it went very
• 1:42:21
  Speaker 2: very well, very successful. Second year did very well too.
• 1:42:26
  Speaker 2: We do the third year of Food Fighters and Dave
• 1:42:31
  Speaker 2: has this marital problem and three days before the show
• 1:42:34
  Speaker 2: cancels off. We dance around, We get Jack White and
• 1:42:39
  Speaker 2: Greta van Fleet musically made no sense compared to the
• 1:42:43
  Speaker 2: Food Fighters. People are really unhappy with us, really unhappy
• 1:42:47
  Speaker 2: with what happened the festil We had to offer refunds.
• 1:42:50
  Speaker 2: Refunds came in and it really made the festival smell.
• 1:42:56
  Speaker 2: But I can't think of any better way. We decided
• 1:42:59
  Speaker 2: to do a fourth year with the Killers. But once
• 1:43:02
  Speaker 2: a festival gets a bad rap, it's hard to fix it,
• 1:43:06
  Speaker 2: certainly in one year, and we decided to cancel the
• 1:43:09
  Speaker 2: festal the fourth year and we're never going back. I'm
• 1:43:12
  Speaker 2: afraid that it was ruined by the bad third year
• 1:43:15
  Speaker 2: that we had.
• 1:43:17
  Speaker 1: Okay, you have a festival in southern California. Not gonna rain.
• 1:43:22
  Speaker 1: It's not gonna be any bad weather. Now these festivals
• 1:43:26
  Speaker 1: are in the past. But did you say, Okay, we're
• 1:43:28
  Speaker 1: gonna put a festival Bridgeport. It could rain every day?
• 1:43:33
  Speaker 1: And it did, And did you have to shut it down?
• 1:43:36
  Speaker 2: Did no? We never shut down, but we started late.
• 1:43:40
  Speaker 2: The second year two we started very late. It was
• 1:43:42
  Speaker 2: very rainy, and started very late. I hated festivals. I'm
• 1:43:45
  Speaker 2: glad I'm not in the festival busts anymore. Because you know,
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 2: he's your partner. God, God doesn't tell you when it's
• 1:43:51
  Speaker 2: gonna rain. He's not a good partner. If he was
• 1:43:54
  Speaker 2: a good partner, it wouldn't rain on my festivals. And
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 2: by the way, it rains on almost every festival in
• 1:43:59
  Speaker 2: the East Coast. Watkins Lenard rained every Woodstock it reigned,
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 2: whether it be Woodstock six ninety four, ninety nine, it
• 1:44:06
  Speaker 2: rained at all three. God likes to make it rain
• 1:44:09
  Speaker 2: on festivals. He's not a good partner. I don't like festivals.
• 1:44:12
  Speaker 1: Okay, you sit around with the concert promoters, they all
• 1:44:17
  Speaker 1: have their stories. So tell me a couple of years.
• 1:44:23
  Speaker 2: Well, I could give you a Sharon Osborne story, who
• 1:44:27
  Speaker 2: I dearly love, but she got real mad at me.
• 1:44:30
  Speaker 2: Once we were having oz I was in charge of
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 2: Ozfest one year, the free oz Fest, when we decided
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 2: to do it for free, and Michael put me in
• 1:44:38
  Speaker 2: charge of You know, that's when Rick and Bob and
• 1:44:41
  Speaker 2: me and Mark are running things, and so we each
• 1:44:44
  Speaker 2: had our own things we were in charge of. I
• 1:44:45
  Speaker 2: was in charge of ozvest I like that Sharon. Sharon
• 1:44:49
  Speaker 2: liked my wife a lot, so I thought, this is great.
• 1:44:52
  Speaker 2: But it's a free oz Fest. So I get on
• 1:44:55
  Speaker 2: the phone and we're planning it. And Dan Peese was
• 1:44:58
  Speaker 2: our production manager. He rests in peace and he came
• 1:45:02
  Speaker 2: from me. I brought Danny into the business, and so
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 2: it's a perfect way to me for me to run it.
• 1:45:09
  Speaker 2: And I got on the phone with Sharon and uh,
• 1:45:11
  Speaker 2: it's a conference called there were no zooms back in
• 1:45:14
  Speaker 2: the day. And she says, I'm having ten trucks. And
• 1:45:18
  Speaker 2: Danny had said to me, can't be more than two trucks.
• 1:45:21
  Speaker 2: We can't afford more than two two trucks. So I
• 1:45:24
  Speaker 2: said to Sharon, well, what do you think of the
• 1:45:26
  Speaker 2: idea of two trucks? He goes, who the fuck is
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 2: talking to me like this? I'm friendly with her. I
• 1:45:33
  Speaker 2: got Jimmy kpplic you motherfucker. Shut the fuck up. We're
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 2: doing ten trucks. I want to hear another word out
• 1:45:40
  Speaker 2: of you. I back off. I call Michael up on
• 1:45:43
  Speaker 2: the side. I'm in real trouble. She yelled at me.
• 1:45:45
  Speaker 2: I hate getting yelled at by women. It's a bad thing.
• 1:45:48
  Speaker 2: Blah blah blah. He goes, do whatever she wants. Thankfully
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 2: that worked out, osays. Happens in Hartford that tour, and
• 1:45:56
  Speaker 2: the kids started throwing dirt all the lawn, picking up
• 1:46:01
  Speaker 2: sod and throwing it all over the place. I get
• 1:46:03
  Speaker 2: on stage and I say to everybody, I am in
• 1:46:06
  Speaker 2: charge of assess the live nation. I decide where it's
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 2: gonna play. I really didn't decide. Sharon decided where it's
• 1:46:12
  Speaker 2: good play. But I lied, I said, and I'm never
• 1:46:15
  Speaker 2: bringing it back to Hartford again if you don't stop
• 1:46:17
  Speaker 2: putting everything down. They put the sod down. Everything got
• 1:46:20
  Speaker 2: real peaceful. I walked backstage with a big chest out there,
• 1:46:24
  Speaker 2: go Sharon. I just stopped the riote outside how'd you
• 1:46:27
  Speaker 2: do that? Then? Well, I got on stage and I
• 1:46:29
  Speaker 2: got on the mic, and I said, you know what
• 1:46:31
  Speaker 2: if blah blah blah blah blah blah, who the health
• 1:46:34
  Speaker 2: let you on stage? I said, I just went on stage.
• 1:46:37
  Speaker 2: The production manager, my production manager. I want him in here.
• 1:46:40
  Speaker 2: To bring the production manager in here? Who've told you
• 1:46:43
  Speaker 2: to let him speak? Well, he wanted to stop a riot.
• 1:46:46
  Speaker 2: It's not his stage. When I'm here, it's my stage.
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 2: I would have stopped it, I said, Sharon, I stopped
• 1:46:52
  Speaker 2: the riot. It's not your fucking stage. Get the fuck
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 2: out of here. I'd go home. She didn't want me
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 2: on the grounds. She sent me home. I was sixty
• 1:47:01
  Speaker 2: years old. I'm being sent home as a very bad
• 1:47:08
  Speaker 2: moment in my career, I'll tell you that. So that
• 1:47:10
  Speaker 2: was a great Sharon Osbourne not appreciating what I had done,
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 2: let's put it that way. But I learned a lesson
• 1:47:17
  Speaker 2: because Michael kept me in charge of us as for
• 1:47:20
  Speaker 2: a few more years because he said, you're learning how
• 1:47:22
  Speaker 2: to deal with her now, aren't you. I said, yes,
• 1:47:25
  Speaker 2: I am learning how to deal with her now. So well,
• 1:47:29
  Speaker 2: Michael put me and this guy Ben Whedon in charge
• 1:47:32
  Speaker 2: of clubs and theaters. When I was helping run things,
• 1:47:34
  Speaker 2: I said to Michael, I'd never run a club. I
• 1:47:36
  Speaker 2: don't know anything about clubs, because that's why you're doing it.
• 1:47:39
  Speaker 2: I don't want fresh eyes on it. And he was right.
• 1:47:43
  Speaker 2: I saw so many things that were done in clubs
• 1:47:45
  Speaker 2: that were weren't really the right thing, and he was right,
• 1:47:48
  Speaker 2: put fresh eyes on it. So, you know, I gained
• 1:47:51
  Speaker 2: Michael's trust, and that was very important that I gained
• 1:47:54
  Speaker 2: Michael's trumps. You know, there are tons of stories, old
• 1:47:58
  Speaker 2: rock and roll stories. You know, there were times they
• 1:48:02
  Speaker 2: didn't pay the act because I didn't have the money
• 1:48:04
  Speaker 2: on me. So I literally wrote out in IOU and
• 1:48:07
  Speaker 2: I paid it. I paid it, but didn't have enough money.
• 1:48:09
  Speaker 2: With I lost a lot of money. I'd write in IO,
• 1:48:11
  Speaker 2: you literally iowe you seventeen hundred dollars or something like that,
• 1:48:16
  Speaker 2: and I'd pay it. And then there were you know
• 1:48:19
  Speaker 2: stories with Kiss. We were in Springfield, Massachusetts, and their
• 1:48:25
  Speaker 2: sound and lights blew out, and I go backstage and
• 1:48:29
  Speaker 2: I'm with Gene and Paul and I go we could
• 1:48:32
  Speaker 2: turn on either the sound or the lights, but we
• 1:48:34
  Speaker 2: can't do both. And Paul looks at me and goes,
• 1:48:37
  Speaker 2: if the kids aren't getting a kiss show, fuck it,
• 1:48:39
  Speaker 2: we're not giving them a kiss show. So I look
• 1:48:42
  Speaker 2: at them and I go, well, Gene, then I can't
• 1:48:43
  Speaker 2: pay you act to give everybody their money back. And
• 1:48:46
  Speaker 2: Jane looks at Paul and goes, we're going on stage
• 1:48:49
  Speaker 2: sound only, no lights were getting paid. I like Gene
• 1:48:53
  Speaker 2: a lot. He's a real businessman. I like that he
• 1:48:56
  Speaker 2: understood the ideas to make money. So I really bonded
• 1:48:59
  Speaker 2: with Gene that night, very nicely. So, you know, we
• 1:49:03
  Speaker 2: have so many stories. You know, it's very funny. The
• 1:49:07
  Speaker 2: last thing that you did on Donald Kay, I had
• 1:49:10
  Speaker 2: written to you about, you know, the stories of dying
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 2: with us, and Peter Rudge saw that he had written
• 1:49:15
  Speaker 2: to you also. Peter I had spoken to Peter in
• 1:49:17
  Speaker 2: fifteen years, and he called me and he said, I've
• 1:49:20
  Speaker 2: spoke to you so many years. We need to do
• 1:49:22
  Speaker 2: a documentary. We're trying to put together, Peter and I
• 1:49:25
  Speaker 2: and a document and Don Los a documentary putting all
• 1:49:29
  Speaker 2: of us in a room and telling all the old
• 1:49:31
  Speaker 2: stories about what we did with all the artists and
• 1:49:34
  Speaker 2: how we the stories that we had. Mike loved sleeping
• 1:49:38
  Speaker 2: on my apartment. Well, I'm the vacation with Peter Frampton
• 1:49:41
  Speaker 2: and Nassau or whatever. The stories we all have. Don
• 1:49:44
  Speaker 2: Lai had the Olmer brothers sleep at his apartment because
• 1:49:47
  Speaker 2: they couldn't afford hotels in nineteen sixty nine when they
• 1:49:50
  Speaker 2: played the Tea Party in Boston. There were so many
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 2: great stories that I'm afraid of dying with people like
• 1:49:56
  Speaker 2: Donald Kay and I hope we put a documentary together
• 1:50:01
  Speaker 2: that will put everything well, it's just one hour and
• 1:50:05
  Speaker 2: a half.
• 1:50:06
  Speaker 1: Certainly needed just a little more stuff before we go.
• 1:50:09
  Speaker 1: What did you learn at clubs that was done wrong?
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 2: They didn't ramp. First thing I noticed. They kept the
• 1:50:16
  Speaker 2: same beer prices for every show. So if you had
• 1:50:20
  Speaker 2: a James Taylor in the club, which is really more
• 1:50:23
  Speaker 2: pop smoking crowd than a beer drinking crowd, the beers
• 1:50:26
  Speaker 2: were five dollars. But if you had Leonard Skinner in
• 1:50:29
  Speaker 2: the club, which is more of a beer drinking crowd,
• 1:50:32
  Speaker 2: the beers for five dollars. I said, raise it to
• 1:50:35
  Speaker 2: six or seven dollars. They're not going to not buy
• 1:50:38
  Speaker 2: the beer. All of a sudden, we created a new
• 1:50:40
  Speaker 2: income stream that nobody had ever thought of. It's called
• 1:50:42
  Speaker 2: ramping up price. Since you ramp you ramp up or
• 1:50:44
  Speaker 2: you ramped down. Nobody had ever done that before everything
• 1:50:47
  Speaker 2: was the same price. I said, that makes no sense.
• 1:50:51
  Speaker 2: So that was the first thing I changed with the
• 1:50:54
  Speaker 2: club business. Ramping beer prices and also ramping him down.
• 1:50:59
  Speaker 2: You make more money. You might sell the price might
• 1:51:03
  Speaker 2: be less per beer, but you'll sell more beer, so
• 1:51:06
  Speaker 2: you end up making more dollars at the end of
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 2: the day. I changed parking. If the club had its
• 1:51:13
  Speaker 2: own parking lot, I said, it's not the number of
• 1:51:17
  Speaker 2: cars you park the amount of money you make on
• 1:51:19
  Speaker 2: the parking. Charge more money if I park less cars,
• 1:51:22
  Speaker 2: but you make more money in the end. So it
• 1:51:24
  Speaker 2: wasn't everyone that with lot's gonna fill up, well, then
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 2: charge more money. And even if it's only three quarters filled,
• 1:51:30
  Speaker 2: you're gonna make more money on a three quarters fill
• 1:51:32
  Speaker 2: lot than a fill lot at a lower price point.
• 1:51:35
  Speaker 2: So I tried to change the whole thinking of how
• 1:51:38
  Speaker 2: you make money. It's not the same all the time.
• 1:51:41
  Speaker 2: If an old show with the Beach Boys, my premium
• 1:51:44
  Speaker 2: parking prices go up on that because they don't want
• 1:51:47
  Speaker 2: to walk too far. But if you have whiskey Myers
• 1:51:50
  Speaker 2: they don't give a darn. Don't walk a mile to
• 1:51:53
  Speaker 2: see Whiskey Myers right now. So I lower the price
• 1:51:55
  Speaker 2: on the parking when it comes to Whiskey Meyers. But
• 1:51:58
  Speaker 2: I raised the price in the parking when it comes
• 1:51:59
  Speaker 2: to the Beach Boys. So if every show is different,
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 2: it's a local business. Every market's different, every show is different,
• 1:52:08
  Speaker 2: every day the week is different. You gotta spend more
• 1:52:10
  Speaker 2: money to sell a Monday show than not Saturday show.
• 1:52:13
  Speaker 2: So what do you do. You spend more money to
• 1:52:15
  Speaker 2: sell a Monday show. So I don't even keep the
• 1:52:17
  Speaker 2: same advertising costs on a per show base. I want
• 1:52:22
  Speaker 2: to know what day of the week it is. If
• 1:52:23
  Speaker 2: it's a Monday, I got to spend more money to
• 1:52:26
  Speaker 2: market the show. It's a very it's a very unique business.
• 1:52:31
  Speaker 2: It's not selling m and ms, which sell the same
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 2: in every market. Doesn't matter. If I have a Monday
• 1:52:36
  Speaker 2: show with a week act, I got to spend more money.
• 1:52:38
  Speaker 2: If as Saturday show with a strong act, I hardly
• 1:52:41
  Speaker 2: have to spend any money and they just have twenty
• 1:52:43
  Speaker 2: five percent, it doesn't matter. Deliver Rodrigo's of the World,
• 1:52:46
  Speaker 2: the Bruce Springsteens of the World. It doesn't matter. Then
• 1:52:48
  Speaker 2: any day of the week selles tickets. But when you
• 1:52:51
  Speaker 2: have a Rod Stewart on a Monday, people in this
• 1:52:53
  Speaker 2: seventies don't want to go out on Monday nights. So
• 1:52:56
  Speaker 2: on a Saturday night, I'll church to hide a ticket
• 1:52:58
  Speaker 2: price for Rod Stewart on Saturday night a lower that
• 1:53:00
  Speaker 2: took our price on a Monday night. And same thing
• 1:53:03
  Speaker 2: with clubs. Budday night tickets should be cheaper than Saturday
• 1:53:07
  Speaker 2: night tickets.
• 1:53:09
  Speaker 1: Okay, you know there's all this discussion about the younger
• 1:53:14
  Speaker 1: generation drinking less. Have you seen that?
• 1:53:19
  Speaker 2: Yes, yes, I've noticed our in Bridgeport. Our alcohol sales
• 1:53:24
  Speaker 2: were down last year. Our per caps were down last year.
• 1:53:27
  Speaker 2: It's very noticeable.
• 1:53:30
  Speaker 1: And what is Jimmy's Concert Club.
• 1:53:35
  Speaker 2: It's a by the way. I think it's down because
• 1:53:37
  Speaker 2: the kids are drinking less, but I think gummies are
• 1:53:40
  Speaker 2: taking over. I think that really is what's doing. And
• 1:53:43
  Speaker 2: what we've done in Bridgeport is we have a Candidis
• 1:53:48
  Speaker 2: dispensary in the Amphitheater. We are not allowed to sell it,
• 1:53:53
  Speaker 2: but you can order online before you get there and
• 1:53:56
  Speaker 2: they will have it for you and you can pick
• 1:53:58
  Speaker 2: it up there. You have to pay for online but
• 1:54:00
  Speaker 2: you can pick it up at the Amphitheater and we're
• 1:54:02
  Speaker 2: finding it's doing more in my business.
• 1:54:04
  Speaker 1: How much funny can you make doing that?
• 1:54:06
  Speaker 2: We don't make money on it. We charge them to
• 1:54:10
  Speaker 2: the season a certain amount of money. I think it's
• 1:54:12
  Speaker 2: ten thousand dollars and they set up there and so
• 1:54:15
  Speaker 2: we don't have any margin. It's more like a sponsorship,
• 1:54:19
  Speaker 2: and that's what we do. So I have no idea
• 1:54:21
  Speaker 2: what the margins are. But they're back year two this year,
• 1:54:24
  Speaker 2: so they must be doing well.
• 1:54:26
  Speaker 1: Okay, So Jimmy's concert.
• 1:54:28
  Speaker 2: Club it's called Friend to Jimmy because they think they're
• 1:54:33
  Speaker 2: my friends, which is really funny because I go out
• 1:54:35
  Speaker 2: and they say, oh, I'm your friend. I go, okay,
• 1:54:37
  Speaker 2: I've met you before, but you are my friend. They
• 1:54:40
  Speaker 2: pay three hundred and twenty five dollars. We have four
• 1:54:43
  Speaker 2: hundred members. We have to keep it down to four
• 1:54:45
  Speaker 2: hundred because it's a separate hold on our tickets and
• 1:54:48
  Speaker 2: we don't give them the best seats. They're in the
• 1:54:50
  Speaker 2: front third of the house. We don't give them the
• 1:54:52
  Speaker 2: best seats and they know that in advance. But what
• 1:54:54
  Speaker 2: we do is they pay three hundred and twenty five
• 1:54:56
  Speaker 2: dollars a year. They get the right to buy between
• 1:54:58
  Speaker 2: two and eight tickets to show. That's what show it
• 1:55:00
  Speaker 2: is and what the artist puts as far as their
• 1:55:04
  Speaker 2: maximum number of buys that can do. And we email
• 1:55:07
  Speaker 2: them the show. We have the credit card on file,
• 1:55:10
  Speaker 2: and they email back how many tickets they want, and
• 1:55:14
  Speaker 2: then we email them the tickets. It's the easiest way
• 1:55:18
  Speaker 2: to buy a ticket and we have We sell out
• 1:55:20
  Speaker 2: our four hundred memberships every year without a problem.
• 1:55:23
  Speaker 1: Okay, you mentioned the different budgets for the night of
• 1:55:27
  Speaker 1: the week. You talked about how there's so many more
• 1:55:31
  Speaker 1: concerts and there's so much more of everything. How do
• 1:55:34
  Speaker 1: you make people aware of a show today?
• 1:55:38
  Speaker 2: Well, it's a new world out there. It's obviously everything
• 1:55:40
  Speaker 2: social media and digital and you know, Facebook and Instagram
• 1:55:44
  Speaker 2: and TikTok and everything like that. I'm a big Facebook guy.
• 1:55:50
  Speaker 2: I love Facebook. I enjoy Facebook, but I don't do
• 1:55:53
  Speaker 2: Instagram or TikTok. And you know, seventy five percent of
• 1:55:58
  Speaker 2: our budgets how social media. I'm still on the radio
• 1:56:01
  Speaker 2: every week and you know, and every Thursday morning I'm
• 1:56:04
  Speaker 2: on from eight to nine on the rock station and
• 1:56:06
  Speaker 2: New Haven WPLR. But people call me up and ask
• 1:56:09
  Speaker 2: me about Madonna. It's Madonna coming in, is Free as
• 1:56:12
  Speaker 2: Sky coming in. So it's great that people that don't
• 1:56:16
  Speaker 2: listen to PLR twenty four hours, the one hour I'm
• 1:56:19
  Speaker 2: on a week, they listen to me because I'll tell
• 1:56:22
  Speaker 2: them when any show is coming in. So we use
• 1:56:25
  Speaker 2: that very effectively. I'll talk about show, and I'll talk
• 1:56:27
  Speaker 2: about my competitors shows too. I make it that it's
• 1:56:30
  Speaker 2: not a live nation show. If something's coming into a
• 1:56:33
  Speaker 2: competitive venue like Foxwoods or ag might be is bringing
• 1:56:36
  Speaker 2: a Journey in next week up at the People's Bank Arena,
• 1:56:39
  Speaker 2: I'll talk about Journey. I don't want I want listeners
• 1:56:42
  Speaker 2: because most of the shows are mine anyway. So I
• 1:56:44
  Speaker 2: am very open about supporting my competitors shows on my
• 1:56:48
  Speaker 2: radio show.
• 1:56:49
  Speaker 1: Okay, a couple of differences from the old days. Tickets
• 1:56:54
  Speaker 1: can go on sale a year in advance, and whereas
• 1:56:59
  Speaker 1: before mid May it was six weeks would be a
• 1:57:01
  Speaker 1: long time. So there are things that sell out instantly.
• 1:57:07
  Speaker 1: The stuff that does not to what degree is their
• 1:57:10
  Speaker 1: walk up business? And how do you sell the tickets
• 1:57:14
  Speaker 1: when they don't all go clean right from the get go?
• 1:57:19
  Speaker 2: Well, first, I'm not a big fan of that. Nile
• 1:57:21
  Speaker 2: Horanz just did the same thing next April. We put
• 1:57:24
  Speaker 2: a show this week on sale. It was a week
• 1:57:26
  Speaker 2: after we put Olivia Rodrigo on sale in the same building.
• 1:57:29
  Speaker 2: Olivia Rodrigo grows five million dollars over the two shows.
• 1:57:33
  Speaker 2: I don't want to put another show in the same
• 1:57:34
  Speaker 2: building on sales, especially if it's a year off. It's
• 1:57:37
  Speaker 2: next April. I don't want to do it. But his
• 1:57:39
  Speaker 2: record's coming out June fifth, so he had a reason
• 1:57:42
  Speaker 2: to do it. There's too many shows on sale right now.
• 1:57:46
  Speaker 2: The money's not out there now. He's doing well, so
• 1:57:49
  Speaker 2: it's good he's doing well, but he would have done better.
• 1:57:51
  Speaker 2: He would have done better if he waited. I think
• 1:57:55
  Speaker 2: it's a real problem. I think what happens you end
• 1:57:58
  Speaker 2: up putting a show to sleep because you can't advertise
• 1:58:00
  Speaker 2: for a year, and it's hard to wake the show
• 1:58:03
  Speaker 2: up because you're putting so many new shows on sale.
• 1:58:06
  Speaker 2: I think we're making a big mistake doing that. I
• 1:58:08
  Speaker 2: don't like what we do, but you're one hundred percent right, Bob.
• 1:58:11
  Speaker 2: We put shows on sale six months in advance. I
• 1:58:14
  Speaker 2: love the six week program. I think it's much better.
• 1:58:17
  Speaker 2: I think we would sell more tickets, but it's not
• 1:58:20
  Speaker 2: up to us. When we put a show on sales
• 1:58:21
  Speaker 2: up to the artist and.
• 1:58:24
  Speaker 1: After the additional on sale, how do you drive sales thereafter?
• 1:58:29
  Speaker 2: Well, social media is pretty cheap, so that's pretty good
• 1:58:32
  Speaker 2: for us. We keep it on social media. Again, I'll
• 1:58:36
  Speaker 2: mention it on my radio show every week on the
• 1:58:39
  Speaker 2: certain shows to keep them awake. I have to keep
• 1:58:41
  Speaker 2: shows awake. I don't want them to go to sleep.
• 1:58:44
  Speaker 2: And then we'll throw around Valentine's Day. We'll put Nile
• 1:58:49
  Speaker 2: Horan back on because it's a good girls show and
• 1:58:52
  Speaker 2: maybe the boyfriend or the husband wants to buy a
• 1:58:55
  Speaker 2: Valentine's gift. We'll look at Christmas. We'll put Nile Horan
• 1:59:00
  Speaker 2: on ads on Christmas time, so we'll look at spots
• 1:59:05
  Speaker 2: that makes sense for the artists. To Father's Day, we'll
• 1:59:09
  Speaker 2: put Rod Stewart might be asleep for a while, went
• 1:59:12
  Speaker 2: on sale to World'll put Rod Stewart because good Father's
• 1:59:15
  Speaker 2: Day present or something like that. We'll look for certain
• 1:59:19
  Speaker 2: pockets that people might be looking to buy tickets for
• 1:59:21
  Speaker 2: another reason other than just going to the show. That's
• 1:59:25
  Speaker 2: where I do it at I can't speak for anybody else,
• 1:59:28
  Speaker 2: but I look for pockets of interest. That's what I
• 1:59:30
  Speaker 2: call it. Pois. I look for poise. When is that
• 1:59:33
  Speaker 2: person going to be interested in buying a ticket they
• 1:59:35
  Speaker 2: normally wouldn't be interested in. I always use Valentine's Day
• 1:59:39
  Speaker 2: as a good female concert time. So you'll see a
• 1:59:43
  Speaker 2: lot of shows in Connecticut in February being at marketed
• 1:59:49
  Speaker 2: Mother's Day. Same thing. You'll see me in May. Two
• 1:59:52
  Speaker 2: weeks ago. I had a whole bunch of shows running
• 1:59:55
  Speaker 2: ads for Mother's Day gifts, Father's Day, same thing.
• 1:59:59
  Speaker 1: Okay. There was a belief even from some of the
• 2:00:02
  Speaker 1: big agents that when the classic rock acts died, which
• 2:00:07
  Speaker 1: they're doing is we're sitting here, it would become a
• 2:00:10
  Speaker 1: theater business. But there are more stadium shows than ever before.
• 2:00:16
  Speaker 1: So where's the business going.
• 2:00:20
  Speaker 2: The business is going to get bigger and bigger, and
• 2:00:22
  Speaker 2: I believe the reason really is certainly TikTok and social
• 2:00:26
  Speaker 2: media is important. You can go on YouTube and watch
• 2:00:28
  Speaker 2: anything you want. You go on on the TikTok. But
• 2:00:31
  Speaker 2: I really believe it's free music, It's Spotify, it's serious XCM.
• 2:00:36
  Speaker 2: I pay a monthly fee to listen to radio with
• 2:00:39
  Speaker 2: no commercials. I love it, and I listened to the Spectrum. Well,
• 2:00:43
  Speaker 2: the Spectrum puts sixty years of music on. I got
• 2:00:47
  Speaker 2: turned onto Bruno Mars because I was listening to the Spectrum.
• 2:00:52
  Speaker 2: I got turned onto John Mayer. I love both of
• 2:00:55
  Speaker 2: them very much, John Mayer's I'm a giant fan of
• 2:00:57
  Speaker 2: John Mayer's and from fear Field I didn't and from Fairfield, yes,
• 2:01:01
  Speaker 2: and from Fairfield. So I just love John Mayer. I
• 2:01:05
  Speaker 2: love his music. I can name twenty of his songs
• 2:01:08
  Speaker 2: without a problem. But I heard it on the Spectrum.
• 2:01:10
  Speaker 2: But I never would have done it I before I
• 2:01:13
  Speaker 2: when my wife died, the first girl I dated, she
• 2:01:16
  Speaker 2: loved Jason Moras. I knew other than promoting Jason Maris,
• 2:01:20
  Speaker 2: I never heard a song. I wanted to impress her.
• 2:01:23
  Speaker 2: I said, I really don't know, but I'm going to
• 2:01:24
  Speaker 2: go home and listen. I just want to Spotify and
• 2:01:27
  Speaker 2: started listening to Jason Moras. I became a Jason Moras
• 2:01:30
  Speaker 2: fan because it's free. That's what's building our business. We
• 2:01:34
  Speaker 2: get our music on a monthly subscription basis. Now that
• 2:01:38
  Speaker 2: is the greatest. You don't have to buy a fourteen
• 2:01:40
  Speaker 2: ninety nine CD anymore. I think this business will continue
• 2:01:44
  Speaker 2: to explode even more. I don't think we've seen the
• 2:01:46
  Speaker 2: top yet because it's so easy to turn yourself onto music,
• 2:01:50
  Speaker 2: new music. Now it's free.
• 2:01:53
  Speaker 1: Two best shows you ever saw, Two best shows they
• 2:01:57
  Speaker 1: ever saw.
• 2:01:57
  Speaker 2: I think the greatest live performer I've ever seen its
• 2:02:00
  Speaker 2: Bruce Springsteen in the Eastern Brand. I don't want to
• 2:02:02
  Speaker 2: be trite, but I will say politically, I'm aligned with
• 2:02:06
  Speaker 2: Bruce Springsteen. Seeing him on Saturday Night and the Garden
• 2:02:10
  Speaker 2: was easily one of the top five concerts I've ever seen.
• 2:02:14
  Speaker 2: Seeing you two at the Sphere, I love the Sphere.
• 2:02:18
  Speaker 2: It was a great concert. The Sphere is the show.
• 2:02:22
  Speaker 2: The music is the background as far as I'm concerned,
• 2:02:26
  Speaker 2: but I love the event. It was great. And then
• 2:02:29
  Speaker 2: the Eagles. I love the Eagles. I just love the Eagles.
• 2:02:33
  Speaker 2: I want to see them every chance I get. The
• 2:02:36
  Speaker 2: Eagles in nineteen ninety six at the Meadows was probably
• 2:02:39
  Speaker 2: the best concert I ever saw. And then I'll throw
• 2:02:42
  Speaker 2: my laugh one with be Paul McCartney. I flew up
• 2:02:45
  Speaker 2: the Buffalo to see Paul McCartney back in November. And
• 2:02:49
  Speaker 2: there's no bad song. There's no bad song, there's no
• 2:02:52
  Speaker 2: average song, even there's just no average song. He's just
• 2:02:56
  Speaker 2: the greatest songwriter of my generation. I sid of Billy Joel,
• 2:03:00
  Speaker 2: the greatest American songwriter of our generation. So I'll put
• 2:03:03
  Speaker 2: Billy Joel's consciences up there also.
• 2:03:07
  Speaker 1: Okay, Jim, we could talk for days. I think your
• 2:03:10
  Speaker 1: idea of getting all the promoters together and getting all
• 2:03:14
  Speaker 1: these stories down because it was such a different business
• 2:03:16
  Speaker 1: and there's so many stories. Thanks for taking this time
• 2:03:19
  Speaker 1: to speak with my audience.
• 2:03:21
  Speaker 2: And Bobby, you come back home. Let's get together. Okay.
• 2:03:25
  Speaker 1: If I'm come I'm definitely doing it.
• 2:03:27
  Speaker 2: Okay, we'd love to see you, Okay, Pal, till next time.
• 2:03:32
  Speaker 1: This is Bob Left sets