2004 Flashback: How Rival Entertainment boldly entered the concert promotion biz

The promoter that brought Atlanta sold-out 2004 concerts by rapper Kanye West, soul singer Jill Scott and art-rocker David Byrne has just booked its first arena show --- pioneering hip-hop act the Beastie Boys Oct. 15 at the Gwinnett Arena --- and, next weekend, will attempt to pull off its biggest and most ambitious event yet.

The concert is called SoulFest, though it’s really much more than a festival of soul. It is, in fact, a two-day extravaganza of hip-hop, R&B and gospel taking place in the parking lot at Turner Field and starring, among others, headlining rappers Antwan “Big Boi” Patton and LL Cool J; R&B acts Angie Stone and Anthony Hamilton; old-schoolers Chaka Khan, Frankie Beverly & Maze and Gap Band; and gospel star Kurt Carr.

“There’s no doubt,” says Rival senior partner Josh Antenucci, “that there’s gonna be some skepticism with new guys coming in and doing something so large.”

He’s right. The idea of putting such an event in a parking lot during a soft summer for concert ticket sales has raised some eyebrows.

“It’s not an event that I’d like to be trying to do right now,” says veteran Atlanta concert promoter Peter Conlon.

“Not a lot of people want to stand on asphalt in the summer and watch talent. That’s sort of a conceptual flaw.”

Rival counters that huge crowds at Music Midtown --- Conlon’s signature annual event --- stand on asphalt while watching bands play the 99X stage.

“Agents and managers are believing in [SoulFest],” says Rival senior talent buyer Lucy Lawler, who used to work for Conlon, “or they wouldn’t have their artists on it.”

SoulFest may be Rival’s biggest gamble, but it’s not the company’s first. The company aggressively pursued the reunion tour by the late-’80s cult band the Pixies, then floored the Atlanta music scene by selling out two October shows at the 4,678-capacity Fox Theatre.

“Lucy’s a good talent buyer, and they’re taking some bold steps,” says Windstorm Productions President and Variety Playhouse General Manager Steve Harris. “The Pixies was certainly a home run. But it’s tough when you swing for the fences --- ‘cause when you miss, you miss big time.”

For Rival, no strikeout has been more dramatic than Lollapalooza, the national alternative rock festival that was scheduled to hit Atlanta in mid-August before horrific ticket sales forced the tour to abort.

“Atlanta was the market that made me cancel the whole tour,” says Lollapalooza co-founder Marc Geiger, a senior vice president at the William Morris talent agency in Los Angeles. “I knew Lucy promoted it well, and we came out of the box with such a bad ticket count,” only 800 sold after “a couple of days” on sale.

Antenucci says, “We’re not worried” about ticket sales for SoulFest. He expects 10,000 to 15,000 people each day.

Credit: AJC

Credit: AJC

Musical farm system

The idea for SoulFest predates Rival’s inception.

It goes back about two years for Tom Cook, 31, an Emory Law School grad and the founder of Rivendell Enterprises, which is a part owner of Park Bench Co. (of the eponymous Buckhead and Emory Village bars), a partner in MidCity Cuisine (Atlanta magazine’s restaurant of the year) and the founder and managing member of concert venues EarthLink Live (1,100 capacity) and Vinyl (300 capacity).

Cook’s father is John Cook, chairman and chief executive officer of PRG-Schultz, the Atlanta-based recovery auditing firm that in 2003 --- a year the elder Cook has characterized as “tough” --- had $375.7 million in revenue, according to its annual report.

Tom Cook loves soul music, and with Rival off the ground this year --- and with the media partnership of powerhouse hip-hop and R&B radio station V-103 --- he was able to attempt a large-scale event that covered the spectrum of contemporary and classic African-American music. Financial sponsors include Ford and Budweiser.

The first artist on the bill was Patton, the rap-centric half of Atlanta’s mega-selling, Grammy-winning, world-conquering hip-hop duo OutKast. These days, if you tell people that a member of OutKast is going to be someplace, you’ve got an event-in-the-making right away.

“We knew that we wanted Big Boi to headline one of the nights,” Lawler says. “We weren’t sure who we wanted to headline the other night, but once we had him signed on, everything else fell into line.”

Credit: PHIL SKINNER/AJC

Credit: PHIL SKINNER/AJC

Lawler, 29, got her experience working for House of Blues (from 2000 to 2003) and for Atlanta’s legendary Concert/Southern promoters Conlon and Alex Cooley (from 1996 to 2000).

She credits Cooley and Conlon for showing her how to work with booking agents, but now her former bosses are some of Rival’s most serious adversaries. Though other promoters occasionally make a splash (as AEG recently did with Prince at Philips Arena), Atlanta’s major concert scene consists of four key players: Concert/Southern, House of Blues, Windstorm and now Rival.

In at least one key way, Rival has emulated Concert/Southern, which is now a part of Clear Channel, the world’s leading concert promoter/producer.

Both Rival and Clear Channel have a kind of Atlanta farm system in which to grow their artists. Clear Channel operates the cozy rock venue Cotton Club and the larger Coca-Cola Roxy, while Rival does the same for Vinyl and EarthLink Live. The idea is to groom local and up-and-coming national talent in the small room, then move the bands up.

When Clear Channel needs a larger room than the Roxy, it turns to its converted downtown church, the Tabernacle. When Rival needs a larger room than EarthLink Live, it looks to such independent venues as the Fox Theatre or the Gwinnett Arena or, in the case of a colossal event like SoulFest, the parking lot at Turner Field.

Only time --- and ticket sales --- will tell if the SoulFest gamble is an ingenious use of an unconventional space or an overly ambitious disaster. And the same measuring sticks will be used, sooner or later, to determine Rival’s ultimate effect on the market.

“In order for any music scene to be healthy, you need a variety of promoters,” says William Morris’ Geiger. “And competition keeps the old promoters a little bit more on their toes, not as complacent.”

Conlon echoes that sentiment, though he says Rival has “not whatsoever” changed the way he does business.

“Look, we’ve been promoting here, Alex and I, for 30 years,” he says. “We welcome competition.”