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John Scher · The Bob Lefsetz Podcast

• 0:08
  Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Leftstar Podcast. My
• 0:13
  Speaker 1: guest today is John Cher. John, what's the status of
• 0:18
  Speaker 1: the independent concert promotion business today?
• 0:23
  Speaker 2: Post a pitiful Live Nation overwhelmingly dominates the entire concert business.
• 0:32
  Speaker 2: I believe they are monopoly. So far, the Justice Department
• 0:37
  Speaker 2: has not said that AGE is a much much smaller competitor.
• 0:45
  Speaker 2: And then there are you know, literally a handful of
• 0:49
  Speaker 2: of independent promoters. Really only a handful of ones that
• 0:53
  Speaker 2: were once major promoters as we were. I mean we
• 0:57
  Speaker 2: were for many many years OP ten promoters. One or
• 1:02
  Speaker 2: two years, we were the biggest promoters in the country.
• 1:06
  Speaker 2: But what's happened is, you know, Live Nation. Look, their
• 1:12
  Speaker 2: model works for them. There's there's no question I did.
• 1:16
  Speaker 2: I didn't. I wasn't a believer. They tried to buy
• 1:18
  Speaker 2: me a couple of times, and I was not a believer.
• 1:22
  Speaker 2: I see now how they've been successful, and uh, you know,
• 1:27
  Speaker 2: you got to take your hat off to Michael Rippino,
• 1:29
  Speaker 2: who you know, is running a public company that, despite
• 1:35
  Speaker 2: the fact that many people, including myself, think it's a monopoly,
• 1:40
  Speaker 2: is is doing pretty well. So you know, it's very hard.
• 1:46
  Speaker 2: I don't think somebody young in the business could repeat
• 1:50
  Speaker 2: what I've done or what any number of other major
• 1:54
  Speaker 2: promoters Jerry Michaelson, Greg Proolf and Jerry Wasserman the few
• 1:59
  Speaker 2: of us that are left, but do it.
• 2:03
  Speaker 1: Okay, what is the status of your promotion business at
• 2:07
  Speaker 1: this point?
• 2:09
  Speaker 2: You know, it's pretty good. We've become a small hale
• 2:15
  Speaker 2: theater company. For the most part, We've got only an
• 2:20
  Speaker 2: occasional arena show. We've got two sold out Tool shows
• 2:25
  Speaker 2: at Madison Square Garden next month. But arena shows, where
• 2:30
  Speaker 2: I used to do fifty sixty a year are down
• 2:35
  Speaker 2: to a handful. So you can't make the profit and
• 2:40
  Speaker 2: nor therefore be able to support the infrastructure that you need.
• 2:47
  Speaker 2: So you know, over the last ten years or so,
• 2:51
  Speaker 2: we've gotten smaller. We're still doing about one hundred shows
• 2:55
  Speaker 2: a year, but almost exclusively anywhere from five hundred seaters
• 3:01
  Speaker 2: to six thousand seaters.
• 3:04
  Speaker 1: Okay, so you say you have Tool at Madison Square Garden.
• 3:09
  Speaker 1: How did you get that? As opposed to Live Nation
• 3:12
  Speaker 1: or aging.
• 3:13
  Speaker 2: Pure loyalty by the band in their agent. You know,
• 3:17
  Speaker 2: something that something that existed for most of my career.
• 3:25
  Speaker 2: If you play the act when they're small and you
• 3:28
  Speaker 2: keep doing a good job. They stay with you, especially
• 3:32
  Speaker 2: over the since the Ticketmaster merger with Live Nation, that
• 3:37
  Speaker 2: just isn't the case. I mean, I'll give you a
• 3:41
  Speaker 2: good example. I played Iron Maiden from the very very
• 3:45
  Speaker 2: beginning up through and including selling a mat at Madison
• 3:48
  Speaker 2: Square Garden and in the Meadowlands in a Nasau Coliseum
• 3:55
  Speaker 2: three tours ago. I got my Madison Square Garden date,
• 4:03
  Speaker 2: but I came to discover that I was one of
• 4:05
  Speaker 2: only two promoters in the country that got an arena.
• 4:09
  Speaker 2: Live Nation got all the rest of the dates. So
• 4:13
  Speaker 2: we did the show. It sold out. A couple of
• 4:16
  Speaker 2: years later, my phone rings and it's Rod Smallwood, who's
• 4:19
  Speaker 2: the manager of Iron Maiden, longtime manager, all right, and
• 4:23
  Speaker 2: he calls me a note the agent didn't call me.
• 4:26
  Speaker 2: The manager called me and said, I'm really sorry, but
• 4:30
  Speaker 2: I can't give you a date on this tour. And
• 4:34
  Speaker 2: I said, did we do anything wrong? Said no, You've
• 4:37
  Speaker 2: always been great. But Live Nation made a point of
• 4:41
  Speaker 2: saying that if they don't get New York, they're going
• 4:44
  Speaker 2: to change the offer they made and it will cost
• 4:47
  Speaker 2: me millions of dollars. So I'm sorry, John, You're a
• 4:50
  Speaker 2: good guy, but we can't play for you anymore. So,
• 4:55
  Speaker 2: right there, on a given Iron Maiden tour, which would happen,
• 5:00
  Speaker 2: say every two or three years, I'd usually get four
• 5:04
  Speaker 2: or five such shows New York, New Jersey, Long Island, Buffalo, Rochester, Albany,
• 5:09
  Speaker 2: those kinds of places. Now I've got none.
• 5:14
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's do the math here. You're saying. Rod Smallwood
• 5:18
  Speaker 1: said if he didn't go with Live Nation, he would
• 5:21
  Speaker 1: lose millions of dollars. Now, if you look at all
• 5:25
  Speaker 1: the markets you were in, why couldn't he make those
• 5:29
  Speaker 1: millions and add them in to Live Nation? Where would
• 5:34
  Speaker 1: Rob have lost the millions?
• 5:37
  Speaker 2: Live Nation would have changed. I don't know what ultimately
• 5:40
  Speaker 2: they paid him her show or per tour, all right,
• 5:44
  Speaker 2: but he indicated to me that the offer that he
• 5:47
  Speaker 2: had if if they if they gave us New York,
• 5:53
  Speaker 2: and there's a promoter since passed away in Florida, he
• 5:57
  Speaker 2: got Florida John Stall, that they would change the deal
• 6:01
  Speaker 2: to to lesser terms.
• 6:04
  Speaker 1: Wow, so Rod called you. If you have this conversation
• 6:08
  Speaker 1: with other managers or agents, well.
• 6:12
  Speaker 2: In this case, the agent did never even called me.
• 6:16
  Speaker 2: Maybe Rod told him he called and and and that's
• 6:19
  Speaker 2: why I've had similar conversations, uh, with with the managers
• 6:26
  Speaker 2: and agents, you know, absolutely, you know, if it's an
• 6:31
  Speaker 2: act that we've had a long history with. For example,
• 6:39
  Speaker 2: I played Peter Gabriel a lot of times early in
• 6:42
  Speaker 2: his career and actually promoted the first Genesis tour ever
• 6:46
  Speaker 2: in America. You know, I when when I saw he
• 6:49
  Speaker 2: was putting a record out, I called his agent, John
• 6:53
  Speaker 2: Marks and at w A and I said, I see
• 6:58
  Speaker 2: Peter's putting an album out. You know he usually tours
• 7:00
  Speaker 2: behind albums. I said, can we talk about some dates?
• 7:04
  Speaker 2: And he said nope. I said, uh, why not? He said,
• 7:08
  Speaker 2: We're going with Live Nation. I said, what if I
• 7:11
  Speaker 2: could put together a consortium? Nope, we did the last
• 7:15
  Speaker 2: tour with Live Nation. We're gonna we're gonna do it
• 7:17
  Speaker 2: again with them.
• 7:19
  Speaker 1: Just to stay on your point, how difficult would it
• 7:22
  Speaker 1: be for you to put together a consortium?
• 7:27
  Speaker 2: Modestly difficult? You know. Uh, there's four or five independent
• 7:34
  Speaker 2: still that you know. I know we'd join together another planet,
• 7:40
  Speaker 2: jam Niederlander, Danny's Alasco. Uh, so yes, we could put
• 7:47
  Speaker 2: it together. We couldn't snap our fingers like Live Nation
• 7:51
  Speaker 2: and aeg can you know they can just snap their fingers,
• 7:54
  Speaker 2: you know, and in an hour put together a tour.
• 7:58
  Speaker 2: But you know, given a little bit of time, we
• 8:00
  Speaker 2: absolutely could do it.
• 8:02
  Speaker 1: So let's say you put together the consortium, you put
• 8:06
  Speaker 1: together twenty five dates. Do you believe your offer can
• 8:10
  Speaker 1: be as good as Live Nations in raw dollars?
• 8:15
  Speaker 2: No?
• 8:16
  Speaker 1: And why is that?
• 8:18
  Speaker 2: Because? First of all, they try very hard to lobby
• 8:23
  Speaker 2: acts the only tour in America between like late April
• 8:27
  Speaker 2: or early May to maybe October, early October. Because they
• 8:33
  Speaker 2: own or control ninety maybe ninety five percent of all
• 8:38
  Speaker 2: of the amphitheaters. So when you get an act to
• 8:41
  Speaker 2: play their amphitheaters, besides the ticket sales, which famously some
• 8:48
  Speaker 2: acts have gotten one hundred percent of the ticket sales
• 8:52
  Speaker 2: and amphitheaters, they have all the ancillaries. They have sponsorship,
• 8:57
  Speaker 2: they have food and beverage, they have merching, and they
• 9:01
  Speaker 2: have ticketmaster fees. And so at the end of the
• 9:10
  Speaker 2: day they can break even at the door, even maybe
• 9:14
  Speaker 2: lose some money all rightum, and still make a lot
• 9:19
  Speaker 2: of money. I'm told from my deep throat in a
• 9:25
  Speaker 2: Live Nation that they average about thirty five dollars ahead
• 9:30
  Speaker 2: in ancillaries. So you know, let's say the average amphitheater
• 9:34
  Speaker 2: show does ten thousand people. Due to multiplication, they don't
• 9:38
  Speaker 2: need to make any money at the door.
• 9:43
  Speaker 1: What if the act wants to play inside?
• 9:46
  Speaker 2: They buy tours that all the time that do inside. Now,
• 9:50
  Speaker 2: they don't have as many ancillaries, but they certainly have
• 9:56
  Speaker 2: Ticketmaster and when they put a tour together intoor or
• 10:00
  Speaker 2: they do everything they possibly can to only play buildings
• 10:04
  Speaker 2: that use Ticketmaster. And probably I don't know this, but
• 10:09
  Speaker 2: probably they have deals with certain arenas that they go
• 10:14
  Speaker 2: to with a lot of shows, so they you know,
• 10:17
  Speaker 2: they probably have a rebate situation.
• 10:21
  Speaker 1: Okay, if you could snap your fingers, what would you
• 10:26
  Speaker 1: like the live music business to look like?
• 10:31
  Speaker 2: Well, I think there's a couple of things wrong. I mean,
• 10:36
  Speaker 2: the monopoly, the live nation monopoly is the first thing
• 10:40
  Speaker 2: that's wrong. You'd like to believe that the promoter in
• 10:45
  Speaker 2: a given market that can do the best job and
• 10:49
  Speaker 2: or has a relationship with the act and has played them,
• 10:53
  Speaker 2: would have an opportunity to promote them and at least
• 10:58
  Speaker 2: match it. But the other issue that's very important is
• 11:03
  Speaker 2: that ticket prices have completely guns you know.
• 11:08
  Speaker 3: Walkers, you know, the average arena or stadium P one
• 11:17
  Speaker 3: ticket prices.
• 11:18
  Speaker 2: Top ticket prices are pretty normally close to one thousand dollars.
• 11:24
  Speaker 2: So what's happened to our concert industry is two things. Obviously,
• 11:29
  Speaker 2: there's a lot of rich people in North America, so
• 11:33
  Speaker 2: you know, it's it's a trophy. They can tell their neighbors,
• 11:36
  Speaker 2: the neighbors that you know, they're sitting in the fifth row.
• 11:40
  Speaker 2: And then of course the average fan all right, who
• 11:44
  Speaker 2: probably can't buy the P one tickets, but you know,
• 11:48
  Speaker 2: when the when the P two, P three tickets are
• 11:50
  Speaker 2: down at you know, a couple of one hundred dollars,
• 11:55
  Speaker 2: they can buy them, but they probably can't go to
• 11:57
  Speaker 2: a couple of other shows that they would during the year.
• 12:01
  Speaker 2: So I think that this monopoly is endangering artists development terribly.
• 12:09
  Speaker 2: I think there are a lot of good young promoters
• 12:12
  Speaker 2: who promote in clubs in small halls, but they have
• 12:16
  Speaker 2: little chance of being able to expand their businesses beyond that.
• 12:21
  Speaker 2: They basically have two choices. Stay modest, can make a
• 12:26
  Speaker 2: decent living in clubs and small halls, or try to
• 12:30
  Speaker 2: get Live nation or ag.
• 12:31
  Speaker 1: To buy what do you say to Live Nations claim
• 12:36
  Speaker 1: that their market share is somewhere in the neighborhood of
• 12:40
  Speaker 1: sixty I'd have to look. I think they say fifty something.
• 12:43
  Speaker 1: What would you say to that, Well, the question.
• 12:50
  Speaker 2: That's most relevant is what percentage of arena and stadium
• 12:59
  Speaker 2: and amphitheater headliners did they control? All Right, I've got
• 13:04
  Speaker 2: to then believe that that number is seventy and that
• 13:12
  Speaker 2: AEG's got another twenty or twenty five percent. It is
• 13:16
  Speaker 2: very rare these days that arena sized headliners, amphitheater sized headliners,
• 13:22
  Speaker 2: stadium headliners don't play for one of the two of them.
• 13:26
  Speaker 2: Tool is Is is a great example. They've stayed oyled
• 13:30
  Speaker 2: to me and they've stayed oil to you know, a lot,
• 13:35
  Speaker 2: a lot of independence. Diana Ross has stayed very loyal
• 13:40
  Speaker 2: and last time ran in New York, they made a
• 13:44
  Speaker 2: real run at Diana Ross, who I've been promoting for
• 13:48
  Speaker 2: forty years, and it forced me to have to, you know,
• 13:52
  Speaker 2: pay a larger guarantee. But it's all out, so you know,
• 13:57
  Speaker 2: it was fine, all came out in the wash. So
• 14:00
  Speaker 2: but at the end of the day, uh, you know,
• 14:03
  Speaker 2: when when the when when the Justice Department first investigated
• 14:09
  Speaker 2: Live Nation, they claim that yes they are and then
• 14:13
  Speaker 2: they owned a lot of the amphitheaters. Now they own
• 14:16
  Speaker 2: almost all of them. Uh. And they they claimed that
• 14:21
  Speaker 2: the acts could always choose to play indoors. But as
• 14:24
  Speaker 2: I've explained a minute ago, it's not there. Because if
• 14:30
  Speaker 2: I do a show at the Prudential Center in New York,
• 14:34
  Speaker 2: Madison Square Garden, uh, you know, Buffalo Memorial Auditorium, any
• 14:39
  Speaker 2: any any of the venues that we were going, I
• 14:42
  Speaker 2: don't get any of the ancillaries. The buildings keep the ancillaries.
• 14:46
  Speaker 2: Did they give you? You know, the buildings try to
• 14:48
  Speaker 2: give you a little taste usually they do, but not
• 14:52
  Speaker 2: a big taste versus Live Nation can say wait until May,
• 14:59
  Speaker 2: all right before you go out, or maybe end of
• 15:01
  Speaker 2: April and start down south and and you know, we'll
• 15:06
  Speaker 2: give you one hundred percent of the box office. Given
• 15:09
  Speaker 2: ninety percent of the box office, whatever it is, that's
• 15:11
  Speaker 2: nothing that you can do indoors.
• 15:15
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's just nail indoors, because certainly there are a
• 15:19
  Speaker 1: lot of tours that go out during the winter or
• 15:22
  Speaker 1: even play arenas during the summer. So you compare the
• 15:28
  Speaker 1: economics of an arena date that you promote as opposed
• 15:32
  Speaker 1: to Live Nation promoting well.
• 15:37
  Speaker 2: An arena date that an independent like us does. There,
• 15:41
  Speaker 2: you know, are basic expenses, the guarantee to the act
• 15:46
  Speaker 2: first and foremost, the expenses of doing of doing the show, rent, advertising, staffing,
• 15:54
  Speaker 2: et cetera. All right, so you've got to pay to
• 15:58
  Speaker 2: guarantee put tickets on ill. You got to pay the
• 16:00
  Speaker 2: guarantee first, and you got to pay all the other
• 16:03
  Speaker 2: expenses and after. At that point you start to potentially
• 16:08
  Speaker 2: make a profit. And often the artist makes percentage money
• 16:13
  Speaker 2: at the amphitheaters. They don't have to do any of that.
• 16:16
  Speaker 2: They don't pay rent to themselves.
• 16:17
  Speaker 1: No, no, no, no, I got that. I got there.
• 16:19
  Speaker 1: But Live Nation also plays dates in arenas, yes, like you, Yes,
• 16:25
  Speaker 1: So tell me where the economics differ there.
• 16:29
  Speaker 2: They own ticketmaster.
• 16:33
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's let's stop for a second. If you could
• 16:38
  Speaker 1: snap your fingers. You claim that Live Nation is a monopoly.
• 16:44
  Speaker 1: If you were to break up a monopoly, what would.
• 16:48
  Speaker 2: It look like? Well, you know, only the only one
• 16:54
  Speaker 2: who can really break up a monopoly is the government.
• 16:58
  Speaker 2: What would it look like? You know, they would perhaps
• 17:02
  Speaker 2: be forced to sell off a certain number of amphitheaters
• 17:06
  Speaker 2: that people like me could could pick up. Actually, there's
• 17:09
  Speaker 2: two amphitheaters that we built that they that they have
• 17:13
  Speaker 2: now one outside of Buffalo, one in Scranton, Pennsylvania. Uh
• 17:19
  Speaker 2: so that that you know, that's that's number one, uh
• 17:24
  Speaker 2: number number number two. Uh the whole uh guarantee idea
• 17:31
  Speaker 2: of what percentage of the growth they can they can
• 17:35
  Speaker 2: uh they can give the act, all right, you can't,
• 17:39
  Speaker 2: as I just explained, you can't do it indoors, all right.
• 17:44
  Speaker 2: So uh if they got broken up selling off say
• 17:50
  Speaker 2: half of the amphitheaters to other people. Number one number two,
• 17:56
  Speaker 2: I don't want them to. You know, they don't have
• 17:58
  Speaker 2: to uh divet from Ticketmaster. They simply have to uh
• 18:04
  Speaker 2: let in in you know, the with buildings that they
• 18:08
  Speaker 2: have exclusively Ticketmaster, which are a huge majority of the
• 18:14
  Speaker 2: arenas in his country. They and they are exclusive. So
• 18:20
  Speaker 2: if I go to Madison Square Garden with two sold
• 18:24
  Speaker 2: out tools shows, the Ticketmaster fees are enormous. They scalped
• 18:31
  Speaker 2: their own tickets. They have this thing called t M plus,
• 18:35
  Speaker 2: but they've also been caught scalping their tickets. So uh,
• 18:42
  Speaker 2: you know, if if I had the freedom, I would
• 18:47
  Speaker 2: go into Madison Square Garden or the Prudential Center or
• 18:51
  Speaker 2: or any other venue, and I would use a different
• 18:54
  Speaker 2: ticketing company. There are a lot of them right there,
• 18:57
  Speaker 2: all right, but none of them have anything close to
• 18:59
  Speaker 2: the volume that that ticketmaster has. So those are the
• 19:04
  Speaker 2: two main things. If we can be entrepreneurial with with
• 19:09
  Speaker 2: with the ticket providers, and if uh we can break
• 19:16
  Speaker 2: the the sort of uh gatekeeping of the amphitheaters, uh,
• 19:23
  Speaker 2: you know, that would make a business such as mine
• 19:27
  Speaker 2: much much healthier.
• 19:30
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's say you do a date a building that
• 19:33
  Speaker 1: has an exclusive ticket master contract? Don't you share in
• 19:37
  Speaker 1: the fees?
• 19:40
  Speaker 2: Very rare?
• 19:41
  Speaker 1: If you do share in the fees, Why would that happen?
• 19:47
  Speaker 2: Well, it hasn't happened in a long time. I mean
• 19:50
  Speaker 2: you know there there. You know, there was a lot
• 19:53
  Speaker 2: of years that we would do and in the main
• 19:56
  Speaker 2: AMP in the main arenas that that we worked at,
• 20:00
  Speaker 2: you know, fifteen twenty shows a year. We essentially were
• 20:04
  Speaker 2: a franchise. And so if you guarantee a lot of
• 20:09
  Speaker 2: shows like I did at the old Meadowlands Arena for example,
• 20:13
  Speaker 2: all right, you had a leverage so that you could say, hey,
• 20:17
  Speaker 2: I need a piece of you know, I need to
• 20:18
  Speaker 2: bring my own ticketing in or I need a piece
• 20:20
  Speaker 2: of what you're getting kicked back, all right, So you know,
• 20:25
  Speaker 2: but I can't do that volume anymore. And so the
• 20:29
  Speaker 2: arena is that I, you know, used to do that
• 20:32
  Speaker 2: with I. You know, if I'm doing two, three four
• 20:34
  Speaker 2: shows a year versus twenty or twenty five, I've got
• 20:38
  Speaker 2: no leverage whatsoever. And then you know, the contract with
• 20:43
  Speaker 2: almost all the buildings includes the use of TM plus,
• 20:49
  Speaker 2: all right. Every single show that we do, we tell
• 20:53
  Speaker 2: the buildings we don't want TM plus. But what I
• 20:56
  Speaker 2: found out a number of years ago was even if
• 21:00
  Speaker 2: we and he acts, as long as the agent or
• 21:03
  Speaker 2: the manager will will confirm in writing that they don't
• 21:07
  Speaker 2: want TM plus, all right, they take it down except
• 21:11
  Speaker 2: for when the show becomes ninety five percent sold out
• 21:15
  Speaker 2: or some number like that, and then without your permission,
• 21:19
  Speaker 2: they put it on on Ticketmaster on TM plus. And
• 21:25
  Speaker 2: suddenly where sometimes you look at a show that you
• 21:30
  Speaker 2: know was almost sold out, and there was only saying
• 21:34
  Speaker 2: a given arena with a capacity of let's call it
• 21:37
  Speaker 2: fifteen thousand, and you only saw as a tool right
• 21:42
  Speaker 2: now that there's a few hundred tickets left in each category.
• 21:47
  Speaker 2: Once they turn on TM plus, all of a sudden
• 21:50
  Speaker 2: miracle of miracles, there's two thousand tickets available. Now. They'll
• 21:56
  Speaker 2: tell you that independent scalpers, and it may be, but
• 22:03
  Speaker 2: it's also them. It's also them. And they, you know,
• 22:05
  Speaker 2: they've got court scalping tickets. I mean they, you know,
• 22:08
  Speaker 2: they got caught with Metallica, which you know, you could
• 22:12
  Speaker 2: you could have knocked me over with a feather when
• 22:15
  Speaker 2: I found out that that Metallica was complacent with Ticketmaster
• 22:19
  Speaker 2: scalping tickets. You know, two best managers in the business
• 22:23
  Speaker 2: as far as I'm concerned. You know, I don't think
• 22:26
  Speaker 2: they had a lot of control over their clients in
• 22:28
  Speaker 2: this regard. So you know, you simply can't compete with
• 22:35
  Speaker 2: the money they make Ticketmaster. And look, when I first
• 22:38
  Speaker 2: got into the business, actually when I first got into business,
• 22:41
  Speaker 2: there was no computerized ticket in at all. But early
• 22:44
  Speaker 2: on there was ticket tron and I you know, I
• 22:48
  Speaker 2: done off the top of my head, but I think,
• 22:50
  Speaker 2: you know, the ticket tron feed was probably a buck,
• 22:54
  Speaker 2: you know, maybe it was two bucks all right. Now
• 22:59
  Speaker 2: it can be twenty five dollars of which the promoter
• 23:03
  Speaker 2: gets none up. But if your ticketmaster, sometimes they'll make
• 23:08
  Speaker 2: more money on one of my shows than I will
• 23:11
  Speaker 2: on the show at no risk.
• 23:14
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's stay with your tool shows. Ay, do you
• 23:19
  Speaker 1: have any idea with the off the top of your
• 23:21
  Speaker 1: head what the fees are on the tool tickets?
• 23:24
  Speaker 2: I do, but not off the top of my head.
• 23:28
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's put it this way. Of the shows that
• 23:33
  Speaker 1: you do in an arenas of the overall price, what
• 23:37
  Speaker 1: would you say your fees percentage was.
• 23:40
  Speaker 2: The ticketing fees? Yes, I'd say somewhere between ten and
• 23:47
  Speaker 2: twenty dollars. And for bigger shows to hire the ticket
• 23:51
  Speaker 2: prices to hire the service charges, which makes no sense
• 23:56
  Speaker 2: from a business perspective except for them. But for a fan,
• 24:00
  Speaker 2: Ticketmaster does nothing more to sell a fan a ticket
• 24:05
  Speaker 2: if the ticket's twenty five dollars or whether it's one
• 24:09
  Speaker 2: thousand dollars, same process, same computer use. But the industry
• 24:18
  Speaker 2: has let them get away with it, and there's no
• 24:24
  Speaker 2: looking back right now.
• 24:32
  Speaker 1: Okay. Ticketmaster might say that the majority of the fees
• 24:38
  Speaker 1: go to the building, that's something you agree with.
• 24:43
  Speaker 2: I don't think it's reasonably close to the majority. I
• 24:47
  Speaker 2: think the buildings get rebates, no question, the buildings get
• 24:54
  Speaker 2: huge advances, and especially when they're you know, municipally owned
• 25:00
  Speaker 2: buildings or state owned buildings, they often need the money,
• 25:05
  Speaker 2: so they basically get bribed into making a Ticketmaster deal.
• 25:09
  Speaker 2: And that advance is against a certain percentage of of
• 25:14
  Speaker 2: the service charge. But I would not think it was
• 25:17
  Speaker 2: a majority or even close.
• 25:20
  Speaker 1: A live nation would say otherwise, But we don't have
• 25:23
  Speaker 1: the facts in front of us, so let's move on
• 25:25
  Speaker 1: from that. How do you feel about these exclusive deals
• 25:30
  Speaker 1: with buildings with Ticketmaster? To begin with?
• 25:33
  Speaker 2: I think it's terrible. I think it's it's it's it's
• 25:37
  Speaker 2: you know, helping towards the ruination of of of the
• 25:42
  Speaker 2: of the marketing of the concert business. You know, if
• 25:47
  Speaker 2: we could, if if if a promoter could come into
• 25:49
  Speaker 2: a building and use somebody other than Ticketmaster, all right,
• 25:53
  Speaker 2: Number one, the service charges would be less much less,
• 25:57
  Speaker 2: all right? And number two, I think the TM plus
• 26:01
  Speaker 2: and the scalping would be reduced tremendously.
• 26:06
  Speaker 1: Okay, you mentioned these municipal buildings that need the money,
• 26:11
  Speaker 1: So if we get rid of the advances, what are
• 26:14
  Speaker 1: these buildings going to say? If we got rid of exclusives,
• 26:18
  Speaker 1: we're taking money directly out of the bottom line of
• 26:21
  Speaker 1: these buildings.
• 26:23
  Speaker 2: Yes, but you see, they still can. In other words, first,
• 26:29
  Speaker 2: if they were opened, if the if the ticketing was
• 26:33
  Speaker 2: open to the promoters, all right, certainly Live Nation would
• 26:38
  Speaker 2: use Ticketmaster. Certainly AG would use their system, all right.
• 26:44
  Speaker 2: But the independent promoters, all right, would probably go to
• 26:49
  Speaker 2: other independent companies, all right, And the buildings could say, Okay, look,
• 26:56
  Speaker 2: we get x amount of dollars from Ticketmaster, not from
• 27:00
  Speaker 2: an advanced point of view, but from a per ticket
• 27:02
  Speaker 2: point of view, and to let you use your own
• 27:06
  Speaker 2: ticketing company, you've got to match that. Now, I'm not
• 27:09
  Speaker 2: sure that would be legal, but at least it would
• 27:11
  Speaker 2: be something.
• 27:14
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's go back a step. Yes, like with Taylor Swift,
• 27:19
  Speaker 1: they said they turned off TM plus. You know from
• 27:23
  Speaker 1: personal experience that when you and the act have told
• 27:26
  Speaker 1: them to turn off TM plus, they have turned it on.
• 27:30
  Speaker 2: At the end. Yes, I don't know whether they did
• 27:33
  Speaker 2: a Tails Swift because I didn't promote any I've thought.
• 27:36
  Speaker 1: Always said, I know the only reason about Taylor swhich
• 27:38
  Speaker 1: is I know that she said to turn it off.
• 27:41
  Speaker 1: I can't tell you what happened there, but I'm using
• 27:44
  Speaker 1: an example. You have done shows where the promoter in
• 27:47
  Speaker 1: the act, usually the acts and control anyway, saying no
• 27:50
  Speaker 1: TM plus. And there has been TM plus.
• 27:53
  Speaker 2: Yes, not from the beginning, always towards the end, always
• 28:00
  Speaker 2: towards the end.
• 28:02
  Speaker 1: Now this is something theoretically you could document.
• 28:07
  Speaker 2: Oh yeah, oh absolutely. Look I'll go back. I'll go
• 28:13
  Speaker 2: back to uh Diana Ross. About five or six years ago,
• 28:20
  Speaker 2: we're playing Radio City. We say no TM plus. Diana's
• 28:25
  Speaker 2: agent puts into writing no TM plus. Show sells very
• 28:32
  Speaker 2: very quickly, and we're holding the next day for a
• 28:35
  Speaker 2: second show. Right, we're now ninety five percent sold out.
• 28:44
  Speaker 2: They turn on ticket man, the ticket TM plus. I
• 28:48
  Speaker 2: you know, I jump up and down screaming, yel all right,
• 28:53
  Speaker 2: they do it anyway.
• 28:56
  Speaker 1: So I see that.
• 28:57
  Speaker 2: Suddenly they're all a lot more tickets available. All right?
• 29:04
  Speaker 2: Where did they come from? I can't tell you. I
• 29:07
  Speaker 2: can't document, But suddenly there's more available, all right. So
• 29:12
  Speaker 2: now I have to go to Diana Ross and her
• 29:15
  Speaker 2: agent and her lawyer and say, look, here's the problem.
• 29:24
  Speaker 2: We add the second show. All right, all the potential buyers,
• 29:31
  Speaker 2: fans that we're going to buy off of TM plus
• 29:35
  Speaker 2: for inflated prices, are going to first try to run
• 29:39
  Speaker 2: to buy the best tickets for the second day, and
• 29:43
  Speaker 2: we were only like three weeks before the shows. So
• 29:47
  Speaker 2: I said, it's very possible that the first show we'll
• 29:52
  Speaker 2: have a couple of one hundred empty seats right up front,
• 29:56
  Speaker 2: and that's not a good look. And I don't, you know,
• 30:00
  Speaker 2: I can't recommend to to Miss Ross that that that
• 30:06
  Speaker 2: we do that She and her her advisors agreed we
• 30:11
  Speaker 2: didn't add the second day. The Madison Madison Square Garden executives,
• 30:17
  Speaker 2: who are pretty good people to work with, you know,
• 30:21
  Speaker 2: tried everything they could to get us they add the
• 30:24
  Speaker 2: second day, but it didn't make sense. Manna Ross is
• 30:28
  Speaker 2: a legend, she's a superstar, and she shouldn't play a
• 30:33
  Speaker 2: show that there's you know, two hundred and fifty or
• 30:36
  Speaker 2: three hundred empty seats in the first ten rows. So yes,
• 30:39
  Speaker 2: I gave up a second show that I could have made,
• 30:42
  Speaker 2: you know, a good profit in. But you know, as
• 30:45
  Speaker 2: I've always tried, and I try to protect the act.
• 30:50
  Speaker 2: The act gives you the ability to promote them. You
• 30:54
  Speaker 2: do everything you can to help that act. I mean, Bob,
• 30:57
  Speaker 2: I've been doing this for nearly fifty years. I've never
• 31:00
  Speaker 2: scalped the ticket for one of my own shows ever.
• 31:04
  Speaker 2: And if you think about my representation of the grateful dead,
• 31:08
  Speaker 2: how many millions of dollars I could have made scalping
• 31:12
  Speaker 2: those tickets? All Right, all you can say is I'm
• 31:15
  Speaker 2: a schmuck.
• 31:16
  Speaker 1: Okay, all the shows you've put on, have you ever
• 31:21
  Speaker 1: found that you're the managers or the ask themselves have
• 31:26
  Speaker 1: scalped some of the tickets that they'd been allotted?
• 31:32
  Speaker 2: Very rarely. There are two instances in the eighties when
• 31:37
  Speaker 2: the Meadowlands Arena first was built. You know, I was
• 31:44
  Speaker 2: in business probably for about ten years before that arena opened,
• 31:48
  Speaker 2: and you know, we owned a Capitol Theater in Passaic,
• 31:53
  Speaker 2: and you know, did hundreds and hundreds of shows there,
• 31:56
  Speaker 2: but there was no arena in New Jersey. I used
• 31:58
  Speaker 2: to do some summer shows at an old Triple A
• 32:02
  Speaker 2: baseball park in Jersey City, some very famous shows, but
• 32:07
  Speaker 2: you know, I'm waiting for an arena so it gets built.
• 32:11
  Speaker 2: It was an industry that was still, uh, you know,
• 32:14
  Speaker 2: very personally involved. That loyalty was pretty much there all
• 32:20
  Speaker 2: the time. So as acts that I've played before and
• 32:25
  Speaker 2: even acts that I that that I didn't. I was
• 32:28
  Speaker 2: the logical promoter. Our company was the logical company uh
• 32:33
  Speaker 2: to get to get those shows. Now there's there's a
• 32:38
  Speaker 2: there's a whole long story about uh my, my relationship
• 32:43
  Speaker 2: with Royan Dell's no over that. But it's neither here
• 32:45
  Speaker 2: nor there.
• 32:46
  Speaker 1: Wa whoa, whoa what? Just give us a little taste
• 32:49
  Speaker 1: of that.
• 32:51
  Speaker 2: When when I had a good relationship with ron all right,
• 32:55
  Speaker 2: I stayed in Jersey, he stayed in New York. You know.
• 32:58
  Speaker 2: I did hundreds and hundred shows in Pasake and Hasbury
• 33:02
  Speaker 2: Park and Jersey City and stuff like that. When the
• 33:05
  Speaker 2: Middle Ends Arena was starting to be built, Ronie asked
• 33:09
  Speaker 2: me out to lunch, and uh like, I said. We
• 33:13
  Speaker 2: were pretty family in those days, and I said sure.
• 33:16
  Speaker 2: So we went to lunch and at lunch he says
• 33:18
  Speaker 2: to me, John said, they're building this new arena, right,
• 33:23
  Speaker 2: And I said, oh yeah, I'm you know, I'm real involved.
• 33:25
  Speaker 2: I've been been involved in the you know, in the
• 33:29
  Speaker 2: ployment and all the pulminary stuff with the sports authority.
• 33:32
  Speaker 2: You know, I can't wait. He said, well, you know what, John,
• 33:35
  Speaker 2: I'm going to lose some shows. I said, uh, you know,
• 33:38
  Speaker 2: because the most acts were playing two shows at the Garden.
• 33:42
  Speaker 2: There was no New Jersey show all right. So I said,
• 33:46
  Speaker 2: you're not going to lose them all, you know. So
• 33:50
  Speaker 2: he says to me, well, we and I we should
• 33:54
  Speaker 2: be partners on those shows, all right. So I looked
• 33:58
  Speaker 2: at him and I said, Ron, I, I'll tell you what.
• 34:01
  Speaker 2: Let's go back to nineteen seventy one when I opened
• 34:05
  Speaker 2: up the Capitol at age twenty, and let's go back
• 34:11
  Speaker 2: to whatever that date was in the eighties. I'll show
• 34:16
  Speaker 2: you my books. You show me your books, all the
• 34:19
  Speaker 2: money that you made at Madison Square Guard, and you
• 34:21
  Speaker 2: write me a check for half of it, all right,
• 34:24
  Speaker 2: and we can be partners on everything. So he lost
• 34:28
  Speaker 2: his temper a little bit and he said, listen, if
• 34:35
  Speaker 2: you don't do this, I'm going to put you out
• 34:37
  Speaker 2: of business, all right. And I said I don't think so.
• 34:43
  Speaker 2: I'm pretty confident. So the meeting ended. One of the
• 34:49
  Speaker 2: guys who worked for him at the time, guy named Jonathan.
• 34:52
  Speaker 2: Sure really good guys, passed away, hung back and said
• 34:58
  Speaker 2: to me, John, the acts and the agents love Ron.
• 35:02
  Speaker 2: He's gonna put you out of business. He's not kidding.
• 35:06
  Speaker 2: And I looked at him and I said, Jonathan, no offense,
• 35:09
  Speaker 2: I'm not worried. So when Herina opens. For the first
• 35:15
  Speaker 2: number of years, we basically do every single show, all right,
• 35:20
  Speaker 2: except for two. One Rod Stewart, the other Madonna. Rod
• 35:27
  Speaker 2: Stewart's manager and Madonna's manager at the time was Freddy Demand.
• 35:33
  Speaker 2: In each case asked for something like five hundred tickets
• 35:38
  Speaker 2: to be held for them. It was obvious what they
• 35:40
  Speaker 2: were going to do. They didn't say, We're going to
• 35:42
  Speaker 2: scalp them. They just said, and I turned them down. Uh,
• 35:47
  Speaker 2: and then I didn't. I didn't get those shows. Delse
• 35:51
  Speaker 2: New got those. That was the first shows that Delsne
• 35:53
  Speaker 2: ever got there. So you know, you know what, I
• 36:01
  Speaker 2: can look you in the eye and I can say
• 36:04
  Speaker 2: I've been really pretty pretty straight across the board. And
• 36:10
  Speaker 2: I'm more I'm a schmock. I've told you that before,
• 36:14
  Speaker 2: all right, I said, I never scapped any tickets. I
• 36:18
  Speaker 2: never did any funny business with the books. And it's
• 36:23
  Speaker 2: it's what I thought, you know, A one can just say,
• 36:28
  Speaker 2: it's the way my folks brought me up. But it's
• 36:30
  Speaker 2: also early in my career. The most significant or one
• 36:35
  Speaker 2: of the most significant relationships I developed early on was
• 36:40
  Speaker 2: with Frank Barcelona, all right and Premier Talent, And you know,
• 36:45
  Speaker 2: there's never been anything like Premier Talent, even as huge
• 36:50
  Speaker 2: as CIA and WM and some of the other ones.
• 36:53
  Speaker 2: Premier probably represented more than fifty percent of the headliners
• 36:58
  Speaker 2: in the business for a long time. And I was
• 37:01
  Speaker 2: sort of the youngest guy to get in on the
• 37:03
  Speaker 2: you know, on the Barcelona gang, all right. You know,
• 37:08
  Speaker 2: people like Don Wung, Larry Maggott. You know, we're at
• 37:11
  Speaker 2: least ten years older than me. Graham was twenty years
• 37:14
  Speaker 2: older than me. And it changed my life, obviously. And
• 37:21
  Speaker 2: you know, Frank didn't want to hear about people scalping
• 37:24
  Speaker 2: tickets now, so you know, between my upbringing and Frank's
• 37:31
  Speaker 2: guidance and Barber's guidance, I never scalped tickets. And I
• 37:37
  Speaker 2: and I you know, I stayed away from the managers
• 37:40
  Speaker 2: who did.
• 37:42
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's just go back to uh dellsoner, how come
• 37:46
  Speaker 1: you got all the dates?
• 37:49
  Speaker 2: I got all the dates because for ten or twelve
• 37:52
  Speaker 2: years before that, I would be doing probably fifty or
• 37:58
  Speaker 2: sixty shows a year at the Capitol and Convention Hall
• 38:01
  Speaker 2: in Asbury Park, all right. Doesn't ever tried to do
• 38:05
  Speaker 2: shows in New Jersey, all right. And I worked really
• 38:09
  Speaker 2: hard from the day I started to establish Jersey as
• 38:14
  Speaker 2: a separate market from New York. All right. Now it's
• 38:17
  Speaker 2: even more separate because of financial reasons. But uh, you know,
• 38:22
  Speaker 2: it's it's you know, I've said this a thousand times.
• 38:26
  Speaker 2: There's six million people that live in the what was
• 38:29
  Speaker 2: the old two to oh one area code, so the
• 38:31
  Speaker 2: northern part of New Jersey. It's the second most densely
• 38:36
  Speaker 2: populated state in the country, and I think it's the
• 38:40
  Speaker 2: second highest per capita income. It was a market just
• 38:43
  Speaker 2: in need of a city, all right. And when I
• 38:47
  Speaker 2: was little, Newark was a big city, right, and a
• 38:51
  Speaker 2: lot of act played Nework. There was no arena, but
• 38:54
  Speaker 2: you know, every played, from everybody from Lawrence Welk to
• 38:57
  Speaker 2: the Rolling Stones and Bob Dylan played Symphony Hall in
• 39:01
  Speaker 2: New York. Then there were these nineteen sixty seven riots,
• 39:06
  Speaker 2: and it wiped Nork off the face of the earth,
• 39:09
  Speaker 2: and still to this day hasn't completely recovered. It's come
• 39:13
  Speaker 2: a long ways. You know. There's two great facilities there
• 39:16
  Speaker 2: in a Prudential Center and the New Jersey Performing Arts Center. Uh,
• 39:20
  Speaker 2: and still symphony holes there. But for a long long time,
• 39:26
  Speaker 2: York was wiped off the face of the earth. But
• 39:28
  Speaker 2: the Metropolitan Nirk was a huge, wealthy market, and I
• 39:34
  Speaker 2: grew up there and I understood it. Uh, And that's why,
• 39:41
  Speaker 2: you know, no one was trying to book the Capitol Theater.
• 39:44
  Speaker 2: You know, nobody was trying to book Asbury Parker ventional
• 39:47
  Speaker 2: I shouldn't say that. There was a guy named most
• 39:49
  Speaker 2: SEPTI very nice man who in the fifties into the well,
• 39:55
  Speaker 2: I don't know about the fifties, but the sixties into
• 39:57
  Speaker 2: the early seventies book shows at Convention Hall. He knew
• 40:03
  Speaker 2: nothing about rock and roll. He was a classical music
• 40:06
  Speaker 2: promoter and he just believed whatever the agent's told him.
• 40:13
  Speaker 2: But then when we came on board and started to
• 40:17
  Speaker 2: look to do shows. At the time, we knew what
• 40:20
  Speaker 2: we were doing. You know, we knew that the band
• 40:24
  Speaker 2: who he never heard of, could sell three thousand tickets. Yeah,
• 40:30
  Speaker 2: you know, So we competed for about a year, year
• 40:34
  Speaker 2: and a half, and then finally he was a very
• 40:37
  Speaker 2: nice man. He called me up, said let's let's have lunch,
• 40:42
  Speaker 2: and he said, I'm going to give you my contract,
• 40:44
  Speaker 2: all right. I can't compete with you, all right, And
• 40:48
  Speaker 2: he admitted, you know, he knew classical music inside out,
• 40:52
  Speaker 2: but you know what was happening is we were we
• 40:55
  Speaker 2: were booking the shows down the other end of the
• 40:58
  Speaker 2: borderwalk at a place called the Casine Arena, all right,
• 41:01
  Speaker 2: and we were you know, we we we knew what
• 41:04
  Speaker 2: we were doing. You know, it was of our age.
• 41:06
  Speaker 2: I mean, we were kids. You know. One of the things,
• 41:09
  Speaker 2: you know that was so much fun for me was,
• 41:13
  Speaker 2: you know, while my friends were in graduate school, you know,
• 41:16
  Speaker 2: I was out there promoting concerts with acts that we
• 41:18
  Speaker 2: all loved. So he saw the handwrite in the wall,
• 41:23
  Speaker 2: like I said, he was a very nice man, and
• 41:27
  Speaker 2: he said, stop down the other end of the board walk.
• 41:31
  Speaker 2: I'm going to give you my contract, set you up
• 41:33
  Speaker 2: with the town in the city. And so for probably
• 41:38
  Speaker 2: close to twenty years we did all the shows in
• 41:41
  Speaker 2: the summer in Asbray Park.
• 41:44
  Speaker 1: Let's go back to Frank Barcelona. You and me know
• 41:47
  Speaker 1: a lot about it. A lot of people don't. So
• 41:50
  Speaker 1: tell me how you got included Frank and how he
• 41:53
  Speaker 1: kept everybody in their own area.
• 41:57
  Speaker 2: Well, let's start with the second part. Frank envisioned the
• 42:03
  Speaker 2: concert business almost like pro sports, almost like the major leagues.
• 42:09
  Speaker 2: All Right, everybody had a franchise if they did their job. Well,
• 42:13
  Speaker 2: they were professional, innovative, all right. They got all his acts,
• 42:18
  Speaker 2: all his acts, all right. And I, you know, I,
• 42:25
  Speaker 2: like I said, I was a generation or a half
• 42:26
  Speaker 2: a generation behind when that first got set up. But
• 42:30
  Speaker 2: when I started and I started doing shows in Jersey
• 42:35
  Speaker 2: while I was in college and then you know, so
• 42:42
  Speaker 2: it was hard in those days when the Fillmore East
• 42:44
  Speaker 2: was still open. Graham had an exclusivity that was like
• 42:49
  Speaker 2: one hundred miles or seventy five miles around New York.
• 42:53
  Speaker 2: So you couldn't get very many acts to play Jersey
• 42:56
  Speaker 2: except for mostly the American acts, all right. I used
• 43:00
  Speaker 2: to play Mountain a lot because you know, you know,
• 43:04
  Speaker 2: uh and and so uh. In the case of Mountain,
• 43:09
  Speaker 2: Frank was their age, all right. So when I found
• 43:12
  Speaker 2: the Capital, and I had a partner in those days
• 43:17
  Speaker 2: when when when we found the Capital, I you know,
• 43:21
  Speaker 2: I went to Premiere and went to you know, my
• 43:23
  Speaker 2: agent there and got in to see Frank and Barber, uh,
• 43:27
  Speaker 2: and I told them what I wanted to do. They
• 43:30
  Speaker 2: gave me the blessing. We opened the Capital with Humble
• 43:34
  Speaker 2: Pie in the Jay Giles band instant sell out. You know,
• 43:40
  Speaker 2: Frank was there, uh and uh you know, from that
• 43:44
  Speaker 2: point on, the Capitol was a massive success for its
• 43:47
  Speaker 2: size in the day it opened. Uh And so you
• 43:51
  Speaker 2: know what that proved more than anything else was. You know,
• 43:55
  Speaker 2: it proved me right about the market, all right. Pasacica,
• 43:58
  Speaker 2: Jersey was a little run down on industrial town, all right,
• 44:02
  Speaker 2: no place people were going to hang out. But you know,
• 44:06
  Speaker 2: we did a lot of set out shows. We did
• 44:08
  Speaker 2: a lot of enormous shows. I mean the Rolling Stones
• 44:12
  Speaker 2: played there, The Who played there, Springsteen played there, Billy
• 44:16
  Speaker 2: Joel played there, and in many of those cases way
• 44:19
  Speaker 2: after they became a renax. So uh, you know. And
• 44:25
  Speaker 2: and Frank, Frank was really once he got past meeting him,
• 44:33
  Speaker 2: he's an incredibly nice, friendly guy, as his wife June
• 44:38
  Speaker 2: is uh. And so I got close with him, and
• 44:42
  Speaker 2: then I started to to to manage some acts. And
• 44:48
  Speaker 2: the first considerable act that I that that that that
• 44:52
  Speaker 2: I managed was Renaissance, all right, and uh I signed
• 44:57
  Speaker 2: him the premiere and they were, you know, that had
• 45:01
  Speaker 2: about a ten year run where they were really successful.
• 45:03
  Speaker 2: They were selling out three thousand seaters, a couple of
• 45:06
  Speaker 2: gold and platinum records, and the relationship just grew and
• 45:11
  Speaker 2: grew and grew from there.
• 45:20
  Speaker 1: Okay, So let's say you wanted to do something in
• 45:26
  Speaker 1: Pennsylvania fifty miles from Philadelphia. What would Frank say, that's
• 45:33
  Speaker 1: Maggot's territory end.
• 45:35
  Speaker 2: If it was fifty miles, which is why eventually I
• 45:38
  Speaker 2: built an amphitheater in scrant all right. Nobody was doing it,
• 45:44
  Speaker 2: all right? If you could find a market that nobody
• 45:47
  Speaker 2: else was putting shows into, and there was another market
• 45:50
  Speaker 2: to be added to a tour, instead of thirty dates,
• 45:53
  Speaker 2: there could be thirty one dates. Frank and the other agents,
• 45:58
  Speaker 2: you know, we're fine if I wanted to go to
• 46:02
  Speaker 2: Cherry Hill or Camden or something like that. Not a shot,
• 46:06
  Speaker 2: you know, Larry Maggott and Allen speedback all the way.
• 46:10
  Speaker 1: Okay. What about Jerry Weintraube when he wants to be
• 46:14
  Speaker 1: the national promoter and also Bill Graham when he starts
• 46:17
  Speaker 1: promoting the seventy four Crosby Stills, Nation and Young tour.
• 46:22
  Speaker 1: What'd you feel about that?
• 46:24
  Speaker 2: Well, early on, before my relationship with the Grateful Dead,
• 46:31
  Speaker 2: Jelled Graham was my hero, all right, and you know
• 46:37
  Speaker 2: I could fall follow along like a puppy dog, and
• 46:43
  Speaker 2: so Chrisby, Stills, Nash and Young seventy four. We got
• 46:46
  Speaker 2: the show at Roosevelt Stadium in Jersey City, and actually
• 46:50
  Speaker 2: it's a very famous show in that it happened the
• 46:53
  Speaker 2: night that Richard Nixon resigned, all right, and it was
• 46:58
  Speaker 2: you know your four Yeah, Jerry wan Troupp, I guess
• 47:03
  Speaker 2: before I was in in the business, I think he
• 47:08
  Speaker 2: you know, he did most of the Elvis states, if
• 47:09
  Speaker 2: not all of them. He did led Zeppelin dates and
• 47:14
  Speaker 2: oh and Sinatra dates. All right. So here's an interesting story.
• 47:21
  Speaker 2: When Giants Stadium was first built and it opened a
• 47:25
  Speaker 2: year before the arena opened, I was working with the
• 47:28
  Speaker 2: Sports Authority and the shows, the Sports and Exposition Authority,
• 47:32
  Speaker 2: and you know, I was going to promote the opening
• 47:35
  Speaker 2: show at Giants Stadium, which was actually in year two.
• 47:38
  Speaker 2: They didn't want that. They barely finished the stadium for
• 47:41
  Speaker 2: the Giants to open in September. But in year two
• 47:46
  Speaker 2: they were ready to do concerts, and there weren't a
• 47:49
  Speaker 2: lot of stadium concerts in those days. So you know,
• 47:52
  Speaker 2: I went out and tried to put a show together
• 47:54
  Speaker 2: and did Beach Boys, Steve Miller Band, Pablo kuz all Right,
• 48:01
  Speaker 2: so we're holding the date talking to the agent, Wan
• 48:07
  Speaker 2: trap is the manager of the Beach Boys in those days,
• 48:11
  Speaker 2: all right, and although they were big, he wasn't promoting
• 48:16
  Speaker 2: all of the dates. So you know, I'm patiently waiting, waiting,
• 48:23
  Speaker 2: waiting for the dates to get confirmed. And I get
• 48:26
  Speaker 2: a phone call. I'm one of the guys who runs
• 48:28
  Speaker 2: the Sports Authority, guy named Lauris Smith, who's passed but
• 48:33
  Speaker 2: very important guy in my life. And he, you know,
• 48:37
  Speaker 2: he ran the stadium in the Arena for a long time.
• 48:44
  Speaker 2: So I get a call from Morris and he says
• 48:47
  Speaker 2: to me, tomorrow morning, I want you to be in
• 48:49
  Speaker 2: my office at nine o'clock. I said, what's up. He said,
• 48:53
  Speaker 2: you'll see when you get here. And he was a
• 48:55
  Speaker 2: bit of a wise guy. Great guy, but a wise
• 48:57
  Speaker 2: guy all right. So you know, I picked my ass up.
• 49:01
  Speaker 2: I went got to his office and he was sitting
• 49:06
  Speaker 2: in his office with the chairman of the Sports Authority,
• 49:10
  Speaker 2: so his boss operationally, not but his boss. And they said, uh, John, Uh,
• 49:21
  Speaker 2: I'm gonna walk into another office, all right, and I
• 49:25
  Speaker 2: want you to there's somebody in there and I want
• 49:28
  Speaker 2: you to talk to him. So we got up, we
• 49:30
  Speaker 2: walked into the other office and there was Dave Ferana,
• 49:35
  Speaker 2: worked for Winehop in contract Twist at the time, and
• 49:39
  Speaker 2: Lauris walked me in and then left and just left
• 49:43
  Speaker 2: the two of us, all right. So I said, Dave,
• 49:51
  Speaker 2: what are you doing here? And he, like, you know, stammered, said, well,
• 49:58
  Speaker 2: you know, you know, Jerry's decided we're gonna Jerry and
• 50:01
  Speaker 2: Tom Mulett decided that, you know, we're going to promote
• 50:04
  Speaker 2: the show. And I said, do you see what just
• 50:09
  Speaker 2: happened in the last five minutes? I said, I don't
• 50:13
  Speaker 2: think so, all right, and you know, the light bulb
• 50:17
  Speaker 2: went up in his head. You know, he saw the
• 50:19
  Speaker 2: way they played it. I got the show, sold it out,
• 50:25
  Speaker 2: and I got a phone call from Winetop. I can't
• 50:33
  Speaker 2: remember if it was before the show or right after
• 50:35
  Speaker 2: the show, but he was laughing. He got a huge
• 50:39
  Speaker 2: kick that I stared him down, huge kick out of it.
• 50:44
  Speaker 2: And from that point on and the same thing with
• 50:47
  Speaker 2: with uh uh Tom Mulett and Terry Bassett, all right,
• 50:52
  Speaker 2: they almost always found uh, you know, a show or
• 50:56
  Speaker 2: a half a show for me with all the stuff
• 50:58
  Speaker 2: that they that they would doing. So you know, uh
• 51:04
  Speaker 2: it was you know, listen, I was I was a kid,
• 51:07
  Speaker 2: I was maybe I was thirty. Uh so you know
• 51:13
  Speaker 2: that was great. Now that led to another great story,
• 51:16
  Speaker 2: which was you managed the Moody Blues, not just whole
• 51:22
  Speaker 2: their whole career, but you know, in the latter part
• 51:24
  Speaker 2: of their career for a long time. And he played
• 51:26
  Speaker 2: for me in New York. It is after I went
• 51:28
  Speaker 2: into New York and uh he he uh. I get
• 51:37
  Speaker 2: the date from the agent and the phone rings and
• 51:42
  Speaker 2: it's Tom Eulet and he's hysterically laughing so much, and
• 51:46
  Speaker 2: I couldn't understand what the hell he was saying. He
• 51:48
  Speaker 2: was just belly laughing out loud. So I finally said,
• 51:53
  Speaker 2: come get a hold of yourself. You called me right,
• 51:58
  Speaker 2: So he did, and he said, you know what I've
• 52:01
  Speaker 2: been doing for the last twenty minutes. I said, I
• 52:03
  Speaker 2: have no idea, he said, getting screamed at it. Bill
• 52:07
  Speaker 2: Graham for giving you the Moody Blues. All right, I said,
• 52:11
  Speaker 2: Did he want it? No, he didn't want He wanted
• 52:13
  Speaker 2: me to give it to dells Ner. Now, now this
• 52:16
  Speaker 2: is a whole other, huge part, you know, of my story.
• 52:20
  Speaker 2: But Graham and I eventually became, you know, bitter enemies.
• 52:25
  Speaker 2: More on his end in mind. But he hated me
• 52:29
  Speaker 2: so much at that point because of the relationship I
• 52:33
  Speaker 2: had with the grateful dead that he actually tried to
• 52:38
  Speaker 2: hurt me, and and Tom thought it was so he
• 52:44
  Speaker 2: thought it was the funniest thing he ever heard in
• 52:45
  Speaker 2: his life. All right, So of course I got the
• 52:48
  Speaker 2: date and you know later that day where that night
• 52:54
  Speaker 2: is what Graham died in the helicopter crash. So the
• 52:59
  Speaker 2: last thing to Build did that I know of, was
• 53:02
  Speaker 2: try to fuck me. So and you know what I
• 53:09
  Speaker 2: can say, truthfully, in many ways, he was my hero
• 53:15
  Speaker 2: when he started, you know, this this sort of war
• 53:19
  Speaker 2: with me. You know, I learned a lot about him.
• 53:23
  Speaker 2: I learned a lot from him. He was a great showman,
• 53:26
  Speaker 2: no question, but he wasn't quite as squeaky clean as
• 53:29
  Speaker 2: as he would have had you believe that that he was.
• 53:33
  Speaker 2: I didn't want to fight with him, you know, there
• 53:36
  Speaker 2: was no reason to fight with him. He's more successful
• 53:39
  Speaker 2: than I was. He was a lot older than me,
• 53:42
  Speaker 2: but uh he you know there. You know, there's hours
• 53:47
  Speaker 2: of stories I can tell you about our interactions over
• 53:50
  Speaker 2: the years, but that was one of them.
• 53:54
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's go back to something you said earlier that
• 53:58
  Speaker 1: the tickets are so expressed that it's hurting artist development. Now,
• 54:05
  Speaker 1: I would say the tickets are so expensive because of demand,
• 54:09
  Speaker 1: that's what people want to pay for them.
• 54:14
  Speaker 2: Well, look, we will see in a couple of years,
• 54:20
  Speaker 2: all right. There's no question at post COVID the the
• 54:25
  Speaker 2: you know, there was an enormous amount of pent up
• 54:29
  Speaker 2: excitement about going to live shows again, all right, and
• 54:32
  Speaker 2: I don't think we've seen the end of that. I
• 54:35
  Speaker 2: think that there's no question that that ticket prices for many,
• 54:40
  Speaker 2: many many years were undersolved. All right.
• 54:45
  Speaker 3: Underpriced, yeah, underpriced, yeah.
• 54:49
  Speaker 2: But should they have dreamt to six hundred, seven hundred,
• 54:53
  Speaker 2: eight hundred, one thousand dollars twelve hundred dollars? No.
• 54:59
  Speaker 3: No.
• 55:00
  Speaker 2: A friend of mine the other day told me he
• 55:01
  Speaker 2: found an old ticket stuff of an Eagles show that
• 55:03
  Speaker 2: I did in Rochester, New York, and the ticket was
• 55:09
  Speaker 2: seventy five dollars, and he remembers me going, and I did.
• 55:14
  Speaker 2: I was at the time very friendly with Irving, and
• 55:20
  Speaker 2: I said to you nuts, you know, because he averaged
• 55:24
  Speaker 2: p one ticket price then was probably forty maybe fifty dollars,
• 55:29
  Speaker 2: And he said there's a demand, and he's right, there
• 55:32
  Speaker 2: was the demand. But now that seventy five dollars is
• 55:37
  Speaker 2: probably five hundred dollars, and the ticket prices across the
• 55:42
  Speaker 2: board for the major acts is way beyond five hundred dollars.
• 55:50
  Speaker 2: So I think what happens is I think the superstars
• 55:54
  Speaker 2: will still continue to get those prices and still do
• 55:58
  Speaker 2: great business. But I think somebody who pays five hundred,
• 56:03
  Speaker 2: seven hundred, one thousand dollars for a ticket, that's a
• 56:07
  Speaker 2: middle class person, won't be able to go to a
• 56:11
  Speaker 2: couple of other shows that they'd like to go see
• 56:14
  Speaker 2: where the ticket price top ticket price might only be
• 56:17
  Speaker 2: eighty or ninety dollars, right, But if you're spending seven hundred,
• 56:22
  Speaker 2: you know, the next month or two you're not You're
• 56:26
  Speaker 2: saving your money, you know. Now, Look, there's a lot
• 56:29
  Speaker 2: of rich people in this world, and in America especially,
• 56:33
  Speaker 2: so you know, rich people are gonna pay whatever they
• 56:36
  Speaker 2: want because it's a certain trophy. You know, it's you
• 56:39
  Speaker 2: know those some people are all driving Lamborghinis and porches.
• 56:44
  Speaker 2: All right. But I think it's going to hurt going forward,
• 56:52
  Speaker 2: and I think it's already hurt the rock business. As
• 56:56
  Speaker 2: you have written. I'm sure there's not all lot of
• 57:00
  Speaker 2: rock acts anymore, you know, all the old ones are
• 57:03
  Speaker 2: still there all right, but it's very rare that you
• 57:07
  Speaker 2: see a new rock act really really top off. There's
• 57:14
  Speaker 2: probably more Americana acts that have grown into being arenact
• 57:19
  Speaker 2: and straight ahead rock and roll bands.
• 57:23
  Speaker 1: And you think that's because the prices for the so
• 57:25
  Speaker 1: called heritage acts are so expensive.
• 57:29
  Speaker 2: Yeah, I do, I do, And look, you know it's
• 57:33
  Speaker 2: it's it's a with a lot of these acts, well,
• 57:36
  Speaker 2: the heritage acts. Psychologically, even if they don't say it's
• 57:41
  Speaker 2: the last tour, everybody thinks it's the last tour, you know.
• 57:46
  Speaker 2: I mean this was on a what eight year final tour,
• 57:51
  Speaker 2: and I still don't believe they won't get back together.
• 57:53
  Speaker 3: I agree, yeah, you know, uh, the Eagles, you know,
• 58:01
  Speaker 3: this is the last tour.
• 58:04
  Speaker 2: Maybe maybe I think if gunn Fry was alive, it
• 58:07
  Speaker 2: wouldn't be. But I think that that Henley knows he
• 58:12
  Speaker 2: can go out on his own and still draw pretty
• 58:15
  Speaker 2: big crowds. Not as big as Evils, but pretty big crowds.
• 58:19
  Speaker 2: And the pop and hip hop acts that have exploded,
• 58:24
  Speaker 2: you know, with few exceptions, I don't think they have
• 58:27
  Speaker 2: a long career. There are some exceptions, no question. I
• 58:31
  Speaker 2: mean Beyonce and Taylor Swift. I think forever. But and
• 58:38
  Speaker 2: there are a couple of hip hop acts that that
• 58:40
  Speaker 2: will probably have a long, long career. But if you
• 58:45
  Speaker 2: look back at hip hop twenty thirty years ago, the
• 58:51
  Speaker 2: acts that were really big, Toy Hell, Cool Jay, they
• 58:55
  Speaker 2: can't sell any tickets anymore, all right. Snoop Dogg, you know,
• 58:59
  Speaker 2: I did you know. I think there's a resurgence for Snoop.
• 59:03
  Speaker 2: But I did Snoop a bunch of years ago and
• 59:05
  Speaker 2: couldn't sell out the Apollo. So it seems to me
• 59:12
  Speaker 2: that while hip hop is enormous, it doesn't seem to
• 59:18
  Speaker 2: be creating long term careers. I could be wrong, you know,
• 59:23
  Speaker 2: I could be wrong.
• 59:23
  Speaker 1: But let's go back to what you said. We have
• 59:27
  Speaker 1: the COVID build up. Some might say that the concert
• 59:31
  Speaker 1: business will rage forever because it's unique experience in the
• 59:37
  Speaker 1: world where we all have the same items, we have
• 59:39
  Speaker 1: the same phone, we have this and that, and it's
• 59:41
  Speaker 1: a once in a lifetime maybe experience. Do you think
• 59:45
  Speaker 1: that the business will fall off in a few years.
• 59:49
  Speaker 2: I think the prices will fall off in a few years,
• 59:53
  Speaker 2: all right. And I think if the price is fall off,
• 59:57
  Speaker 2: then the business will still stay very healthy. It is
• 1:00:02
  Speaker 2: a unique experience, all right, and even to me, and
• 1:00:06
  Speaker 2: I'm sure you at the right show, they are in
• 1:00:10
  Speaker 2: the back of your next still stands up, you know.
• 1:00:12
  Speaker 2: And I've seen thousands of shows, you know, so there's
• 1:00:15
  Speaker 2: nothing like that except for maybe, you know, championship sports.
• 1:00:20
  Speaker 2: So no, I don't. I'm not predicting the demise of
• 1:00:23
  Speaker 2: the conceptist by any way, shape or form. You know.
• 1:00:27
  Speaker 2: What I'm predicting is that I don't think it can
• 1:00:30
  Speaker 2: sustain these crazy ticket prices over the long haul. Some
• 1:00:35
  Speaker 2: of them will be there as long as there's a
• 1:00:37
  Speaker 2: super superstar, they'll be there, all right. But I think
• 1:00:40
  Speaker 2: the crazy ticket prices will will will have to come down, right,
• 1:00:47
  Speaker 2: and we'll have to give the audience a more reasonable
• 1:00:53
  Speaker 2: reason to go to shows, to go to acts that
• 1:00:56
  Speaker 2: you know, that that that they're not quite sure they
• 1:00:59
  Speaker 2: love what they like. And like I said, in the
• 1:01:03
  Speaker 2: Americana World, look, you know, Mumford and Sons, Luminears. I mean,
• 1:01:08
  Speaker 2: you can go on and on and on. You know,
• 1:01:10
  Speaker 2: some of those actually become a renact. You know, ten
• 1:01:13
  Speaker 2: years ago there was no such thing as an American
• 1:01:15
  Speaker 2: act becoming an a renact, you know, So you know,
• 1:01:19
  Speaker 2: I think that's you know that that that is uniquely
• 1:01:25
  Speaker 2: American to the American upper middle class, well educated person.
• 1:01:32
  Speaker 2: All right, I think they're you know, they're they're, they're
• 1:01:34
  Speaker 2: they're listening to these acts, whether it be on their
• 1:01:38
  Speaker 2: computer or whether on what little radio is left, and
• 1:01:42
  Speaker 2: and the acts are getting big.
• 1:01:45
  Speaker 1: Okay, let's say you're talking about these tickets five hundred
• 1:01:49
  Speaker 1: to twelve hundred dollars. How can you control prices today
• 1:01:57
  Speaker 1: when the demand far out rips capacity and people are
• 1:02:04
  Speaker 1: willing to pay much more than the face value.
• 1:02:07
  Speaker 2: Well platinum tickets. You know, it's one of the things
• 1:02:10
  Speaker 2: that that ticketmaster was good at creating platinum tickets, taking
• 1:02:16
  Speaker 2: a certain amount of good seats and basically put them
• 1:02:20
  Speaker 2: up for auction so that the heavy hitters, you know,
• 1:02:26
  Speaker 2: will be able to pay, you know, higher prices than
• 1:02:32
  Speaker 2: the average punter.
• 1:02:35
  Speaker 1: What about the secondary market.
• 1:02:38
  Speaker 2: Well, I've been fighting this bob for forty five years
• 1:02:43
  Speaker 2: and beating my head against the wall. You know, I
• 1:02:49
  Speaker 2: was successful at one point in getting New Jersey to
• 1:02:54
  Speaker 2: put together an anti scalping law. It was a good law,
• 1:02:56
  Speaker 2: all right, except for law enforcement wouldn't enforce it, all right,
• 1:03:02
  Speaker 2: And you know. I remember sitting down once with like
• 1:03:04
  Speaker 2: a colonel from the New Yorsey State Police and saying,
• 1:03:09
  Speaker 2: why aren't you It's the law. It got passed, the
• 1:03:11
  Speaker 2: governor signed it, and he was pretty simple. He said,
• 1:03:16
  Speaker 2: I'm worried about killings and rapes and grand grand last larceny.
• 1:03:22
  Speaker 2: I get no time chasing after a ticket scout, so
• 1:03:26
  Speaker 2: you know it eventually, you know it went away. So
• 1:03:32
  Speaker 2: you know, I think that if you take complete greed
• 1:03:37
  Speaker 2: out of it, there's a way that the industry can
• 1:03:41
  Speaker 2: modify scalping all right, with something like platinum all right
• 1:03:50
  Speaker 2: and come back down to earth. You know. I speak,
• 1:03:55
  Speaker 2: you know, reasonably often at colleges, and I even for
• 1:04:00
  Speaker 2: one year toward a course at Syracuse. A lot of
• 1:04:05
  Speaker 2: kids these days, college aged kids, which should be the
• 1:04:07
  Speaker 2: heart of the music business, don't go to shows. They
• 1:04:11
  Speaker 2: go to clubs. They don't go to shows. I've lectured
• 1:04:15
  Speaker 2: at NYU a year or two ago. Probably there were
• 1:04:20
  Speaker 2: forty kids in the class. Maybe twenty five percent of
• 1:04:24
  Speaker 2: them went to shows. They all went to clubs, all right.
• 1:04:28
  Speaker 1: Just to be clear, you're talking about a club where
• 1:04:30
  Speaker 1: there's a DJ and bottle service and all that.
• 1:04:33
  Speaker 2: Stuff, or or even a band, but the ticket price,
• 1:04:36
  Speaker 2: the admission is ten dollars, you know, or they passed
• 1:04:40
  Speaker 2: a hat. So it's not a lack of interest by
• 1:04:45
  Speaker 2: young America in music, you know, it's that they can't
• 1:04:50
  Speaker 2: afford to go to the big shows, and certainly can't
• 1:04:53
  Speaker 2: afford to go to many of them. You know, we're
• 1:04:56
  Speaker 2: going to see We're going to see next year an
• 1:04:59
  Speaker 2: annoy or miss rolling Stone tour, biggest ever, all right,
• 1:05:04
  Speaker 2: probably as big as it possibly can be, because now
• 1:05:08
  Speaker 2: they don't have to say it's going to be the
• 1:05:09
  Speaker 2: last tour. The average person's gonna say, they're eighty years old.
• 1:05:13
  Speaker 2: How many more times can they do this? I better
• 1:05:16
  Speaker 2: go see it, you know. And who aren't far behind that? Yeah,
• 1:05:22
  Speaker 2: and look at you Look at the Genesis tour. You
• 1:05:25
  Speaker 2: know Collins couldn't couldn't stand up, he he you know,
• 1:05:30
  Speaker 2: he performed and sang reasonably well, sitting down. All right,
• 1:05:37
  Speaker 2: these acts are going to fade away, you know, and
• 1:05:40
  Speaker 2: and and uh, you know, some of them are retiring.
• 1:05:44
  Speaker 2: You know, some acts that you know that I did
• 1:05:46
  Speaker 2: a lot of business with over the years that we're
• 1:05:48
  Speaker 2: still doing great business. Retired Joan Baez retired, You know,
• 1:05:52
  Speaker 2: last time she played in New York, I sold that
• 1:05:54
  Speaker 2: three shows at the Beacon with her. She retired, all right,
• 1:05:58
  Speaker 2: Paul Simon Bass retired, all right. He might do a
• 1:06:02
  Speaker 2: date now and again, but he's not gonna tour again.
• 1:06:06
  Speaker 2: So you know, some of these acts, you know, are
• 1:06:10
  Speaker 2: gonna drag their asses out on stage until they drop.
• 1:06:15
  Speaker 2: So you know, we still got, you know, probably a
• 1:06:18
  Speaker 2: few more years of the Warhorses, but then what happens now?
• 1:06:24
  Speaker 2: Of course? Also I think that you know well, is
• 1:06:27
  Speaker 2: country's mainstream. Country was never mainstream in most of my career, never, never, never, right,
• 1:06:34
  Speaker 2: And as a matter of fact, very few big country acts,
• 1:06:37
  Speaker 2: big country acts ever played New York. All right, will
• 1:06:42
  Speaker 2: he always played New York. Will He even played stadiums
• 1:06:44
  Speaker 2: for me in in in New York and in upstate
• 1:06:48
  Speaker 2: New York. But you know, the mainstream big country acts
• 1:06:56
  Speaker 2: didn't play New York. Johnny Cash played. I played Johnny
• 1:06:59
  Speaker 2: Cash a couple of once at Carnegie Hall, an amazing shop,
• 1:07:03
  Speaker 2: all right, but they just didn't come. And I used
• 1:07:05
  Speaker 2: to argue with some of the agents I knew in Nashville.
• 1:07:08
  Speaker 2: Is okay, let's say you can sell out an arena
• 1:07:11
  Speaker 2: in forty of the fifty states. You can't in the Northeast,
• 1:07:16
  Speaker 2: but come and play at theater and I'll do something
• 1:07:19
  Speaker 2: to try to build your business. But of course, in
• 1:07:23
  Speaker 2: most of the Northeast there was not and still isn't,
• 1:07:27
  Speaker 2: any country radio. But the big country acts have basically
• 1:07:32
  Speaker 2: become mainstream rock bands, all right, And with all you know,
• 1:07:39
  Speaker 2: with all the things that go would be in a
• 1:07:42
  Speaker 2: big time mainstream rock band.
• 1:07:50
  Speaker 1: Well, how'd you beat the Grateful Dead?
• 1:07:54
  Speaker 2: I met the Grateful Dead by booking a show in
• 1:07:58
  Speaker 2: the early seventies. He's at this Triple A baseball park,
• 1:08:02
  Speaker 2: Roosevelt Stadium, and I booked it just from they had
• 1:08:08
  Speaker 2: an agent for one tour. Other than that, they never
• 1:08:11
  Speaker 2: had an agent. And a friend of mine named Ron
• 1:08:14
  Speaker 2: Rainey was the agent, and he sold me a show.
• 1:08:19
  Speaker 2: I don't remember what guarantee I played, but I knew
• 1:08:21
  Speaker 2: they were big enough to sell a lot of tickets,
• 1:08:25
  Speaker 2: and so I played that first show. I got along
• 1:08:30
  Speaker 2: with him. Well, it was a craft to be able
• 1:08:37
  Speaker 2: to get along with them, because of the zoo that
• 1:08:39
  Speaker 2: surrounded them roadies at all, all right. But you know,
• 1:08:45
  Speaker 2: I was a tough little kid, and you know I
• 1:08:49
  Speaker 2: took those ship and gave it back home.
• 1:08:51
  Speaker 1: So can you give me an example of taking their
• 1:08:53
  Speaker 1: ship and give a get back to him? Oh?
• 1:08:56
  Speaker 2: One time, one time when they're doing the sound check,
• 1:09:03
  Speaker 2: I'm on stage, I think it was up in Rochester
• 1:09:07
  Speaker 2: and Kid Candelario of one of their roadies. All right,
• 1:09:14
  Speaker 2: I'm standing on the side of the stage, and all
• 1:09:17
  Speaker 2: of a sudden, he throws a full can of soda
• 1:09:20
  Speaker 2: all right at me, whizzes by my head. It hit me.
• 1:09:24
  Speaker 2: It would have killed me probably or damaged me badly.
• 1:09:28
  Speaker 2: I didn't say a word. I turned around, I picked
• 1:09:32
  Speaker 2: it up and heaved it right back at it. They
• 1:09:37
  Speaker 2: respected me for that, you know. And the other thing is,
• 1:09:43
  Speaker 2: you know, they were very wary when I first met him. Now,
• 1:09:46
  Speaker 2: I wasn't around in the sixties, so all I know
• 1:09:48
  Speaker 2: about the sixties, which is a very cold period for them,
• 1:09:52
  Speaker 2: is what they told me. All right. But by the
• 1:09:55
  Speaker 2: seventies they didn't trust agents, they didn't trust most promoters.
• 1:10:01
  Speaker 2: And you know, I developed a nice relationship with you know,
• 1:10:05
  Speaker 2: doing a few dates, and then one day, I think
• 1:10:10
  Speaker 2: it was probably seventy four seventy five, I get a
• 1:10:17
  Speaker 2: phone call like two o'clock in the morning, from Rock Scully,
• 1:10:23
  Speaker 2: who was, you know, one of the characters in their
• 1:10:27
  Speaker 2: lives and was their road manager at the time. And
• 1:10:32
  Speaker 2: he called me and I woke me up at night.
• 1:10:35
  Speaker 2: I said, you know what's up? He said, Garcia Hunter
• 1:10:40
  Speaker 2: got busted. I said, okay, what do you want me
• 1:10:45
  Speaker 2: to do about it? He said, they need to get
• 1:10:47
  Speaker 2: bailed out. They're in I think was Mount Holly, New Jersey.
• 1:10:53
  Speaker 2: I said, okay, how much is the baill I think
• 1:10:55
  Speaker 2: they said two thousand or three thousand dollars. The capital
• 1:11:00
  Speaker 2: in those days had a safe with a fair amount
• 1:11:03
  Speaker 2: of cashing it always, so said, okay, give me the
• 1:11:06
  Speaker 2: address where it is, and you know, I'll go to
• 1:11:09
  Speaker 2: the capitol. I'll get the money, and I'll go bail
• 1:11:11
  Speaker 2: them out. What he didn't realize was this town was
• 1:11:18
  Speaker 2: about half an hour outside of Philadelphia, and I was
• 1:11:21
  Speaker 2: way up in Northern Jersey, all right. He didn't bother
• 1:11:25
  Speaker 2: to look at a map, because the coolie should have
• 1:11:27
  Speaker 2: made with Larry Maggott, all right, but he didn't. So
• 1:11:31
  Speaker 2: I jumped in my car, I had a friend with me,
• 1:11:34
  Speaker 2: drove for two hours down there, bailed them out of jail,
• 1:11:39
  Speaker 2: drove him back to New York and hung out with
• 1:11:46
  Speaker 2: with Garcia Hunter till you know daylight, and uh, you know, Garcia,
• 1:11:55
  Speaker 2: I can tell you it was one of the smartest
• 1:11:57
  Speaker 2: people I ever met in my life. He's up there
• 1:12:00
  Speaker 2: with three or four other people, none of whom were musicians.
• 1:12:04
  Speaker 2: And we were friends, you know, I can say that,
• 1:12:07
  Speaker 2: not the brag, but we were friends. See that picture
• 1:12:12
  Speaker 2: right there that I'm portant.
• 1:12:13
  Speaker 1: To, well, we're audio only.
• 1:12:17
  Speaker 2: Oh okay, you show you cancer me. Okay. So he
• 1:12:20
  Speaker 2: painted me a picture, all right, and it's sitting on
• 1:12:23
  Speaker 2: my wall. Nobody in the Grateful Dead ever got a
• 1:12:26
  Speaker 2: picture from him, all right. So I you know, I
• 1:12:30
  Speaker 2: had a very quiet, very interesting relationship with him. And
• 1:12:38
  Speaker 2: one day they toured and I played him at Rosloe
• 1:12:42
  Speaker 2: Stadium again their Wall of Sound tour, and technically it
• 1:12:49
  Speaker 2: was a complete disaster. Sold a lot of tickets, but
• 1:12:52
  Speaker 2: complete disaster, and they decided to get off the road
• 1:12:57
  Speaker 2: for a while, all right, try to figure out that
• 1:12:59
  Speaker 2: the whole sound thing, et cetera, et cetera. So they
• 1:13:03
  Speaker 2: filmed the last dates of those tours, which were at Winterland, right.
• 1:13:09
  Speaker 2: So you know, I'm sort of staying in touch, you know,
• 1:13:13
  Speaker 2: but they're not on the road, not much to do.
• 1:13:16
  Speaker 2: Phone rings. One day it's Jerry, and you know, I
• 1:13:20
  Speaker 2: basically said, what's up. He said, I want you to
• 1:13:23
  Speaker 2: fly out to LA to meet me. I said, okay,
• 1:13:27
  Speaker 2: you know what's it about. He said, you'll see when
• 1:13:29
  Speaker 2: you get here. So you know you're not going to
• 1:13:32
  Speaker 2: say no to Terry Garcia again. In uplone, I fly out.
• 1:13:36
  Speaker 2: He picks me up at the airport and I always remember,
• 1:13:40
  Speaker 2: this is the first one I ever saw, the two
• 1:13:42
  Speaker 2: thousand and two BMW, which was like the starter BMW
• 1:13:47
  Speaker 2: in those days. And we went to a studio where
• 1:13:54
  Speaker 2: they were cutting the film and they had a rough
• 1:13:57
  Speaker 2: cut of the film. He said, I want you to
• 1:13:58
  Speaker 2: see the film. So I sat there for whatever it
• 1:14:01
  Speaker 2: was close to two hours, I guess, and it was great.
• 1:14:04
  Speaker 2: It's still great. It's still one of the great rock
• 1:14:06
  Speaker 2: and roll movies of all time. And he said, you
• 1:14:10
  Speaker 2: like it. I said, yeah, I think it's fabulous. He said, okay,
• 1:14:13
  Speaker 2: let's go. We're gonna have dinner at hal Kant's house,
• 1:14:16
  Speaker 2: which is their lawyer, the Dead's lawyer. He's passed away,
• 1:14:19
  Speaker 2: but very interesting guy. He was the Dead's lawyer and
• 1:14:23
  Speaker 2: he was also a world poker Champion champion, and so
• 1:14:29
  Speaker 2: we had dinner, and at the end of dinner we
• 1:14:34
  Speaker 2: went and sat down in the living room and he said.
• 1:14:40
  Speaker 2: I said to him, Jerry, the movie was great. I
• 1:14:43
  Speaker 2: really enjoyed it. Could you tell me why you wanted
• 1:14:46
  Speaker 2: me to see it so badly? All right? He said, oh, yeah, sure,
• 1:14:50
  Speaker 2: you're going to distribute it. I said, Jerry, the only
• 1:14:55
  Speaker 2: thing I know about movies is that I go to
• 1:14:56
  Speaker 2: them once in a while. I don't distribute a movie,
• 1:14:59
  Speaker 2: all right. He said, that might be true, John, but
• 1:15:02
  Speaker 2: you know more about how to promote Grateful Dead than
• 1:15:04
  Speaker 2: anybody else alive. So the vote of confidence that you
• 1:15:09
  Speaker 2: can't beat. So I learned, and my staff learned very
• 1:15:16
  Speaker 2: quickly how to distribute a movie and it was unique.
• 1:15:21
  Speaker 2: We forwalled the best sounding theaters, and I think we
• 1:15:26
  Speaker 2: ended up playing thirty maybe forty cities one at a time,
• 1:15:31
  Speaker 2: a week or two at a time, and brought in
• 1:15:34
  Speaker 2: sound systems so that because in those days movie theaters
• 1:15:38
  Speaker 2: the only sound was behind the screen one giant speaker.
• 1:15:43
  Speaker 2: So we did that, and you know, it was successful.
• 1:15:50
  Speaker 2: And then I helped him make a deal with a
• 1:15:52
  Speaker 2: distributor to do all the secondary markets and stuff, and
• 1:15:59
  Speaker 2: you know, I talked to him nearly every day, and
• 1:16:02
  Speaker 2: he had actually, Jerry had a manager, guy named Richard
• 1:16:04
  Speaker 2: Loran at the time, who's a very good guy, still
• 1:16:07
  Speaker 2: a friend of mine, and he was very instrumental in
• 1:16:11
  Speaker 2: all of that. So you know, that's happening. And then
• 1:16:15
  Speaker 2: when that's over with, I don't know how long, but
• 1:16:18
  Speaker 2: you know, not long after that, I get a call
• 1:16:23
  Speaker 2: from both Jerry and another one from Whir and said,
• 1:16:28
  Speaker 2: we're thinking of going back out of the road. I
• 1:16:31
  Speaker 2: want you to come out and meet with us. So
• 1:16:34
  Speaker 2: you know, sure, I jumped at it.
• 1:16:35
  Speaker 1: Just before you meet, it's The Grateful Dead. Did you
• 1:16:39
  Speaker 1: make or lose money on the movie?
• 1:16:42
  Speaker 2: The movie made money. Didn't make a lot of money,
• 1:16:44
  Speaker 2: but it made money.
• 1:16:45
  Speaker 1: So your flo They say where, and Jerry say come out?
• 1:16:50
  Speaker 2: Yep. So I come out and we go to Weir's house,
• 1:16:55
  Speaker 2: which is the ultimate bachelo pad at the time, all
• 1:16:59
  Speaker 2: right on top of one mountain, and Marin and yeah,
• 1:17:03
  Speaker 2: and we sit around for a long time, you know,
• 1:17:08
  Speaker 2: probably six seven hours, and basically what they all say
• 1:17:15
  Speaker 2: is we want to go on the road. They haven't
• 1:17:18
  Speaker 2: figured out how to really play arenas yet all right
• 1:17:21
  Speaker 2: where it would sound good see to them. The reason
• 1:17:24
  Speaker 2: I think that their career is second only to the Beatles,
• 1:17:29
  Speaker 2: that they were the most significant sociological act of the
• 1:17:34
  Speaker 2: rock era was because they really gave a shit about
• 1:17:37
  Speaker 2: the fans right, and they didn't want up having failed
• 1:17:40
  Speaker 2: with this wall of sound, they wanted to figure out
• 1:17:44
  Speaker 2: a way to be able, and then they weren't going
• 1:17:45
  Speaker 2: to go to bigger places, especially indoors, until they could
• 1:17:52
  Speaker 2: get the sound right. So he said, we're not playing arenas,
• 1:17:55
  Speaker 2: so you know, what do you think? John? So it
• 1:18:00
  Speaker 2: sort of just sort of fell out of my mouth.
• 1:18:02
  Speaker 2: It wasn't really any stroke of genius. I said, let's
• 1:18:06
  Speaker 2: pick ten cities. Let's play three days in each city,
• 1:18:10
  Speaker 2: and you know, the theaters that you would normally play
• 1:18:13
  Speaker 2: because at that point they were only playing like single
• 1:18:15
  Speaker 2: nights in places. I said, and and you know, let's
• 1:18:21
  Speaker 2: you know, let's get get get the buzz back. Uh
• 1:18:25
  Speaker 2: and uh they said, uh, okay, but you know, won't
• 1:18:30
  Speaker 2: they were very self aware of how big they were.
• 1:18:33
  Speaker 2: Uh they said, uh, how are we gonna how are
• 1:18:35
  Speaker 2: we going to distribute the tickets? You know, because there'll
• 1:18:40
  Speaker 2: be more people than tickets available, and they they didn't
• 1:18:44
  Speaker 2: want to do it. I don't remember if there was
• 1:18:46
  Speaker 2: Ticketmaster yet or there was ticket tron still, but they
• 1:18:49
  Speaker 2: didn't want to do that. So I said to him,
• 1:18:53
  Speaker 2: we'll do lottery. How do you what do you mean
• 1:18:56
  Speaker 2: we'll do the lottery. I said, We'll put the word out,
• 1:19:01
  Speaker 2: give them a post office box, let them, you know,
• 1:19:06
  Speaker 2: write a ticket request with money order, and we'll film
• 1:19:10
  Speaker 2: until we're sold out. And I like that idea. So
• 1:19:14
  Speaker 2: they said, who's going to do that? I said, I'll
• 1:19:16
  Speaker 2: do it all right. So I had a little office
• 1:19:20
  Speaker 2: in Jersey that was the second floor of a building
• 1:19:25
  Speaker 2: that was an insurance broker on the first floor. Anyway,
• 1:19:30
  Speaker 2: So we put the word out and it was a
• 1:19:31
  Speaker 2: dead head hotline, and two dead head hotlines, one in
• 1:19:34
  Speaker 2: San Francisco, one in at the Capitol got the word
• 1:19:39
  Speaker 2: out and it was an amazing response. We got hundreds
• 1:19:44
  Speaker 2: of thousands of requests for tickets, you know, and the
• 1:19:48
  Speaker 2: average seat was probably seventy five hundred and eight thousand
• 1:19:51
  Speaker 2: tickets three days in the theater. And the first amazing
• 1:19:56
  Speaker 2: thing is they started to come in is the envelopes
• 1:19:59
  Speaker 2: almost all of them had really intricate artwork on them.
• 1:20:04
  Speaker 2: So you immediately said, Okay, I know they're a great band,
• 1:20:08
  Speaker 2: but this is something really special, you know, for the
• 1:20:11
  Speaker 2: fans to you know, draw other stuff. So we did.
• 1:20:17
  Speaker 2: We did the whole country, twenty four hours a day,
• 1:20:21
  Speaker 2: three shifts of people. I lost my lease, I got
• 1:20:25
  Speaker 2: thrown out of the office, but we pulled it off.
• 1:20:29
  Speaker 2: It did well, had a good time. And over those
• 1:20:33
  Speaker 2: few years, uh, they you know, the sound companies were
• 1:20:39
  Speaker 2: getting more and more sophisticated. Uh, and you know they're
• 1:20:44
  Speaker 2: there sound people always were, you know, really on top
• 1:20:47
  Speaker 2: of things. So first I introduced them to Claire Brothers
• 1:20:53
  Speaker 2: one or two tours. They were the real state of
• 1:20:56
  Speaker 2: the art at the time. And then slowly but surely
• 1:20:59
  Speaker 2: they're techies took over it and built their own system
• 1:21:03
  Speaker 2: all right. So we started to play arenas, and they
• 1:21:09
  Speaker 2: put speakers not only on the stage, but they put
• 1:21:13
  Speaker 2: sound like speakers in the back of the arenas all right.
• 1:21:19
  Speaker 2: And they put small clusters of speakers in the hallways
• 1:21:23
  Speaker 2: all right. So wherever you were, if you were, if
• 1:21:26
  Speaker 2: you were a dancer, you were out in the hallways
• 1:21:29
  Speaker 2: spinning away, all right. And the music was right there
• 1:21:32
  Speaker 2: for so, like I said, they cared about their fans
• 1:21:35
  Speaker 2: more than any act I've ever even imagined. All right,
• 1:21:40
  Speaker 2: So you know at that point they said to me,
• 1:21:47
  Speaker 2: you know, you booked the tour, and I said, uh,
• 1:21:51
  Speaker 2: I can introduce you to some pretty good agents. No,
• 1:21:54
  Speaker 2: we don't want an agent. You booked a tour. So
• 1:21:58
  Speaker 2: we made a deal. How can't attorney was was involved,
• 1:22:01
  Speaker 2: and sort of standard deals in those days were guarantees
• 1:22:06
  Speaker 2: in eighty five fifteens, all right, So we made a
• 1:22:11
  Speaker 2: deal that i'd co promote with local promoters because I
• 1:22:17
  Speaker 2: always believe that was best for them, and I always
• 1:22:20
  Speaker 2: did that with all my management acts. All right, you
• 1:22:22
  Speaker 2: know you don't want you know, you want somebody on
• 1:22:24
  Speaker 2: the ground, you know. And so they made those dates
• 1:22:30
  Speaker 2: eighty twenties, and I split them with the local promoters
• 1:22:33
  Speaker 2: except for the dates in the northeast that I would
• 1:22:35
  Speaker 2: normally have promoted anyway. And they became eighty five to fifteen.
• 1:22:41
  Speaker 2: And the only thing they didn't want me involved in
• 1:22:45
  Speaker 2: was the West coast. They still wanted Graham to do it.
• 1:22:49
  Speaker 4: They loved Graham, but they didn't trust Graham. Why did
• 1:22:59
  Speaker 4: they trust Well, I think they suspected that he wasn't
• 1:23:07
  Speaker 4: giving them suspected that he wasn't giving him a fair count.
• 1:23:12
  Speaker 4: And then I found out more this. This went on
• 1:23:15
  Speaker 4: for a number of years, and you know, once I
• 1:23:18
  Speaker 4: was really established as their guy, Graham got angrier and
• 1:23:23
  Speaker 4: angrier with me, all right, till finally one day they
• 1:23:29
  Speaker 4: called and they said, we're playing Spartan Stadium.
• 1:23:33
  Speaker 2: I think it was San Jose all right for Graham. Well,
• 1:23:38
  Speaker 2: we want you to negotiate the deal. I said, are
• 1:23:42
  Speaker 2: you fucking mind all of you guys? I said, this
• 1:23:47
  Speaker 2: guy will put a hit out on me. They said, no, no,
• 1:23:50
  Speaker 2: we're going to talk to him about it. He's going
• 1:23:52
  Speaker 2: to be okay with it, all right. Said you know
• 1:23:55
  Speaker 2: you're not. You're not getting any piece of it. You're
• 1:23:57
  Speaker 2: not promoting it. You just you you cut the deal
• 1:24:00
  Speaker 2: because you know we've exammed over the years, we've examined
• 1:24:02
  Speaker 2: your deals. They're right, very righteous deals, et cetera, et cetera.
• 1:24:07
  Speaker 2: So a day or two goes by and trying to
• 1:24:11
  Speaker 2: remember who called me, it's either Bobby or Mickey called
• 1:24:17
  Speaker 2: me and said, okay, the deed's done. We've told Graham
• 1:24:20
  Speaker 2: he's accepted it. I said, you sure, said yep. Absolutely.
• 1:24:27
  Speaker 2: So I called Graham and I said, Bill, you know,
• 1:24:35
  Speaker 2: the dead telled me that that you're fine with me
• 1:24:38
  Speaker 2: doing the deal with you. He said that's right. I said, okay, great,
• 1:24:44
  Speaker 2: So I said, do me a favorite, you know, send
• 1:24:47
  Speaker 2: me your proposed deal, the you know, the expenses, et cetera,
• 1:24:52
  Speaker 2: et cetera. Let me look at him eighty five fifteen.
• 1:24:55
  Speaker 2: No problem, you know, I'm not I'm not involved financially.
• 1:25:00
  Speaker 2: So he says, uh, okay. A week goes by, Two
• 1:25:06
  Speaker 2: weeks go by, no paperwork from Graham. Another week goes by.
• 1:25:15
  Speaker 2: I called Greg Perloff, who I was friends with and
• 1:25:18
  Speaker 2: still in transfer. All right, I said, Greg, do you
• 1:25:22
  Speaker 2: have any idea what the fuck's going on? He said,
• 1:25:25
  Speaker 2: Bill is not happy that he's having to deal with you.
• 1:25:29
  Speaker 2: I said, then, why the fuck did he tell Did
• 1:25:30
  Speaker 2: he tell the dead that he would? He said, I
• 1:25:33
  Speaker 2: don't know, but he's not happy. I said, Greg, so
• 1:25:37
  Speaker 2: I don't wrap him out to the vand get the
• 1:25:41
  Speaker 2: fucking expenses and send them to me. Said okay, let
• 1:25:45
  Speaker 2: me see what I can do. A couple of hours later,
• 1:25:49
  Speaker 2: the phone rings and it's Graham and he is fucking berserk.
• 1:25:56
  Speaker 2: The only way I can describe it is he was
• 1:25:58
  Speaker 2: like a beached where just screaming at the top of
• 1:26:03
  Speaker 2: his lungs, just doing anything to get back in the water,
• 1:26:06
  Speaker 2: all right. And this tirade went on for half an hour.
• 1:26:13
  Speaker 2: I couldn't get two words, and he's screaming at me.
• 1:26:18
  Speaker 2: I've got to deal with Jersey for my band. So
• 1:26:24
  Speaker 2: eventually the coal ended. I don't know if you hung
• 1:26:27
  Speaker 2: up or just whatever. I picked up the phone. I
• 1:26:32
  Speaker 2: think I spoke the Lash and Jerry and I said
• 1:26:37
  Speaker 2: I'm fucking out, all right, I'm you know, I'm out.
• 1:26:41
  Speaker 2: I said, you know, this guy will put a fucking
• 1:26:43
  Speaker 2: hit out on me, you know. And and so they said, okay,
• 1:26:48
  Speaker 2: we'll get the expenses. We just want you to look
• 1:26:50
  Speaker 2: at them, all right, you know, and bless the expenses.
• 1:26:54
  Speaker 2: So I said, okay. So they got the expenses, they
• 1:26:58
  Speaker 2: sent them to me, all right. I look that. Everything
• 1:27:00
  Speaker 2: looked pretty much in order, all right, except for one
• 1:27:03
  Speaker 2: thing that I didn't understand. There was a fee I
• 1:27:07
  Speaker 2: want to call ten thousand dollars, but I don't remember
• 1:27:10
  Speaker 2: exactly how much was for the set that he built.
• 1:27:15
  Speaker 2: Because outdoor shows he always built, you know, pretty elaborate
• 1:27:19
  Speaker 2: scenery sets right, and he wrote it off. You know
• 1:27:23
  Speaker 2: that they cost ten thousand dollars. Nobody ever questioned them.
• 1:27:27
  Speaker 2: So when I asked the guys in the band, you know,
• 1:27:32
  Speaker 2: was this kosher? They said, We've paid for this set
• 1:27:36
  Speaker 2: three times already. He's got he's got a few of them.
• 1:27:41
  Speaker 2: He rotates them around because he does it for everyone,
• 1:27:43
  Speaker 2: not just a grateful day, all right. He paints him,
• 1:27:46
  Speaker 2: he does a little little different color here or there,
• 1:27:49
  Speaker 2: and then cycles him back around. We ain't paying for it, right,
• 1:27:54
  Speaker 2: So I said, okay, who's going to tell him? I said,
• 1:27:58
  Speaker 2: he won't take my call. Trust me, he will not
• 1:28:02
  Speaker 2: answer my phone call. So they said, okay, why don't
• 1:28:07
  Speaker 2: you call your friends? Would pearl off? Why don't you
• 1:28:09
  Speaker 2: pull him and tell him? So I did to this day.
• 1:28:13
  Speaker 2: I don't know whether they paid for it or I
• 1:28:15
  Speaker 2: didn't do the settlement. I didn't know. But this made
• 1:28:19
  Speaker 2: Bill fucking crazy, and I understand why it made him crazy,
• 1:28:24
  Speaker 2: which I said to him at first, you're nuts. You know,
• 1:28:27
  Speaker 2: the guy doesn't like me to start with. And the
• 1:28:31
  Speaker 2: relationship continued till the day Jerry died. I made the
• 1:28:37
  Speaker 2: arrest record deal for him, together with Hal can't their attorney.
• 1:28:44
  Speaker 2: At the very end of my relationship with him, with
• 1:28:47
  Speaker 2: Cameron Sears, who became their their tour manager, good friend
• 1:28:51
  Speaker 2: of mine still and John Frankenheimer, the attorney, we made
• 1:28:56
  Speaker 2: the deal at Warner Brothers, which brought the two catalogs together.
• 1:29:01
  Speaker 2: It's a monumental deal. And that was the last thing
• 1:29:05
  Speaker 2: I did for them and Jerry passed away. And the
• 1:29:13
  Speaker 2: only way I can describe it, I don't really I
• 1:29:16
  Speaker 2: managed Weir Cameron and I managed Weir for about ten
• 1:29:20
  Speaker 2: years after that, no longer. And the only way I
• 1:29:25
  Speaker 2: can describe it is that, you know, they weren't difficult.
• 1:29:32
  Speaker 2: I didn't manage them. Lots of people want to say,
• 1:29:34
  Speaker 2: I man, I didn't manage them, but I represented them,
• 1:29:37
  Speaker 2: you know, in a number of ways. And it's very interesting.
• 1:29:43
  Speaker 2: You'd go to board meetings and I didn't have a vote,
• 1:29:48
  Speaker 2: but I sat in on them, and they'd bring up
• 1:29:51
  Speaker 2: various different things, both unimportant and important. And I saw
• 1:29:57
  Speaker 2: the pattern when you Gerry was okay with whatever was
• 1:30:01
  Speaker 2: being proposed. He just sort of sat back and voted
• 1:30:07
  Speaker 2: last year next to last when it was something that
• 1:30:10
  Speaker 2: Jerry really wanted to do or really didn't want to do.
• 1:30:14
  Speaker 2: He voted first, so there was never an argument that
• 1:30:20
  Speaker 2: I saw until at one point Phil lesh we had
• 1:30:27
  Speaker 2: formed the REX. I was a founding member of REX,
• 1:30:31
  Speaker 2: and we formed REX and it was great and to
• 1:30:33
  Speaker 2: this day it's still a great charity. And Danny Griffkin,
• 1:30:39
  Speaker 2: who was, you know, one of the half a dozen
• 1:30:42
  Speaker 2: of management kind of people from earlier days, was made
• 1:30:47
  Speaker 2: the head of REX. And I had my problems with
• 1:30:50
  Speaker 2: Danny early on, but we were fine. We were great friends.
• 1:30:53
  Speaker 2: We still are. Phil marches into a board meeting with
• 1:30:56
  Speaker 2: his wife Jill and says, right in front of them,
• 1:31:00
  Speaker 2: in the whole band, I want to fire Danny from REX,
• 1:31:04
  Speaker 2: and I want to put Jill in charge. Now, Danny
• 1:31:09
  Speaker 2: did a great job, was as mellow as could be,
• 1:31:13
  Speaker 2: and they all looked to Phil like he was joking,
• 1:31:19
  Speaker 2: you know, and finally he said no, he was dead serious.
• 1:31:24
  Speaker 2: And I can't remember, but more than one of the
• 1:31:27
  Speaker 2: members said, we're not firing Danny. So that was the
• 1:31:32
  Speaker 2: beginning of the real hard feelings would Phil. He founded
• 1:31:40
  Speaker 2: his own charitable organization, his wife managed him, and it
• 1:31:48
  Speaker 2: just it got and to this day is still really ugly.
• 1:31:52
  Speaker 2: Phil in my view, decided with Jerry Kahn. He was
• 1:31:57
  Speaker 2: the leader of the band. Jerry never even acknowledged he
• 1:32:01
  Speaker 2: was the leader of the band. Just by osmosis, he
• 1:32:04
  Speaker 2: was the leader of the band. And so, you know,
• 1:32:09
  Speaker 2: it deteriorated. And then Jerry died and I met with
• 1:32:14
  Speaker 2: the band the day after the funeral. There's a funny
• 1:32:18
  Speaker 2: thing on at the funeral. I go to the funeral,
• 1:32:22
  Speaker 2: I speak at the funeral, and when we're walking out
• 1:32:25
  Speaker 2: of the funeral, I walk I'm walking out with Dylan,
• 1:32:29
  Speaker 2: and a San Francisco Chronicle photographer took a picture of
• 1:32:33
  Speaker 2: the two of us walking out. Next day. On the
• 1:32:36
  Speaker 2: front page of the San francis are Chronicle is Bob
• 1:32:40
  Speaker 2: Dylan with an unknown person leaving Jerry Garcia is perfect,
• 1:32:48
  Speaker 2: right right. And what I really remember about it is
• 1:32:52
  Speaker 2: while we were walking out, Dylan leaned over to me
• 1:32:56
  Speaker 2: and said, you know what, John, I said, what Bobby
• 1:32:58
  Speaker 2: said the guyline there, He's the only one in the
• 1:33:01
  Speaker 2: world and knows what it's like to be me, which
• 1:33:05
  Speaker 2: was pretty profound.
• 1:33:06
  Speaker 1: Absolutely.
• 1:33:07
  Speaker 2: Yeah. So I met with the band the next day
• 1:33:15
  Speaker 2: or maybe two days later, and and uh, you know,
• 1:33:19
  Speaker 2: I I you know, I said to him, guys, Jerry
• 1:33:23
  Speaker 2: would not want you to break up, you know, you
• 1:33:27
  Speaker 2: know you guys, are you an extraordinary group? Sure you
• 1:33:31
  Speaker 2: won't be the same. But so Phil announces absolutely not,
• 1:33:39
  Speaker 2: and they vote to never call themselves the Grateful Dead again.
• 1:33:43
  Speaker 2: And Phil says, I don't want to tour anymore. I'm
• 1:33:48
  Speaker 2: going to write the Great American Symphony. And I think
• 1:33:53
  Speaker 2: for two years he probably tried to do that, all right,
• 1:33:56
  Speaker 2: But in the meantime we put together the Further Festival, right,
• 1:34:01
  Speaker 2: and the Further Festival was just sort of traveling festival
• 1:34:05
  Speaker 2: that was anchored by by Bob Weir and Mickey Hart
• 1:34:10
  Speaker 2: and Bruce Hornsby and a rotating set of other people,
• 1:34:14
  Speaker 2: sometimes Hart Tuna, sometimes Los Lobos, et cetera, et cetera.
• 1:34:18
  Speaker 2: Everybody did their own set, and at the end of
• 1:34:22
  Speaker 2: the show, everybody on stage jam. Phil decided in the
• 1:34:30
  Speaker 2: third year that he would go out with it, but
• 1:34:39
  Speaker 2: his conditions were, I only want one opening act, all right,
• 1:34:45
  Speaker 2: and you know, I only want to play X amount
• 1:34:48
  Speaker 2: of dates. So I booked the tour with Phil as
• 1:34:55
  Speaker 2: part of it blows up, you know, enormously. We do
• 1:35:00
  Speaker 2: the whole tour. The last two days are at Shoreline,
• 1:35:05
  Speaker 2: uh in San Francisco. So, uh, you know, I'm out
• 1:35:10
  Speaker 2: there early with the band for soundcheck, and uh, we're
• 1:35:14
  Speaker 2: hanging out backstage and one of the runners comes over
• 1:35:21
  Speaker 2: and says, uh, Phil and Jill want to see you.
• 1:35:24
  Speaker 2: So we were all the rest of us were all
• 1:35:27
  Speaker 2: in one trailer. They had their own trailer, and uh,
• 1:35:32
  Speaker 2: so you know I had I had very little relationship
• 1:35:36
  Speaker 2: with Phil, but I didn't have a bad relationship Phil,
• 1:35:40
  Speaker 2: or did I think I did? All right? You know,
• 1:35:43
  Speaker 2: most of my tenure with the Dead Phil was drunk,
• 1:35:48
  Speaker 2: all right. He was a loner and and and and
• 1:35:50
  Speaker 2: he was drunk. The one and only nice thing I
• 1:35:53
  Speaker 2: can say about Jill is she sobered him up and
• 1:35:56
  Speaker 2: and and saved his life. All right. So I go
• 1:36:00
  Speaker 2: into this trailer and I say, what's up, guys? And
• 1:36:04
  Speaker 2: they said, now now that the financials were all the
• 1:36:09
  Speaker 2: members had an equal share, and I had a share,
• 1:36:13
  Speaker 2: all right, and Cameron had like a half a share
• 1:36:16
  Speaker 2: something like that because he was still on the payroll
• 1:36:18
  Speaker 2: of the Great Gravel Dead productions. So I said, what's up?
• 1:36:24
  Speaker 2: They said, we we we see no reason why anybody
• 1:36:33
  Speaker 2: but Weird Heart and me should get you know, a share.
• 1:36:38
  Speaker 2: Everybody else should be, you know, on salary, I said,
• 1:36:41
  Speaker 2: this is the last two dates of the tour, all right,
• 1:36:44
  Speaker 2: you knew what the deal was going in. I'm not
• 1:36:47
  Speaker 2: going to these guys and tell them they're not going
• 1:36:48
  Speaker 2: to get their money now. Thankfully at the time, I
• 1:36:51
  Speaker 2: control the money. So they said, well, if they don't
• 1:36:57
  Speaker 2: agree to this, we'll never play with them ever again.
• 1:37:03
  Speaker 2: So you know, I tried my best to talk them
• 1:37:07
  Speaker 2: out of that with good reason. Hornsby had been a
• 1:37:11
  Speaker 2: member of the Dead all right, and added a lot
• 1:37:14
  Speaker 2: to it. Cameron, you know, was my partner really and
• 1:37:22
  Speaker 2: I put up all the money. I put up all
• 1:37:24
  Speaker 2: the money, and did all the booking work all right
• 1:37:26
  Speaker 2: in advance and all of that. So they said, well,
• 1:37:30
  Speaker 2: that's not acceptable to us, and go tell them that
• 1:37:32
  Speaker 2: if they don't do it the way we want it,
• 1:37:34
  Speaker 2: we'll never play with them again. So I can I remember,
• 1:37:39
  Speaker 2: just like I can see it right in front of me.
• 1:37:41
  Speaker 2: I went into the trailer where everybody else was was sitting,
• 1:37:46
  Speaker 2: told him what fit what Phil said. Mickey went fucking nuts,
• 1:37:51
  Speaker 2: absolutely nuts. Hornsby just looked and said, not fair. That's
• 1:37:58
  Speaker 2: not the deal I made, you know. And oh and
• 1:38:01
  Speaker 2: then Mickey said, Cameron's house. There was a terrible storm,
• 1:38:06
  Speaker 2: like a couple of weeks before the tour, and a big, huge,
• 1:38:08
  Speaker 2: old tree fell down on Cameron's house, broke through the roof.
• 1:38:12
  Speaker 2: So Mickey screaming, who the fuck did they think they are?
• 1:38:16
  Speaker 2: Cameron's house just burnt down. His house didn't burn down.
• 1:38:19
  Speaker 2: But that was the sentiment, and the sentiment was all
• 1:38:22
  Speaker 2: of them except for Phil, really felt like they were
• 1:38:26
  Speaker 2: a family. Right. I always describe it as Peter Pan
• 1:38:31
  Speaker 2: and lost boys. Right, Peter Pan died, the Lost Boys
• 1:38:35
  Speaker 2: were lost, you know, and by putting together further, it
• 1:38:40
  Speaker 2: gave him an opportunity, you know, to be together and
• 1:38:44
  Speaker 2: to work, you know, worked together. So at that point, Phil,
• 1:38:50
  Speaker 2: that's when Phil started to go out on his own,
• 1:38:53
  Speaker 2: despite the fact that he never wrote the Great American Symphony,
• 1:38:55
  Speaker 2: and there were years and years of terrorable animosity, all right,
• 1:39:02
  Speaker 2: and you know, he he he hired an agent, a
• 1:39:07
  Speaker 2: guy named Jonathan Levine, who you know, did really sneaky
• 1:39:11
  Speaker 2: things about, you know, around the further touring and and Bob,
• 1:39:16
  Speaker 2: we're touring and uh, you know it was ugly. It
• 1:39:21
  Speaker 2: was it was ugly and and and uh, I mean
• 1:39:24
  Speaker 2: Phil empowered Jill. First time I've ever said this out loud.
• 1:39:29
  Speaker 2: And Jill was nice enough. She wasn't, but it's just
• 1:39:36
  Speaker 2: she wasn't an expert in the music business. And she
• 1:39:40
  Speaker 2: got very vicious. They both got very vicious towards we
• 1:39:44
  Speaker 2: Air and towards me. And I remember distinctly telling Bob
• 1:39:49
  Speaker 2: what was going on, because Cameron and I were managing
• 1:39:52
  Speaker 2: Bob at the time, and Bob, Bob looked at me
• 1:39:55
  Speaker 2: one day and he said, she must be a to
• 1:40:00
  Speaker 2: suck the paint off of a battleship that he's listening
• 1:40:02
  Speaker 2: there that way. It's funny I've ever said that out loud.
• 1:40:15
  Speaker 2: And it got uglier and uglier. There were a couple
• 1:40:18
  Speaker 2: of moments that I met with them and and they
• 1:40:23
  Speaker 2: sort of begrudgingly acknowledged that I was an important part
• 1:40:27
  Speaker 2: of the history, but that never lasted more than a
• 1:40:32
  Speaker 2: week or two, all right. And then Bobby, who has
• 1:40:39
  Speaker 2: always had a bit of an addiction problem, all right,
• 1:40:42
  Speaker 2: was straight. He was doing great, and he was playing great,
• 1:40:46
  Speaker 2: and rat the band were playing great. And he calls
• 1:40:50
  Speaker 2: me one day and he says, John, I got to
• 1:40:54
  Speaker 2: tell you something that you're not gonna want to hear.
• 1:40:56
  Speaker 2: I said, uh, what's that? And he said Phil called
• 1:41:01
  Speaker 2: me and he asked me and my wife had to dinner.
• 1:41:06
  Speaker 2: I said, okay, what did you say? And I said, uh,
• 1:41:11
  Speaker 2: he said, well, yeah, we've got unfinished business together. I'm
• 1:41:15
  Speaker 2: gonna go. And I said, Bobby. Now, for most of
• 1:41:23
  Speaker 2: the post Jerry time, Bobby, when he had to play
• 1:41:30
  Speaker 2: with Phil, got physically ill and got drunk all right,
• 1:41:38
  Speaker 2: and you know, we sent him to rehab a couple
• 1:41:42
  Speaker 2: of times. He always recovered. He also every year for
• 1:41:48
  Speaker 2: the month of February he got completely sober. Why the
• 1:41:54
  Speaker 2: month of February shortest month of the year. He admitted
• 1:42:00
  Speaker 2: it all right. And when Bobby was just a casual
• 1:42:05
  Speaker 2: drinker or plot or whatever, he was fine, you know,
• 1:42:10
  Speaker 2: he was fine, but he spun out a couple of times.
• 1:42:16
  Speaker 2: So I said, okay, go to philp just you know,
• 1:42:20
  Speaker 2: be careful. So they go to dinner with their wives.
• 1:42:25
  Speaker 2: And the next day Bobby calls me and says, John,
• 1:42:32
  Speaker 2: I did something that you're going to be mad at me.
• 1:42:36
  Speaker 2: I said, what's that, Bob? He said, I agreed to
• 1:42:41
  Speaker 2: go out with Phil. And I said, Bobby, every time
• 1:42:49
  Speaker 2: you've done that, we've had to send you to rehab,
• 1:42:53
  Speaker 2: all right, So he says, well, they quandered me, and
• 1:42:59
  Speaker 2: I didn't really have any way out. Bobby is not
• 1:43:02
  Speaker 2: someone who does good confrontation. He's very smart, don't get
• 1:43:05
  Speaker 2: me wrong. So I said, what happened? Now? If you remember,
• 1:43:11
  Speaker 2: Phil had relatively recently gotten a new liver because he
• 1:43:16
  Speaker 2: was a terrible alcohol I think, actually I don't know
• 1:43:19
  Speaker 2: it's sure, but I think he might have gotten two livers.
• 1:43:23
  Speaker 2: But he was clear, completely sober. So we thought, all right,
• 1:43:27
  Speaker 2: and Bobby said, they went to this restaurant and Phil
• 1:43:31
  Speaker 2: ordered a bottle of wine, ordered for everybody, said Phil drank?
• 1:43:35
  Speaker 2: He said, absolutely, And four or five bottles later, we're
• 1:43:41
  Speaker 2: all shit face drunk. He said. That's when I agreed
• 1:43:48
  Speaker 2: i'd go out with I said, you're nuts. I want
• 1:43:52
  Speaker 2: no part of this. So he said, well, one of
• 1:43:54
  Speaker 2: the conditions is that you and Cameron aren't involved in
• 1:43:57
  Speaker 2: the tour. I said, Bobby, you know you can meet
• 1:44:03
  Speaker 2: that condition. You know I'm quitting all right. I'm not
• 1:44:07
  Speaker 2: gonna see you go to your grave, all right for
• 1:44:10
  Speaker 2: this motherfucker who you know? Bobby told me stories, you know,
• 1:44:15
  Speaker 2: from when he first joined the band. Remember Bobby's like
• 1:44:18
  Speaker 2: five years younger than everybody, so he was like seventeen
• 1:44:21
  Speaker 2: or eighteen years and they were like, you know, in
• 1:44:22
  Speaker 2: our early twenties. He said, Phil used to beat the
• 1:44:25
  Speaker 2: shit out of him. You know. There were two incidents. Once,
• 1:44:29
  Speaker 2: he said, Phil threw him down a set of stairs,
• 1:44:32
  Speaker 2: could have broken every bone in his body, all right.
• 1:44:35
  Speaker 2: And and once Phil was in the back seat of
• 1:44:37
  Speaker 2: a car that he was in the front seat and
• 1:44:39
  Speaker 2: Phil was smacking the shit out of him while they
• 1:44:41
  Speaker 2: were while they were driving. I said, you remember telling
• 1:44:44
  Speaker 2: me these things? He said, yeah, but I've got unfinished
• 1:44:49
  Speaker 2: business with him. I said, well, you're going to have
• 1:44:51
  Speaker 2: to do it without me, And then Cameron said, separately
• 1:44:54
  Speaker 2: the same thing. And of course they put the show
• 1:45:00
  Speaker 2: was on sale and it did great business, but Bobby
• 1:45:06
  Speaker 2: got shitfaced at every single shot, all right. And there's
• 1:45:13
  Speaker 2: one very famous show that was at the Capitol Theater
• 1:45:17
  Speaker 2: in Portchester, all right, where the film Bob Show played,
• 1:45:24
  Speaker 2: and Bob was so fucked up that on stage he
• 1:45:30
  Speaker 2: fell down. And this is all on videotape. You can
• 1:45:34
  Speaker 2: see this, all right. Bob falls down and Phil doesn't
• 1:45:38
  Speaker 2: even look at him, doesn't even look at him. Just
• 1:45:41
  Speaker 2: keeps playing. Roadies went on to the stage, pick up
• 1:45:45
  Speaker 2: Bob put him in a chair. All right, Phil still
• 1:45:51
  Speaker 2: hasn't looked at him, right, And the only reason I
• 1:45:54
  Speaker 2: say that I wasn't there, but I've seen the video.
• 1:45:56
  Speaker 2: It exists a little while longer, maybe half a song later.
• 1:46:05
  Speaker 2: Bobby falls off the chair, right, So this is really
• 1:46:09
  Speaker 2: fucking sad. Phil never looked at him when the roadies
• 1:46:14
  Speaker 2: came out to take them off the stage, help them
• 1:46:16
  Speaker 2: off the stage, Phil never looked at him, all right,
• 1:46:21
  Speaker 2: So deep down inside you gotta believe that he really
• 1:46:26
  Speaker 2: really resented the shit out of Bobby. Why. I don't know.
• 1:46:32
  Speaker 2: Bobby was better looking at him. He went out with
• 1:46:35
  Speaker 2: prettier girls than he did. He wrote hit songs, which
• 1:46:39
  Speaker 2: Phil never did. He sang lead on half the songs,
• 1:46:44
  Speaker 2: you know, But those were all facts. And when Jerry
• 1:46:47
  Speaker 2: was alive, you know, you couldn't tell that there was
• 1:46:50
  Speaker 2: a problem, all right. The first I knew that Bobby
• 1:46:52
  Speaker 2: had a problem with Phil was over the years he
• 1:46:55
  Speaker 2: told me about these couple of incidents. When the band
• 1:46:58
  Speaker 2: first formed, Oh Bobby did that, and then one more
• 1:47:03
  Speaker 2: time they played together. I think on this fairly well
• 1:47:08
  Speaker 2: show that was up in Wisconsin, and to the best
• 1:47:12
  Speaker 2: of my knowledge, they've never played together again. But you
• 1:47:15
  Speaker 2: know what, I wouldn't surprise if they did. Bobby is
• 1:47:18
  Speaker 2: the most non confrontational person I've ever met. I love
• 1:47:22
  Speaker 2: him to death, and it's just sad. It's just sad.
• 1:47:27
  Speaker 2: You know, he's never gotten over Jerry's death. Look at
• 1:47:30
  Speaker 2: the beard. Bobby never had a beard. He grew the
• 1:47:33
  Speaker 2: beard after Jerry died. You know, he wanted to look
• 1:47:36
  Speaker 2: like Jerry. You know. So he's a brilliant guy. He's
• 1:47:42
  Speaker 2: a sweetheart, but he's non confrontational and he's you know,
• 1:47:47
  Speaker 2: let people take advantage of specifically, Phil, Do.
• 1:47:52
  Speaker 1: These guys have any money and do they have money
• 1:47:56
  Speaker 1: during the time that you worked with him, Yeah, they
• 1:48:01
  Speaker 1: had money. They didn't nearly have what they could have
• 1:48:06
  Speaker 1: had because they had like fifty people on the payroll
• 1:48:10
  Speaker 1: at real salaries, at the equivalent of you know, six
• 1:48:13
  Speaker 1: figure salaries, all right, So in that way it was
• 1:48:17
  Speaker 1: almost a commune, all right. But they made a lot
• 1:48:23
  Speaker 1: of money. Like I said, the Warner Brothers deal deal
• 1:48:27
  Speaker 1: at the end was multi multi million dollars. And I
• 1:48:31
  Speaker 1: think they were you know, at that point, I think
• 1:48:35
  Speaker 1: they were wealthy, not crazy wealth, all right, but they
• 1:48:40
  Speaker 1: owned all their own publishing, and you know, Jerry's is
• 1:48:45
  Speaker 1: obviously worth a fortune, and Bob's is worth a fortune,
• 1:48:48
  Speaker 1: all right. So you know, I always drove into Bob's
• 1:48:51
  Speaker 1: head that, you know, you know, that's your retirement, you know,
• 1:48:56
  Speaker 1: don't fuck around with it, and he never did.
• 1:48:59
  Speaker 2: He never did. And actually Robert Hunter ran a publishing company. Now.
• 1:49:04
  Speaker 2: I think they're all much wealthier because I think that
• 1:49:09
  Speaker 2: Phil did very good business when he went out with
• 1:49:12
  Speaker 2: his Phil and friends for a number of years, and
• 1:49:17
  Speaker 2: Dead and Company the huge business. So you know, Dead
• 1:49:23
  Speaker 2: and Company, Bobby and Mickey and for a while Billy,
• 1:49:26
  Speaker 2: although Billy left at some point, had to be making
• 1:49:30
  Speaker 2: a lot a lot of money, you know. So yeah,
• 1:49:33
  Speaker 2: I think they were all fine financially.
• 1:49:36
  Speaker 1: What's the best Grateful Dead show you ever saw?
• 1:49:40
  Speaker 2: Very hard, you know, very hard. I mean I've seen
• 1:49:43
  Speaker 2: so many, so many. I think Roosevelt Stadium when they
• 1:49:47
  Speaker 2: played with the band a couple of days before Watkins Glenn.
• 1:49:53
  Speaker 2: I think the second night they played the Capitol and
• 1:49:56
  Speaker 2: that original run one the Bedheads very often sighted is
• 1:50:03
  Speaker 2: the greatest show was at Cornell. I was there. I
• 1:50:08
  Speaker 2: didn't spend a lot of time watching the show because
• 1:50:10
  Speaker 2: you've a been up to Thika. I have, Yeah, so
• 1:50:13
  Speaker 2: you know, there's all these deep ravines and stuff. So
• 1:50:19
  Speaker 2: you know, the kids were all fucking stoned out of
• 1:50:21
  Speaker 2: their minds. So you know, I spent much of that
• 1:50:25
  Speaker 2: show outside trying to keep kids from jumping into the ravines.
• 1:50:31
  Speaker 2: So uh, hey, you know it's funny, but it's true.
• 1:50:36
  Speaker 2: And and you know I've heard the show over and over,
• 1:50:39
  Speaker 2: so it was it was a great show, you know,
• 1:50:42
  Speaker 2: and and and it's interesting. You know, every show they've
• 1:50:46
  Speaker 2: virtually ever played is you know, is on tape, and
• 1:50:49
  Speaker 2: you know, uh yeah, everybody can hear it. I would
• 1:50:55
  Speaker 2: say that maybe two out of every ten were stinkers,
• 1:51:02
  Speaker 2: all right. You could tell when they were stinkers more
• 1:51:06
  Speaker 2: than you could tell whether they great or were they
• 1:51:08
  Speaker 2: very great? Right, because like any band, although you know,
• 1:51:12
  Speaker 2: they never really had any hit singles, they had one
• 1:51:14
  Speaker 2: hit single, Touch of Gray, which you know, almost killed everybody.
• 1:51:20
  Speaker 1: But what do you mean it almost killed everybody?
• 1:51:23
  Speaker 2: Well, what happened was they were huge at that point.
• 1:51:27
  Speaker 2: Jerry comes out of out of this coma all right, right,
• 1:51:31
  Speaker 2: touch of Gray. It's like a top five, top forty
• 1:51:35
  Speaker 2: hit right, so they were huge underground fm ys whatever.
• 1:51:41
  Speaker 2: But then it goes mainstream and so the shows get
• 1:51:48
  Speaker 2: overwhelmed with people trying to break in. I remember standing
• 1:51:52
  Speaker 2: out in the hill at sarah Tooga Performing Arts Center,
• 1:51:55
  Speaker 2: completely sold out and there there were like ten thousand
• 1:51:59
  Speaker 2: kids outside the fence, and finally they broke the fence
• 1:52:03
  Speaker 2: down and they came over. They came over the fence
• 1:52:04
  Speaker 2: like lemmings, you know. So you know, it became it
• 1:52:09
  Speaker 2: became clear to everybody we couldn't play amphitheaters anymore. And
• 1:52:12
  Speaker 2: and they never wanted to play stadiums. They had turned
• 1:52:15
  Speaker 2: me down like two years in a row to play
• 1:52:18
  Speaker 2: stadiums are big stadiums. They played like Roosevelt Stadium. But
• 1:52:21
  Speaker 2: you know, that was thirty thousand and finally, when the
• 1:52:26
  Speaker 2: last year that we did amphitheaters, it was so much
• 1:52:30
  Speaker 2: and and you know, some of the ampethsaders said, you
• 1:52:33
  Speaker 2: just can't come back. I took another shot at doing
• 1:52:38
  Speaker 2: stadiums with them, and they said, no, it's a rip
• 1:52:41
  Speaker 2: off to the fence. I said, how about this, What
• 1:52:45
  Speaker 2: if I got a support act that was big enough
• 1:52:49
  Speaker 2: in each of those cities to be a sellout one
• 1:52:52
  Speaker 2: night arena act and they opened for you. And all
• 1:52:56
  Speaker 2: we had to do was up to take a price
• 1:52:58
  Speaker 2: by five dollars because they were very every sensitive about
• 1:53:00
  Speaker 2: ticket prices too, all right, they said, can you do that?
• 1:53:05
  Speaker 2: I said, yeah, I can do it. You know, I'm
• 1:53:07
  Speaker 2: gonna have to pay the acts, you know, six figures,
• 1:53:10
  Speaker 2: but yeah, I can do it. But you'll make as
• 1:53:12
  Speaker 2: much or more money, more money actually. So one year
• 1:53:18
  Speaker 2: it was Steve Winwood, one year was Cosby Sills and Nash.
• 1:53:24
  Speaker 2: One year it was Bob Dylan and Tom Petty together.
• 1:53:28
  Speaker 2: One year it was just Dylan in a bit and
• 1:53:31
  Speaker 2: Grateful Dead backed up Dylan. So it was spectacular success,
• 1:53:38
  Speaker 2: spectacular success. Their ticket prices were still less than almost
• 1:53:40
  Speaker 2: everybody's and and uh, you know, the audience, the audience got,
• 1:53:46
  Speaker 2: you know, a huge headliner. Even with those huge headliners.
• 1:53:52
  Speaker 2: In the beginning of the show, stadiums were maybe a
• 1:53:56
  Speaker 2: third field. By three quarters of through the show, they
• 1:54:00
  Speaker 2: were packed. And they were smart enough. You know. I said,
• 1:54:04
  Speaker 2: they didn't have any hit singles, but they had their
• 1:54:07
  Speaker 2: equivalent of hit singles. Uncle John's band, Casey Jones, you know,
• 1:54:11
  Speaker 2: et cetera, et cetera playing in the band, so they
• 1:54:15
  Speaker 2: sort of recognized that and tended, more than in other situations,
• 1:54:21
  Speaker 2: play a bunch of those songs towards the end, and
• 1:54:23
  Speaker 2: so the audience went completely fucking nuts. So, you know,
• 1:54:28
  Speaker 2: in their own way, they were great showmen. You know,
• 1:54:32
  Speaker 2: they weren't you know, they weren't slick, they weren't they
• 1:54:34
  Speaker 2: didn't use a lot of tricks, but they were great showmen.
• 1:54:39
  Speaker 2: And you know, to this day, listen, I think I
• 1:54:43
  Speaker 2: could be wrong, no way to know. I think the
• 1:54:45
  Speaker 2: Grateful that are bigger now than they ever were. I
• 1:54:49
  Speaker 2: think that the entity the Grateful dead from a merchandising
• 1:54:52
  Speaker 2: point of view, From a music point of view, I
• 1:54:56
  Speaker 2: think they're bigger than they ever were. I think other
• 1:55:00
  Speaker 2: than the Beatles, not only the most sociological important act,
• 1:55:04
  Speaker 2: I think other than the Beatles are the biggest act
• 1:55:05
  Speaker 2: in the world. Well, I can't count Taylor Swift and
• 1:55:09
  Speaker 2: the biggest rock act in the world, and we'll continue
• 1:55:14
  Speaker 2: to be. You know, you talk to kids who weren't
• 1:55:17
  Speaker 2: alive when Jerry, when Jerry was in the band, and
• 1:55:22
  Speaker 2: they're absolute dead heads. So you know, it's you know,
• 1:55:27
  Speaker 2: it's a great salute to.
• 1:55:28
  Speaker 1: Them, absolutely the debtor forever. We can't go on forever.
• 1:55:34
  Speaker 1: Then we'll have to do this again. John. There's so
• 1:55:36
  Speaker 1: much we couldn't even get into never mind we're dead stories.
• 1:55:39
  Speaker 1: But I want to thank you so much for talking
• 1:55:41
  Speaker 1: to my audience. No thanks, I'm happy to do it again.
• 1:55:46
  Speaker 2: You bet.
• 1:55:46
  Speaker 1: Until next time. This is Bob left six
• 1:56:10
  Speaker 2: S