3 ms·

Marc Geiger helped create Lollapalooza, now he wants to save live music

boomboomsubban 6y ago
If they aren't making distressed assets plays and they want to make these venues partnerships, why purchase 51% rather than 50%/49%?
jelling 6y ago
Curious to see how this goes, specifically what percentage of current owners are still involved in operations 5 years from now. Live music is full of characters on the business side and I wonder it will be like for them having a boss.
personlurking 6y ago
Also interesting, regarding what YT Music is doing, including with live music: "Inside YouTube’s plan to win the music-streaming wars" https://www.protocol.com/youtube-music https://www.protocol.com/youtube-music
- 52-6F-62 6y ago
  Ironically, I just tried renting the Devil and Daniel Johnston on YouTube. First time ever. It would not play back in Firefox because "there was an error licensing this video" after I had already paid them. It will work in Chrome. Last time I'm doing that...
claudiulodro 6y ago
Live music has literally been around for thousands of years. Excluding a pause this year because of the pandemic, can it even be "killed off"? The venues may change over the years, but musicians seem to be a fundamental part of humanity at this point.
- jariel 6y ago
  The meaning of music has fundamentally changed over the last 100 years, and especially in the last 20. The number of working pro musicians has dropped by something like 95%, so has the amount of live music. Partly due to recorded music of course (weddings would have had a band, now they have a DJ), and in the last 20 years because music is 'something else'. Visit the Billboard 200 right now, and you'll see that almost none of it cay be 'played live'. What's to play (?), an mp3? Chief Keef went on tour and his performance was, walking out on stage cranked up with his buddies, while they played his track over the loudspeakers. They didn't even bother to remove the lyrics or change the track. Just played the track. Then he drunkenly stumbled around the stage, incoherently mumbling some of his own rap words against the already mostly incoherent rap lyrics on his own track. Crowd goes wild. I went to a 'Brazil/France/USA' rap-fusion thing in Montreal, I was very excited, the track started, the 'hype man' with 'big hair came out' and said 'heyo' , then 'yo yo yo', then 'ayeee' about ever 10-15 seconds, getting the crowd going. But he wasn't the hype man - that was the act. That was his 'performance'. Just saying 'yo yo yo' a few times now and again over some track. And people paid for that. Modern pop acts are no longer musicians, they are 'creative famous people'. Music is just one 'angle' on being famous, it blends in with TikTok/YouTube/Instagram as one big smear of 'trying to be popular'. So there's a lot of good serious music, but it's a side-show like it never was before, so there probably needs to be some conscientious efforts to support it. We spend some money supporting 'Orchestral' music partly out of a benevolent view, we're likely going to have to do the same for 'live music'.
rectang 6y ago
Geiger is buying them out. > buying at least 51 percent of the equity in those businesses A consolidation is the worst possible outcome. The less diversity in ownership, the narrower the conception of what sort of acts get booked and the less artistic adventurism. We don't need SaveLive to reproduce the "success" of TicketMaster in keeping out those who won't play by their rules. I would rather see all these venues die, and then have new independent ventures sprout up to fill the void.
steve_g 6y ago
'Song for a New Day' by Sarah Pinsker is a Nebula award winning book about live music vs. virtual reality in a post-pandemic/bioterrorism world. It was written just before Covid took off, so it's interesting to see how well it predicted the 'feel' of the pandemic lifestyle. https://www.amazon.com/Song-New-Day-Sarah-Pinsker/dp/1984802585/ https://www.amazon.com/Song-New-Day-Sarah-Pinsker/dp/1984802...
heelix 6y ago
I'm hoping that if nothing else comes from this, that Ticketmaster suffers a fatal blow from this zombie apocalypses gap in live events. Truly a bane on any live event.

If they aren't making distressed assets plays and they want to make these venues partnerships, why purchase 51% rather than 50%/49%?

jelling 6y ago

Curious to see how this goes, specifically what percentage of current owners are still involved in operations 5 years from now. Live music is full of characters on the business side and I wonder it will be like for them having a boss.

personlurking 6y ago

Also interesting, regarding what YT Music is doing, including with live music: "Inside YouTube’s plan to win the music-streaming wars" https://www.protocol.com/youtube-music https://www.protocol.com/youtube-music

52-6F-62 6y ago
Ironically, I just tried renting the Devil and Daniel Johnston on YouTube. First time ever. It would not play back in Firefox because "there was an error licensing this video" after I had already paid them. It will work in Chrome. Last time I'm doing that...

claudiulodro 6y ago

Live music has literally been around for thousands of years. Excluding a pause this year because of the pandemic, can it even be "killed off"? The venues may change over the years, but musicians seem to be a fundamental part of humanity at this point.

jariel 6y ago
The meaning of music has fundamentally changed over the last 100 years, and especially in the last 20. The number of working pro musicians has dropped by something like 95%, so has the amount of live music. Partly due to recorded music of course (weddings would have had a band, now they have a DJ), and in the last 20 years because music is 'something else'. Visit the Billboard 200 right now, and you'll see that almost none of it cay be 'played live'. What's to play (?), an mp3? Chief Keef went on tour and his performance was, walking out on stage cranked up with his buddies, while they played his track over the loudspeakers. They didn't even bother to remove the lyrics or change the track. Just played the track. Then he drunkenly stumbled around the stage, incoherently mumbling some of his own rap words against the already mostly incoherent rap lyrics on his own track. Crowd goes wild. I went to a 'Brazil/France/USA' rap-fusion thing in Montreal, I was very excited, the track started, the 'hype man' with 'big hair came out' and said 'heyo' , then 'yo yo yo', then 'ayeee' about ever 10-15 seconds, getting the crowd going. But he wasn't the hype man - that was the act. That was his 'performance'. Just saying 'yo yo yo' a few times now and again over some track. And people paid for that. Modern pop acts are no longer musicians, they are 'creative famous people'. Music is just one 'angle' on being famous, it blends in with TikTok/YouTube/Instagram as one big smear of 'trying to be popular'. So there's a lot of good serious music, but it's a side-show like it never was before, so there probably needs to be some conscientious efforts to support it. We spend some money supporting 'Orchestral' music partly out of a benevolent view, we're likely going to have to do the same for 'live music'.

rectang 6y ago

Geiger is buying them out. > buying at least 51 percent of the equity in those businesses A consolidation is the worst possible outcome. The less diversity in ownership, the narrower the conception of what sort of acts get booked and the less artistic adventurism. We don't need SaveLive to reproduce the "success" of TicketMaster in keeping out those who won't play by their rules. I would rather see all these venues die, and then have new independent ventures sprout up to fill the void.

steve_g 6y ago

'Song for a New Day' by Sarah Pinsker is a Nebula award winning book about live music vs. virtual reality in a post-pandemic/bioterrorism world. It was written just before Covid took off, so it's interesting to see how well it predicted the 'feel' of the pandemic lifestyle. https://www.amazon.com/Song-New-Day-Sarah-Pinsker/dp/1984802585/ https://www.amazon.com/Song-New-Day-Sarah-Pinsker/dp/1984802...

heelix 6y ago

I'm hoping that if nothing else comes from this, that Ticketmaster suffers a fatal blow from this zombie apocalypses gap in live events. Truly a bane on any live event.