Wednesday, February 2
Clubs in the Spotlight
Moderator: Sean Striegel, House of Blues Anaheim
Michael Jaworek, Birchmere
Joe Rinaldi, Viper Room
Bruce Houghton, Skyline Music
Nick Storch, Face The Music Touring
Sam Kinken, Irving Plaza

Sometimes it’s not enough to have a lower ticket price than your colleagues at the sheds and arenas, or a better backstage deli spread. Even the clubs have to keep abreast of what’s hot and what’s not and keep the fans, and the artists, coming back for more. In this case, the Internet seems to be what’s hot.

Irving Plaza’s Sam Kinken raised the issue of Internet radio and whether it’s practical to bring a webcasting station on the West Coast – such as NPR powerhouse KCRW in Santa Monica, Calif. – in on the promotion of a show in New York City.

“If you can find a better sponsoring radio station in your market, then you should do it,” a skeptical Kinken said. “But if there’s not a station in your market that’s really into your artist and if KCRW is willing to give away tickets and give us online mentions, it seems to me not a bad thing to do. I can’t measure the success of it.”

Joe Rinaldi, who books the Viper Room in West Hollywood, Calif., said some webcasters serve as tastemakers and help promote emerging artists. He cited WOXY-FM in Cincinnati as one such station.

“WOXY ... has a great influence on what we’re doing in Los Angeles and they choose to participate,” Rinaldi said.

As an example, he said one band he’d booked at the Viper Room, High Speed Scene, was getting airplay at the station long before L.A. radio picked it up, and credited WOXY for a healthy chunk of his ticket sales that night.

Skyline Music’s Bruce Houghton, the only agent on the panel, books many artists that are not necessarily mainstream acts.

“I’m a huge believer that, dollar-for-dollar, Internet targeted music sites – not the general ones but the targeted ones – are probably the most efficient,” he said. “The problem is, in some ways, some of them are getting smarter – or maybe more expensive – not about the (Web site) ads so much, but their proprietary e-mail lists.”

Internet ads on targeted Web sites have worked well when the sites serve as gathering places for fans of a particular genre.

“I think for our purposes, Absolutepunk.net is a great site for the heavy stuff,” Face the Music Touring’s Nick Storch said. “These sites are informative and not only are kids going there to find out about what’s going on, they can find out about shows.”

Michael Jaworek, who manages the Birchmere and IOTA clubs, is in a similar position, and utilizes e-mail lists for shows.

“We’ve used a lot of Internet recently because most of the shows that we do are not acts that get radio airplay. The subdivision of the e-mails between different market segments has made all the difference whether it’s rhythm and blues, jazz, bluegrass or other shows we do.”
Moderator Sean Striegel, who manages the House of Blues in Anaheim, Calif., tied the threads together.

“Whether it’s the street teams, the radio and all the little things that can be done for each show, we need to be working together and thinking outside of the box to get there.”