Panel Report:
Making A Production Of It
Moderator
Patrick Stansfield Patrick Stansfield & Associates
John Brown Brown United
John Conk Event Services
Keith Kevan Network KKO
Steve Lemon Innovents, Inc.
Dave Shadoan Sound Image
Mark Sidlow Gibson Amphitheatre
Michael Strickland Bandit Lites

Anyone who says the concert business isn't going anywhere isn't talking to "the right people," moderator Patrick Stansfield said. And many of those people were in the room, including Jake Berry - who was immediately drafted to join the panel as he walked in.

Key questions for this lively panel included if production has gotten any easier, and who makes the decision on where a production will go and how it will get there.

Event Services' John Conk said he doesn't think shows are getting any easier to produce, regardless of technology advances or who has the final say.

"On the level I am fortunate to work on - I'm an outdoor guy - they're getting bigger and bigger. The buildings aren't getting any bigger, but the productions are getting bigger, and the people who are building them are getting smarter," Conk said. "But they're stretching the limits in terms of how much weight they want to hang on roofs, how much stuff are you going to hang over the audience, how much your artist wants to fly. For Madonna, we had a truss this summer that was 200 feet long.

"The technology has gotten more refined but we're still trying to jam five pounds in the two-pound bag regardless of whose vision that is. It's the managers and the artists who want what they want. We're still trying to rent you as much gear as you want, still trying to give you the vision that you want and do it at the price that you want. That's never going to change."

When Stansfield asked if LED lights are a usable light source for the fraction of the weight, Bandit Lites' Michael Strickland said it's not feasible just yet.

"But in that same vein, lighting was a pretty dumb industry until about 10 years ago," Strickland said. "The level of sophistication was zero. With the advent of the moving light and Vari-Lite and all of that, in many cases the sound company is paid less than the lighting company because the lighting company will have $3 million or $4 million worth of moving lights.

Stansfield asked the panel just how much of the production concept comes from the artist and from an artist's intermediary.

Innovents' Steve Lemon said the artist meets with a designer before a production company is hired, and often problems that arise are out of his control.

"You can facilitate where to take it from there to make it workable and tourable. Unfortunately, I'm brought in a little late sometimes, later than I would like to be," Lemon said.

Berry said there are two classes of designers: one who has a sense of reality, and one who can "paint pretty pictures" and sell a concept.

"They sell this to an artist and they have no idea what they're getting themselves into," Berry said. "Then the production staff is brought in to make this 200-foot-long thing fit into 150 feet. We say we can't do it, and they set up a meeting to find someone else. Somebody else says yes and they'll tell us to screw off.

"The weights get heavier and we get more video and more sound. It's impacting the sight line issue to sell tickets, impacting the ground on the way it's set up, it impacts people like John Brown because they have to supply something that can carry that weight and keep up with everybody else. It's a never-ending cycle."

Gibson Amphitheatre's Mark Sidlow said he's not often asked what he has in house and what his weight limits are.

"On random occasions we get a call asking if they can send a tech guy to talk about what we have in house," Sidlow said. "Fortunately, we have a Sound Image PA, which has been great for us. If we get in touch with some of the tours, it helps expenses. We don't really have much interaction with big tours until they're booked and on the road."

Brown United's John Brown said he's not asked to build small things and tells potential clients he can hang "concrete blocks and elephants."

Dave Shadoan of Sound Image said the weight of a PA that he hangs for outdoor shows is about half of what it was 10 years ago but the artists still want more.

"The Tool tour we just finished the last leg of, we had 140 boxes in arenas," Shadoan said. "About 76 to 82 would have covered it but it's part of the set, it's part of the look, part of the feel of what they want. Maynard [James Keenan] said they wanted the walls to breathe."

Shadoan said he talks with a few agents regarding the country acts he works with, and it's working out fine.

"There are tours out there doing 16-20 trucks in country music," Shadoan said. "They're very big productions with huge video and lighting systems and they're selling lots of tickets. The agent is concerned because he wants to look at the gross investment in the product. He's booking those shows and his capital comes out of that."

Who makes the call if a production goes south and decisions have to be made about cutting trucks or seats that have to be killed? "There's a step in between, which is to find a vendor that will meet the budget," Strickland said "We have ourselves to blame for this. Three out of four companies realize you can't do that for $10,000 but there's always the fourth company that says 'I'll do it for $10,000.' And they always go to that step.

"If we policed ourselves, and we had some sort of integrity as an industry whereby there was somewhat standard pricing, then it wouldn't happen."

Tina Amendola