The New Bosses 2011

The New BOSSES 2011 Ten future industry leaders revealed

Market Report: Benelux Mixed fortunes in European powerhouse

Shows Keep Swinging Family show market plays safe

Live Music Intelligence An ILMC Publication. Nov 2011, Issue 38

Keeping the Faith George Michael’s Symphonica profiled

EFR 2011 The results of IQ’s fourth annual festival survey A New Wave: Ian Hogarth Tomorrow’s Venue: David Jones Flying the Kitemark: Jonathan Brown Festival Weather: Alison Tickell

Left to right: Ryan Chisholm, Craig D’Souza, Matthieu Drouot, Ian Hogarth & Hardi Loog.

Niall Morris, Martin Nielson, Caius Pawson, Alex Stevens & Dave Wallace.

A veritable bible for young faces that you should know, this year’s New Bosses List has thrown up some serious talent in the live business. The fourth of our annual polls to find ten future industry leaders, the list spans continents and sectors across the music business world.

Once again, IQ raided every line of our database to cast the voting net as far and wide as possible, and the response was, as usual, fantastic. There are no complicated rules, no longwinded voting forms, and you can’t buy a table at an award show to guarantee a spot. This year’s nominees are simply 30 or under, haven’t been featured before, and are busy building the industry of the future, one deal, megabyte or artist at a time. Simples!

As before, the votes we’ve received will form the list of nominations for the ‘Tomorrow’s New Boss’ Arthur Award at ILMC 24 in March 2012. Voting for the awards opens online in December and the whole ILMC membership will be able to make their appropriate mark. We’ll keep you posted nearer the time, but for now, I very much hope you enjoy these ten tales of ambition and early success.

Greg Parmley Editor, IQ

Ryan Chisholm, 25

Manager, Bill Silva Entertainment

After swapping his focus from athletics to music, Ryan Chisholm joined Bill Silva Entertainment five years ago. His father, Kevin Chisholm, has managed Santana for 25 years, and is a frequent source of inspiration. Ryan co-manages Christina Perri with Tom Gates and also represents James Morrison for North America and Pennsylvanian rockers Good Old War. How challenging is it to break into the industry?

It’s a better time then ever. There are so many amazing young people around and I organise mixers in LA to bring together around 150 under-30’s who are in the industry, to make sure they are all connected. I focus a lot on the younger generation and also on giving respect to the people who did it all before us.

What are you most proud of so far? Building a really great team here at Bill Silva Management. Jason Mraz is obviously heavily established and taking Christina Perri from

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around 400 fans on Facebook to 500,000 was a great feeling.

How do you see the roles of managers’ evolving?

As a manager, you now need to know all sides of the business and get more involved in every aspect of an artist’s career. Teams and budgets are shrinking, so it’s on us to be creative, come up with solid plans and to create great relationships with partners that can take artists to the next level. On a wider note, I’m excited about the digital age and what’s to come, especially subscription music and that it might create a solid revenue stream for artists.

Craig D’Souza, 29

Agent, Primary Talent International

Craig started in the business booking artists for the Luminar Leisure nightclub chain in 2000. In 2002, he moved to Mission Control Artist Agency, becoming MD in May 2008, and in July 2010 he joined Primary Talent. His roster includes Wretch 32, DJ Fresh and Roll Deep.

What needs to change in the industry? The ‘capture the market’ mentality. For me, being an agent isn’t about taking on as much as you can and ‘booking by numbers’. It’s about tailoring a strategy that assists in the development of an artist’s career. We also need to recognise the potential of young people with fresh ideas; those who think outside the box and aren’t afraid to do things differently. Some of the most successful managers of the last two years and the agents who represent their artists are under 30 years old.

Is the role of an agent evolving? We no longer follow a ‘standard’ remit. Agents are now often amongst the first

Matthieu Drouot, 28

people on board with an artist. If I recognise potential I will take an artist on before management or a label are in place. I also believe that with the shrinking amount of promotional opportunities for new artists, the agency is even more vital as part of the frontline marketing campaign for labels. It’s up to us to come up with ideas that make sense to both labels and promoters whom we work closely with to strategically break and sustain artists’ careers.

How do you see your roster? It’s eclectic. I’d say the common denominator is the ability to crossover with something fresh. I only ever work with artists I am passionate about and I have to be a fan of their music.

Deputy CEO, Gerard Drouot Productions

Originally from Paris, Matthieu studied business for three years then began managing small bands and working as a stagehand and crew chief. When GDP expanded in 2007, he joined as a production assistant before beginning to work on offers with his father, Gerard. Currently Matthieu promotes artists such as Drake, Game, J Cole, Boyz II Men, Avenged Sevenfold, Milow and Amos Lee. What needs to change about the French industry?

France and French promoters need new buildings to play with, not only to increase competition between them, but also to get up-to-date with what’s happening in other countries. Each of Paris’s theatres now needs to be booked nine months or a year in advance – minimum. Some important worldwide-known cities such as Bordeaux, Lyon or Marseille still do not have proper halls for live shows. In a dynamic city like Bordeaux, we still only have the city ice-rink which is older than Bercy in Paris!

How do you see your role as a promoter changing?

France has great promoters and sometimes good record

companies, but there are no good management brands as there was no legal framework for managers in France until August this year, and French bands can rarely export.

I would like to work more with French acts and I look forward to working with professional French management.

Has your family name had an effect on your career?

Regardless of your name, if you blow what you do, you aren’t going to get a break.

What’s next? Well, just being where I am right now at GDP with the opportunity to keep this great family business going for the next 25 years. I’m proud to be part of a team that’s just getting together and for whom the sky is the limit.

Ian Hogarth, 29 Co-founder/CEO, Songkick Before he co-founded gig-tracking website Songkick, Ian Hogarth completed a masters degree in computer vision at the University of Cambridge in the UK, studied mandarin in China, worked for a consulting firm in Silicon Valley and moonlighted as a hip hop DJ. Songkick now claims to be the second-largest live music site in existence.

What do you attribute the success of Songkick to?

We have a real passion for understanding the fan and what they want from live music. The fan has been neglected for a long time in live music and as technologists we have tried to fix that. We see our users going to 70% more concerts after they start using Songkick so it is actively changing people’s behaviour as it gets them out to more live music.

What effect will Facebook Music have? It should accelerate the adoption of streaming music services like Spotify which means that even more data about what people listen to will be available. Consequently, it will

be easier for people to tell us which bands they like so we can tell them when they come to town. Ultimately, live music relies a lot on having a sense of demand so it’s going to be good for the industry in that respect.

Is there room for young entrepreneurs? It’s always hard because unless you’ve done something before, like inventing Facebook or Google, you don’t have a track record and are very much an unknown quantity; web-based technology makes it quite easy to throw up a new product quickly, but that means there is much more noise in the marketplace. The challenge is standing out from the noise.

Hardi Loog, 25

CEO, RL Entertainment

Estonian Hardi has lived in Finland since 1991, and began promoting shows at college. After completing a business management degree at Helsinki University and while working part-time selling bicycles, he started RL Entertainment with partner John Rugemalira. The company’s roster currently includes Paul Anka, Yes, Jamie Woon and DJ Fresh.

What are you focused on currently? Right now, we are building up the company – we have been profitable for three years so it’s time to expand. We need a better team with more people working in the office. Until now, it’s not something we had time to think about. We started from nothing and learnt everything by ourselves; we had no mentors and no family members already in the music business, so it was a lot of work. We are also building our website, booking for 2012 and programming The Urban Festival in Helsinki.

Is there room for young entrepreneurs? Not too much. In Scandinavian countries there is no school for

Niall Morris, 29

this business; it’s too risky for a lot of people and it is hard to get into if you don’t know anyone. Even though we haven’t fucked up anything in our entire career, every time we speak to a new agent we have to prove that we are a solid promoter. They’re still really careful with us even now.

What are you most proud of so far? I’m proud that I can support my family now, and my team as well – we always made it our mission to make this our day job and enjoy what we are doing. And I’m proud of our biggest concert this year in Estonia: 30 Seconds to Mars played to 12,000 people outdoors.

Promoter, MCD Productions

Niall started as entertainment officer at Trinity College, Dublin, where he partnered with MCD to save a struggling five-night run of shows. Twelve months later he was working for them, initially booking burger and chip vans, then boutique camping, campsite entertainment and commercial deals at the company’s festivals. Two years on, he was back booking bands, and shows this year have included Elbow, Kasabian, The Saturdays, Example and Friendly Fires.

Is social media changing the business? Because the population of Ireland is quite small, you can make Facebook connections with almost the whole country very quickly. We focus a huge amount on Facebook, and also Twitter, which keeps getting better. You can run a Twitter search and see people’s initial reactions to shows, whereas a year ago it was hard to do that. At the moment it’s definitely bringing down promotion costs as it’s word of mouth and free.

Martin Nielsen, 28

How is the promoter’s role developing? Ireland is having a pretty tough time here with the economy, so we need to work a little bit harder. You can’t bring bands in all the time and you need to be a little bit more sensitive to the days of the week, the ticket prices, and making sure that you do the right deals.

What’s the best piece of advice you have been given? Stay in your lane – find the one thing that you are good at and just do that, don’t try to move over!

Head promoter, Live Nation Norway

Swedish-born Martin Nielsen was inducted into EMA Telstar via his father Tor, who has worked there since the early 80s. After completing a masters degree in finance and informatics, Martin started in the company’s accounting department, before moving to promotion. Shows have included Kings of Leon, In Flames, Kanye West, Taylor Swift, Gogol Bordello and Slipknot.

What do you think needs to change in the industry?

With the shift in income from recording to live, the artists now want even more money and the deals are getting tougher. The only way that promoters will survive in the end is if this changes.

How are the Nordics changing? Since they are not getting that support from the label anymore, it’s becoming harder for younger artists to afford to come to the Nordics. It’s easier to do a lot of cities elsewhere in Europe and the UK, but the Nordics are long distance which costs too much.

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What role do you think promoters will have in five years time? The roles of promoters have already changed during the last few years, so I predict that they will remain in a similar place to where they are now, which is where the label comes at the end of the chain. It used to be artist, management, agent, record label and then promoter but now the record label is at the bottom of the pile. Also, the roles of agents and promoters may well become more similar to each other when more deals are done directly with the artist/management through bigger companies like Live Nation and AEG.

Caius Pawson, 25

A&R manager, XL Recordings

Caius started promoting club nights and gigs in his teens, through which he met Richard Russell, head of XL, who offered him a job. Having worked for XL since the age of 18, Caius is now A&R manager and product manages MIA and Giggs the rapper. In 2006, he started label, management and publishing company Young Turks, signing The XX, who subsequently won the Mercury Music Prize in 2010.

Is there room for young entrepreneurs? Loads, absolutely loads. Anyone can start a record label or manage a band or put on a show. There is always a need for people with new ideas to match the new generation of artists. The whole thing is being able to understand your artist, and as a whole generation of new artists come through, so will a new generation of people to understand those artists best. It will be the 18–21 year olds who are going to the same parties, staying up all night, doing all the same things as the artists, who will best be able to expose them around the world.

Alex Stevens, 29

How do you view the role of A&R? A&R’s are there to create the best environment for bands to make the best possible albums, so each A&R does the role completely differently. A&R is about making sure the creative environment is the correct one.

What has been your career highlight so far? The pleasure is the start of the journey as opposed to the end.

Every time you set out on a new project with an artist, the opportunities are limitless and those are the best moments: when you are getting to grips with each other and working out new ideas.

Communications director, Dour Festival

Belgian Alex Stevens had an early start in the business, DJing on a local radio show at the age of 12. At 14, he started one of the first online music magazines, Nameless, and by 16, he was running online promotion for festivals. Alex has worked with Dour since 2000, has booked one of its stages since 2004 and worked there full-time since 2005. He also runs local-band incubator Court Circuit and is a director on the board of independent festivals association De Concert.

Tell us about Court Circuit and De Concert? I’m the president of Court Circuit and we work on promoting local bands, helping them to grow to a different level of their careers. We have a demo contest online, live competitions and we hold a conference. De Concert started with festivals such as Festival des Vieilles Charrues and Sziget Festival in 2008 and our aim is to exchange ideas on a musical level, including sharing new bands.

How is communicating with an audience changing?

Since 2000, I’ve been growing communities online, and now we have a lot of fans on Facebook and a big mailing

Dave Wallace, 27

list. But what we are really focusing on is having a really good website. We see the festival website as a magazine where we talk about music; where we have a special connection with our audience. We are not just trying to sell tickets but to make it for music lovers – building a real relationship with them.

How do you find the time? You just have to be well organised. I studied computer science so it comes naturally to me. It’s interesting to work in several businesses so that you can have a different viewpoint.

Manager, Wildlife Entertainment

While singing and touring in hardcore bands and dabbling in promotion, Dave Wallace studied commercial music at Westminster University in the UK. On graduating, he worked at Primary Talent, signing Glasvegas, Iglu & Hartly, and Two Door Cinema Club, before moving into artist management at Wildlife.

Was it always your plan to become a manager? Not really. I gave up performing when Glasvegas got too busy and my focus changed to wanting to work mainstream stuff and take it bigger. Once I realised that, my aim was definitely management. I felt that when I had a strong enough phone book and contact list I would step out on my own and do that.

What are you most proud of? There’s a bunch of stuff, like when I got my first disk, the framed disks you get when you sell 100,000… stuff like that was really cool at the time. For me right now, Morning Parade selling out

The Scala is probably my proudest moment to date.

Where would you like to be in five years time? I’d love to think that I could have another band or an act on the roster that I love as much as Morning Parade. I’d like to think I can find another group of people that I believe in as much as them.

What do you think needs to change in the industry?

UK catering at venues! As a manager you have to roll with the punches week to week, but the catering in UK venues really needs to step up a level. Europe look after us so well – there’s a big difference.