Wednesday, November 24, 2010

So much music, so little moolah

There's an overwhelming amount of exciting live music happening in the first three months of next year , and thru December too. Big Bay Out, Splore, Laneway, Womad (now without Seu Jorge, who has pulled out due to promotional commitments in Brazil resulting from changes in their album release schedule, apparently), Aloe Blacc, Kitty Daisy and Lewis... the list just goes on and on. Trying to pick where you spend your hard earned money is a tough call.

One event that won't be going ahead is hiphop/r'n'b shows Boom Tunz.

From Rip It Up's site, "Boom Productions, the promoters behind next months two R&B Hop Hop Boom Tunz events in Hamilton and Wellington, starring  international artists; Kelly Rowland, T-Pain, Ludacris, and Third World have regrettably been forced to cancel the two inaugural concerts due to poor ticket sales.

Director, Neil MacLeod of Boom Productions announced today that whilst public and media interest in Boom Tunz has been exceptionally strong, this has failed to translate to sales.

“The international line-up for Boom Tunz is one of the hottest on offer in R&B and Hip Hop circles ... therefore we’re absolutely dismayed at the lack of support” said Mr MacLeod.

In New Zealand there is unfortunate trend with R&B and Hip Hop events cancelling. Mr MacLeod added; “Audiences need to break the cycle and support these ventures by purchasing tickets in advance so that promoters have confidence in presenting world-class acts in New Zealand – as well as ensure artists’ of this calibre actually want to perform in New Zealand.”

What Macleod doesn't address why this alleged trend keeps happening. Some in the media have painted this as a case of hiphop artists being unreliable (a dubious myth at best), when the reality is that there are some questionable promoters out there with chequered histories for advertising events where in some cases, they're haven't even confirmed the international acts they're advertising.

It simply isn't true that the public is to blame for this - I've been to a number of hiphop shows by visiting overseas artists in the last 12 months that were packed out, one of which sold out a few months in advance of the artist's show dates. Blaming the public is poor form.

1 comment:

deleted said...

Everyones a promoter these days, and there are some absolutely shit promoters (i.e ones in the dance scene getting blacklisted by international agencies) that don't deserve to be in business.

Untill these cowboy promoters finally run out of money we are going to see more of this (blamed on poor sales, visa issues or whatever) for one reason and one reason only ...

promoter incompetance.