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23.08.13 MusicWeek 17
being a festival that offers a depth of culture that is just not there at any other festival in the UK.
hip-hop and British grime. I’m keen on that because [it will feature] acts that will come through and be potential headliners. I want Reading and Leeds to be giving an expression to UK hip-hop in particular because it’s a great thing and is a really great genre of music – it’s where some great songs have been written and where great lyrics are being put together. It’s an expression of what the UK is at the moment.
What precautions have you taken to curb secondary ticketing at Reading and Leeds? Has it improved over the years? To a large extent the public have become a little bit more discerning in terms of where they buy. We had a situation five or six years ago where I had 5,000 people turn up with tickets and not one of them was valid. We did a big campaign around it at the time and worked really hard to warn the public and work with the authorities to clamp down on illegal sites. Consumer programmes on radio and TV - Radio 1 in particular - have also had huge news stories about it so people are much more aware of it now. In the main what I see from the secondary ticket
sellers is - certainly with festivals - they sell tickets that they’ve got rather than tickets that they hope to have.
How did you drive number down from 5,000? Did you have any fake tickets turn up last year? There were virtually none last year. Of course the later the show sells out, the less demand there is for the secondary market because there are still tickets available on the primary market. We may find an increase this year and it’s certainly something I’m conscious of.
Would you ever consider going totally paperless? Yes, I’d love to go paperless. But the downside is that when you get home you haven’t got anything to pin to the wall to remind you of your great weekend. Paperless is great as a transaction but it’s not great as a souvenir. However, I think there will be a time when the audience want it and that will be the time to do it. In the UK it’s not quite where it is with other countries. In Norway you walk in to the equivalent of WH Smiths and somebody buys a newspaper and it doesn’t occur to them to get any coins out - they just pay on credit card or bankcard. Whereas we still have the desire to hold the
Queen’s shilling in our hand – it’s a cultural thing. When that culture changes, the demand will change and that will be the time. There are some retailers trying to force the situation but actually I think it’s fallen on deaf ears and that’s why people like Ticketmaster and See Tickets are not going for it hell for leather. They know it will come and they will be ready for it when it does but they are not seeing the public clamour for it.
“The UK Government are fuddy duddy idiots. [We’re] too rock and roll for them. David Cameron thinks some posh event with three course dinners is a festival” MELVIN BENN
How important is it to you to maintain the pricing of tickets at Reading and Leeds? At the moment people’s incomes are not going up or if they are, they’re going up very marginally. It’s incumbent on me to try and maintain the ticket price at or around the same price as it was the previous year as often as I can. Sometimes that means that we pay less on acts or see our overall margin potential reduced or whatever, but I think it’s really important to try and respond to the economics that all people have got - young people in particular.
Do you think live events are at risk of pricing fans out of market in future? No I don’t think so. Sold out festivals - all of whom have got ticket prices at or around £180-£210 - demonstrate that there is a market to sell at that price as long as the offering is good value.
How has this last summer been at Festival Republic’s other big event Latitude and what’s the future? The future is bright. Latitude for me was a great festival with three extraordinary headliners [Bloc Party, Kraftwerk, Foals]. The content away from the headliners is much more important to the overall value of the ticket than anywhere else. When you have Alison Balsom, the classical trumpeter, Sadler’s Wells, Germaine Greer, Foals and Kraftwerk all at the same festival then you know you’re getting incredible diversity. Latitude for me stands alone as
ABOVE
Headlining: Kasabian play to a packed out crowd at Leeds Festival 2012
Has Glastonbury’s return affected you this year? No, not at all. I didn’t think it would either. I’ve always been of the view that Glastonbury gives people a good vibe about festivals generally and actually is a plus rather than a minus in terms of other festivals selling tickets. It gets great coverage on the BBC and people get enthused about festivals as a result of it.
What are the biggest challenges for Festival Republic as a whole? Having enough weekends in the summer. I’d like more weekends so I can have more festivals. I adore festivals - they are great things to own, promote, put together and be part of. In a pressured life, they are a great way to just open the tap and let that pressure release a little bit.
You’ve spoken out before about a lack of Government support for live sector, do you think that’s getting any better? I don’t think they care about us at all, quite frankly. It’s gotten marginally better in that they’ve relaxed the licensing law in terms of small performances at pubs and venues but the truth is that the Government - and it isn’t just this Government, it’s all Governments - they see the Royal Opera House and the Royal Albert Hall as culture. They don’t see 90,000 people packed in a field in Reading as culture. They are fuddy duddy idiots. It’s just too rock and roll for them, really. David Cameron at some posh event eating a three-course dinner outside in the Cotswolds thinking that is a festival - he should get on his bike and cycle to Reading, then he’d know what a bloody festival was. They miss the point of our industry in its entirety
as far as I’m concerned. It’s so fundamental to young people’s culture and they can’t embrace it. You see [MP] Tom Watson, who’s just stepped down from the Shadow Cabinet, talking enthusiastically about bands when he’s stood in a field in Glastonbury. Why did that make news? It made news because he’s the only one of the 617 MPs in Parliament that’s even been heard talking about a band.
Last year you mentioned there might be a new small festival on the cards – is that still going ahead? I’ve been trying desperately to do it and it’s absolutely still on the table. I think it will happen next year. It won’t be a camping festival, but a one or two-day activity in or around Alexandra Palace.
What are the future ambitions for Festival Republic? I’d say 2013 is probably going to be the best year for me for four or five years. So now it’s about consolidating and making sure all the bills maintain their place at the top of the tree.
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