Posted on 06/27/2015 10:12:20 AM PDT by a fool in paradise
TO JUDGE by the crowds making their way to Glastonbury Festival on June 24th, it is a good time to be in the music industry. This week nearly 200,000 revellers set up camp across several fields in Somerset, where the festival has been held nearly every year since it first started as a small, hippyish event in 1970. Now hundreds of live bands and DJs will perform on 90 stages over five days. Each punter pays £225 ($353) for the experience, which, thanks to the damp British weather, tends to be a muddy one.
Glastonbury is perhaps the most striking example in Britain of how big music festivals are booming. But as the demand for festivals becomes ever greater, a potential supply-side problem has started to become apparent. It hints at how the music industry has changed rapidly over the past ten years, and how it may need to adapt.
Over the past decade sales of recorded music fell sharply. According to the BPI, an industry body, income from recorded music fell from £1.2 billion in 2004 to just under £700m in 2014. The fall has slowed in recent years, partly because of the increase in online streaming, which accounted for £115m in 2014. But other revenue streams have become far more important—particularly the live music industry. In 2011 it was worth £1.6 billion, according to PRS for Music, which collects royalties on behalf of writers and publishers.
A large chunk of this booming live market is in summer festivals. Whereas around 80 big festivals took place in 2004, there are now over 250 scattered across the country. The season stretches for nearly six months. As new festivals have sprung up, established ones have got far larger. Reading Festival used to have a capacity of around 40,000 people in the mid-1980s, recalls Steve Parker of Live UK, an industry magazine; and it would only pull a crowd of 20,000 or 30,000, he says. Now over 80,000 people go there each year. And despite ticket prices rising faster than inflation, many festivals sell out. All the tickets for Glastonbury were snapped up in 26 minutes in October last year.
Big artists and promoters both benefit from this boom, says Tim Chambers, a music consultant. Artists bag only 10% of the net profit from recorded music, but can command up to 90% of gross ticket receipts. And promoters can make money from large, captive audiences by charging eye-watering prices for food, merchandise and parking.
However, the popularity of festivals poses a problem. As they have grown in Britain so too have they blossomed in America, Asia and Europe. But the pool of artists who appeal to large, diverse crowds and have enough music to play for an hour or more has not increased at the same rate. This means that there are not enough big headliners to go around. Analysis by Will Page, the director of economics at Spotify, a streaming service, shows that the average age of headline acts at nine festivals in Britain has gradually risen (see chart). In the 1990s, bands in their mid-twenties, such as Radiohead, headlined at Glastonbury, points out Mr Page. Although exceptions exist—this year, the 28-year-old Florence Welch was drafted in at the last minute to headline the Friday slot—it appears to be getting rarer, he says.
Part of the reason for this may be that punters themselves are ageing: according to Festival Insights, an industry publication, in 2014 the average age of a festival-goer was 33. Promoters may be reacting to this by putting on older acts. But it also reflects a supply-side constraint in the market, says Chris Carey, a music consultant. Fewer small clubs and pubs exist for new young bands to start out, he says, and older bands are still keen to perform live in order to boost their coffers. This means that fledgling artists find it both harder to start a career and to muscle in to a headline slot once they have gained momentum.
Solving this problem will not be easy. Big record labels are less willing than in the past to take risks or nurture new talent. It is a “more cut-throat industry”, says Rob da Bank, the DJ behind Bestival, another big festival. If a second album is unsuccessful, artists are often dropped. And online music services have changed the way people listen to music: rather than consuming a whole album, people can pick and choose. New music “moves so much faster than ten years ago”, says Rob Challice, an agent and festival director. Bands become popular quickly but disappear just as swiftly.
If headliners cannot be found, then festivals will have to adapt. Many have already become nicer to attend, with showers, better food, yurts and the like. Some may have to specialise in a particular genre of music, or scale down to their original size. Rather than chase one big artist or band with a hefty fee, organisers may have to look for several middling ones to headline. Perhaps this is no bad thing. As live music booms, it is becoming increasingly competitive.
Steely Dan will be on tour shortly. All exceptionally good musicians.
“Steely Dan will be on tour shortly. All exceptionally good musicians.”
Steely Dan was mostly recorded with hi-tech of the day, in studios.
Hence the jazz/rock fusion which was relatively but not totally new. Santana did it, too.
Modern (and clinging mid-to-late career) music ping
With 90 stages, the shared experience of the weekend is lost. And DJs are "entertainment" but not musicians.
Here in Orange County, CA there is a major cover band scene which is enjoyable because:
Voices are better
Songs are familiar
Cheaper
Convenient
And session musicians. Fagen's material (Nightfly, Kamakiriad) too. I'm "good" through Two Against Nature. Later than than feels repetetive, but I haven't given it a fair listen. Stuck in the past.
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From the same year (with many of the same bands)
Toronto was before it. Atlanta Pop was before it. Texas Pop was after it. Toronto Rock Revival (with the Plastic Ono Band) was after it. Palm Beach Festival may have been created to cash in on it after the fact.
"
And the next year:
And some of these were in sports stadiums, not open fields.
$#!* People Say at Music Festivals
by TheRoundaboutCrew
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=U1LQGo7xgPg
The “facilities” are a main reason I rarely go to big outdoor events. My teenagers have been to some one-day multi-performer concerts, such as the “Warped Tour.”
I think that, as with any type of recreational activity, a point will be reached where the supply exceeds the demand, and then some will go out of business.
Austin City Limits and Bonnaroo seem to be a couple of the most successful fests here. Upwards of 100,000 attendance. ACL is over two weekends. Bonnaroo, one. Haven’t attended either but my daughter has. She should be performing at both next year.
Yeah, 90 stages is overkill, and I would never pay a cent to see a DJ. I mean, nowadays everyone has their whole record collection in their pocket, so what is the point?
One-day events are as far as I’ll go. After 10 hours of walking around out in the sun (if you’re lucky), I need my own bed to sleep in :)
The Stones are totally screwing this up for everyone, LOL!
Burt Bump! Such pretty melodies with such meaningful lyrics! :)
Having experienced these sort of events before... it was nice to go in style in an RV with it's own bathroom for a change. You really don't want to see the inside of a Port-a-potty at one of those weekend long sort of shows on the last day.
I have seen Mexican jail cells that were less disgusting.
Youngsters are more resilient and less squeamish than I am.
Ooooh! That looks like a good one!
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