SPEAKER_03 0:48

Denny Horn, and you're a concert producer, promoter, and that's what you do, correct? Correct. Correct. Okay, cool. Well, yes, I'm in Willow Grove today, which is close to home. So it wasn't much to travel in this nice little uh office. And then we're just gonna get going here. So um how did you get into what you do? Or if you want to talk about you know what you do, and then let us know how did you get into the kinds of promotions?

SPEAKER_02 1:13

It's it's a lifelong passion. The the music in my life from being a little baby to like when I was little, I used to take the the little 45 r RPM record player and put it on the the uh windowsill and play like Beach Boys or whatever and look at the outside of people walking up the street. I'm like, Down, I've just created a soundtrack. So everything for me is all all about the music. So I grew up, my sister turned me on to um Motown at an early age because she was three years older than me. So I I started with Motown and went to dances like she did. And um in my twenties I worked in a record store in Center City, Philly.

SPEAKER_03 1:54

So I was dealing vinyl at a and that was back like in the height of Philly, right? Like gamble and huff with the Motown and Pretty much, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 2:02

Like this was 74 through 76, so I was like 22 to 25 years old. It's a great time to be alive. Yeah, they were good times, and and it was right after the electric factory closed down. The electric factory was where we would go for concerts at 22nd and Arch Street.

SPEAKER_03 2:19

It was a um now did they open back up? Because I worked for them in like 2000.

SPEAKER_02 2:24

Yeah, yeah. I mean, they're they're still the they were and still remain like one of the main concert promoter in the in the city. Larry Maggot's company. Yeah, yeah, yeah. So back in in 68, 69, about those two years, he um leased out this abandoned tire warehouse at 2201 Arch Street, put in black paint, dayglow, coffins against the wall, double decker soundboard, lightboard, sheets for the background of the stage and benches and you know, Hendrix, dead, Pink Floyd, you name it, until um then police commissioner Frank Rizzo, who then became our mayor. At that point, he was the police commissioner and he closed the place down as a public nuisance. It might have been that one Sly in a Family Stone concert we went to where Sly went off the stage, the band followed him, we all got behind them like a conga line singing a cappella, we want to take you higher, we want to take you higher, as it went out the side door into the alley, across the street, and back into the front entrance.

SPEAKER_03 3:25

Oh my god, that sounds amazing!

SPEAKER_02 3:26

We were a neighborhood nuisance that night. Ah. So uh a lot of shenanigans took place there. And about that same time zone, uh, we had the free concerts in Belmont Plateau, which started in 70, with which was Earth Day, because Philadelphia hosted the first Earth Day with Alan Ginsburg and and Redbone played.

SPEAKER_03 3:46

You mean like Earth Day? Is it like an event or like the actual April 22nd?

SPEAKER_02 3:49

The actual beginning of Earth Day. Oh, Philly started out? Yeah, yeah. Oh, that's a museum. We uh yeah, we walked from the art museum to down West River Drive to Belmont Plateau, where which became the home of the of the Sunday Beans. So Sunday Beans were free concerts that went on from I think '68 through '70 again till Mayorizzo shut it all down. But we were going strong. He's a public nuisance. God bless his soul. But anyway, so we we had a good time. They were free, and they went on. I mean, once there was an electrical shutdown, and they took they turned the power off on an artist by the name of Lee Michaels, and we just said, keep going, Lee. And he's singing a cappella without the equipment.

SPEAKER_05 4:33

Right.

SPEAKER_02 4:33

So we just kept on going until they said, Okay, it's dusk, and it's illegal to be in Fairmount Park after dark after dark. So that was the early 70s, and then 74 is when I got the job at Jerry's Records. So I was slinging vinyl for a couple years. And it wasn't long after I started there. Um, Sid Payne hired me and he went on to work for Electric Factory for Larry Maggot. And a guy by the name of Tom Sheehy took his place, and then within six months, Tom takes me aside and goes, I need to talk to you privately. Let's go outside. I thought I was getting fired. He said, I'm getting a job at AM Records as their artist and repertoire guy. You're getting the keys. I'm like, This is so cool. I mean, I'm 23 years old. I'm managing a 10,000 foot square foot record store with a with a boutique in the back. So they were good days, and and there was a lot of press parties, a lot of hanging out at the right places with the cool people in town. Yeah. And uh networking within the industry. Peaches came in from Los Angeles. They were um a national chain of record stores. And they opened up two stores, one in Philadelphia in Northeast Philly, Welshna Boulevard, which is the store I worked at, and then the other one was in Merchantville, New Jersey. And so that was another that was 77 through 79. Okay. Or so. And so they they were just the greatest years. We had uh at Welshna Boulevard, we had like bands playing in the parking lot. We had uh lots of you know walk-in visits, like the tubes came in to visit the store. Isaac Hayes came in once, and once and the manager at a Merchantville store called us up and said, You guys got to come over for lunch, and he wouldn't tell us why, so we figured it's probably the smart move. So we go over there. We're sitting in his office having lunch with Talking Heads in '77 when their first album came out. Yeah. Just casual, barefoot, hoagies on the floor. And it wasn't like a it wasn't like a record company event, it was just like hanging out. Yeah. So they were great years. And and then at a certain point I shifted into an entire different industry uh in the early 80s. So I worked in the natural products industry. I drove a truck for a distributor, then I got into sales and marketing. It was a wonderful turn for me because it taught me a lot about how to eat and supplements and the right things to eat and take and learn learn about your body and spiritual. It's a whole and and plus they love music too, like the trade shows they had for the natural products in the industry. There was one in Anaheim that still goes on every um fall, is it? Yeah, every fall. And there's like late night raves with bands playing till all hours in the morning. And at one point, there was a guy I was working with, um, he's part of the Spivak brother. The Spivak brothers were the people that were were partnered with Larry Maggot for the first time. I do know that name Adam Adam. Yeah, yeah. Yeah, Adam. And so this was um oh god, I'm forgetting his first name. I'm sorry. The the the the the nephew who just passed away, but he and I were planning to do some after parties after the trade shows, like they do in Anaheim. Okay he had the food and catering connection, and I had the bands, so we we were going to merge our efforts and have like ridiculous parties with good food and bands, but then then the the show ended, went to Denver. So that was that was the end of that. So um so now now we're we're so in 2016, 2017, 2018, those two and a half, three years, I was hosting some some um house parties with live music. It started with my friend Audrey Marsh Fine, Audrey Fine Marsh, sorry I got it backwards, and she she is a good friend of mine since the 70s, and she used to host some uh house parties at her house in media, specifically with David Gans, who hosts The Grateful Dead Hour, and he lives in Oakland, he's still does the Grateful Dead Channel in serious. So one year she couldn't do the do the function, and I said, Well, I'll do that, you know. So I did that with David at someone's house, and then we did a follow-up the next year with David at another house where David actually did his uh Golden Road broadcast from that guy's house while we were outside with the first band. Oh, nice. And the end of 2018, I w I went to um this estate, the Pitcairn estate in Huntington Valley, which is called the Lord's New Church, and it's a property, it's a it's a 100-acre property. On my birthday, I think it was 68 or 69 at the time. Whatever year that was, 2018, whatever the math has up to. I decided I want to celebrate my birthday at a function someone else was having, because anybody can rent the church hall. Okay. It's a 100 capacity or more a little bit more, and it's used for um banquets and bar mitzvahs or whatever. It's non-denominational, so they don't really uh subscribe to any particular faith, no Christianity, nothing like that. Okay. Uh that night I met I met the actually Charles Messina, who was a good friend of mine and a music influencer in our beautiful community of music friends. She was always helping me with tickets at my at my house concerts. So she happened to be doing catering work that night and introduced me to the gentleman who was the event director for the church that owns the property. And so well, actually, he worked for the property management company, which is underneath the church. The church oversees everything. And so I met this gentleman and he gave me his card. I went back a week later, and he gave me the golf cart tour of the property, and I knew right away I needed to do something there. I I felt like I was tapped on the shoulder. So one thing led to another, and next thing you know, I'm I'm booking concerts because when I met this guy's name was Clayton Walsh, and he was the guy, he's the event director to work for Bryn Athen property management, and they take care of the property, they curate the land. And it's also part of the Pennypack Environmental Trust. So the whole property is all land that will never be touched, and there's 60,000 acres that surround the 100 acres that was all Pitcairn property. That's also part of the Pennypack Trust, never to be built on. And so it's all beautiful, it's like uh I guess you call it a watershed pretty much. And the Pennypack Creek, which runs from Bucks County 28 miles and empties out into Port Richmond, surrounds this estate. So Theodore was one of the sons, and he moved out of Brynathen to come into this estate. Theodore was a uh a music guy, he supported the uh Philadelphia Orchestra. He's a f you know a lot of philanthropic efforts on their part. Like he donated millions of dollars to the Philadelphia Orchestra. Um, his wife taught piano on the property. So my feeling is that's what touched me the night that I thought I should be doing something there. Yeah. Maybe it was him or a spirit thereof. I started producing concerts wit not even knowing what I was doing. Yeah. Just no I just knew that something was driving me to do it. And so, you know, everything was like very boom, boom, boom, week after week, like too many shows and too short of a time, but it was establishing a thing. And then that was for like a whole year, and then 2019 drifted into when COVID hit, which was 2020. Yeah, at that same time, they gave me permission to go outside. At that point, I still needed to adhere to the the uh six-foot safety space rule, so I actually had to use like markers and I couldn't draw on the grass because the grass is pristine. I could I wanted to use like baseball chalk, the mark it off would have been five minutes of that, and I'd be done. Instead, I had to use like sticks and wires and strings. I mean, the first time I did it, it was and it was great because you could buy tickets for a family of four, and you get that six-foot pod, which holds about four people, and then you get six feet surrounding it. So now you got like 18, 20 feet for your own family. So people were bringing like string lights and making like their own little villages, yeah. Mini villages. So at that point, we could only fit like maybe 75 people in the major part of the sheepfold, and then maybe another 100 people surrounding it. Now that COVID's over, actually, I'm skipping a beat here because what happened was the the small lawn, the sheepfold, gave way to the bigger lawn. So we actually graduated to the larger lawn, which is I think the size of like two football fields. And now we're talking about renting stages, renting lots of gear, major light shows. Um that went on for like almost a year and a half or so or a little bit more, because one of one of my favorite things I've ever done there is is booking, and I and this goes to my feeling of emerging artists. I really like emerging artists. So I I was working with dogs in a pile. We had them inside before COVID would steal your face, and that was a barn burner. You couldn't get your fingernail on the building. People were like running past security. Well, Charles was the ticket taker, and like you know, taped up wristbands, and oh, this guy put me on the guest list, like all kinds of like lies and excuses just to get in the building. So we toured up that night. I said, This band is something, and they even opened for Steal Your Face. Okay. Then when we got outside, I booked them twice in in 20 actually uh summer of 2020, and then again in the fall for the Halloween spectacular, which was my highest moment in the on those grounds. We called it the Freak Fest, and it was Dogs in a Pile and Pan Song, and that was the third time booking them, and then now they're starting to reach into the str stratosphere. Now we have like Liquid Light Show, we have Lasers, we have Stage Trip Productions. Andrew Levin and Aaron Cohen are two of my friends that we work in partnership together, and we lit up that place like no one's business. There was and and Clayton was allowed my patrons to bring their own personal fires for their own little pods. I think we're still using the six-foot pods now with the number markers. And so then, as far as the eye could see, it looked like a pagan ritual. You could see like little fires going on. Oh wow. And my guy Jack Harding of Divergence Lasers, he said, This is great. I I don't even need to use my smoke machine because wherever your campfires are, my lasers will hit it. Yeah. So the whole night was insane. It was insane. And so that and then things changed over the next year or so. Um, some it got a little another promoter was brought in, and I'll leave the drama aside, but things changed, and um the neighborhood had enough of of the shenanigans. At the end of the day, like in in the infinite words of my friend George Price, who produces the Snipes Farm Festivals in In and Out of the Garden, he said, you gotta tame your audience. And I always swore by that. You know, like like like when Phil left and the dead sent that announcement around, leave nothing but footprints, that kind of thing. Yeah, like I'm out there Monday mornings picking up cigarette butts and stuff like that. The hippies and and the beats before them were all about freedom of expression and art. And there's a point where you need to like rein it in. Yeah, like the Murray people.

SPEAKER_03 15:28

Well, that's the thing, they're having a great time and they're and they're feeling the feeling the energy and the love and the this and the that, but they're not realizing what they're doing.

SPEAKER_02 15:36

Well, you have to have boundaries.

SPEAKER_03 15:37

Throw your trash out.

SPEAKER_02 15:38

Right. And don't go swimming and s naked and tripping in some guy's backyard pool in Huntington Valley. That's a no-no. That's a no no. Because I heard that happen. It happened not under my tutor, which but anyway, thing things things will go down, but then it's like a good time. But the he yeah, well, sometimes you know I think Bob Weir once said it well, is that anything worth doing is worth overdoing? Yeah. It's like come on, Bob, take it easy. But you know, rules are rules, and we have to have a little a little uh you know it's boundaries, a couple boundaries. Yeah, some kind of uh decency, you know, some kind of and courtesy, because you know, you know, it's like people live there. But so we we had an 11 o'clock curfew, and now that that ended, and then I was asked back, which I feel blessed that that happened, because after all the dust settled, I was invited back. I was told three years ago by Len Rose, who is the president of the of the uh of the Bryan Addison property management company, and they over oversee what goes on there, and he said, Would you want to come back and and do shows inside, like you when you started? That was three years ago. And I said, For sure, I would love to. And then his sister Elizabeth Rose retired, and another woman took her place and found the email thread in her cachet in her computer, and she called me up. This is three years later, and she goes, Are you still interested in doing the music at at our venue? I said, Yeah, let's meet. And we met, and and next thing you know, November 7th and 8th was my launch of this of this past year. We had back-to-back shows with Pure Jerry and who are great friends of mine, Michael Sanfaso and Melanie, and they they've been by my side since since Circle D Productions, which by the way is the name of my company. There you go. I forgot to I forgot to leave that little fact out. And and just for for the record, I was born and raised in Oxford Circle, Northeast Philly. That's where I get I do the circle. Okay, and the D is my name. So Okay, that's where you got that from. So um I I just launched it November 7th and 8th with back-to-back indoor shows, and then on March 14th, I threw my 74th birthday show with Pure Jerry and his acoustic band Great Folk, and Michael's son uh Phoenix on the grand piano is a beautiful Steinway piano. I think it's either Steinway or Baldwin, it's like a hundred years old, and that sits on the property. And he played that for like 35-40 minutes before the first set. So that was like a bang up night with about 10 vendors in in the little space that used to be a grain silo for the sheep. We call it the round room. And so I thought it would take another year before they would invite me to be outside on the big lawn again, but they already did, and we start that June 20th.

SPEAKER_05 18:19

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 18:19

June twentieth will be the relaunch in the on the sh it's gonna be in the sheepfold and as we gain our footing again because it's like a a crawl walk run all over again. We we don't want to here we are, neighbors, you know.

SPEAKER_03 18:33

Yeah, we're back. We're back. So you gotta make sure everything goes alright.

SPEAKER_02 18:37

We don't wanna, you know, cause any problems. So um so we're gonna start with the sheepfold, but it's gonna be like from 3 to 10 p.m. I can't announce the bands yet, but it's coming together. Um it's gonna be a fundraiser for a fellow named Fletcher Fox. Fletcher is a young man, he's got autism, and he's just been diagnosed with four-stage colon cancer, and he had a a very big issue with the institution he was in where they abused the children. And his mother is a high profile lawyer that goes after these places and shuts him down. So this is uh going to be we don't have a name for it yet. I think it might be like a concert for Fletcher. Yeah. I wanted to call it Fletcher Fest, but Andrew Levin from Stage Trip goes every time you use the word festival, it's gonna rain. Yeah. It rains, he's actually you know, I don't know. Yeah. I I like the word festival. But anyway, uh we're gonna go from either either two or three p.m. till about curfew, which is ten p.m. Yeah. And then we're gonna have a two-hour after party by the by the fire pit, which is a fire pit drum circle, whoever has a guitar. That's gonna go on from 10 p.m. till midnight once we unplug. Um I can't announce the bands yet. We will be putting this on sale very shortly, but think of these bands Grateful Dead, Neil Young, Hot Tuna, Marshall Tucker, New Riders of the Purple Sage. That's covering the genres without without naming the bands. Yeah. We'll leave that as a tease.

SPEAKER_03 20:04

Yeah, nice, nice. So when you're doing these, uh producing these shows, like what what's a what's a day look like like in a major event? Is it stressful?

SPEAKER_02 20:14

Well, every every day, you know, it's like from from the minute the idea is launched, there's all the preparation. Like uh there's so many plates to spin between promoting and advertising and and all these just the hiring of the bands is not a big deal. Just it's like a simple I I mean my my th gig is I gotta meet them first. I gotta h I'm all about relationships. Yeah. I think relationships are the key to any any proposition, business or love or marriage, whatever. So I want to make sure the relationship is solid, that we're equally transparent, and then the money comes later. We'll we'll talk about what do you what do you look for and what are you offering? And we go back and forth till we make an agreement and then we draw up a contract. And I didn't use contracts for several years until I met uh my good friend Peter Shaffrin, who was part of Wall Street Dead Ahead, which are deadheads in New York, that are like a consortium of professional deadheads that hang out together. And so Peter used to run uh River Spirit concerts up in Hastings on the Hudson. So he had an outdoor festival while I was doing my thing. We both got shut down around COVID, and then he started doing like I I did my thing with the six-foot pods, and he did his thing with virtual reality, where he would go to bands and film them, and for an extra couple bucks you can get the headset and be where they are. He's gonna be able to do that. What a time way alive, right? Yeah, he when he even went out on a boat once in the Hudson. I said you took your gear out on a boat in the Hudson. So got it.

SPEAKER_03 21:45

That was the time to do that kind of stuff, you know.

SPEAKER_02 21:47

Yeah, and and so Peter, it he's like such a great guy to have him in my in my posse, 'cause he and it's all about your your village that you build. Yeah. And and he taught me he ran a law firm for thirty two years, so he taught me how. How to do contracts. Okay. And so now it's like, okay, because the spoken word is one thing.

SPEAKER_03 22:05

So did you have an incident like that? Because you said you didn't use contracts for a while. Was there an incident that you were like, oh, maybe I need to start using a contract? Or was it because of Peter that you were kind of like?

SPEAKER_02 22:15

Not so much an incident, but misunderstandings. You know, it's like, well, you said this and but then you said that. Yeah. It's like it's gotta be, you know, signed, sealed, and delivered, and everything understood. And, you know, f from all the different people I've met, like Andrew Meachum, who just bought the gem in Spring City. He has his own.

SPEAKER_03 22:33

I have a podcast with them. I don't know if you know that. Oh no, I didn't know that. Yeah, you'll have to check it out. Oh, Andrew's great. We're both with the city. Andrew and Katie, I got to, I got to talk with them.

SPEAKER_02 22:39

Yeah, they bought that place. Have you been to the gem?

SPEAKER_03 22:42

I I traveled there too. Yeah, I haven't been able to go to a show. Yeah. I was supposed to a week or two ago, but um, yeah, I did, I did check it all out.

SPEAKER_02 22:50

Yeah, and he's he's good people. He's a younger cat, and and we purposely met in Phoenixville for lunch one day just to get to know each other and talked about our like-mindedness and where we want to go with this whole thing. Yeah. Because he he's doing a lot of things. He went out on a limb. He he gave up a big business to buy this building, and now he's you know, look, he's gonna go through the same.

SPEAKER_03 23:12

It's tough with that location there. That's what they're having the most time. Because everyone that I've talked about, they love the place. Yeah. But you know, they gotta get the locals.

SPEAKER_02 23:19

Yeah, gotta get those Royals Ford people out there. You know. I mean, no one even knows what Roy's Ford is.

SPEAKER_03 23:25

You know what's that?

SPEAKER_02 23:26

That's the town that you drive through to get to the gem. Could be its own little musical mecca. You never know what a sleepy town could turn into. And a good example is Phoenixville. Phoenixville was a dead town for the longest time, and then now it's like bustling, you can't find parking, and there's an Ambler starting to come up. Yeah. You know, Amber's getting big. They have that festival coming up.

SPEAKER_03 23:46

Rich Rich was talking about Ambler. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 23:48

Rich is an Ambler native. Before he formed Southeastern PA Live or SEPA Live, he was Ambler Live, I think it was called. And so he stretched his wings. And you know, in fact, it was Rich that was an original pioneer with with the uh with the Circle D crowd. Oh he came up to me at one of my shows and he leaned over and he's a quiet kind of guy because you know you're creating a community. And I I didn't even think about that. It never it never crossed my mind. But that's why I do what I do. Because I I feel so strongly that we need community, especially the planet being in disarray as it is. Oh, yeah. So never never have we had more of an opportunity. Like for me, like going to concerts, like the going to Dead Shows since 1970, it was all about letting your hair down, just hanging out. You know, it's cool, like time off, not to think about stuff. And now it's even more necessary to steady our vibration because, you know, like you said, with with promoting all the things I need to do, it's like a constant barrage of things to do and things to wrestle with. But you can't do that if your head's not on straight. If you if you don't have like I do meditation, my wife and I do transcendental meditation. We we subscribe to several different spiritual practices just to keep our our mind, body, and spirit together so I can perform. Because that's that's why I I said to myself in 2024, I was going to take the whole year of 2025 and look at what I'm doing and try to re-evaluate and restructure my model so I could do what I do without losing my health.

SPEAKER_04 25:23

Right.

SPEAKER_02 25:23

And my well-being. I mean, I'm 74.

SPEAKER_04 25:25

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 25:26

And it's like a young man's game for sure. My passion's being served, and I feel like I'm I'm doing what I was called to do. Yeah. Like like I said, when I got the LNC thing started, it wasn't even something I was thinking about. Just sort of I feel like it chose me. Yeah. Which is fine. It's like that that Grateful Dead song, the music plays the band, yeah, kind of thing. And and that's what's going on. So I I I follow the muse. I feel if I'm doing anything else, I'd be doing myself a disservice, let alone the community. And so I feel so again, so strongly that when people are all hanging out together and we're all doing that same thing and our minds are linked and and we're all ecstatic and we're dancing and singing together. Uh, now you got like all these great festivals at workshops and stuff. Yeah. The whole thing's taking taking on new levels. It is. And and I enjoy that whole camaraderie. Like when like I said, when I had that lunch with Andrew, we talked about how we could put our minds together in in a communal sense, as as evidenced by uh in Westchester PA, there's a whole collective there of people that kind of headed up by Kyle and his band, Rico Wehr Collective. Like I had him and he brought five other bands to the Rotunda, which is another venue I book at, and I let him run the night. I said, You're gonna f figure out how these bands get on and off the stage. Good luck. And and they brought their own vendors, but the point I'm making is they're a community and they do things in a communal sense, which is which is why I love doing what I'm doing, especially at this venue in West Philadelphia, the Rotunda, which is I have mainly the LNC and the Rotunda.

SPEAKER_04 27:01

Okay.

SPEAKER_02 27:02

And that those are my two main sources of energy. And the Rotunda is on the Penn Campus, it's owned by University of Pennsylvania, and it basically took the place of the international house. The international house was on the Penn Campus, not far from Annenberg, and they had all these like eclectic bands like the Sun Ra and Spoken Word and Poetry and things like that. And so when that closed, those bands started playing, or those artists started performing at the uh at the um the Rotunda, which is uh at 4014 Walnut Street, and I do have a show coming up. Here comes the plug May 21st at the Rotunda.

SPEAKER_03 27:42

If this is out by then, I'm not sure when this will come out, but hopefully. Hopefully, hopefully. It might come out actually by May 21st.

SPEAKER_02 27:52

Oh well, anyway, it's it's uh Brian Elliott and and and a newly formed quartet and in from Virginia, ex-Philadelphian Patrick Higgins and his band called Getting Weird, which is all Bob Weir stuff. Okay. Kingfish Bob Weir, Bobby and the Midnights. So that's May 21st. That's my next next show. And then uh as I said, June 20th. And then there's other things coming up that I I can't mention yet, but the calendar's filling up, and uh, God willing, I'll you know, maintain my health and keep on going.

SPEAKER_04 28:20

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 28:21

Take vacations, take some time off. I have to have the balance. Like last night I worked to like 7:38, and my wife's like, Where's your balance? Where's your balance? Yeah, you know, and I always know women are always smarter.

SPEAKER_03 28:34

It's hard. Well, this industry is hard and sometimes you do lose your balance. You just so it's it there's a lot that it takes to make it happen. Um, what's one of the riskiest events you've ever produced? Is there one?

SPEAKER_02 28:46

I'd say for the most part, there's not that much risk except for you know when when you uh I guess getting the money to pay everybody is risky. Yes, you know what I mean? That is a risk. We we were talking, you know, off camera before about how how selling advanced tickets is nearly impossible unless like I try to brighten up my advanced tickets, maybe offer like I now I do these like VIP seats where the you like you can get a chair near the stage and you get ten dollars of a craft voucher for food or crafts to make that seat even more worthwhile, but it's only an advanced ticket or anything I I can think of in the creative sense, even giving commissions to people that I hire as interns to sell tickets with their own private code to use that will give them a couple bucks for doing that effort. So it's all about incentive. Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 29:36

And you know, the hard the riskiest thing is just having well the hard thing about advanced tickets too is like if you're do uh no, if you just have people Venmo you, that's one thing. But if you do it through a ticket link, it it sucks because there's all those extra fees. So it's like, yeah, your advanced ticket might be 20, but it's actually going to be 25, 26, and if the at the door it's 30, it's like people are like, Well, I'm not even really saving. Right. You know what I mean? So it's advanced tickets are hard.

SPEAKER_02 29:59

Well, fortunately for me, and this goes back to Peter Shaffrin. One of the things Peter has done is he started a ticket company, and it's called Clive Shows or C Live Shows. He's my main ticket guy, he's he's nine percent. So a $20 ticket is like $21 and change. Oh, okay. So it's not so bad. No, and then we get all the emails, and then I send out an email to everyone who bought tickets in advance if I have that email captured so I can say, hey, what what why did you come to the show? How did you hear about it? Like a marketing survey where I'll reward them for their participation in my marketing survey. I'll give you a a sweepstakes ticket or whatever, I'll give them some kind of reward for their own.

SPEAKER_03 30:39

I just did an event, I did an event in New Jersey and it was through um the Ticketing Co. which has their own little fee, but now also I guess because of taxes, maybe, yeah, New Jersey added on another six percent.

SPEAKER_02 30:50

Right.

SPEAKER_03 30:51

I was like, oh man. That just it just raised the ticket like between the fee and the fee. And I'm like, how do I even it's like and then if you and then you don't want people paying the same price, I don't know, you know, it gets weird. It's difficult.

SPEAKER_02 31:03

It's like if I do a show, it's a like I like to have like a $20 advance for an average the three-hour show. And then you're talking like, well, 20 or and then 25 at the door. So when people think that there's going to be more than $1.20 or $1.50 added, they might say, Well, for three more hours, I'll wait till the night of the show. And anyway, people are waiting till the last minute because you never know what's going to be booked. Things pop up left and right before you know it. And you and I don't blame people for waiting for the for the last minute.

SPEAKER_03 31:31

It just happened to me actually the other week because I was supposed to go. The Grateful Day Trippers did a um and let's give a shout-out. We always give shout outs to Grateful Day Trippers. Yeah, man. That uh actually Denny and I connected before, but we actually never connected and we kept trying. But Ricky got us to actually get in a room together. So shout out to them. Yeah, but um, they had a Grateful Days, uh Grateful Days, Grateful Day Trippers takeover at the gym just back uh April 17th with uh Adventures of Matt Black, Teresa, and um And Mike's and I was supposed to go. I was so excited. I usually work Friday nights, I was just so excited about this. I'd known for a couple months, and then I ended up having a funeral that day. I never bought my ticket, but I was going to, yeah, then I was like, eh, I could just, you know, maybe the day of whatever I was going to, and then I ended up having this funeral that ended up going until which was in Jersey that went, you know, I was with them to like five or six, and I was like, I and it was gonna be a two-hour drive to the gym, and then I had to work the next morning, like a private event, and I'm like, you know what, I need to take care of myself in this situation and not and so it's an example of you know, things happen, and I still sent them 20 bucks.

SPEAKER_05 32:38

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 32:38

Because I was like, I really wanted to support you guys, and I would have I bought stuff from the gym and I would have like supported, but like, here's 20 bucks at least. Either give it to the gym, or if you want to put it towards the bands, or if you want to use it for yourself, could get mocktails or whatever. Um, so I still did that just because I felt felt bad.

SPEAKER_02 32:53

Well, that happens with my shows too. Like, I'll look at the list of like I'll I'll do a printout after I get you know Peter's final tally, like these, and I put them in alphabetical order to make so I have a couple women that are my my regular ticket ladies. Uh shout out to Faith Smith and Carol Miller. They're they've been steady with me. And Charles always around when I need Sheryl. And so if I have three people, even better. But so I have like the printout nice large fonts that people can read it in alphabetical order. And I look at it at the end of the night and I see like, well, these eight people didn't show up.

SPEAKER_04 33:24

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 33:25

They didn't call me up and go, we want our money back, we just couldn't come. Yeah. And they said use it, you know. I mean, even um the Royal in Glenside, I remember going there to a couple shows, and they had a little electronic tip jar for the venue. Really cool idea. Yeah. You put your credit card in, boom, little donation.

SPEAKER_03 33:44

People like us want to support. You know what I mean? So, yeah, like any way that yeah, that's cool.

SPEAKER_02 33:49

Yeah, and that's what it takes, because you know, the the one thing I I I haven't done that I'm beginning to do, and especially with June 20th coming up, is and it's gonna be an expensive show, is gonna is have sponsors, and that's my next level. Uh as is like even Ricky and Lydia sent out a little letter about we're looking for to to side up with people for sponsors. They sent one to me, and so you know, I don't know if I could be their sponsor, but I think I need I need the sponsor. I think I read the email wrong. I thought they just want to hang out. But anyway, so we're working on that. Like I I use um AI to my advantage, and I ask AI, you are a music producer and you want to hire sponsors in the Montgomery County area, yada yada yada. Next thing you know, you're getting like two pages of who to call, when to call. So we're gonna develop a list because for June 20th coming up so soon, as big as a show it is, would I like to have a corporate sponsor? Yes. Would I get one a month before? Dubious. So I mean, when I had my birthday party March 14th, this gentleman from Lee's Hoagie's calls me up. I never even met him before. He goes, Hey, can I feed your band? I'm like, Yeah, sure. Let's take the green room line off my expense chart, you know. And so he brought like a few hundred dollars worth of hoagies and steaks and sodas, and he he owns, I think, two or three Lee's hoagies. So he'll be the first person I call for a sponsorship. So if I can get like, you know, 10 local sponsors, well, why not? Because we're talking Montgomery County. So I'll go to the Chamber of Commerce and find out who the targets are, find somebody that can sell sponsorships, give them a commission. I can't do it all. Yeah, that's the thing. Yeah. So the biggest when you talk about the risk or challenge, the big challenge is doing it all. I want to do things efficiently. Yeah. I don't want to have things drop through the holes, you know, and I'm I'm big on resolution, whether it's what I do or my relationships with my artists or the people that work with me. Like if there's a problem, like in the very beginning when I started out uh Circle D Productions, there was some talk on the street whispering down the lane, like, hey, Denny's doesn't know what he's doing or whatever. Like people had issues, but they weren't coming to me to tell me, bands or otherwise. So whispering down the lane, it's like one of the worst things ever. It's like, you know what, you got something to you want to say to somebody, me or whomever, you come to the source, you know. Yeah. Like, how can I fix a problem if I don't even know what the problem is? Yeah. So I get too busy, people think, oh, I just don't know what I'm doing. But so you it's always trial by fire, you know, you just keep doing it till you get it right, and like one of these days I'll get it right, you know. Yeah, I think I'm heading in that direction.

SPEAKER_03 36:34

Yeah, no, that's great. How about like things like weather or cancellations, like about band cancels, um, or uh uh technical issues, like how do you deal with those type of things?

SPEAKER_02 36:47

Well, the contracts are pretty clear, yeah. You know, um like like like with Peter's contracts, being a lawyer for 32 years, there's a lot of what he calls boilerplate stuff, like acts of God, things like that. Yeah. So I'm protected if there's a cancellation. Like it like for for June 20th, if we're expecting 200, 300 people, I can't put them in the church hall if it rains. So maybe we'll put up a couple extra um tents like George does with snipes. He has some big tents out there for people. So it's you know, that's a three-day festival. You can't really have a rain date on a three-day festival. Right. I can have a rain date on a single date, but for June 20th, we'll put we'll put the tents up, you know, whatever whatever it takes to make people drier if they can be. The band's always protected. So we have to make sure the band in the gear is protected. Um, but I've had shows in the rain, you know, people just rough it. You know, it's it's yeah, festival seasons like that. Yeah. Some of the bet like some of those lock-ins and um Bonaroos. So I remember I remember seeing this video that my morning jacket put out. They called it Return to Thunderdome was a documentary about the first time they played Bonaroo. I think it was their first time. The worst storm in creation came. They had all the guys in the in the booth looking at the radar and they're freaking out. And they Jim James is on stage barefoot in the thunderstorm, holding up his guitar. And he said to the press, he goes, If I'm gonna go, I'm gonna go. Oh my god. And the band's chasing him around with pairs of shoes. Come on, man, put the shoes on. So, you know, you know, people people will, if it's warm enough and hot enough, they won't really care about the rain. Yeah. Unless it's like a real severe situation. So, but um, you know, if but the again, the contract does have those provisions like where I can cancel. I mean, I've even had a a clause in there about we the the promoter has the right to cancel if X amount of tickets aren't sold by a certain date. Which we hate doing that. No one wants to sign that. And and I don't blame you. So I take it out. I take it, I take the clause.

SPEAKER_03 38:53

Yeah, because it's like, yeah, we only sold it, I'm not gonna I'm gonna lose money, but those people were looking forward to that good time, and that's just like a bad luck. It's hard.

SPEAKER_02 39:02

I've I've taken a lot of hits over the years. I I can't say and anybody in the record in the music business will agree it's not a profitable business unless you're a superstar. Like dogs in a pile, right? They scraped around for a long time, making their bones, and now they're out there getting buoy dollars for national touring act, you know, a good five figures, easy. I won't maybe 15, 20, whatever. It's up there. Yeah, and deservedly because they worked their asses off to get to where they are today, and and and that's what hard work will do. And so I'm I'm hoping that the hard work will pay off.

SPEAKER_03 39:35

As this community keeps building, you know, I just feel like I'm meeting a lot of people through this podcast and I'm hearing so many stories that are similar. And I feel like we're all we're all we're all coming together, you know. That's what's there's a whole event that I'm not gonna I haven't announced or anything yet, but when we're off camera, I will I I'll tell you about it that I think you'll be pretty excited that I have in mind um to bring everyone together a little bit more.

SPEAKER_02 39:58

Well, which bring which brings me to a thing I can talk about. Um, I mentioned Stage Trip Productions. That's um they call it a sound sensation or so that's a visual, they do like the immersive visuals, like the immersive like technology with the wraparound videos and stuff like that, um computer technology, and and so we have access to a 90-foot circus tent, a canvas circus tent that was it was a a guy from Florida who had a circus, like a circus lay, and it was in Atlantic City. Aaron Cohen is a partner, he lives in Atlantic City. Aaron saw the tent and he met the guy that owns it, and he goes, Can we show you what our visuals look like? We'd like to maybe collab with you. And the guy loved it because uh, what can you not like about like Mars on your ceiling? You know all of a sudden you're on in outer space. The guy goes, I love what you're doing, but um I'm retiring. But you can buy my tent. Which happened. Okay. So it's it's it holds a thousand people. Wow. So what we have to do is this is the dream. And it's called if you go to Sa Stage Trip Productions website or stage trips.net, stage trip.net, um, there's a link for uh Big Top 360. That's what the name of the project is. So we're gonna take this tent, it's yellow with purple edges, and it's got the the spires like a real circus. Yeah. Just like circus, and we're gonna build this up. You know, it's it's a huge project. I mean, but it's the dream that we want to pursue as a team. Me working with Andrew and Aaron and have this thing take off, maybe find someplace in the in the Northeast corridor between New York and Maryland that we could set this thing up and run it for maybe a couple weeks at a time. It's massive, a thousand people. It's crazy. I mean, we could have like multiple and we'll we'll bring in jogglers and clowns. Yeah, why not? Yeah, we'll keep the circus atmosphere. Yeah, yeah, you might as well. Little trapeze between between bands. But that's that's gonna happen. That's that's a reality that we're we're pursuing and staying. I don't know that. That sounds great. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 42:04

Um, so you basically started doing a lot of this not too long ago, like seven years ago, you said right. Yeah, yeah, okay. Because I was gonna ask you about like how things have changed, but not too much has changed, I feel like technically, maybe a little bit, because there's AI. But um, you know, since you started and technology or social media, things like that, like how it's changed.

SPEAKER_02 42:26

Well, that that's that's a good point because you know, in the world of marketing, like you know, promoting is nine-tenths of the equation. Getting the gig set up is one thing, but getting the promotion and the advertising and strategically doing everything. Yeah. And so that's why I wanted to take off 2025 to look at what I'm doing and make this happen. I've got letters out to different colleges where I'm looking for interns to come on board, and I'll I'll reward them as best I can until we really make money. There will be a certain amount of sweat equity, it's just the way it is, you know. And people want people that like I'm approaching people that took the marketing courses at Montgomery County College, or the people that took the uh recording industry classes, and then they're looking to step into that industry. So we're I'm giving them a leg in. Yeah. And the networking is half the price of what they're doing. You know what I mean? Like they're they're suddenly now they're they're around me and other people that do what we do, which is what they're doing if they do a good job, then it's like, you know, now you might get a job or right, and let them work for a year and then take off. Yeah. Just like the bands I hire. If I bring in a band and they take off, God bless them. Although I'm still stuck on Noah Gibney. He's like he was 15 when I brought him in. He's a piano player, singer from uh the Reading area, and he was fifteen when I met him. Now he's a Berkeley School of Music uh student. He plays with O'Teal, he plays with Splinter Sunlight, he's well on demand, he's like blue eyed soul. Like how old is he now? He's nineteen now. Oh, okay. And and I'll book him tomorrow. And he loves that we still hang out together. Like we did one show together where tickets were pretty Minimal and he's he said, I'm really happy that you paid me, but I hope we can still work together. I said, Of course. Right. You're too good to let go of. Yeah. So I'm I have a I I pride myself in in knowing talent when I see it, and and I also rely on other people. Like I'll call up different people in our community, you know, Steve Matt or Tony Turbin or Rich Staller and say, Hey, what do you think of this band? I'll uh get their feelings just so I can get a little, you know, what do you think of these guys? Like I'm working with a 10-piece um Santana tribute band that I haven't even seen yet, but I'm like, Are you kidding me? I I saw the videos, I'm like, this guy is Carlos, he's that good. So I'm looking for a a stage that is big enough for them. So yeah. We'll we'll we'll get there. 10 piece.

SPEAKER_03 44:44

Are they expensive?

SPEAKER_02 44:46

Probably, but they're they also that's that's I'm glad you mentioned that because some bands they have a price tag, but they're also willing to take a hit to to get on a stage. Right. You know what I mean? Like work with you. And work with me, yeah. I mean, that happened to me from day one when when I started LNC, my whole circle D operation, um, the first band that I signed was the Blue Way Ramblers, which are Graham Ford and and and and and uh Hanneman and those guys and Billy Dominic on violin. And so um Hanneman gave me a contract that I never even saw before, I didn't even know what it was, and said, if we make we were we're looking for this much money, and then 25% of every dollar over that till we reach the next level. Which I thought that seems scary to me, but then I realized that that makes us both have the equal incentive. Yeah, the high tides rise all boats theory. So we're both working for that extra ticket to be sold. Right. We both make more money when that happens. Right. I thought I'd be on the losing end, but that was like one of the smartest things I've ever done. Good idea to put in it in a David Hanneman. I forgot, almost forgot his first name.

SPEAKER_03 45:54

Yeah, that's a good idea to put in, and that was in a contract.

SPEAKER_02 45:57

Yeah, it was it was their contract. So now what I do is I have my negotiations and I ask the bands, you know, what's the ballpark that you're looking for? Let me see. Because a lot of bands come to me and they go, What's your offer? But it works both ways. It's like I besides my offer, what are you looking for? I think I think we want to meet in the middle, yeah, is what I'm looking to do. And I and I never finalize a contract until an offer page is sent out with like, okay, we had the discussion, here's the offer. Do you accept the offer? And then that becomes it's like a second contract. May or may not be necessary, but it's it's a formality. Yeah. And but it's a simple one-pager. And so I like that that concept of if it like if a band says to me, hey, we're looking for a thousand dollars, just throwing a number out. I'm like, how about this? How about if we do 700 and 25% of every aggregate dollar over that till we reach that, or not even have a plateau, go past that thousand. And then I'll do a little math equation, show them if you sell a hundred tickets, we, if we sell a hundred tickets, wow, you're making 1,500. Yeah. You always wanted a thousand. So the numbers can can jump all over the place, but you it needs to be seen, I think, because when you talk about it, it's one thing, but when you when you see it, because I'm from the retail world, so retail marketing, I like to show you know a store, well, this is what it costs you to get the product, this is what you should be selling it at. Why would you want to gouge and get those slow dimes versus fast nickels? You know, which is why sometimes I'll reduce the price on an early bird ticket just to get people to buy the advanced tickets. Yeah, I'll take a hit on it, but I'd rather have more asses and seats.

SPEAKER_03 47:38

Yeah, I'd rather know people are in a building.

SPEAKER_02 47:40

Yeah, yeah, at less price. I think they call it like a lost leader in retail. It doesn't look good as a single purchase. Like, you know, why would you want to lose five bucks on a $20 ticket? Well, because I'm selling $50 more of them than I would if I didn't. Right. So, you know.

SPEAKER_03 47:55

And you want to have a party. Exactly. You don't want it just five people because you had to pay $100 a ticket and you're like, no one's there, and then the experience is different.

SPEAKER_02 48:02

But but it's nice to have those levels, you know, or or a door split. Yeah. A door split's probably the simplest thing ever. It's like, you know, like the Falser Club, they do like a 70, 30, or 80, 20, depending on it's like with LNC, it's BYOB, so there's no bar. With the Rotunda, they don't even have a bar. So I don't I can only make extra money off the revenue from vendors as as a point of of revenue or income to to balance out the uh the balance sheet, but it's all for the common good of being able to pay the bands and the venue and the sound and the lights and all that stuff. But the cool thing about the rotunda, it's got everything already there. Okay. It's a great building, it sounds great. It's right on the Penn campus. Um, there's uh a great engineer that works there, two of them. Great uh lighting system that was enhanced by Andrew and Aaron with Stage Trip. We actually because they had lights that look like they're ready to fall in the crowd, you know. We gotta fix that. Yeah, nice. But they don't have central air, so we close we close from May till September.

SPEAKER_03 49:01

Oh, wow.

SPEAKER_02 49:02

You gotta do what you gotta do.

SPEAKER_03 49:03

Gotta do that. Well, there's enough going on through September. So there's no kind, then not, you know, then whatever.

SPEAKER_02 49:08

And then and then because of the the growth of my operation, I uh and and the the size of my musician roster, because bands are finding me, and then I wake up at four in the morning, can't go back to sleep, and I find another four bands floating around the internet. Next thing you know, I'm like, like, follow, and then I reach out and I go, I gotta talk to you guys. So I'm always finding all these different bands, and and I love giving them stages to play on. There's a band I discovered in New York, they're called Shakedown City, and they're a band that discovered themselves on the parking lot of a Dead Company show at at City Field where the Mets play and Dead Company was playing. And so these guys, from what I gather, number one, their guitar player, Garen is incredible. He's nationally known. And David Mendelssohn and his other vocalists, they do like a three-part male vocal harmony thing that I've never heard before in any band. And so I got them a gig at 118 North, which is another thing that I do is I put bands into different venues because of my venue connections. I'm connected to I can I mean Andrew's busy enough with the gem, but if he needed a date and he came came to me and said I need a band, I could probably help him out. Yeah. And then I do like an industry percentage for whatever my efforts are. Yeah. And I always ask the band, do you need me to help with promotion and marketing? I can throw that into my mix as well. Yeah. So I did that with Shakedown City. I got them a gig at 118 North, thanks to Jesse Lundy, who runs Rising Sun Presents. And they did pretty good that night, and then they booked their second gig there. And like I said before, once I'm I I don't mind establishing a band and letting someone else take the reins after that. Don Shore, who was a good friend of mine from the 70s, 50 years of friendship, he works with George Price at Snipes, and he got George to come to see them, and George even got to play harmonica with them. That's that's the way in. You get George to play harmonica with your band, you're in. And so uh George booked them at In and Out of the Garden, his three-day Grateful Dead theme festival last summer. They had the unfortunate slot of 11 a.m. on a Saturday when people are just waking up from the Friday night show. Right. And but George was so impressed that he promised them that day a year ago he would give them what became this year's headline slot for Saturday night, June 5th. So they're headlining. That's how good Shakedown City are. And now they're just going wild, they're playing everywhere. And and getting back to the the hardship of promoting, um, they have their own in-house promoter that's on their payroll. You know, whatever that costs, you know, you know, they're if they're able to do it, wonderful. But this woman The band does or that's yeah, Shakedown City does. And she's like a superstar, and she's she's got all the networking. So, you know, they they work in tandem with her, and and that's how it has to be. Any band that's or artist is trying to get ahead, they they should. I always ask in my in my relationship building, what do you do to promote your band? Because I want to I'm telling them I'm one guy, and until I have my team in place, I need more cooperation, I need more of a partnership. So, and you'd be surprised, there's a lot of bands that are like, Yeah, we do XYZ A B C like they they got it going on, or at least have somebody like like with Shakedown City when they when they give out their postcards that says, Do you want to be an influencer? And then that which is what I'm doing right now. I wrote I wrote a letter saying, Do you want to be a brand? I call a brand ambassador. I think I learned that from Railroad Earth. They used to do that. So as a brand ambassador, you get to choose what your field of expertise is. Is it social media, TikTok, Instagram? Like I I have four Instagram accounts. I have no idea what to do. I have no idea how to how to work them. Oh, really? But I need to have I need to have a 26-year-old come in and teach me how to do that. Yeah. So that these are the pieces of the puzzle I've been working on that along with, you know, again, as a brand ambassador, do you want to be a uh sales rep? Do you want to sell tickets? Do you want to sell sponsorships? So if I can get somebody good at selling, there's a million people out there that will sell sponsorships, I'll pay easy 10, 20%. Yeah. You give me a $500 sponsorship, sure, I'll give you $50 or $100. You know, that's money in the because that's that's money in the bank, is that's the when you talk about the risk. When I set up a show, if I had a couple thousand dollars sitting in a kitty, then I could pull from that. I could say, well, I'm not really risking a lot because I've got that bank. Yeah. But until I get to that level, it's it's a growing process, and I think I'm heading in that direction.

SPEAKER_03 53:42

Yeah. Yeah. When it comes to bands and musicians, like what's a com is there a common mistake, or like what are some mistakes that they might have when they're approaching a uh promoter or a venue?

SPEAKER_02 53:54

Probably if they're if they're not willing to meet part way in the conversation, I guess. Yeah. You know, it's like, where do we stand? You know, like I'm I'm really transparent. And like if I if I have a band booked and something happens and I and I lose that date or whatever, I always say, I'm gonna promise you another date. And I I try to do my best to live up to that promise. Whereas they as they used to say in the in the music business, give them a definite maybe.

SPEAKER_04 54:22

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 54:23

But you know, and you can't only do so much, but but I always I'll I'll put my best foot forward and give them the best shot I can. So um, but yeah, it's challenging when you when you when you don't get the cooperation. Yeah. Like we had a a long conversation yesterday in a with a I I can't say who it was because it's it's a band coming up, but this guy told us all of his angles and where he comes from, and he was giving us tips. Like, including, yeah, why don't you get a hotel in the area and and get them as a sponsor? They'll give you give them like 30 rooms half price, because I got people coming from all over, and that would be great. You know, just have them half price is it's money in the bank, or at least like if I had to pay an artist to live in a hotel, if I get those five rooms or ten rooms at half price, then I'm saving some money.

SPEAKER_04 55:11

Yeah.

SPEAKER_02 55:12

So it's all a function of you know, clarity. I I I need clarity, I need to have a total understanding. I don't like surprises. No one likes surprises, you know. At the end of the day, we gotta get all that stuff up front, which is why I like contracts where we spell it out and have it sign because we we all agree.

SPEAKER_03 55:28

Yeah. How important is um professionalism off stage with these bands?

SPEAKER_02 55:35

Oh, very important. Yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_03 55:37

I mean, you know, we need to I mean have you dealt with anything before that's like I can't believe that knucklehead just did that.

SPEAKER_02 55:44

Oh, yeah. Which which which I I cannot name names, but I I I will tell you I've I've run into multiple not multiple, a sif a significant amount of of toxicity. Oh yeah. Because of bad attitude or misunderstandings.

SPEAKER_03 56:03

You know, it's like a lot of ego, like egos. Oh my god, yeah, yeah.

SPEAKER_02 56:07

And that gets in the way. I mean, it gets in the way of normal life. Right. Ego, you know, it's like you gotta work from the heart.

SPEAKER_03 56:14

That's like when you were just talking about like not meeting in the middle. It's like, you know, it I was thinking, like, is there bands that might be really good, but they haven't put in their time and they're thinking they're deserved, you know, right, more than you're actually gonna pay because are you gonna really sell tickets? Right. Like at the end of the day, there's four people in a room for you.

SPEAKER_02 56:34

Right. You know, not saying there's but these are the challenges. It's like with with Peter by my side, he he's the first to look up the band that I'm like, I'll hire a band and he'll go, you know, this band's got like um ten thousand oh five thousand followers on Facebook. They haven't posted anything for two years.

SPEAKER_03 56:54

Well then you gotta do your research, yes. And then like because like on Instagram you'll be like, Oh, they got fifteen thousand, but then you look and something's only been played a thousand times with two likes, and it's like, all right, well, which is why I need social media team.

SPEAKER_02 57:10

I need people that can there's less of that now.

SPEAKER_03 57:12

That was like a big thing, I feel like when when Instagram, like 2016, 17, 18, everyone was buying followers and it's it's kind of shunned upon now, but you know, people are still doing it, or you can buy likes, buy comments.

SPEAKER_02 57:25

Oh boy, is that like fake Yelps?

SPEAKER_03 57:28

It's like come people that make a business out of it, so they have four and it's probably a bunch of bots. So in and sometimes I don't it's probably more authentic now, but you can tell because the comments are like ridiculous, like they're don't even make sense.

SPEAKER_05 57:40

Yeah.

SPEAKER_03 57:41

But those comments are what get things in the algorithm. But yeah, so then you gotta research all that. Yeah, you know.

SPEAKER_02 57:48

Well, it's it's difficult. You know, a lot of it a lot of it's invisible till it becomes a reality. I mean, e like like when I hire a band or or when I meet a new band, not hire. And I have what's called a new artist intake form that I create. It's basically who you are, what you are, where you play, where you'd like to play, how many people came to that show. Like, you know, if you're if you played, you know, a place and only fifty people showed up, well that's that's a red flag for me, you know. Um I'm not gonna not hire a band because their draw was bad, but I might say to them, well, what happened at that room without spending you know a million hours on the project, I'm I might want to know, you know, look, I'm there's a little bit of a risk on my side here because you're not promoting yourself, you're not selling tickets at your show.

SPEAKER_03 58:40

So do you have all that like in contracts about promotions? Like if you don't see any active No, not really.

SPEAKER_02 58:46

It's 'cause, you know, at the end of the day Um Like I've I've been accused of uh overthinking, you know, and or over I don't know what the word is, uh, but without a team I get a little bit more nervous about what I'm doing. Yeah. Because I'm not sure if we're really making the reach. Like if I was five people, I know we'd be making the reach, which which is why I need interns. But I don't wanna I don't wanna um micromanage a band. Yeah. You know? True. Like there's certain bands that I work with, like you don't have to call us every week. We we got this. Yeah. But doing does it is a phrase I really like. It's like if they're if you can say all you want, but if if they're not coming to the door and not buying tickets, you know. I had a band once that didn't didn't do any promotion, and I and I asked people at the door why'd you come to the show? And who what brought you here? Oh, it was this, this, this, this, and that, but not the other band. So what's wrong with that picture? Yeah. What's wrong with that picture is that band didn't do anything. Yeah. And so I won't work with them again. I can't. Not in good conscience. Or I'll tell them, I'll say, you know, I might give you a second shot, but it's kind of like once bitten, twice shied. Like, you know, because I've got I don't and I don't want to be a snob and turn people off just because of one bad experience, but unless I feel that ex that can be the problem can be solved. Because I'm I'm big on resolution, I'm big on, you know, what's the problem, how can we fix it? Yeah, you know, like I I love you guys, but I had a problem with this one show or these past three shows, no one was coming. What can we do to fix that? Yeah. But if you're gonna tell me you're too busy to promote because you have your day job in the way or whatever, well, you know, that's not gonna work for me. Yeah, you know, I mean I can't do it all myself. I mean, those those days are over, really. I think it is it used to be on the venues.

SPEAKER_03 1:00:40

Well, and they also got to realize this is all indie. I mean, you know, obviously if you had millions of dollars behind you, yeah, yeah, we could get you everywhere.

SPEAKER_02 1:00:48

That's what I tell people. I said, Look, I'm not great, but yeah, I'm I'm not Live Nation, I'm not I'm not Ardware Musical, I'm not this, you know. If you want that, good luck, get in there. But if you want a stepping stone to that that stage, you know, I mean I can at least somewhere to get started kind of thing. It's it's challenging, but I'm I'm up for the challenge, but I'm not gonna you know beat my head against the wall till I'm bleeding. You know, I want to be able to get some reward or something.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:13

I just visualized that. That's why I laughed. I just saw you over there in the corner all bloody and disgusting.

SPEAKER_02 1:01:18

Yeah, it's like it's like the uh the 1776 guys, you know, to do with the with the fife and the bandana with the blood all over it, because he's still marching on. And that's what I'm gonna do. You know, they're gonna they're gonna have to rip me off the the dance floor, pretty much.

SPEAKER_03 1:01:31

You know, no, I understand. I mean, there's a lot, like even what I I do, it's it's I've been doing what I do for decades, and it's like, but you will I feel like you like, uh, I'll get I'm getting there, I'm figuring it out. And I mean, as long as you're happy and having the the important part is you're happy and not because I've had parts of my career where I've just stressed out, I'm waking up crazy, sure, and then you realize after that goes on for a little bit, like this is not good for my mental health, my physical health, my my whatever. Like, how can I make this fun again? Or how can I make this something that or you know, what do I need to take out of my equation to like right now that I'm in the process of that? There's things that I've been doing in parties that I gotta take out of my equation to open up the road for what I see next, you know. Um, what's something what what are you most excited about right now?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:22

Um I'm most excited about continuing to grow community to to bring people together because like the thing for Flesher Fox, you know, that's that can set the tone for next year doing it again for autism or colon cancer. Every show I've ever done. That's in May? That's uh June 20th. That's a June 20th. Okay. And so that's and where's that at? That's at the Lord's New Church. Okay. Or eventually. And what town is that in again? That's in Huntington Valley.

SPEAKER_03 1:02:48

Oh, it's right near me. Yeah, yeah. June 20th. What day of the week is that?

SPEAKER_02 1:02:51

It's a Saturday, baby. So that's gonna be a fun night because um on the grounds there, they they do a full moon jump circle fire pit every every full moon, which is coming up again. That's anybody's welcome. There they do, yeah. Any anybody's welcome.

SPEAKER_03 1:03:05

Um, what's one lesson that you've learned along the way that you would give to aspiring um promoters, people that want to promote, um or do what you do.

SPEAKER_02 1:03:19

Set your intentions with clarity and and and and positive vibration. Um, you know, be fair, um, be open, be open-minded to the discussion, but also know your boundaries, you know, know when if you feel like you're being taken advantage of, you want to make sure you have the resistance to that, or at least like, hey, I don't feel right about this. But it like like I say, it's about relationships. I just think it's a you know, just have a clear understanding and make sure that you're on the same page with the people you deal with. Artists, art artists or photographers, videographers, make sure everybody knows what everybody's doing and that we're all open-minded and and just like be open, be open to suggestion, you know.

SPEAKER_03 1:04:07

Yeah. As far as your events and people that attend them, what's one of the most important things that you hope they remember or walk away with?

SPEAKER_02 1:04:14

Um they remember how great the music was, they remember um what it feels like to to be a free spirit for a few hours, to to take your mind off of the normal days' activities and just let your hair hang hang down and know that you have a safe spot to come back to. Yeah. You know, because I I know not all venues are are safe to come back to or in general, but but the the the ones that put the good foot are are out there. Um so you know, I I I want to make everything an event as opposed to just like another typical experience. I just want people to to to you know have a good time and and remember what a good time they had, and that's their takeaway and they and they want to come back again and and have that experience.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:02

Yeah. Um so people can mostly find your contact at circledproductions.com.

SPEAKER_02 1:05:08

No, it's uh my actual uh webpage is circledconcerts.com. My Facebook page is circledproductions.com.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:18

Is there anything else?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:20

Well, what the the takeaway here is music is healing. Yeah. Or as Mickey Hart from The Grateful Dead once said, we're in the transportation business. We move people. Yeah. And that's what it's about. It just thrills me to the core to watch people smiling, uh happy with each other, yeah. You know, and just dancing.

SPEAKER_03 1:05:41

All right, so I'm gonna ask you the last question of the podcast. How is music your hero?

SPEAKER_02 1:05:45

Um it it just um heals, it's just it's got healing quality. Um, it it soothes me. The music hits the dopamine levels, which attack uh enter into the relief r the rewards. system of your brain like money and food. So dopamine by music will do that. I remember reading an interview once I read an interview once with the guy that invented coss headphones and he talked about the music coming up the diaphragm into the into the it's all about you know the um the chakras. Where like I've been learning some breathing exercises about breathing into different chakras. Right. So you open up the heart, they open up the third eye. So I think it's all about letting the music fill your soul. You know that's what it's all about. Let it let it drive you in a in a biological way. You know it's all it's all chemistry. You know sound is chemistry. Like they're using sound like for dementia and and Alzheimer's sound it's like that miss thing I always wanted to do that I what I'm not doing now is to be a sound therapist and do like healing sessions, you know. Yeah. On a cruise boat or something.

SPEAKER_04 1:06:56

Yeah. There you go.

SPEAKER_02 1:06:58

Live in Hawaii or Thailand or something. I must be doing something wrong. But but I I'll I'll probably have some workshops you know at the show especially when we get the big top going.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:07

Yeah. You know, we'll do some work yeah that sounds awesome. Yeah and sound is yeah sound is a very powerful uh you can kill people with sound.

SPEAKER_02 1:07:14

Sound is good very powerful sound is God.

SPEAKER_03 1:07:16

Yeah yeah it really is um all right well thank you so much for taking the time to uh to share your story and teach us a little bit about being a promoter thank you thank you for having me yeah of course and like what you're doing you're getting you're getting the word out getting the word out yeah I'm the I'm the uh messenger I guess I mean I do a lot of things too but yeah no it's great it's great I'm meeting a lot of people and I I I feel like it's just gonna keep getting deeper and then connect I can connect people and all right well thank you thank you thank you until next time keep creating keep connecting and keep building together remember we're in this together so let's keep each other dying alive