Eurocrisis and Coca co... hum, Metallica management!

Last December the manager of Metallica and the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Mr Burnstein (picture above), stated that the instability of the Eurozone and the European Union more generally has re-scheduled the tour of the two bands (The Gardians, 7/12/2011). The anticipation of the EU currency decrease toward the Dollar and the fear of payment delays from Festivals and live venues will stop the tour of the two mastodons for 2013 in Europe. A 2012 Metallica summer tour has been announced despite the fact the band has intensively toured last summer. Does this choice will be really profitable in this time of crisis where the unemployment rate is considerably growing? The price of Metallica's tickets (£60/80$ for a single show, and £170 for the Download festival) combine to the short gap since their last visit could badly impact on this 2012 tour.

 So what is going on the live music market in Europe? We all know that the recorded music revenues are decreasing  mostly due to the illegal Internet downloading (-2.7 in UK between 2007 and 2010). "Tours are almost the only way to make money" stated  Megadeth drummer Shawn Drover, and the live music is doing really well!
In France the famous festival "Les Vielles Charrues" has seen growing its sales by 34% between 2005-2011 and the development of Heavy Metal festival such as the Hellfest, the Motocultor Festival reflects well this good dynamism. In UK, reports stated the live music industry increased by more than 60% between 2005-2011. Bands revenues are now mostly coming from their tours, and the development of new markets such as South America and more recently Asia should export more and more the Heavy Metal music in the world. However the excellent quality of European festival and the importance of its market should not be ignored by big US bands.
From my point of view, few artist seems to forget that the role of a tour is not only to sell tickets or taking good fees from festivals but to promote the band image to its public and for the love of the music itself...

News from the Download and the Hellfest

With the beginning of this new year the number of headlines of the Heavy Metal festivals are growing up!
The Download Festival which announced its 3 principal headlines few months ago (Black Sabbath, Metallica and The Prodigy) has just added the critically acclaimed Thrash Metal Machine Head, and our favorite rednecks Lamb of God. The festival is continuing its opening to a larger audience with band such as Tenacious D (Jack Black) and the Grunge legendary Soundgarden. It is rumoured that Van Halen will play in exclusivity to the Download (RockHard mag).

The Hellfest has for the moment not add any new band to its line up already extremely rich. The festival will increase its capacity by adding 2 new scenes to a new site (still in Clisson, France). Each scenes will have similar style of music like the precedents years where the Black Metal and Death shared the Rock Hard Tent, and the Stoner, Sludge and Doom were in the Terrorizer tent. Let see how the Hellfest will segment more its festival with these new scenes.

The date of the 2 festivals (8 to10 of june for the Download and 15 to 17 of the same month) will probably give us a good idea of what band will complete the Download Line up(exclusivity except, such as Metallica), as every year.