Speaker 1: Welcome, Welcome, Welcome back to the Bob Left Sets Podcasting.
Speaker 1: My guest today is a man who food needs an introduction,
Speaker 1: a man who's played every role of the music business,
Speaker 1: the one and only Irving as of Irving. Good to
Speaker 1: have you here, thrilled to be here, Abob. So what's
Speaker 1: really going on with the live business? Are we back?
Speaker 1: Are we not back? Are we gonna have to have
Speaker 1: vaccine passports? How do you see it? We're not gonna
Speaker 1: have vaccine passports. Um. The thing that you know has
Speaker 1: has unimpressed me, shall we say, is as we were
Speaker 1: in the in the depths of this, there was all
Speaker 1: this talk about all these people running around, we're gonna
Speaker 1: have testing machines, and can you test a person every
Speaker 1: twenty seconds or ninety seconds before they walk in the building,
Speaker 1: and they're gonna require that before we can go. And
Speaker 1: then it was we're gonna have you're gonna have a
Speaker 1: put on your device, you know, a vaccine passport. And
Speaker 1: and what I'm finding is none of the above. When
Speaker 1: you go to a venue I've been doing, a well
Speaker 1: known venue called Staples Center for a Laker basketball game. UM,
Speaker 1: and you arrive and they say, uh, I need to
Speaker 1: see your vaccine card. Okay, then you pull out your
Speaker 1: phone and a guy looks at it for about ten seconds.
Speaker 1: Doesn't match your name against the card or anything. So um,
Speaker 1: you know, our government blue wear masks, don't wear masks,
Speaker 1: wash your hands, don't wash your hands. And now they've
Speaker 1: blown you know, at all levels, federal, state health. We
Speaker 1: have no plan. It's it's it's total chaos out there.
Speaker 1: So I think it hurts consumer confidence on whether it
Speaker 1: attend to show. Um. And you know, that's just you know,
Speaker 1: in addition to you know, musicians basically being the bottom
Speaker 1: of the heap uh in terms of um assistance, financial
Speaker 1: assistance for their cruise and them during this pandemic um,
Speaker 1: they haven't even come up with a decent plan to
Speaker 1: protect us, or protect the fans or give people confidence
Speaker 1: to come back to shows. Now, does that mean that
Speaker 1: people aren't going to come? Of course they're gonna come,
Speaker 1: but they're not. I don't think they're gonna come um
Speaker 1: in the numbers that they would have had we had
Speaker 1: a cohesive vaccination passport plan. So are there any issues
Speaker 1: of liability in the behalf of the promoter of the act?
Speaker 1: Is are you hesitant to book your acts until you
Speaker 1: see what ultimately plays out. Look, it's the it's the wild,
Speaker 1: wild West. Um. I don't think anybody's really worried about liability,
Speaker 1: you know. And we've got some states all already passing
Speaker 1: no liability laws. Um, California, who had the strictest um
Speaker 1: lockdown laws. UM. Now suddenly, as I understand it, if
Speaker 1: you're going to go into a music venue, UM, it's
Speaker 1: the honor system. You have to say, I've either been
Speaker 1: vaccinated or tested in the last forty eight hours. Uh
Speaker 1: so you know what, what's what's somebody gonna sue for
Speaker 1: that for I mean, you know it's crazy, okay, But
Speaker 1: in terms of booking your acts, where you that where
Speaker 1: were you on that one of your acts going to
Speaker 1: start hitting the boards? The gardens opening Medison Square Gardens
Speaker 1: opening June seventeenth with the Food Fighters that that that
Speaker 1: was up and sold out already, the second shows in
Speaker 1: the Garden or the Eagles in August, I think two
Speaker 1: and two. Um, there's an announcement coming at the Forum
Speaker 1: for a mid July date. UM. So you know, Jimmy
Speaker 1: Buffett's opening his tour in July eighth in Nashville. Um,
Speaker 1: people are going you know and um and uh it's
Speaker 1: hard if you're a you know on a level arena
Speaker 1: or stadium act that you have to go build a
Speaker 1: huge production because you can't be sure, um of what
Speaker 1: of what's going to happen. So you know, the you know, uh,
Speaker 1: they're really the really big tours are being very wary.
Speaker 1: Most of them are just holding off until next year. Okay,
Speaker 1: so let's talk about your management company. Who started in management?
Speaker 1: Explain it to me. Jeffrey runs it, where are you involved, etcetera.
Speaker 1: But we're a private company, Bob, so we're not big
Speaker 1: on titles, so nobody really runs it. Um. We're a
Speaker 1: group of very talented managers. Um. And and you know
Speaker 1: we have teams of people on each account. But you know,
Speaker 1: a managed you can't run a management business like a
Speaker 1: real business, you know, I mean, as you know, as
Speaker 1: you know, most of us in the business don't feel
Speaker 1: that we really have jobs. You know, we really do
Speaker 1: this because we love it. Um. But yeah, my my
Speaker 1: son Jeffrey is very talented. I think he's one of
Speaker 1: the best managers I've ever known. So yeah, he's he's
Speaker 1: got a group of managers around him who have been
Speaker 1: incredibly successful. Okay, so, uh at full Stop is what
Speaker 1: the management company is called. Now, what's the derivation of that?
Speaker 1: Why is it called full stop? Um? Full Stop was
Speaker 1: a company founded by Harry Styles and Jeffrey. Aesof that
Speaker 1: merged with I don't know what was I calling mine?
Speaker 1: He's off music management, I think, and and that, uh,
Speaker 1: you know who needs you know, we don't have a
Speaker 1: case of Geff and I justs we didn't need the
Speaker 1: name on the door, so full stop was full stop
Speaker 1: was fine? So I love the name. Okay, it's kind
Speaker 1: of an English term, you know, from in the war.
Speaker 1: You know, at the end of the at the end
Speaker 1: of the wires that would come in, it would say
Speaker 1: full stop. That's how you knew when it was over.
Speaker 1: So I I don't know the derivation. There's something English
Speaker 1: about it. You'd have to ask carrier Jeffrey. Okay, how
Speaker 1: many acts are under the full Stop banner at this
Speaker 1: particular point in time, I don't know. I never counted.
Speaker 1: We don't publish artist rosters. I really don't know. Twenty thirty, fifty,
Speaker 1: I don't know more than I'd say closer to thirty
Speaker 1: than twenty or fifty. Okay, how many people work for
Speaker 1: full Stop? I don't know, what is this? The I
Speaker 1: R S. I mean, what's going on here? Bob? No, no, no,
Speaker 1: why would the things people want to know? I'm not
Speaker 1: writing it down to, you know, to write a book.
Speaker 1: It's just to get an idea. I would guess there
Speaker 1: are far more people that work there than clients, so
Speaker 1: you know, probably maybe are they all there in Westwood
Speaker 1: at this point or is everybody spread out? Uh? We
Speaker 1: were spread out before, you know. Uh, but um, it's
Speaker 1: really interesting because if you go into a management office
Speaker 1: in the middle of the summer especially, and there's a
Speaker 1: lot of people there, you know it's not going well
Speaker 1: because we by nature touring being you know, a vast
Speaker 1: majority of the earnings, uh, for our artists. You most
Speaker 1: people are on the road. People are out, um, you know,
Speaker 1: so you know, we don't care where people live. We've
Speaker 1: got people. We've got people in Nashville, We've got people
Speaker 1: New York, we got people in Scottsdale. People you know,
Speaker 1: people living up in the Bay Area, people living in
Speaker 1: the desert. Okay, needless, just say you are the most
Speaker 1: experienced manager extant. To what degree are you focused on
Speaker 1: mentoring the other people at full Stop or it's pretty
Speaker 1: much everybody going their own way and just gleaning your
Speaker 1: great moves and acting accordingly. Um uh, we think we
Speaker 1: have an incredible culture. UM. You know, this isn't Frontline
Speaker 1: Management where we you know, um, which as you know
Speaker 1: because we've talked about it a lot, but for your listeners,
Speaker 1: we may not have when you know. When we you know,
Speaker 1: Frontline Management was founded at a time when there's a
Speaker 1: lot of consolidation going on the business and I was
Speaker 1: starting over in the management business after having left the
Speaker 1: record business, and and we found that no matter how
Speaker 1: big the Eagles and Fleetwood Mac were, you weren't going
Speaker 1: to fight the consolidation in the business. UM. So we
Speaker 1: got other like manded managers to that we acquired or
Speaker 1: merged with. UM. But full Stop is a business that's
Speaker 1: been grown out of culture, so we're not interested in
Speaker 1: acquiring other managers. We kind of it's all everything's homegrown,
Speaker 1: you know. Um. We've got incredible people and managers who
Speaker 1: have worked up through the rants. It's a great place
Speaker 1: for for somebody interested in the managing business to work
Speaker 1: because you're gonna you're gonna grow and you're gonna learn
Speaker 1: it and you're gonna you're gonna become successful and wealthy
Speaker 1: doing it. But we have a culture. Um. You know.
Speaker 1: Rule one is always make the right decision for your
Speaker 1: artists and it will be the right decision for your business.
Speaker 1: So you don't think short term, We think long term.
Speaker 1: Rule two is see rule one. UM, And that's uh,
Speaker 1: that's that's kind of how how we run it. You know,
Speaker 1: none of us can sell a ticket. Um. Uh. And
Speaker 1: we love it. And if you don't, you know, my
Speaker 1: advice is, if you don't love artists and the craziest
Speaker 1: that comes with it, don't do it. Let's talk about average,
Speaker 1: which you referenced. You famously lined up certain clients so
Speaker 1: you had power against the labels or Visa Viva labels.
Speaker 1: Same deal. When Live Nation then called Clear Channel was
Speaker 1: moving up, you helped form a competitor a g. Can
Speaker 1: you tell us about those experiences in your strategies? Um,
Speaker 1: it was survival. I mean back in those days, it
Speaker 1: was shrinking from like twelve to five record labels. Now
Speaker 1: we're basically down to the three majors, but with some
Speaker 1: wonderful independent action going on now outside of it, Um,
Speaker 1: there was big consolidation at retail, you know, because this
Speaker 1: was even precede you know, it was even pre c
Speaker 1: d s in early days of c ds when we
Speaker 1: when we did that, and there was consolidation and promoters,
Speaker 1: you know, because Bob Sullerman, which was the primary it
Speaker 1: wasn't really about the labels as much as it was
Speaker 1: the live side of the business. And Bob Sullerman had
Speaker 1: come along and you know, and rolled up a whole
Speaker 1: bunch of these big promoters and sold them to Clear
Speaker 1: Channel Radio. Uh and in those days called Clear Channel. Um.
Speaker 1: And and I woke up one day, uh, and I'd
Speaker 1: restarted my business, and I believe I was managing the
Speaker 1: Eagles and Journey. And I got into a big beef
Speaker 1: with a couple of promoters that were running Clear Channel
Speaker 1: at the time, who are my friends who had done
Speaker 1: business with for thirty years. And I said, I gotta
Speaker 1: get bigger fast, or I'm not going to be able
Speaker 1: to you know, no matter how you know, I should
Speaker 1: I should quit because I can't I can't get fair
Speaker 1: deals for my artists. UM. So that's that was the
Speaker 1: the reason for putting together front Line And what about
Speaker 1: helping in the creation of a g um that was
Speaker 1: that was the level of playing field as well in
Speaker 1: those days. And you know Tim lay Wicky who UM
Speaker 1: who I met when he was building staples UM understood
Speaker 1: the content game and said we want to be in it.
Speaker 1: And I felt that. And I had invested in a
Speaker 1: company called Concerts West, not the original Big Concerts West,
Speaker 1: but some guys that are in Gongo area and Meglan
Speaker 1: who had split off from the origin know when Concerts
Speaker 1: West folded and Terry Bassett gave them the name so
Speaker 1: that the company name would go on. So I I
Speaker 1: had invested in those guys, and in those days I
Speaker 1: had invested in Golden Voice in Coachella, UM, and then
Speaker 1: we kind of put together Golden Voice Coachella and UH
Speaker 1: Concerts West to start a g live. Okay, let's stay
Speaker 1: with a live business. This is a business where those
Speaker 1: on the inside know what's going on, those on the
Speaker 1: outside are clueless. Ticket masters paid to take the heat.
Speaker 1: But as a manager, we've discussed a number of issues
Speaker 1: relative to the buildings, tickets on the manifest, what leverage
Speaker 1: their employing. Can you go a little deeper into that,
Speaker 1: UM tickets on the manifest off the man of what
Speaker 1: you want to know. Yeah, we were taught. We were
Speaker 1: talking that the buildings are withholding tickets and wanting certain
Speaker 1: commitments in order to take the data for you to
Speaker 1: play the date. Um there were you know, Bob, it's
Speaker 1: really been cleaned up recently over the years though. Um.
Speaker 1: So like if you if you landed on Earth from Mars,
Speaker 1: how a record contract has written or paid, or how
Speaker 1: a live contract has written or paid, It would never
Speaker 1: look this way. When Fred rosen Um took over and
Speaker 1: and made and switched, we had a company in those
Speaker 1: old days called Tickettron that he kind of put out
Speaker 1: a business. And the difference between Tickettron and ticket Master
Speaker 1: was it was an all in ticket price went during
Speaker 1: the Tickettron days and then you would pay them a
Speaker 1: dollar and a half or two bucks for selling your ticket.
Speaker 1: Rosen came along and said to the buildings, instead of
Speaker 1: you paying a dollar and a half to two bucks
Speaker 1: to Tickettron, I'll pay you, but I'm gonna put a
Speaker 1: service charge on top. So he they inflated the price
Speaker 1: of tickets and and basically took a piece of the
Speaker 1: artist gross and and start paying the buildings. So then
Speaker 1: you know, so as things happen. So then we as
Speaker 1: managers and agents then said okay, but we're not gonna
Speaker 1: pay you rent. Right, So then when we weren't paying
Speaker 1: them rent, they said, okay, but we've got these seats
Speaker 1: that we sold as I don't know, sponsor seats, club seats,
Speaker 1: you know, whatever, wherever you want to call them, and uh,
Speaker 1: you know, and and that's what helped us finance the
Speaker 1: improvements on our buildings. So those seats don't exist, meaning yeah,
Speaker 1: we're gonna they're sold and we're gonna put people in them,
Speaker 1: but they're sold by the year. And then suddenly buildings
Speaker 1: started with sweets. So so through the years, it's just
Speaker 1: a moving of the same money around. Okay, you know, uh,
Speaker 1: you know, a standard or nine five deal with an artist,
Speaker 1: if promoter had to live off of just that, um,
Speaker 1: there'd be no you know, there would be no live nation,
Speaker 1: there be no age, either be no promoters. So so
Speaker 1: then it comes down to, oh, but we have to
Speaker 1: have rebates and we have to have ticket service fees,
Speaker 1: and we have. Then then somebody invented the facility fee,
Speaker 1: which was supposed to pay a state government or something
Speaker 1: attacks but it wasn't attacked. It was to pay off
Speaker 1: your loan for having built the building. But no, no,
Speaker 1: two buildings have the same economics. But um, um, you know,
Speaker 1: since you know, listen, um, Michael Rapino is committed to
Speaker 1: a fair count okay, and and between him, um and
Speaker 1: and pressure and and look, buildings are not the enemy.
Speaker 1: You know, Buildings don't make nearly the kind of money
Speaker 1: that people think, okay, So um, And there's a lot
Speaker 1: of people that would take tickets off the manifest you know,
Speaker 1: in this order, I would say the um, the stub
Speaker 1: hubs of the world are the are the worst, okay,
Speaker 1: because they have no skin in the game, and they've
Speaker 1: got people that get ahold of tickets and they take
Speaker 1: a big chunk um. You know, buildings taking tickets, you know,
Speaker 1: manifests tickets off the manifest except you know that's kind
Speaker 1: of gone away, especially for a big act, okay. And
Speaker 1: then of course you've got acts that are doing it themselves.
Speaker 1: So um, it's a while wild west out there. Okay.
Speaker 1: So let's today today. If you play an arena fifteen
Speaker 1: thousand seats, how many of those seats are in the
Speaker 1: deal with the act? And how many just never show off? Well,
Speaker 1: I can. I can tell you at the Forum, every
Speaker 1: seats on the manifest. Okay, I can tell you that, UM,
Speaker 1: in most buildings, every seats on the manifest except for
Speaker 1: the sweets. Okay. Now, on a big show they might
Speaker 1: try and put four extra stools and the suits and
Speaker 1: sell them. But the buildings are being really cool now,
Speaker 1: so they're kind of telling you and they're gonna they're
Speaker 1: gonna pay you or split that money with you on
Speaker 1: those seats. Um, it's it's gotten cleaned, it's gotten a
Speaker 1: lot cleaned up. There are there are a few buildings,
Speaker 1: uh that still have some some some unmanifested seats. And
Speaker 1: their claim is, look, the way we built this building
Speaker 1: was with the money from these suite holders. We took
Speaker 1: these massive, several thousand dollar year commitment for people to
Speaker 1: have these suits, and that's what allowed us to go
Speaker 1: have the money to go get financed so we can
Speaker 1: build the building. UM and and what so, So what
Speaker 1: goes on is with the exception of the suites, it's
Speaker 1: pretty clean out there with the buildings. Now there's a
Speaker 1: few and what they claim is well for the suites
Speaker 1: that are behind the stage and can't see, that's why
Speaker 1: we have these unmanifested seats to move these people down there.
Speaker 1: But of course we find them listed on the secondary
Speaker 1: a lot of times, and you don't know if it
Speaker 1: was the guys in the suite that listed it or
Speaker 1: the building that listed it. But every time we find that,
Speaker 1: we clean it up real quickly. And all in all,
Speaker 1: the building sign of the business is very clean, The
Speaker 1: ticketmaster side of the business is very clean. The secondary
Speaker 1: is very dirty. Okay, before we get to the secondary,
Speaker 1: let's just just you talk. Can you explain since you
Speaker 1: certainly worked at Live Nation where the profit verticals for
Speaker 1: the promoter um, Well, at Live Nation they have a
Speaker 1: wonderful sponsor, you know, have the sponsorship branding arm um
Speaker 1: is you know they're allowing you know that that isn't shared, okay,
Speaker 1: so that they make their money that way they you
Speaker 1: know then and certainly when they own venues, they're making
Speaker 1: it off the popcorn and the beer in the parking
Speaker 1: and and and stuff like that. But on the straight
Speaker 1: promoter line, the money, the money's you know, the money's made,
Speaker 1: you know, off a piece off a piece of the ticket. Okay,
Speaker 1: what's the status of the secondary market today? And uh,
Speaker 1: we'll see post COVID, you know um stub Hub and
Speaker 1: those you know whereas Live Nation and a g. When
Speaker 1: COVID hit, we're saying, if you'd like a refund, here's
Speaker 1: your cash. Stub Hub basically issued credits. Okay, So coming
Speaker 1: out of COVID, I'm hoping these guys have maybe shot
Speaker 1: themselves at the foot because when the consumer realizes that
Speaker 1: he can't get his cash back from these people, maybe
Speaker 1: people will realizing for the pariahs that they are. Now.
Speaker 1: You certainly come up with ways to beat the scalpers.
Speaker 1: You came up with Platinum, and you told me once
Speaker 1: you know, find someone who complains about paying you know,
Speaker 1: five sit in the first ten rows for the Eagles.
Speaker 1: You can't find them, so well he well here look here,
Speaker 1: here's what it is. You gotta price your tickets, right.
Speaker 1: I mean, if you're an act and you think your
Speaker 1: your fans gonna love you more because you charge less money,
Speaker 1: and then somebody buys six tickets and gives and sells
Speaker 1: four of them on the secondary. You know, when when
Speaker 1: you go to a concert you don't turn it's not
Speaker 1: you know, when you get on an airplane, you don't
Speaker 1: get to the person next to you and say how
Speaker 1: much did you pay for your ticket? I paid more
Speaker 1: than you. Oh I'm piste off. It's just a fact
Speaker 1: alive when you when you walk into building, nobody turns
Speaker 1: to the guy next and says where did you get
Speaker 1: your ticket and how much did you pay? They just
Speaker 1: know what they paid and whether they thought it was
Speaker 1: worth it, you know. And the great thing is that
Speaker 1: we can dynamically price now. And if you if an
Speaker 1: act will price their tickets right, so you have a
Speaker 1: chance to charge in the upper deck and the seats
Speaker 1: behind the stage a very small amount of money so
Speaker 1: that more of your real fans they can pick where
Speaker 1: they want to sit in the building, where what they
Speaker 1: can afford um. And you know, if if acts would
Speaker 1: just price their tickets right, the only people that ever
Speaker 1: complain about tickets being priced too high were the press
Speaker 1: who got their tickets for free anyway, you know, And
Speaker 1: and and you know, we're in a new era where
Speaker 1: more and more acts are not afraid to price their
Speaker 1: tickets right. Platinum, it's just that's just pricing your tickets right.
Speaker 1: Only when you when you go on Ticketmaster, it says
Speaker 1: it's a hundred and fifty dollar and a hundred and
Speaker 1: seventy five dollar ticket, but they know to go to
Speaker 1: Platinum and there's some five hundred dollar tickets. It's just
Speaker 1: in a way for an act to say I didn't
Speaker 1: charge five hundred dollars from my tickets. They're fucking kidding themselves. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's talk about e g g. The Oakview Group. What exactly
Speaker 1: is ov G uh. Oak View Group is a a
Speaker 1: company that's primarily owned by Tim Lwicky, UH, the light
Speaker 1: Wicky family and the Asa family. UH, funded with and
Speaker 1: partnered with silver Lake, A wonderful UM one of the
Speaker 1: biggest private equity companies in the world. UM. And we
Speaker 1: have UM UM. We're committed to building new arenas and
Speaker 1: maybe other kinds of venues at some point UM and
Speaker 1: taking over certain existing arenas and renovating them. And what
Speaker 1: we're committed is to, you know, buildings that are built
Speaker 1: UM for the future, not the past. For instance, in
Speaker 1: our you know, in our buildings, UH, you know, you've
Speaker 1: got a sports tenant, seailar being one backstage and music
Speaker 1: being at afterthought where you just get to go use
Speaker 1: the visiting team visiting NBA or hockey teams dressing room.
Speaker 1: There's full sets of dressing rooms like at the Forum
Speaker 1: for music and a full set addressing rooms for sports. Right,
Speaker 1: we're trying to say that music is a tenant and
Speaker 1: just as important as sports. UM and UH and the
Speaker 1: right and the right mix of premium and great experiences
Speaker 1: in the building. People want experience more than just the
Speaker 1: concert now in a building, so UM, you know. And
Speaker 1: we were opening in Seattle in mid October. We're opening
Speaker 1: in New York at the at UBA you know ubs
Speaker 1: Belmont Park, the home of the Islanders. Seattle's the home
Speaker 1: of the Kraken. UH. And we're opening in in Austin
Speaker 1: in April of UM and then the next couple to
Speaker 1: come online or Manchester, England and Palm Springs, California. Now
Speaker 1: haven't you also UH created a group of buildings where
Speaker 1: you share information and there are other initiatives you have
Speaker 1: as a whole. Yeah, the the Arena Alliance. So if
Speaker 1: you're a big national brand, you're probably not going to
Speaker 1: just go to Salt Lake. And if you're if you're Walmart,
Speaker 1: you're probably not going to go do a dealing. You know,
Speaker 1: you don't have anybody in the field there's gonna Walmart's
Speaker 1: going to do a deal with the building in Salt Lake. Okay,
Speaker 1: they like to buy nationally. So you've got these billionaires
Speaker 1: that known the hockey and the NBA teams, but they're
Speaker 1: not getting any national brands. So what we do is
Speaker 1: people for people like pet Smart and Walmart you know
Speaker 1: there we offer it to all our buildings. Were able
Speaker 1: to create national in you know, national brand income for
Speaker 1: these buildings that they wouldn't have. And we share information
Speaker 1: for routing purposes, um and you know, and and and
Speaker 1: stuff like that. So we help these buildings get booked. Um,
Speaker 1: we help them on you know, as we went through
Speaker 1: the COVID protocol. We're you know, we help people through
Speaker 1: their safety stuff. It's it's a consulting arm um and
Speaker 1: and um, you know we're not you know, the Arena
Speaker 1: Alliance are not promoters. Um. You know, we don't book
Speaker 1: the buildings. They booked themselves. But we you know, we
Speaker 1: we make sure to get all the information out out
Speaker 1: for them. Um. But we but we're creating these national brands.
Speaker 1: It's it's it's castlow positive in each building. Okay, let's
Speaker 1: go back to silver Lake. Silver Lake, you know, huge
Speaker 1: venture firm. They ultimately want their money back, whether it
Speaker 1: be going public or someone replacing them. Is that sort
Speaker 1: of built into the ov G relationship? M No, it's not. Okay,
Speaker 1: And they haven't said they're they're they're savvy investors. Um,
Speaker 1: they're just encouraging us to grow the business because they
Speaker 1: like what we what they say. Okay, let's talk about
Speaker 1: selling just in general, not just ov G. You certainly
Speaker 1: of someone who has sold your management company a number
Speaker 1: of times, and you've represented people who sold things. When
Speaker 1: do you think you should sell? And when do you
Speaker 1: think you should hold on? You know, Um, there's a
Speaker 1: lot of questions to go into that, um, family estate
Speaker 1: planning being one. Uh. And you know, and and are
Speaker 1: their errors around to to keep running these companies that
Speaker 1: want to do it and that you believe and can
Speaker 1: do it um uh And you know, and but if
Speaker 1: you're building brands for your artists, most of those people
Speaker 1: are building it to sell. So if that's what you're that,
Speaker 1: that's what you're referring to. But you know, UM, we
Speaker 1: never start a business going hey, we're gonna sell this.
Speaker 1: It just happens. Um. But in terms of in terms
Speaker 1: of the management business, I never you know, I merged
Speaker 1: more than I sold. You know, we merged people together
Speaker 1: in front Line. Uh, then we merged with Ticketmaster. Then
Speaker 1: we merged Ticketmaster in front Line with Live Nation. Um
Speaker 1: so you know, so then when I left, um, you know,
Speaker 1: Frontline State. So that group of manager stayed and I
Speaker 1: started over. Yeah. But also when you went to m
Speaker 1: c A, didn't they pay you for front Line? About
Speaker 1: three years in they paid me for front one. They
Speaker 1: bought front one. What was what was the logic of
Speaker 1: three years? Uh? There was a new existing consent decree
Speaker 1: from the old m c A days. Um, they didn't.
Speaker 1: They didn't want me spending my dame and my time
Speaker 1: on management. I would have been happy not to sell.
Speaker 1: They wanted me to spend all my time. You know
Speaker 1: at that point I was running the record company, we
Speaker 1: were building amphitheaters, I was running their video business. Uh.
Speaker 1: They didn't want me compromised and you know, running around
Speaker 1: to shows all over the world. Okay, let's go back
Speaker 1: to the cell. If someone is not a state planning
Speaker 1: and you represent that act. Now with these huge multiples
Speaker 1: for publishing catalogs, what do you tell them? Um, there's
Speaker 1: a lot of questions you have to ask people. Do
Speaker 1: you have airs. Do you hate your kids? Are you
Speaker 1: worried that your kids are gonna screw up your legacy?
Speaker 1: Do you have things you want to buy? Uh? Even
Speaker 1: at these multiples, if you're just gonna take the money
Speaker 1: and throw it in treasury bills or stuff that's really safe,
Speaker 1: your cash flow every year is the same or more
Speaker 1: holding right, But if you really want to, you know,
Speaker 1: have things that you want to buy with the money,
Speaker 1: or you know, for guys in their mid seventies that
Speaker 1: are that are struggling to make ends meet, they can't
Speaker 1: tour anymore, why shouldn't they sell for a big, huge check? Okay,
Speaker 1: I don't you know? And then again for guys like
Speaker 1: Ryan Tedder who are as hot as hell, are going
Speaker 1: to write more hits, you know, if his family can
Speaker 1: enjoy the benefits of him selling his what he's written
Speaker 1: to date because he knows he's gonna sell, you know,
Speaker 1: write more going forward? Why not? It works for some people,
Speaker 1: doesn't work for others. But as you're seeing, whether you're
Speaker 1: Paul Simon or you're Neil Young or you're Bob Dylan, Um,
Speaker 1: you know these people are you know, I understand every
Speaker 1: one of them wanting to sell and why And as
Speaker 1: you know, you know, we're, um, it's not our primary business.
Speaker 1: But when you know, um, i'd rather my family um
Speaker 1: own royalties from the works of the Beach Boys or
Speaker 1: Linda Ronstad or or David Crosby. Then uh, you know,
Speaker 1: by a Treasury bill. So that's why I'm in that business. Okay,
Speaker 1: let's talk about iconic. Uh you have relationships with those
Speaker 1: three entities. Do you own them a hundred percent? Is
Speaker 1: it your personal money? Is it somebody else's money? We
Speaker 1: uh on on the on the Beach Boys were a
Speaker 1: partnership with the Beach Boys, with us being the controlling
Speaker 1: partner in certain in certain masters, recorded music, flow, royalties, publishing, writing.
Speaker 1: It depends down. You know. They have a very complex thing.
Speaker 1: So we kind of we're so we're the controlling shareholder there. Um.
Speaker 1: In the case of Linda Ronstadt, um, we bought her
Speaker 1: masters and her flow of her recording income. Uh. And
Speaker 1: in the case of David Crosby, we bought his recording
Speaker 1: in his and his publishing and writing. Now I need
Speaker 1: to say, there are a lot of elderly classic rock
Speaker 1: legendary acts. You have three, how many might you ultimately
Speaker 1: end up with? I don't know we um uh. You know,
Speaker 1: obviously the return on investment is not good if you
Speaker 1: just pay a percent cash for these things. So we
Speaker 1: were fortunate enough um to be able to get some
Speaker 1: debt rated uh and sold some debt to a company
Speaker 1: that likes to own debt so that you know, we
Speaker 1: have UM a substantial line of credit in that area too.
Speaker 1: You know, we put up, we put up some some equity.
Speaker 1: But then we have we don't know, you don't borrow
Speaker 1: and anything, but UM, so we have so we have
Speaker 1: resources available and when we see the right things. UM,
Speaker 1: we'll announce a couple more deals soon. But you know
Speaker 1: they're all very predictable. There might you know, so far
Speaker 1: I am done. I haven't done a deal with the client.
Speaker 1: You know, it's been with friends. UM. But they're predictable deals.
Speaker 1: You'll see us do more. You know, we believe that UM,
Speaker 1: we have something to add. I'm not going to buy
Speaker 1: anything that we don't believe. We can't make the cash
Speaker 1: flow bigger. UM. We encourage um some of these uh
Speaker 1: you know artists to stay in. I'd rather buy half
Speaker 1: than all of it, because I think I can their
Speaker 1: half worth you know, a lot more plus they've gotten
Speaker 1: the capital gain on the first half that they sold. UM.
Speaker 1: But you know, we we've we've built and we're building
Speaker 1: out an incredible marketing staff. UM will make some announcements
Speaker 1: on some exciting things on the Beach Boys. UM. You know,
Speaker 1: they spent the last I don't know how many decades
Speaker 1: fighting with each other, UM, and a lot of missed
Speaker 1: opportunities were making up for lost time. And I'm and
Speaker 1: I'm just I'm a Beach Boys freak. It was one
Speaker 1: of the it was the first real show I ever
Speaker 1: attended when I was a kid. UH. And I just
Speaker 1: I just think that that there's credible upside and the
Speaker 1: Beach Boys. When you talk about iconic and you look
Speaker 1: at your other enterprises, there any advantage in mass and
Speaker 1: market share in the legacy business. I don't think so.
Speaker 1: And then let's go into GMR. Tell us how you,
Speaker 1: of all people, suddenly came up with the idea and
Speaker 1: where we are now on global rights management. UM. It's
Speaker 1: it's no secret that I hitched my start to two
Speaker 1: guys named Glenn Fry and Don Henley. Throughout all my career, UH,
Speaker 1: and a lot of what has motivated me to do
Speaker 1: things has been things that I that they've either taught
Speaker 1: me or that we experienced together. Um. And there was
Speaker 1: a there was a time on YouTube where some satanic
Speaker 1: minister was using a hotel California under one of his
Speaker 1: crazy satanic bullshit things. So you know, you know, you know,
Speaker 1: the whackable job at at YouTube. So you send a letter,
Speaker 1: they take it down, pops back up. Then you have
Speaker 1: to send a lawyer's letter, they take it down, pops
Speaker 1: back up. Then you have to kind of really get
Speaker 1: into a process improve you know, uh, improved stuff before
Speaker 1: YouTube will take it down. And what we found out
Speaker 1: was this satanic minister had gone to the UK uh
Speaker 1: two prs, the the the society there. Um and I
Speaker 1: believe we were b m I at the time, so
Speaker 1: b A my Ra as CAP. I'm not sure because
Speaker 1: we went back and forth. But basically b MRI as
Speaker 1: CAP had given blanket rights right. So in the United States,
Speaker 1: if you want to put a song in a play,
Speaker 1: or you want to put a song in your you know,
Speaker 1: in a play at at a high school, you gotta
Speaker 1: get permission. Well, the YouTube had a blanket license YouTube
Speaker 1: and this guy went and got a blanket license from
Speaker 1: the UK from the performing right stiety. So now suddenly
Speaker 1: you could use the Eagles song in a satanic message
Speaker 1: on YouTube and you didn't need any permission and we
Speaker 1: couldn't stop it. So and then I started looking into it,
Speaker 1: you know, and then I would see you can't audit
Speaker 1: as cap or b m I when you know, UM,
Speaker 1: no right to audit. You can't sue them, and and
Speaker 1: I would get stays for all my acts, which just
Speaker 1: to check and I'd go, well, what's this based on?
Speaker 1: And the answers you just shut up in cash it
Speaker 1: so um. So we started the first private h performing
Speaker 1: rights organization in seventy five years. We promptly got sued
Speaker 1: by their radio music licensing cartel uh and all that.
Speaker 1: But it's been a great ride. We're wildly successful. Um.
Speaker 1: We've signed you know, major writer after major writer. Our
Speaker 1: writers are rap cartists, higher are our people make more money.
Speaker 1: It's transparent. Um. You can go on the website and say, hey,
Speaker 1: I got played four time on Kiss FM and this
Speaker 1: is how much money I made. Um. So it's been
Speaker 1: a great business. Um. And we feel like we've made
Speaker 1: the world a better place for these writers. How much
Speaker 1: more would I get if I switched from on a
Speaker 1: traditional Aska BM I to your company. UM. Hard to
Speaker 1: say in a blanket answer, but we did have We
Speaker 1: do have deals where we've garen pee people. You'll make
Speaker 1: ten or more, um, for sure, but I think we
Speaker 1: make people in most instances way more. Okay, you own
Speaker 1: two restaurants, you own a certain amount of real estate,
Speaker 1: how how much of your time and how much your
Speaker 1: investments in real estate? Uh? Okay, I don't own any
Speaker 1: I don't own any restaurants. Those are Shelley's. Okay, everything's
Speaker 1: in the well. The family owns the restaurants, but Shelley. Okay.
Speaker 1: So Nate Now's uh, seventy five year old restaurant in
Speaker 1: Beverly Hills was in jeopardy of becoming extinct. You know,
Speaker 1: the Beverly Hills real estate worth had pretty much made
Speaker 1: it extinct. So through through a labor love, we and
Speaker 1: some other family friends UM have taken it over, even
Speaker 1: pre COVID. You know, we have the right to lose money,
Speaker 1: but we have a mean mats of Brian, a great
Speaker 1: corn beef and a great mats of ball suit. Uh.
Speaker 1: The Apple Pan similar situation where we got a call
Speaker 1: um and the family that had owned it wanted another
Speaker 1: family in the restaurant business to kind of take it
Speaker 1: over that had some Hamburger history. We've had some history
Speaker 1: with five guys, Corn cap Shaw and myself and a
Speaker 1: group that included Phil Nicholson and a bunch of others
Speaker 1: that owned a bunch of five guys restaurants together. Um,
Speaker 1: so we kind of it kind of fell into it.
Speaker 1: But it's for fun and community and uh. Um, you know,
Speaker 1: one Eagles date's gonna make us more than a year
Speaker 1: a year at the restaurant. Uh. And as far as
Speaker 1: real estate goes, Um, we're not heavily invested, but that
Speaker 1: we have invested in the years and everything from apartment
Speaker 1: buildings to office buildings and um, you kind of hang
Speaker 1: on and never sell those, Okay, in terms of things
Speaker 1: that your where your money is invested in, taking your time.
Speaker 1: Is there anything else in your portfolio that I haven't mentioned. Um,
Speaker 1: let's say Oak View g MR Management Business Iconic and uh,
Speaker 1: we're in the process now of starting a record label,
Speaker 1: the music publishing company, and your thoughts in creating those were, um,
Speaker 1: pretty simple, you know you. Um again, I think we
Speaker 1: want to be an alternative to the majors because I
Speaker 1: believe that artists should own their I P. So we're
Speaker 1: gonna be a different model and more artist friendly model
Speaker 1: economic model. UM. And when you look at UH, you know,
Speaker 1: Universal's worth what forty fifty billion, sixty billion? I don't
Speaker 1: know what the number is gonna be when they go.
Speaker 1: Probably Warners is trading at what billion, twenty billions something
Speaker 1: like that. Sony's probably worth somewhere in between. So you're
Speaker 1: over a hundred billion dollars UM. You know, artists like
Speaker 1: to do business with us because we're very hard is friendly.
Speaker 1: We proved it GMR that we can sign UM. We've
Speaker 1: landed an incredible talent in UH to go with my
Speaker 1: son Jeffrey, with Sean Tubby Holiday who's an incredibly gifted
Speaker 1: in our guy. UM. And we've started to sign UM.
Speaker 1: And you know, we kind of think if if we can't,
Speaker 1: you know, get two percent of the market, we're idiots.
Speaker 1: So what's two percent of the market worth two billion dollars?
Speaker 1: And what kind of deals you offering? You know, fifty
Speaker 1: fifty on streaming revenue? Who owns the asset? UH? They
Speaker 1: will be a profit participant for a number of years UM.
Speaker 1: But the artists will always have a right to buy
Speaker 1: us out at fair market value, okay, or or or
Speaker 1: it's either a term or a right to buy out,
Speaker 1: depending on which the artist prefers. And then in terms
Speaker 1: of net how's the net split? Um? Certain, you know,
Speaker 1: it depends on who it is and what it is
Speaker 1: and when it isn't their career. But we won't be
Speaker 1: doing three sixty deals and asking for pieces of touring
Speaker 1: and pieces of of all that stuff. But you know,
Speaker 1: if you're a major established artist, I'm not. You know,
Speaker 1: we're not gonna ask for anywhere near fifty. Okay, let's
Speaker 1: go back to the beginning. So originally you're from Illinois.
Speaker 1: Where are you from? Uh? I was? I was born
Speaker 1: in Chicago. Was raised in a little town called Danville,
Speaker 1: ILLINOI went to a little bit slower. How far is
Speaker 1: Danville from Chicago? A hundred and thirty miles? So what's
Speaker 1: what's Danville like? Are you growing up in the sticks
Speaker 1: or is it like up to date? Uh? Town of
Speaker 1: about thirty forty people. Um, a lot of you know plants.
Speaker 1: You know, there was a GM plant heister, there was
Speaker 1: I think there was a forget who the big cereal
Speaker 1: company was there, um, but it was mostly an industrial
Speaker 1: and right on the Illinois Indiana border. Um. But for
Speaker 1: some reason it had Uh there was a lady that
Speaker 1: taught at the high school for years and uh they
Speaker 1: had a real good arts program. You know. Dick van Dyke,
Speaker 1: Jerry Van Dyke, Bobby Short, Jeene Hackman all came from Danville, Illinois. UM.
Speaker 1: So that's where I grew up and then thirty west
Speaker 1: of that. What'd your father do for a living. My
Speaker 1: father was a pharmacist and had a share in a
Speaker 1: couple of pharmacies. My mom was a bookkeeper. Okay, how
Speaker 1: many kids in the family, brother and sister. I was
Speaker 1: the oldest. You were the oldest. Okay, you go to school.
Speaker 1: You got a public school. I assume, oh yeah, oh,
Speaker 1: you got a public school. You're the class clown or
Speaker 1: you're the troublemaker? Are you the silent? Are you popular?
Speaker 1: What's your role in school? Straight a's class clown and
Speaker 1: you could get away with it because you're so smart.
Speaker 1: Guess Okay, you have a big interest in sports. Were
Speaker 1: you an athlete? No? No, no, no, no, I mean
Speaker 1: did you forget the team? Yeah? Oh yeah, we played
Speaker 1: Yeah all summer we played baseball in the park, you know,
Speaker 1: played basketball poor like basketball baseball. Okay, so now you're
Speaker 1: in high school. How do you fit in? In high school? Well,
Speaker 1: there were I think eight of us Jewish kids in
Speaker 1: the whole school. Yeah, um, but we fit in. You know,
Speaker 1: were you a manager? Were you the guy who's rounding
Speaker 1: people up even back then? Yeah. By the time I
Speaker 1: was a senior in high school, you know, my friends
Speaker 1: were in bands. I know, I tried. I couldn't sing.
Speaker 1: I tried drums, I tried saxophone. Remember in those days,
Speaker 1: you had to learn an instrument. That's part of it. Yeah,
Speaker 1: you know, I wasn't gifted as a as a musician.
Speaker 1: So then I just started kind of My friends were
Speaker 1: all were in bands, so, um, I kind of started
Speaker 1: the business side of it. So I started booking bands
Speaker 1: when I was in high school. Okay, but you also
Speaker 1: told me that you were representing the DJs at w
Speaker 1: l S. That's later. You're already in college when that happens, correct, Okay. Uh, Now,
Speaker 1: needless to say, somewhat like myself, you're somewhat vertically challenged.
Speaker 1: What was the experience of being in school? Did you
Speaker 1: make that work for you? Was, did you take abuse?
Speaker 1: I was no. I was good in high school and
Speaker 1: I liked it. Uh. But when I got to college,
Speaker 1: I went. You know, my dad was a pharmacist, so
Speaker 1: my parents decided I should be a doctor. So I
Speaker 1: I go to the University of Illinois and Champagne, thirty
Speaker 1: miles away. I go there for a couple of reasons.
Speaker 1: I go there because I already had this booking business going.
Speaker 1: So I knew how I was going to put my
Speaker 1: way through school. Um too, I had. I had applied
Speaker 1: at U c l a UM where my and my
Speaker 1: my grandmother, and I had aunts and uncles out here. Uh.
Speaker 1: And I applied at Johns Hopkins Uh. And I got
Speaker 1: an accepted at all three. Um, I was gonna come
Speaker 1: to you at very one, various different points. I decided
Speaker 1: I was going to each one of those, and then
Speaker 1: at the at the end of the day, I just
Speaker 1: decided that I loved booking bands and stuff, and I
Speaker 1: had already started a business there, so I stayed and
Speaker 1: went to the University of Illinois. Okay, what was the
Speaker 1: status of your band booking business by time you graduate
Speaker 1: from high school? And local bands? You know, a bunch
Speaker 1: of local bands. We were playing, you know, renting halls
Speaker 1: and collecting the money, you know, planning sock ops. Well
Speaker 1: what was your deal with the bands and how much
Speaker 1: money could you make? Oh? You know those days you
Speaker 1: were playing for Union scale and stuff. So you know,
Speaker 1: the band was making a hundred ten dollars and I
Speaker 1: was getting you know, eleven bucks on top or something.
Speaker 1: It's crazy. Okay, So you go to college, you're a freshman,
Speaker 1: You walk on the campus. Then what happens? Uh, I'm
Speaker 1: met a crazy guy that book bands there book college bands,
Speaker 1: a guy named Robert Nutt and U T t Um
Speaker 1: and he uh he and I started an agency called
Speaker 1: Blytheam Limited b L y T h M Limited. Some
Speaker 1: street what what what? Why was it called that? It's
Speaker 1: a street in England. Bob had been to England with
Speaker 1: one of the one of the our one of our artists,
Speaker 1: guy in the Finchley Boys, and it was a street
Speaker 1: in England that he remembered. Um, and we just kind
Speaker 1: of took the college circuit by storm. You know, there
Speaker 1: are those days University of Illinois had fifty six fraternities
Speaker 1: and like twenty eight sororities and like three beer bars. Right,
Speaker 1: So We had a lot of gigs to go around,
Speaker 1: and there weren't enough local bands to do it. So
Speaker 1: we had bands coming in from all over the Tri
Speaker 1: state area that we would book. And then we grew
Speaker 1: a business. We expanded the business out there, we opened
Speaker 1: we opened offices in Madison, Wisconsin, and Chicago and Champagne.
Speaker 1: So by the time I was a sophomore in college,
Speaker 1: you know, I didn't have any time for school, and
Speaker 1: I was making more money than a doctor ever could.
Speaker 1: So you know that was it? Okay, a little bit slower?
Speaker 1: How much money were you making? This is the late sixties.
Speaker 1: Hundreds of thousands a year. That's net to you. Yeah,
Speaker 1: that's a lot of money. Especially and then and then
Speaker 1: what did your parents say when nice Jewish boy drops
Speaker 1: out of college? Um, they were very happy to move
Speaker 1: in the new house. I bought him, no problem. Okay,
Speaker 1: Mr Nutt, who you're working with, is he making as
Speaker 1: much money as you? Yeah? Okay? And you're the two principles.
Speaker 1: There is no one else with you? Okay. How do
Speaker 1: you end up representing the w l S d JS
Speaker 1: um So w LS was this powerhouse in Chicago, hundred
Speaker 1: thousand water with ten thousand what I don't know what
Speaker 1: the number was. Was it a hundred thousand, Yeah, hundred
Speaker 1: thousand wats you could you could hear it all over
Speaker 1: the Midwest. You could hear it Nashville. It was like
Speaker 1: I think it was fifty was as much as you
Speaker 1: But you know the three big stations in the world
Speaker 1: where w ABC, kh J in l A and w
Speaker 1: l S and Chicago. Uh so um if you so
Speaker 1: there were this chain. There were all these clubs around
Speaker 1: Chicago that one of their ex DJ is a guy
Speaker 1: named dex Card dex Cards Wild Goose Clubs. So he
Speaker 1: had like seven of these clubs. So what you would
Speaker 1: do to get you couldn't afford as a as a
Speaker 1: little club promoter. You couldn't afford advertising on w LS.
Speaker 1: But w LS allowed their DJs to go out and
Speaker 1: m c these shows. And then they had they had
Speaker 1: spots that they ran all the time where we go
Speaker 1: tonight at x Cards, Wild Goose and Joliet, Illinois. You
Speaker 1: can see three Dog Night with Larry lu Jack, right,
Speaker 1: and so all these disc jockeys and by the way,
Speaker 1: and when you bring him down to the you know,
Speaker 1: to the prom at Danville High School, they were draws.
Speaker 1: They were a big deal, so it was legitimate. I
Speaker 1: mean that you booked these guys, but you'd always book
Speaker 1: them with UH, you know, with an act, so they act,
Speaker 1: you book, you package the act in the DJ together
Speaker 1: and UH and that's kind of how it started. Yeah, well,
Speaker 1: tell me the story, tell my audience story about your
Speaker 1: meeting with Morris Levy. Um. One of our bands, UH
Speaker 1: from Champagne, Illinois at the University of I was a
Speaker 1: big band on campus. Was a band called the One
Speaker 1: Eyed Jacks um and and Bob Nutt had gotten them
Speaker 1: UH up in Chicago, and there was a jingle ad
Speaker 1: agency guy that had a studio and they'd recorded a
Speaker 1: record the name of which I can't even remember right now.
Speaker 1: And Art Roberts, who was the program director, w ls UM,
Speaker 1: I love the song, and he said, I'm gonna play
Speaker 1: this and so I said, well, it's great that you're
Speaker 1: gonna play it. Um, how do I get a record label?
Speaker 1: And those days you'd have distroy aributors like All State
Speaker 1: in Chicago distributed Columbia Records and this one and that one.
Speaker 1: And he says, I'll help you get her. I'll help
Speaker 1: you get a record deal. Okay, and so he says,
Speaker 1: we're gonna go to New York. Um, I'm gonna get
Speaker 1: you a lawyer, and we're gonna go play this. The
Speaker 1: fact that I'm willing to put this record on w LS,
Speaker 1: You're gonna get a record deal, he says. And my
Speaker 1: ears are good. This is gonna be a smash. I
Speaker 1: mean he really believed in the record. This wasn't under
Speaker 1: that table anything, right. Um, So I, Uh, my mom
Speaker 1: was afraid to fly if we took a vacation to Florida.
Speaker 1: We drove. So I'm eighteen, nineteen years old. I think
Speaker 1: I was nineteen. Maybe I've never been on an airplane.
Speaker 1: My first plane flight to go to New York with
Speaker 1: Art roberts Um and we hired this lawyer named Mort Farber,
Speaker 1: who at the time represented I think like Ingelbert Hunker,
Speaker 1: Dank and a bunch of people. And he sets up
Speaker 1: two meetings. When we go to h we go to
Speaker 1: see Atlantic Records Jerry Greenberg at the time, and we
Speaker 1: play We play the record for Jerry. Jay says, it's
Speaker 1: a nice record. I'd have to hear more. I'm not
Speaker 1: sure I want it, and uh, And then we go
Speaker 1: over to Roulette Records to see Morris Leavey and they're
Speaker 1: riding high at that time with Tommy James and the
Speaker 1: Shan dels Uh and the lawyer Mort Farber says to me, look,
Speaker 1: he says, here's what you're gonna do. He says, Morris
Speaker 1: is gonna offer you three for the single and says
Speaker 1: if it's a hit, he'll make an album. But we
Speaker 1: don't have another deal. So you tell him, okay, I
Speaker 1: remember the numbers, like five grand, but tell him you
Speaker 1: got he's got to give you five thousand for the record,
Speaker 1: but you want five points, not three points. So we
Speaker 1: get in the meeting, me and Art and Morris, and
Speaker 1: he listens to the record and he says, let me
Speaker 1: bring my promotion guy in. He he brings this guy,
Speaker 1: Red Schwartz, this famous promotion guy who has just broken
Speaker 1: Tommy James, and Red Sworts says, I like this record.
Speaker 1: I like this right. So so Moore says, okay, kid,
Speaker 1: I'll tell you what. And he's got his big cigars
Speaker 1: and he's chomping on the scars. He says, I'll take it.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna I'm gonna take the record. I'm gonna give
Speaker 1: you five thousand dollars and three points, just like just
Speaker 1: like Mark part Center says, well, Mr Levy, you know
Speaker 1: we have other interests. Um, I'm okay with the five
Speaker 1: thou dollars, but could we please have five? And he
Speaker 1: whirls around on the chair and he looks at me
Speaker 1: and he says, I'll give you five percent, but I'm
Speaker 1: gonna pay you three. That was my first record deal.
Speaker 1: Whatever happened with the record, the record came out and stiffed. Okay,
Speaker 1: so you're this incredible entrepreneur. Where did you learn how
Speaker 1: to do that? I don't know, just in your you know,
Speaker 1: it's in your blood. Okay, Well, I didn't want to
Speaker 1: have a real job. Okay, if you're in high school,
Speaker 1: you're working in high school other than booking bands. Did
Speaker 1: you ever have a paper route? Did you ever sell anything?
Speaker 1: I had a paper route when I was, you know,
Speaker 1: young kid. We had a We had these classes called
Speaker 1: Junior Achievement. I remember. We had so you had to
Speaker 1: make you know, we made these stupid lights that you
Speaker 1: put in your car, that you plug in the battery
Speaker 1: if your car broke down. Um, you learned stuff like that.
Speaker 1: Um My father owned a pharmacy so in the you know,
Speaker 1: in the summers, I would work there, right, work in
Speaker 1: the pharmacy, work to cash, registered, do stuff like that.
Speaker 1: Um kind of had a little business mowing lawns and
Speaker 1: and shoveling snow, but I hired people to do that.
Speaker 1: I would book the lawns. But okay, that's where it starts,
Speaker 1: is to start there or anything before that kind of
Speaker 1: a combination of all of it. Okay, So now you're
Speaker 1: in Illinois, you drop out of college. Are you booking
Speaker 1: bands that are named talent or just all the local
Speaker 1: talent the area? Um? No, we were booking regional bands
Speaker 1: that were important. Okay. Um, but by this time, the
Speaker 1: the agents around the country, you know, knew we controlled
Speaker 1: the college markets especially, so we we were booking some
Speaker 1: we were booking some national talent. You know. The relationship
Speaker 1: with WS certainly didn't hurt me. Like when like three
Speaker 1: Dog Night came in, you know, and and and basically
Speaker 1: they wanted to break in the area. And those days,
Speaker 1: you could put a record on Impuri Illinois or Rockford,
Speaker 1: Illinois and if it showed up, it was a hit.
Speaker 1: That's how you got Chicago to play it. I mean,
Speaker 1: it was legit in those days of how it worked.
Speaker 1: So you know, so Art Roberts, the program director at
Speaker 1: w LS, would would tell like whoever it was at
Speaker 1: ABC Dunhill, Hey, you know, if you really want to
Speaker 1: break this record, there's an agent here that can get
Speaker 1: you dates. If you're gonna put the record on the
Speaker 1: radio and Purian Rockford and all that, you should go
Speaker 1: play there because that's how you really get a simple thing,
Speaker 1: you know, the country. In those days, you could go
Speaker 1: out and hard work. That's how Area Speedwagon was built.
Speaker 1: You know, work. You know, you worked every little nook
Speaker 1: and cranny. So you know, I would get a call
Speaker 1: and they'd say three dog night, take them for three
Speaker 1: weeks and book them, you know, and they'd pay me
Speaker 1: an agency commission and I book them all over the
Speaker 1: three state area little towns and the record would go on.
Speaker 1: And that's how you that's how you built a base
Speaker 1: in those days. Um. And you know, I always thought
Speaker 1: that I had a big edge coming from Illinois and
Speaker 1: having seen how the process worked, and you know, and
Speaker 1: I actually, you know, we actually broke Orio Speedwagon off
Speaker 1: that process. And you know, and you've got guys on
Speaker 1: the coast that had you know, growing up in New
Speaker 1: York and l A. You know, they just think you
Speaker 1: walk in and get a record deal, put on the radio,
Speaker 1: and it happens. But these bands that had touring basis,
Speaker 1: you know, it was become bigger and quicker. How many
Speaker 1: years were you in Illinois before you left for l
Speaker 1: A and once you got to college? Uh? I moved
Speaker 1: to l A when I was twenty two. So what
Speaker 1: very long? No? Okay, and you're in there. How do
Speaker 1: you develop your relationship with Ario Speedwagon and Dan Volgeber?
Speaker 1: Uh Ario Speedwagon? Um, we're a local band that played
Speaker 1: in our clubs and so I was their agent, you know,
Speaker 1: and then there was no difference between agent manager in
Speaker 1: those days, you know. And that's so we made some
Speaker 1: tapes and you know, we I went to New York
Speaker 1: got him a record deal um with Ronald Lexemburg at
Speaker 1: U Epic Records, UM, and you know, so that's how
Speaker 1: that kind of started. But I actually moved to California
Speaker 1: because I had Rio and Vogelberg and I felt that
Speaker 1: I had to go to New York or l A
Speaker 1: to break them because how did you get how did
Speaker 1: you get Fogelberg? Uh? Fogelberg was the local folk singer.
Speaker 1: He played at a place called the Red Herring, which
Speaker 1: was a coffee shop on the other side of town
Speaker 1: in urbana Um. And you know, and the rock guys
Speaker 1: didn't really hang out with the folk guys. And I
Speaker 1: was the rock guy. Uh and uh, a friend of
Speaker 1: mine took me to see Fogelberg, who was friend who
Speaker 1: kind of knew Fogelberg and thought he was great. And
Speaker 1: then uh, he came to my office the next day.
Speaker 1: He had made a tape because his father was a
Speaker 1: high school music teacher in Pure Illinois and had a
Speaker 1: friend in Peak in Illinois, where he had been in
Speaker 1: the studio made some tapes that they and they were
Speaker 1: playing his his tapes on the local college radio station.
Speaker 1: So Dan was like a year younger than me. So
Speaker 1: he came to my office, came on his bicycle, came
Speaker 1: in and played me these tapes. And then of course
Speaker 1: his bicycle got stolen while he was hit in my
Speaker 1: office playing me the tapes. But but the first person
Speaker 1: to take me to see Dan was a guy that
Speaker 1: I had met who just came up to me and said, Hey,
Speaker 1: you gotta go here. This guy is incredible. I have
Speaker 1: nothing to do with him. I don't know him, but
Speaker 1: he's a great, great singer. You gotta go hear him.
Speaker 1: Um and the and the the guy was down at
Speaker 1: the University Illinois visiting his girlfriend. Um the guy was
Speaker 1: John Belushi. It took me to see Dan. I hadn't
Speaker 1: heard that story before. Okay, so now you're you want
Speaker 1: to go to l A and then you ultimately write
Speaker 1: letters to everybody. By the way, it's just strikes me,
Speaker 1: you know, so I meet my, think my, I really
Speaker 1: get started, and you start thinking about it, you know, Belushi,
Speaker 1: Fogelberg and you know what are they now? They're both dead, right,
Speaker 1: I mean, it's God, it's crazy, both prematurely did well.
Speaker 1: You know, it's weird when I remember watching the George
Speaker 1: Carlin special before he died and he had his address
Speaker 1: because ripping this guy out, he's dead and that's in
Speaker 1: the future. Now that's us. It's very weird. And you
Speaker 1: start wondering how much time you actually have left, which
Speaker 1: begs the question anything you have to do before you die? Uh?
Speaker 1: Who is the one who's it? Said to me, I
Speaker 1: don't intend to retire and I don't intend to die.
Speaker 1: I'll just go with that. Well, it didn't work for
Speaker 1: some to Redstone. So but irrelevant when that happens thirty
Speaker 1: years from an hour, thirty minutes from now. God forbid
Speaker 1: any place you haven't been, anything you haven't done, you know,
Speaker 1: I know, you know, I feel very fortunate and blessed
Speaker 1: to what I've done. I'm not. I don't have a
Speaker 1: bucket list left. I mean, it's like, uh, just do
Speaker 1: more of the same. Okay, So you want to move
Speaker 1: to l A. And you told me you wrote these letters. Uh. Well,
Speaker 1: I sent Fogelberg's tape to Geffen because there had been
Speaker 1: an article in Rolling Stone that said, uh, um that
Speaker 1: he was starting asylum records. Um. And and he you know,
Speaker 1: And I sent it to him. I don't and then
Speaker 1: I then I called him. He picked up the phone. Um.
Speaker 1: I knew him a little bit because when he was
Speaker 1: an agent at uh he was booking the association, I think,
Speaker 1: and I booked something or we had a conversation about
Speaker 1: booking something. Uh and he uh and he said that
Speaker 1: he had listened to the tape and he really liked
Speaker 1: it and that I should come see him. Uh. So
Speaker 1: Ario already had a record deal with Epic, and my
Speaker 1: friend Terry Bassett at concerts. West had put them on
Speaker 1: a Grand Funk Railroad tour, so they were out touring
Speaker 1: everywhere and we we had our start. Um. But I
Speaker 1: uh so I came out to see Geffen and he said,
Speaker 1: and he told me, um, that Jack and Brown really
Speaker 1: liked the Vogelberg tapes, but that he was backed up
Speaker 1: on male singer songwriters because he had Jackson, he had Nendoheeny,
Speaker 1: he had David Blue, you know, all these all these
Speaker 1: and he said, if I could wait a year, he
Speaker 1: would sign Dan. Now us being what we were, kids
Speaker 1: being kids. Um, uh, we didn't wait a year, but
Speaker 1: I took it. I took a job working for Jerry
Speaker 1: Heller at a place called the Heller Ficial Agency. Wait wait,
Speaker 1: you told me that you tried to get a job
Speaker 1: with a million other people. That was and he was
Speaker 1: the only one who offered you a job. No, no,
Speaker 1: that wasn't true. That. I don't know what I told
Speaker 1: you then, but but do your call. But I uh, um,
Speaker 1: I had to decide I was gonna go to New
Speaker 1: Yorker l A. I decided I was going to lead
Speaker 1: Champagne and I had actually Bob Nutt had you know,
Speaker 1: right free free you know, kind of just went nuts
Speaker 1: on drugs and alcohol and kind of disappeared. And I
Speaker 1: and the guy I kind of gave the agency to
Speaker 1: the guys that worked for me, uh and said I
Speaker 1: don't want to do us anymore. And I'd saved a
Speaker 1: bunch of money anyway. So um. But the biggest agent
Speaker 1: in the business was Frank Barcelona, premier talent in New York,
Speaker 1: you know, and a gentleman who was you know, who
Speaker 1: was a pioneer of you know, he divided the country
Speaker 1: up and decided who got what. He had all the
Speaker 1: big English bands, right and uh and um so uh
Speaker 1: and and I had books and stuff for Frank and stuff.
Speaker 1: And my friend Bill Elson from Chicago gone to work there.
Speaker 1: Um and Bill had and so I've been in to
Speaker 1: see Frank and he so he kind of said, I'm
Speaker 1: gonna come work here. Come moved to New York and
Speaker 1: work here. So he said, I'm gonna be in Chicago.
Speaker 1: I'm gonna be at Aaron Russo's Kinetic Playground to see
Speaker 1: led Zeppelin. Why don't you come up to Chicago and
Speaker 1: meet with me. I'll meet you in front of the
Speaker 1: Kinetic Playground. At eight o'clock whatever it was, and and
Speaker 1: and and so I go up there and the Kinetic
Speaker 1: playground earlier in the day had burned to the ground,
Speaker 1: and I took that as a message, don't move to
Speaker 1: new Arc, okay. So and I have then offered this
Speaker 1: other job. Jerry Heller was a very uh. It was
Speaker 1: a new startup agency. UH represented jose Feliciano. The guests
Speaker 1: who Lee Michael's Nils Lofgern and grin Um had a
Speaker 1: bunch of stuff, a bunch of Geff and stuff, Jojo
Speaker 1: gunn On Asylum and a bunch of stuff Um and
Speaker 1: Jerry and Donna owned this agency. So it was the
Speaker 1: two of them and me. Uh. And they were fun
Speaker 1: times until Jerry did too much blow and kind of
Speaker 1: gotten to fight with Geffen and was fighting with everybody.
Speaker 1: And then I moved to associated booking company tell the
Speaker 1: story of we're going to do the Lee Michael's Deep.
Speaker 1: So Jerry Heller says to me, Uh, go up stay
Speaker 1: with Lee. Um, make sure he goes to this gig.
Speaker 1: I think it was. I don't know. It wasn't Sacramento,
Speaker 1: might have been Fresno or or something. You told me
Speaker 1: Sacramento the last time, yeah, because it was drivable from
Speaker 1: San Francisco, right, And he had some like Ferrari or something.
Speaker 1: So I get to his house. The sky had live
Speaker 1: mountain lions and tigers in his backyard as pets. Okay,
Speaker 1: scared the ship out of me. So I survived that.
Speaker 1: And he had this wonderful girlfriend that I think had.
Speaker 1: I know whether she was with Van Morrison before or
Speaker 1: after him, but I remember her name was Janet Planet. Right, okay,
Speaker 1: And so Lee and I we jump in the car.
Speaker 1: He drives like a hundred miles an hour to the
Speaker 1: gig okay uh. And he he had this two piece band,
Speaker 1: him and a drummer named Frosty, and he had this
Speaker 1: massive hit record and he was huge in California, so
Speaker 1: you know. And and he played like twenty minutes and
Speaker 1: comes over the size stage and says, come on, kid,
Speaker 1: we're leaving. And I went, you can't leave. You just
Speaker 1: played fifty twenty minutes. He says, do you have the money?
Speaker 1: I said yeah. He says we got paid. I said yeah.
Speaker 1: He says we're out of here, okay, and drag me
Speaker 1: to the car and we drove back to San Francisco
Speaker 1: and you all still have to give the money back.
Speaker 1: Of course we had to give the money back because
Speaker 1: they nearly rioted. And then Jerry Heller said to me,
Speaker 1: what what do you I send you up there? How
Speaker 1: do you fund this up? How did you let the
Speaker 1: guy leave? Right? But anyway, there's I got a million
Speaker 1: of those stories. Okay, so you'll go to Associated Booking.
Speaker 1: What is that? Associated Booking was a bigger agency, um,
Speaker 1: you know, and if you know, it was founded basically
Speaker 1: by Joe Glazer. Um. The guy running it was Oscar Cohen.
Speaker 1: But you know it was built on the back of
Speaker 1: uh you know, Glazer represented um people like Louis Armstrong
Speaker 1: and you know, all the big bands and and and
Speaker 1: that stuff and and it was. It was a solid place.
Speaker 1: You know, Tom Ross who founded CIA Personal Appearance Department
Speaker 1: was there, Johnny Podell who later kind of founded a
Speaker 1: t I. But but we had um Alice Cooper, Quicksilver,
Speaker 1: Messenger Service, um, the doors. It was you know, it
Speaker 1: was a real real place. Okay, then you end up
Speaker 1: booking the Roxy. Yeah, I'm an Associated Booking And then
Speaker 1: David Elliott convinced me to leave. Take Vogel Burgnario with me,
Speaker 1: who I was managing while I was still an agent. Um.
Speaker 1: And come when when David goes to asylum, I go
Speaker 1: to Geff and Roberts too, um to kind of fill
Speaker 1: the void. Uh and and every and they were all
Speaker 1: piste off at Doug Weston for the shitty deals he
Speaker 1: was giving artists. So I guess I kind of I
Speaker 1: guess you know, I would have to say thank you
Speaker 1: to Elliott and David and Lou Adler, who said, uh,
Speaker 1: if you see something really wrong where an artist is
Speaker 1: getting screwed, uh, you know, start something, start a competitor, right,
Speaker 1: So they went and built the Roxy because Doug Weston's
Speaker 1: deals for artists were unfair. I mean you'd have to
Speaker 1: give them big options. You know, Elton, John, Bet Midler,
Speaker 1: everybody came in there. I mean you would have to
Speaker 1: play their three, four or five weeks to get your
Speaker 1: initial booking you'd get. They'd have four options at like
Speaker 1: stupid low money. Um. But yeah, so I end up
Speaker 1: book So I end up booking the the opening of
Speaker 1: the Roxy. And um, in those days, Cheech and Chong
Speaker 1: were huge, and that was lose act of course. UM,
Speaker 1: and I'm trying to remember who we booked the opening week? Um,
Speaker 1: it doesn't come to me now, but I know Cheech
Speaker 1: and Chong had been in there, and and and a
Speaker 1: bunch of bands and and so Lou has said to me,
Speaker 1: you know we need something you need something black too.
Speaker 1: So I booked the Temptations. Um, but they could only play.
Speaker 1: They'd only were only open to play, like Friday Saturday
Speaker 1: or set Mattery Sunday. And he said, look, you know
Speaker 1: my ax just came in here and played five days. Um.
Speaker 1: So I got this big fight with Luke because he said,
Speaker 1: you can't book the Temptations unless play. They played the
Speaker 1: whole week, and I said, I'll tell you what, asshole,
Speaker 1: you booked the fucking so I know. So I booked
Speaker 1: the opening and quit. Um, but should happens? But those
Speaker 1: are those are incredible days in the strip at l A. Okay,
Speaker 1: So you're working at Geff and Roberts. What are you
Speaker 1: doing there? What's going on there? I was predominantly doing
Speaker 1: what I knew best, which was touring, you know, So
Speaker 1: I was I was booking the tours with you know,
Speaker 1: there were agents, but I was putting together and supervising
Speaker 1: the book. And how did you end up managing the Eagles. Um,
Speaker 1: so we were managing those days. Uh, Dylan, Crazy Stills,
Speaker 1: Nash Young, Joni, America Eagles. So the Eagles in America
Speaker 1: were the kids, Poco. I think too, Jackson, Uh, and
Speaker 1: the Eagles America were kind of the kids. And I
Speaker 1: bring Joe Walsh scenario and Vogelberg with me too. Well,
Speaker 1: how do you get involved with Joe Walsh because he's
Speaker 1: with the Belkons in Ohio? How does that start? Uh?
Speaker 1: Um Belkon and I promoted, Um, Mike was a friend
Speaker 1: of mine. We promoted a series of concerts in Lake Geneva, Wisconsin.
Speaker 1: And so I was around Joe a lot. With Mike
Speaker 1: and Joe. The James gang had broken up, Joe had
Speaker 1: made an unsuccessful solo album, Mike and Joe had parted company.
Speaker 1: Um and um, Joe and I had stayed in touch
Speaker 1: because I promoted a bunch of dates on him. So
Speaker 1: he looks me up in l A. He found me
Speaker 1: in l A. Okay, So you're back to the story
Speaker 1: with the Eagles. Uh. Yeah. So um, it's no secret
Speaker 1: that uh um, the Eagles and Geffen had their differences. Um.
Speaker 1: So at some point, um, big blow up occurs. Uh,
Speaker 1: and the Eagles say we're lee eaving. Um, why don't
Speaker 1: you come, Why don't you take Vogelberg and Aaria, Why
Speaker 1: don't you come start your company and be our manager? Right?
Speaker 1: And I'd had a failed negotiation with David Elliott to
Speaker 1: become a partner in the firm. Um the deal and
Speaker 1: by the way, the deal just changed, shall we say,
Speaker 1: it wasn't what they said it was going to be.
Speaker 1: After a year happens in rock and roll. No, uh
Speaker 1: and and uh and they and by the way they
Speaker 1: were they were great mentors. And the deal and by
Speaker 1: the even the change deal was okay. But my heart
Speaker 1: Glenn and Glenna Donna become my closest friends, and Vogelberg
Speaker 1: and Joe. You know, I just want to be with
Speaker 1: my guys. So so I go back to David Elliott
Speaker 1: and say, you know, the Eagles are leaving and they
Speaker 1: want you know, and you know, the deal didn't happen
Speaker 1: that you said was going to happen. Um, I think
Speaker 1: I'm gonna go with him. And they go, Okay, you
Speaker 1: can have your deal. We don't give a we don't
Speaker 1: give a funk if they leave, but we care you leave, right,
Speaker 1: So I said, I'm gonna stay. And I go back
Speaker 1: to the Eagles and say, guess what, We're gonna stay,
Speaker 1: but things will be different because now I'm a partner
Speaker 1: and I can do Then they said, nah, we're not staying.
Speaker 1: Pick that it's demmeer us And so I went. So,
Speaker 1: I you know, I went with them because they were
Speaker 1: you know, was it was. They were you know, they were,
Speaker 1: we were you know, obviously we were really tight. So
Speaker 1: what was the status? Where were they in their album cycles? Then? Um,
Speaker 1: when we left was probably after Desperado but before on
Speaker 1: the Borders released. Okay, so they had the peak on
Speaker 1: the first album, but they were relatively cold at the time, yes, unfortunately. Okay,
Speaker 1: so the first big success you have that your new manager,
Speaker 1: Joe Joe Wos was bigger than the Eagles at that
Speaker 1: point because he has the smoker you drink player, get
Speaker 1: Rocky Mountain way right? And so is the next big
Speaker 1: success the Eagles or is there something else? Well? Are
Speaker 1: Ario is a huge touring band? Um, Joe was, and
Speaker 1: you know, and and yeah, and then uh Dan broke
Speaker 1: after the Eagles, but um, you know, and then it's
Speaker 1: kind of a blur you know, Jimmy Buffett comes aboard,
Speaker 1: Boss Gags, Steely Dan, Stevie Nicks. Okay, so what was
Speaker 1: your special sauce? Um? You know, I think it's just
Speaker 1: that that standard, that standard thing. You know, you take
Speaker 1: every phone call, you return every phone call, you treat
Speaker 1: people with respect. Um. If you know you can't be
Speaker 1: afraid to get in a fight. You show me a
Speaker 1: manager that just says yes and never gets in a fight.
Speaker 1: He's doing a shitty job, okay, because you know, saying
Speaker 1: saying yes is easy, saying no is hard, you know,
Speaker 1: can get you in some scrapes. Um. And and you know,
Speaker 1: the whole thing about you know, you gotta understand, you know,
Speaker 1: the artist is that the artist is the drawing card,
Speaker 1: and the artist is the reason you're there and you
Speaker 1: and you gotta like these people, and you gotta like
Speaker 1: you to love music or you shouldn't do it. Okay.
Speaker 1: People who don't actually know you and go by reputation,
Speaker 1: they're not aware of the fact that you're so charming
Speaker 1: and friendly and you get along. It's not just your personality.
Speaker 1: Was that a strategy? Also? I don't think it's a strategy.
Speaker 1: But listen, Hanley has this this line he uses all
Speaker 1: the time. When it's necessary, I need you to go
Speaker 1: seventies on him. Okay, And and and we I mean,
Speaker 1: come on when your kids and you're you know, you're
Speaker 1: you know, Glenn Fry was James Dean Man. I mean,
Speaker 1: you know, it was like we were running hard and fast.
Speaker 1: You know. I was never you know, consuming what they
Speaker 1: were consuming. But I certainly had the punk attitude, you know. Um,
Speaker 1: and you know, you're in Hollywood and it's an actor job.
Speaker 1: And you know during in the seventies in Hollywood, you know,
Speaker 1: you you know, you had you had rough characters out there,
Speaker 1: whether it was you know, you'd sit in front of
Speaker 1: the sitt in the trouber or at night and listened
Speaker 1: to Albert Grossman and David Geffen scream at each other. Right. Um,
Speaker 1: So it was you just you had to kind of
Speaker 1: play to the to the the type cast that you
Speaker 1: were given. You know, we're all we're in Hollywood, so
Speaker 1: you know all that all that kind of seventies behavior
Speaker 1: was it was one, it was an act too. It
Speaker 1: was fun um and three it worked. Now, you notoriously
Speaker 1: got into battles where you didn't speak to people for
Speaker 1: a while, and then you made up what was happening there. Well,
Speaker 1: when you put somebody in jail, they get out eventually.
Speaker 1: I mean, I kind of it was. I looked at
Speaker 1: it more like a hockey game. You have a fight,
Speaker 1: the guy goes in the penalty box, and then he
Speaker 1: gets out of the penalty box. Yeah, but you also
Speaker 1: sent like, uh, Chuck Morris an actual buck and told
Speaker 1: him he was out of the penalty box. Possible. Okay,
Speaker 1: were you aware before it's released? How big and here's
Speaker 1: how good your memory is and my memory is to
Speaker 1: did you ever know why Chuck Morris went in the
Speaker 1: penalty box? He did tell me, But how you're gonna
Speaker 1: remind me? I can't whip it out. So when I
Speaker 1: was an m c A Records, he was man as
Speaker 1: I sold, you know, and we still had the management business,
Speaker 1: right and you know, he was my promoter in Colorado
Speaker 1: and other places and close close friend, and he was
Speaker 1: managing the Dirt Band and um, the Dirt went off
Speaker 1: of Warner and he made a deal with me for
Speaker 1: the Dirt Band to come record for me. And it
Speaker 1: was you know, and we were launching, really getting big
Speaker 1: in Nashville. Um, and then he decided not to close
Speaker 1: the deal, so I put him in the penalty box
Speaker 1: for a while. Fair right, they went to United Artists.
Speaker 1: It really fucked him up, just when he tells the story.
Speaker 1: But going back, you're you know, it takes a while
Speaker 1: to make Hotel California. Are you aware of the phenomenon
Speaker 1: it's going to be before it comes out? Uh? We
Speaker 1: knew it was magical. Yeah, I mean, look, you never
Speaker 1: you never can predict that level of success. But um,
Speaker 1: you know, he just uh, you know, I had the
Speaker 1: good fortune to be sitting there as those songs were written,
Speaker 1: you know, whether it was in the rented houses that
Speaker 1: we rented or sometimes in my house. Um, and I
Speaker 1: was there when the tracks were laid, and I was
Speaker 1: there when the vocals were late, you know, and you
Speaker 1: just you know, Glenn and Donnas had just hit the
Speaker 1: hit their stride, you know. And I don't know why,
Speaker 1: you know, these guys can't. It doesn't last thirty or
Speaker 1: forty or fifty years, the ability to write and and
Speaker 1: record and stay you know, ahead of it. Um, but
Speaker 1: that you know, but they that those were you know,
Speaker 1: but but look I would contend even all the way back.
Speaker 1: But you know, long run hotel California on the border
Speaker 1: were you know, and I and I thought Long Road
Speaker 1: out of Eden were just amazing pieces of work certainly.
Speaker 1: So ultimately you have this huge success and suddenly you're
Speaker 1: managing everybody Steely Dan boss gags Buffet. Are these people
Speaker 1: just calling the up say, you know, give me some
Speaker 1: of the magic. How do you end up managing all
Speaker 1: those people? Uh? Networking? You know, there's no two situations
Speaker 1: that are saying, um, Jimmy Buffett, Um, I'm in the um.
Speaker 1: You know. We had houses in Aspen, and I was
Speaker 1: in the I was in the Jerome Bar, and Aspen
Speaker 1: called the office and got a message that some opening
Speaker 1: act had canceled and we were leaving the next day
Speaker 1: to start a date in Carolina. And I looked over
Speaker 1: and I knew Jimmy because we were both at Aspen.
Speaker 1: He's sitting literally sitting at the bar with Hunter Thompson
Speaker 1: at the Jerome Bar hotel, and I'm going, Jimmy's wife's
Speaker 1: from Carolina. He's Jimmy's big and Carolina. We're starting in
Speaker 1: the Carolina. So I went over and tapped him on
Speaker 1: the shoulder and said, hey, he wanted he want to
Speaker 1: come open for the Eagles on the tour and he says, yeah,
Speaker 1: I ain't doing nothing. Of course, I said, all right,
Speaker 1: grab your guitar and meet me at the airport. I'll
Speaker 1: book the flights tomorrow morning. He flew together the date
Speaker 1: and that's and he and and uh he was Uh.
Speaker 1: He was managed by a guy in Nashville at the
Speaker 1: time and had a record deal and was starting out
Speaker 1: and it was kind of just getting started for him.
Speaker 1: But things things got got way late, and one day
Speaker 1: after he opens for the Eagles at Madison were Garden,
Speaker 1: his wife Jane Buffett, hops in my limo and says, uh,
Speaker 1: you're going to manage my husband. You're going to go
Speaker 1: buy him out of this other contract and and manage Jimmy.
Speaker 1: So that's how that kind of happens. Um. I believe
Speaker 1: somebody at Columbia Records set me up with boss. Um.
Speaker 1: You know, my my girl Stevie Um was just you know,
Speaker 1: Fleetwood Mac was a mess, and she knew she wanted
Speaker 1: to make solo records. Um. And you know, and and
Speaker 1: we've done dates together, Eagles and Fleetwood Mac. So you
Speaker 1: mostly meet these people out on the road, you know,
Speaker 1: And how do you get involved with Howard Kaufman. Howard
Speaker 1: Kaufman was he and Larry Fitzgerald were running Jimmy Garcio's
Speaker 1: management business, and they were managing Chicago and the Beach
Speaker 1: Boys and maybe even Billy Joel. I don't know, I
Speaker 1: don't remember. But Howard was the kind of CFO guy,
Speaker 1: and Larry was kind of the general manager, you know,
Speaker 1: and Garcio as the producer. UM and I, you know,
Speaker 1: we and I we were recording up at Cariboo, the
Speaker 1: Eagles and stuff. I met Howard and Larry. UM. One
Speaker 1: thing led to another, and Howard ended up you know,
Speaker 1: and Jimmy wasn't paying those guys what they were worth.
Speaker 1: And then Howard became a partner in the company, and
Speaker 1: the rest is kind of history. What we were. Howard's
Speaker 1: roles as opposed to your roles, well, he kind of
Speaker 1: picked up the uh, you know, I was the I
Speaker 1: was the talent artist relations guy. UM. I would help
Speaker 1: the making of the records and the and you know
Speaker 1: kind of route the tours and stuff. But Howard would
Speaker 1: all the you know, all the economics. He was a
Speaker 1: very gifted business manager. So deals, Okay, how do you
Speaker 1: end up at M c A. How did I end
Speaker 1: up at m c A. Uh, Well, the Eagles broke up,
Speaker 1: Fleetwood Mac broke up Um, Steely Dan broke up Um Howard.
Speaker 1: We used to we used to have this act. We
Speaker 1: called me the pencil and him the eraser and uh
Speaker 1: and Howard said, you know, no matter how much money
Speaker 1: we've made, you know, you know, without all this income
Speaker 1: from these other people, we have to go sign other people.
Speaker 1: And all I know is I wake up one day
Speaker 1: and and we'd signed sticks and the go goes. After
Speaker 1: having the Eagles, Steely Dan and Fleetwood Mac, Um and uh,
Speaker 1: somehow fell into UM this movie FM that I had
Speaker 1: made it at Universal, where I took my name off
Speaker 1: because they had the right to take my name off
Speaker 1: if I didn't like the movie, which they thought was hilarious.
Speaker 1: That I negotiated that right. So I did the soundtrack,
Speaker 1: which was very sick ccessful, and I took my name
Speaker 1: off the movie because I didn't like the movie, which
Speaker 1: they thought was fucking ridiculous. So I get a call
Speaker 1: one day from the UM and then UM. They had
Speaker 1: a guy running MCRE Records named Gene Frolick. And in
Speaker 1: those days, I think records were maybe I think they
Speaker 1: were that expensive yet, but okay, I think there were
Speaker 1: still si whatever. Frolick decided that Gaucho by Steely Dan,
Speaker 1: which was the last album they owed m c A, uh,
Speaker 1: should be it was a dollar or two whatever, dollar
Speaker 1: or two dollars more. Um, So Fagan and Becker and I,
Speaker 1: I said, listen, I've got a perfect way to let
Speaker 1: the public know that that we are not off, you know,
Speaker 1: that we're unhappy that they're charging this money. So I
Speaker 1: heard Mickey Rewden, who was this who was Frank Sinatra's
Speaker 1: lawyer in this high powered you know, on Steve Ross
Speaker 1: at Warner's Layer, and I had him sue m c
Speaker 1: A on the grounds that we wanted out of our
Speaker 1: country because um, they're not a proper record label, because
Speaker 1: no record labels stupid enough to charge record And actually
Speaker 1: then they of course had to file for um summary
Speaker 1: judgment to get the case dropped, and we actually took
Speaker 1: Sheinberg's deposition and stuff. It was fucking hilarious, and Sheinberg
Speaker 1: thought that this was the greatest stunt ever. And of
Speaker 1: course we lost, and the album came out and did fine.
Speaker 1: But then I get this call from them one day
Speaker 1: and I was, I don't know, it must have been
Speaker 1: I can tell exactly. I was thirty five and they said, UM,
Speaker 1: why don't you come be on our board and run
Speaker 1: the record company? And you know, I wasn't having any
Speaker 1: fun right then, and I and I turned it down
Speaker 1: a couple of times, and they kept coming back to me. UM.
Speaker 1: And I remember Shelley and I were at Caesar's Palace
Speaker 1: in Las Vegas. They used to have this big tennis
Speaker 1: tournament down there, UM, and we went down with our fringe,
Speaker 1: John McEnroe UM, and he was so and and at
Speaker 1: the time I was playing a lot of tennis and
Speaker 1: stuff and and so he was. He was down there.
Speaker 1: We were hanging out with John macarro and Bjorn Borg
Speaker 1: and you know, they were doing naughty things and it
Speaker 1: was just just really fun. And I remember Shelley come
Speaker 1: in and get me, says, Steaming Knix is on the phone.
Speaker 1: She's crying blah blah blah blah blah blah blah. So
Speaker 1: I get I picked up the phone and Stevie says
Speaker 1: to me, Um, she was signing her solo deal to UH,
Speaker 1: Danny Goldberg and UH and Paul on Modern Records, and
Speaker 1: she says, they say, you're being so mean to them,
Speaker 1: and you're charging them too much money, and you're gonna
Speaker 1: they can't afford to pay for me what you want, etcetera, etcetera, etcetera,
Speaker 1: cter and and you know, and I just kind of
Speaker 1: threw up my hands. I said, Shell, you know what,
Speaker 1: that's a signal maybe I'm maybe I should just go
Speaker 1: do this right so I, you know, and then one
Speaker 1: thing lent to another, so I agreed to do it,
Speaker 1: Like I felt like, I've done interviews where I called
Speaker 1: him the music Cemetery of America, which Lew Wasserman said
Speaker 1: Chibrick thought was hilarious. And I had called him that
Speaker 1: joke of that joke of a record company in the
Speaker 1: valley nobody wants to sign with. And I kind of
Speaker 1: figured there was nowhere to go but up. Yeah, the
Speaker 1: label is essentially moribund. They had this act I took.
Speaker 1: I took all the album covers of the current artists,
Speaker 1: and there's this there was this big long haul down
Speaker 1: at the in the quarter and in the offices, put
Speaker 1: them all up on the on the wall and and
Speaker 1: I and I made I mad, made all the new
Speaker 1: employees work. I said, this is the walk of shame,
Speaker 1: she said we would, And then one by one we
Speaker 1: dropped every act on the roster. Now suddenly you're on
Speaker 1: the other side. You're on the buying as opposed to
Speaker 1: the selling. Yeah, okay, And there was nothing there and
Speaker 1: it was the worst label in the business. How did
Speaker 1: you build it? Uh? Well, I made some mistakes. Uh.
Speaker 1: I bought a jone Jet record she was free after
Speaker 1: her big record on Casablanca. I bought a beat. I
Speaker 1: bought a Barry Gibbs solo record that stiffed. I bought
Speaker 1: a jone Jet record that's stiffed. I bought a Brian
Speaker 1: Wilson solo record that's stiffed. But I love, but I love,
Speaker 1: but I loved all. I loved two of the three. Um.
Speaker 1: But I also started a label within a label, you know,
Speaker 1: in in the black music department, and Clarence Avon helped
Speaker 1: me hire Gerald Busby and Little Silas, both of whom
Speaker 1: are no longer with us. UM And we built a
Speaker 1: label within a label. In those days, you'd have like
Speaker 1: kind of a white head of the of your music division.
Speaker 1: Then it would report in you know, there'll be a
Speaker 1: senior VP Black Music that was a white guy, right,
Speaker 1: and I made Gerald president of Black Music, and you know,
Speaker 1: and and I looked, I just let those guys go.
Speaker 1: You know, I helped them sign, you know, when they
Speaker 1: walk baby Face in l A and I convinced him
Speaker 1: to sign, when they walked Teddy Riley, and I convinced
Speaker 1: him to sign. Um, we still knew it. We stole
Speaker 1: a new addition out from under Clive. He had a
Speaker 1: contract issue and we got there the last minute and
Speaker 1: overpaid and got him. And then I did the same
Speaker 1: thing in Nashville with Jimmy Bowen and uh and uh
Speaker 1: other people where we started a country division, um you know,
Speaker 1: which became a you know, so basically the country and
Speaker 1: the black music divisions made us made our day. And
Speaker 1: then we bought Motown. So would you learn running a
Speaker 1: label as opposed to being a manager? Um, you know,
Speaker 1: I didn't like ever having to be on the other
Speaker 1: side of the talent table. This is kind of why
Speaker 1: I went back there. Okay, then it becomes an amazing operation.
Speaker 1: You leave, you form giant you have you know, you
Speaker 1: keep selling your company. And you were not as big
Speaker 1: then as you were previously and as you are now
Speaker 1: what what was going through your mind in those days
Speaker 1: in the nineties. Um, well the giant things started out okay, um,
Speaker 1: but it never exploded. You know, I kind of did
Speaker 1: the same stuff I'd done there, and you know, started
Speaker 1: country division, started a black music division, the whole thing that.
Speaker 1: You know, it's hard to build from scratch um in
Speaker 1: those days. Um. And so when the so we put
Speaker 1: the Eagles back together and signed journeys, So I said,
Speaker 1: I'm out of here. So I still you know, so
Speaker 1: Roger Eames was at Warners at the time, So I
Speaker 1: sold the label. UM. And by the way, still even
Speaker 1: with a I don't want to call it unsuccessful, but
Speaker 1: a not major asset, still got paid more money than
Speaker 1: I would have had, you know, salary for working you know,
Speaker 1: the salary I would have made staying at Universal. UM.
Speaker 1: So it's still worked out, okay. And then I then,
Speaker 1: you know, then I went back in the you know,
Speaker 1: that's when I go back in the management business. And
Speaker 1: then shortly after that, you know, kind of promoting a
Speaker 1: little bit of everything. I have no attention span, and
Speaker 1: you know, and I know enough to know that you
Speaker 1: can do more for your artists if you have more
Speaker 1: cloud than just managing artists and you can and you
Speaker 1: really need the platform and more than just a management business.
Speaker 1: You know, guys like Corn Capshaw. I've learned that really. Well,
Speaker 1: so what did you then get with the universe merging
Speaker 1: part of front Line with different companies? Well, we're what
Speaker 1: was the strategy and all that? Now, that was that
Speaker 1: you know that the front Line roll up with the
Speaker 1: strategy was to fight the consolidation of what was clear
Speaker 1: Channel and and and those guys at that point, okay,
Speaker 1: you know, and then one and then you know, and
Speaker 1: then uh then it just keeps growing, you know, and
Speaker 1: then h um, and then the Ticketmaster opportunity came around.
Speaker 1: I had one or two choices. I'd gotten the seed,
Speaker 1: you know, when I got ready to merge with a
Speaker 1: bunch of these other managers, we were we were all.
Speaker 1: I had this theory we'd all keep half our commissions
Speaker 1: and then the other half commissions we'd put in the pot.
Speaker 1: So it's kind of we'd all have incentive to take
Speaker 1: care our own acts, but also to look out for
Speaker 1: our partners. And then when it came time to close,
Speaker 1: you know, we had they're like four of us. Everybody was, well,
Speaker 1: where's our check? Right? And nobody wanted to put the
Speaker 1: half in the pot. They wanted me to buy that half. So, UM,
Speaker 1: I knew this guy named Scott Spurling who had been
Speaker 1: who was a Thomas Lee which is now thh Le
Speaker 1: in Boston. I knew him because he was the student
Speaker 1: buyer and went to went to school with my brother
Speaker 1: at Purdue University, and just he calls me up one
Speaker 1: day and says, hey, I'm gonna buy Warner Music. Uh,
Speaker 1: and I'm gonna put this guy, Jeff Quaton's in charge
Speaker 1: to run it. Can you consult us and help us
Speaker 1: get this deal done? And I went to Scott, first
Speaker 1: of all, you're not buying Warner Music. They're gonna use
Speaker 1: you as a stocking horse. And Celty am I, okay too,
Speaker 1: You're not putting Jeff Quaton it's in charge of anything, okay.
Speaker 1: And so one thing led to another. Um, and of
Speaker 1: course they did buy Warner Music. Um. And he came
Speaker 1: back to me and said, how about and I and
Speaker 1: I and we were friends, and I told him I
Speaker 1: know how all these you know, I wanted to emerge
Speaker 1: all these management businesses. He said, merge all the management
Speaker 1: businesses and then we'll merge it with Warner Music, right.
Speaker 1: And then when they when everybody said, oh, we need money,
Speaker 1: Scott came back to me and said, I'll put up
Speaker 1: the money, right. And so Scott and I, you know,
Speaker 1: th H D and I went in business to buy
Speaker 1: all these managers together. And then he comes and then
Speaker 1: he has Edgar Brockt been running Warner etcetera, etcetera. And
Speaker 1: then when the time and then he comes and says,
Speaker 1: we want to emerge. You change Warner Music into a
Speaker 1: different model. We're doing terrible right, uh, And we we
Speaker 1: have the deal done. And I think it was own
Speaker 1: a guy that owned timber Cent Providence owned timber Center
Speaker 1: Warner at the time, this guy Jonathan Nelson, who is
Speaker 1: a really nice guy. But Jonathan said it wasn't fair
Speaker 1: for th H Lee to make a profit when they
Speaker 1: sold Frontline Management and merged it with Warner, so he
Speaker 1: wanted Scott to scourge his profit to the partners. And
Speaker 1: Scott said, I'm not going to do that. And while
Speaker 1: that was going on, Barry Diller showed up and said, um,
Speaker 1: I'll you know, merge with Ticketmaster. I'll pay you more.
Speaker 1: And Scott said, take their check and and and we
Speaker 1: and We basically thought in those days, you know, the
Speaker 1: record business was in the toilet, and we kind of felt,
Speaker 1: all of us, felt, all our managers, that we sat down,
Speaker 1: we all felt that UM, controlling Ticketmaster and putting us
Speaker 1: in the life side of the business was a better
Speaker 1: idea than merging with the record label. But you a
Speaker 1: little bit get in the den of the wolf there
Speaker 1: with Barry Diller. Um. Yeah, Barry's a strong personality, a
Speaker 1: brilliant guy. He's made billions and billions and billions. But um,
Speaker 1: I was a you know, my job because he you know,
Speaker 1: he had screwed Ticketmaster up so bad. Um. Their deal
Speaker 1: was expiring with both a G and Live Nation. So
Speaker 1: it's clear, you know, right after I got there that
Speaker 1: we had to do a deal with one of them.
Speaker 1: So my my that you know, my deal of choice
Speaker 1: was a G because my friend Tim was there. Um.
Speaker 1: So the truth is that we had a handshake UM
Speaker 1: to UM do a new long term deal with a G.
Speaker 1: A G I think was getting like a fIF steak
Speaker 1: in Ticketmaster and return for a long term ticketing deal. Um.
Speaker 1: And then uh, Phil Lanchitz and Barry Um I couldn't
Speaker 1: get along and the deal fell apart. So then I
Speaker 1: went and made the Live Nation deal and lived happily
Speaker 1: ever after. Yeah, so what kind of plane do you have? Now? Um?
Speaker 1: What kind of plane? I don't have any plane. My
Speaker 1: wife has a plane? What kind of what? Shelley, what
Speaker 1: kind of plane does she have? She has? She has
Speaker 1: a she has a humble airplane. We fly private. Okay,
Speaker 1: it ain't that humble because you upgraded. So you upgraded
Speaker 1: from something not so humble to something a little less humble.
Speaker 1: So you don't want to mention the model the maker. No,
Speaker 1: it's not important. Okay. Many people will say economically, it
Speaker 1: doesn't pay to have your own plane, just use net chet.
Speaker 1: What's the thinking there? Um? Look, and a lot a
Speaker 1: lot of plants. Clients have planes and stuff too. Um.
Speaker 1: First of all, I think the plane is a is
Speaker 1: a great luxury, but it's also you know, I could
Speaker 1: I used to pre pandemic. I'm doing it again. You
Speaker 1: save up six seven stops and you go out, and
Speaker 1: you know you can go out and get done in
Speaker 1: three days. It would take you ten days if you
Speaker 1: find commercial city to city. But that that notwithstanding, the
Speaker 1: rule of thumb is if you're flying two hundred fifty
Speaker 1: hours a year or more as an entertainer and executive.
Speaker 1: Uh in in in a in a fractional jet. You
Speaker 1: should you're better off owning your own plane. Okay, So
Speaker 1: what's your take on YouTube now? Um? You know they've
Speaker 1: just they still pay so little per per stream or
Speaker 1: per whatever you want to say, user or whatever. Um.
Speaker 1: I think they're shocked that they're now getting another so
Speaker 1: many subscribers they're signing up for the pay service. Um,
Speaker 1: but it's you know, it's it's you know, they they're
Speaker 1: saying they paid four billion or whatever. You know, I've
Speaker 1: got analysis being done. It's not as rosy as it looks.
Speaker 1: But it's not as bad as it was. So you
Speaker 1: know they get a they get a C minus for
Speaker 1: me instead of an F these days. Um, but it's
Speaker 1: getting better, it is getting better. What what will make
Speaker 1: it get better? What would you like to see happen there?
Speaker 1: You see is going to happen? Well, I contend with
Speaker 1: a company like YouTube, where they say YouTube wasn't making
Speaker 1: any money. When the worth of your company goes from
Speaker 1: a hundred million to a trillion five or whatever it
Speaker 1: goes to that you made money, there's different. There's two
Speaker 1: ways to make money, cash and and the valuation of
Speaker 1: you of your business. Their valuation of their business based
Speaker 1: on YouTube was went way up, you know, and and
Speaker 1: you know they and they got uh, they got into
Speaker 1: bed with the labels or you know, the labels are
Speaker 1: getting paid a bunch of money that isn't being shared
Speaker 1: with artists and producers. You know, Oh, YouTube is promotional, okay,
Speaker 1: so you don't have to pay a royalty on it,
Speaker 1: you know, and then they pay the labels all this
Speaker 1: flat money, and then you know, it's a look, it's
Speaker 1: a big fight, you know. The it's uh, we're never
Speaker 1: going to get a fair division between you know, creative
Speaker 1: and whether it's YouTube or you know, or one of
Speaker 1: the labels or or somebody. But we can get closer
Speaker 1: to the middle. And of the varying streaming companies left
Speaker 1: really three big ones, Apple, Amazon, Spotify. Do those maintain
Speaker 1: their you know independence? Is there a merger there? How
Speaker 1: do you see that? There's no there's no merger there.
Speaker 1: You know, the personal regulators wouldn't allow it. There's no
Speaker 1: fit there, and they have different business plans. Amazon, you
Speaker 1: know is you know, Amazon Prime is about getting loyalty
Speaker 1: from customers to their other business and they use music
Speaker 1: and movies and streaming for all of that. You know
Speaker 1: at you know Apple, Yes it's a services company, but
Speaker 1: it's also um you know, hardware. But you know Apple
Speaker 1: is the only company that you know doesn't give anything.
Speaker 1: You know, they don't do any free okay, all right?
Speaker 1: And Spotify I think needs to do free for their
Speaker 1: business model. But you know, you know, you need a
Speaker 1: healthy Spotify because you know they're in one line of business.
Speaker 1: Amazon and Apple have other businesses. Um. So I think
Speaker 1: there's a nice balance now between the three. And from
Speaker 1: where you sit, you know, there's all this scuttle but
Speaker 1: about streaming payments, I'm talking about paid services. What's your
Speaker 1: viewpoint on that? Um? The services are paying a fair
Speaker 1: amount to for I p so, but I don't agree.
Speaker 1: I don't agree with how it's divided, okay, meaning you
Speaker 1: know it's being used, you know, for a kid using
Speaker 1: it as a radio station and punching the button thirty
Speaker 1: five times while I'm at work, right and you know
Speaker 1: that record that he's punching thirty five times getting paid
Speaker 1: thirty five times. I've paid the same amount of money
Speaker 1: I work and then I come moment at night and
Speaker 1: listen to four tracks you know, my you know, but
Speaker 1: my four tracks you know whoever those were don't get paid.
Speaker 1: What the you know what the one wrecked one new
Speaker 1: you know record that came out that the kids hit
Speaker 1: played thirty five times during the day, So you know,
Speaker 1: I think it should be by the user, not not
Speaker 1: by the you know, not by the Okay, So now
Speaker 1: you're in the publishing business. Most people believe the streaming
Speaker 1: pive publishing gets uh too lower percentage. Do you agree
Speaker 1: with that? Do you think? You know, there's some government
Speaker 1: regulations spotify for them. What's the future of publishing payments on?
Speaker 1: The general consensus amongst the artist groups is that the
Speaker 1: labels got too big a pie in the streaming versus
Speaker 1: the publishers. Now Universal, Sony and Warner owned huge publishing companies,
Speaker 1: so they're getting this you know, but yeah, you know,
Speaker 1: but but but you know, so the argument that you
Speaker 1: would hear from publishers and writers is that, yeah, but
Speaker 1: you know, they have a lot of administration deals and stuff.
Speaker 1: So when a dollar goes to the record company, the
Speaker 1: label keeps a lot more of it than when a
Speaker 1: dollar goes to their publishing company. I don't think they
Speaker 1: sat down and figured that out. Traditionally, labels in our
Speaker 1: business took the artist development process and the marketing costs,
Speaker 1: and publishers, you know, got less per record because they
Speaker 1: took less risk. They paid writer advances, but they didn't
Speaker 1: have marketing costs. They didn't have manufacturing costs. You know, now,
Speaker 1: of course nobody has manufacturing costs. But there's just traditions.
Speaker 1: And I think that's why publishers got less than they
Speaker 1: than they you know that that that then they should
Speaker 1: have gotten. Yeah, is there an imbalance? He isn't gonna
Speaker 1: get fixed. I doubt it. Okay, Now the big action
Speaker 1: in the last couple of years is third party money.
Speaker 1: Scooter Braun took a huge check, he went through changes,
Speaker 1: ultimately sold out to the Koreans. We have Mercuriotis, we
Speaker 1: have Primary Wave. Is this all a good thing or
Speaker 1: not good thing? Um? Look the you know, look the
Speaker 1: great thing about um capitalism in general, UM is you know,
Speaker 1: everybody's got a chance to go invent and do things differently. UM.
Speaker 1: I wouldn't. Uh. I don't know scooters deals, but I
Speaker 1: know that uh. Um, I do know some of the
Speaker 1: deals he made when he was acquiring management businesses and stuff,
Speaker 1: and the way in which they were done, and you know,
Speaker 1: those managers end up losing clients and there wasn't full
Speaker 1: disclosure and stuff like that, so and and and you
Speaker 1: and uh, you know, I just think that UM, there's
Speaker 1: there's certainly within their rights to do what they want.
Speaker 1: UM merchs model. You know, I love the idea that
Speaker 1: marks out there bringing attention to UM the value of
Speaker 1: I P because that helps artists. And I don't you know,
Speaker 1: if I don't want to if I don't want to
Speaker 1: match or right that big a check, I you know,
Speaker 1: I just say I can't do it. But I'm never
Speaker 1: gonna bitch when an artist gets more money. That's that's
Speaker 1: why we exist. Speaking of the artist, what about the
Speaker 1: seven year rule? The seven year rules are cake okay? UM.
Speaker 1: When I was at Universal in the eighties, and I
Speaker 1: was one of the guys that helped, you know that
Speaker 1: not help, but I certainly supported that we needed the
Speaker 1: exclusion from the seven year rule because you know, sometimes
Speaker 1: the band wouldn't happen to their fifth year, right, you
Speaker 1: get two albums in five years, you'd lose money and
Speaker 1: then so it was necessary. But these days, you know
Speaker 1: how you know, how long did it really take Billie
Speaker 1: Eilish or Olivia Rodrigo or one of those to happen. So,
Speaker 1: you know, it's just a changing marketplace, you know. And
Speaker 1: and the seven year rule is antiquated. So I mean,
Speaker 1: I mean, you know, the you know, the exception you know,
Speaker 1: giving a record. The only people in the state of
Speaker 1: California to get an exception to the seven year labor
Speaker 1: law are you know, people that are penalized or recording artists. So,
Speaker 1: but there's there's a compromise to be had. Uh and
Speaker 1: you know, the bill will come back up in January. Uh,
Speaker 1: and they'll be a big fight and hopefully uh, reasonable
Speaker 1: people will will work it out, you know. But you
Speaker 1: know the labels, you know, look, so the seven year
Speaker 1: things antiquated, but so is the uh um, you know,
Speaker 1: the clause, the rerecording clause. You know, Taylor Swift's being
Speaker 1: really successful right now right rerecording all her stuff. You know,
Speaker 1: labels have far more to worry about with that than
Speaker 1: they do the seven year statute. Okay, what is the
Speaker 1: future of the labels because now many people, you know,
Speaker 1: they can make the record without the label. They can
Speaker 1: put it on Spotify just like anybody else. Now obviously
Speaker 1: they have great I P. But going forward, you know,
Speaker 1: look they're the banks, um. Now that they're all public
Speaker 1: entities thinking quartered a quarter um there you know, I
Speaker 1: see the deals of titaned um and you know it's
Speaker 1: it's it's it's free enterprise, it's capitalism. So now that
Speaker 1: they're down to three and that their public companies sort
Speaker 1: of feels like they'll be flourishing. Independence coming at some point.
Speaker 1: And the agency business, you'll say, the agencies have changed completely.
Speaker 1: You know, w M E does not make most of
Speaker 1: their business and not most of their money in Hollywood.
Speaker 1: And do we even need an agent? Is you know
Speaker 1: we need this many agents? Look look there just uh yeah,
Speaker 1: I think we need agents. I believe in the agency system,
Speaker 1: especially for you know, not everybody. The handful of major
Speaker 1: attractions don't need agents, but they have areas of their
Speaker 1: life where their agents get them, you know, look at
Speaker 1: after them. You know. Um. But in terms of the
Speaker 1: personal appearance agency side of the business, um, most ex
Speaker 1: you know are needed. And you've got a lot of
Speaker 1: managers these days that an artists, sophisticated that really need
Speaker 1: the skills of an agent to make their make their
Speaker 1: live deals. So who do you learn from? Mm hmm,
Speaker 1: Well I learned the most from Don Henley and Glenn
Speaker 1: Fry of everybody, a couple of lessons, you know. One
Speaker 1: of the earliest things, you know, Fry showed up in
Speaker 1: a T shirt that said song power and tossed me
Speaker 1: a T shirt that said phone power, and uh, you
Speaker 1: gotta have great songs. I learned that from them. It's
Speaker 1: about songs, it's about lyric it's about distinctive melody. All
Speaker 1: starts there, okay, But on a general level, like in
Speaker 1: the Wall Street journals, say who are your mentors? Who's
Speaker 1: your club? Who's your club today? I had I had
Speaker 1: the good fortune, you know, to be around David Geffen
Speaker 1: and Elliott Roberts in the early days. Okay, Um, I
Speaker 1: had Barry Diller in my life. I had Scott Spurgwing
Speaker 1: and Teach Lee in my life. I had John Alone
Speaker 1: in my life. Right that that at Live Nation, those
Speaker 1: are those are there's some Lou Wasserman and Sid Sheiberg
Speaker 1: were amazing, right. So, you know, I've been around some
Speaker 1: of the most you know, famous corporate minds in the
Speaker 1: business and you pick up stuff and you learn stuff,
Speaker 1: but you know, eventually you turn it into your own. Okay,
Speaker 1: So when you're in a quandary, who do you call Shelley? Okay?
Speaker 1: And what does she tell you? Work harder? But how
Speaker 1: about business insight? In terms of decisions? Who do you call? Um?
Speaker 1: Who are my mentors these days? Who do I call
Speaker 1: business insights? Um? You know I have some really close
Speaker 1: personal friends, some of whom I'm in business with and
Speaker 1: not but um, David Bonderman, tpg uh Egon Durban at
Speaker 1: silver Lake, Eddie Q at Apple. Um. You know, there's
Speaker 1: a there's a lot of a lot of great people around.
Speaker 1: Rapino and I talk regularly. I think he is brilliant
Speaker 1: and strategic and I learned a lot from him. I
Speaker 1: can't tell you how much I learned from the Lye
Speaker 1: Wicky brothers, from Tim and Todd uh Tim and Todd Lwicky.
Speaker 1: So I got a lot of people around to bounce
Speaker 1: stuff off. And you still talk to Don Henley every day? Yes?
Speaker 1: And how long a conversation about what well it can be?
Speaker 1: You know, it can be some texting, but but you know,
Speaker 1: you know, we either talk on the phone or multiple
Speaker 1: texts every day and personal or business both. Okay, So
Speaker 1: the music business, what do we know? Sixties and seventies
Speaker 1: drove the culture If you were a musician who as
Speaker 1: rich as anybody in America today we literally have billionaire
Speaker 1: it's okay, most almost none of them made their money
Speaker 1: a former etcetera. In addition, once you start in the
Speaker 1: sixties to seventy five, it's a new business with evolution, okay,
Speaker 1: the switching and the deals from the Sid Bernstein deals
Speaker 1: to the Peter Grant deals, etcetera. Where's music place in
Speaker 1: the firmament now? And what is the future? Um? Music
Speaker 1: and is still a very important part of culture, probably
Speaker 1: more influential, um then it's ever been. It may not,
Speaker 1: it may not be throwing off the economics in terms
Speaker 1: of other people are making more money, but it's certainly
Speaker 1: as important to lifestyle and culture as as it's ever been.
Speaker 1: So you know, for you know, if you want to
Speaker 1: be I guess, if you're thinking how am I going
Speaker 1: to become a multibillionaire, you've got to think of some
Speaker 1: crazy company to start that you can sell as to know,
Speaker 1: anything related to tech. But um, but if you want
Speaker 1: to influence culture, I would still say that a musician
Speaker 1: influences more than a than an actor or you know
Speaker 1: any of that stuff. Okay, you have a million stories,
Speaker 1: tell us one or two of your favorite stories. I'll
Speaker 1: close with one great one. Okay. Um it is and
Speaker 1: and it's no secret that it has to be Joe Wallace, right,
Speaker 1: who is another one of my closest running mates for many, many,
Speaker 1: many many years. Um, which Joe Walls story? Do you want?
Speaker 1: You want a Keith Moon story or oh I got
Speaker 1: a good one. So we were on the road tour
Speaker 1: pre joining the Eagles, Joe Wah, Marshall, Tucker, Leonard Skinners, um.
Speaker 1: And in those days, Um, Joe would hallucinate, and so
Speaker 1: we would get adjoining rooms and I'd leave the door open,
Speaker 1: so in the middle of the night when the Martians
Speaker 1: came to take him, he'd run in my room yelling,
Speaker 1: the Martians are coming, the Martians are coming. And I
Speaker 1: would just say, no, Joe, They're not go back to bed. Right.
Speaker 1: So we get it. We're an upstate New York I
Speaker 1: think it was like Syracuse or Albany or one of those.
Speaker 1: And uh, And we were in one of those round
Speaker 1: holiday inns and we check in at the and they go,
Speaker 1: we don't have any adjoining rooms. And you know, and
Speaker 1: that's the first thing that travel agent, the tour manager
Speaker 1: had because Joe couldn't couldn't sleep. He wasn't in the
Speaker 1: joining room of me. And they said, but we have
Speaker 1: rooms next door to each other. There physically isn't two
Speaker 1: rooms in the hotel that you know where the door
Speaker 1: opens and it connects, I says, Joe, you'll be fine
Speaker 1: for one night. And you know, I said, you'll be
Speaker 1: fine for one night. What what I'll do is I
Speaker 1: won't double lock my door. I got two keys to
Speaker 1: my room. And when the Martians come in the middle
Speaker 1: of the night, you go out in the hallway, you
Speaker 1: take one step to the right, you unlock my door.
Speaker 1: You come in and and and you kept me And
Speaker 1: he says, I'm fine, that's great, no problem. Um. And
Speaker 1: these are the days. So you know, you land at
Speaker 1: an airport, I'd call the office and I'd scribble on
Speaker 1: the back of a piece of paper thirty calls or
Speaker 1: so that I have to call back. So I'm sitting
Speaker 1: in my hotel room, chose in the in the room
Speaker 1: next door to me, and you're sitting there and you're
Speaker 1: you're dialing one after the other and you know, you're
Speaker 1: entering your credit card and you remember those days when
Speaker 1: you know your course, you know. And I had given
Speaker 1: Joe it had had this horrible chainsaw on the road
Speaker 1: with him to saw things, uh, and it was one
Speaker 1: of those dirty ones that had like you had to
Speaker 1: put a casoline in it and ship. So I got
Speaker 1: him an electric chainsaw and mounted it in a guitar
Speaker 1: case and stuff. So he's got out his electric chainsaw, um,
Speaker 1: and I hear it start, and I'm going so he
Speaker 1: saw you know, he's sawing up some furniture, no big deal, uh.
Speaker 1: And then the wall, like I hear it, like into
Speaker 1: the wall, right. So I just keep making my phone
Speaker 1: calls and it's getting louder and louder, and then I
Speaker 1: see the thing come through the door. So he's made
Speaker 1: an igloe sized cut all, you know, like an opening
Speaker 1: to an igloo around like semicircle. And then he and
Speaker 1: then he's you know, kicking it and pushing it and
Speaker 1: you know, the plasters breaking, and the ship comes through,
Speaker 1: and I just keep making my calls and he crawls
Speaker 1: through the hole in the wall between the two of us,
Speaker 1: and he looks up at me and he says, and
Speaker 1: I made it just your size, but a big I
Speaker 1: just have to ask one more question. You have all
Speaker 1: the stories and stories on the road. The manager of
Speaker 1: the hotel finds out, what do you do? Just have
Speaker 1: a huge stack a hundred dollar bills? How do you
Speaker 1: get out of this? You pay road manager, tour manager
Speaker 1: deals with it and and as long as you have
Speaker 1: enough money, it all works. Yeah. Well, you can't do
Speaker 1: it these days. First of all, people film ship and
Speaker 1: they put it up. You can't get away with this
Speaker 1: ship anymore. You go to jail for it. Now. Somebody
Speaker 1: would have filmed it right right, Okay, thanks Bob Irving.
Speaker 1: We we've just you know, hit the surface of the planet.
Speaker 1: But we can do it again. You know, wh where's
Speaker 1: this air? Where's this air? Where? Yea both where. It's
Speaker 1: gonna be on literally every podcast service. We are I
Speaker 1: Heart products, So it'll be on the i Heart platform,
Speaker 1: beyond the Spotify platform, beyond the Stitcher platform, beyond the
Speaker 1: Apple platform, beyond the Mzon platform, so it's on all
Speaker 1: of the big things. I'm sure you know that everyone
Speaker 1: will be scrambling to hear your words of well you
Speaker 1: keep up the good work Bob. You're doing and by
Speaker 1: and by the way, as you know, I'm a big fan,
Speaker 1: and you're you're you're hitting it out of the park.
Speaker 1: You're doing good. Thanks so much for taking the time irving.
Speaker 1: I know you're busy, so until next time. This is
Speaker 1: Bob left sets