COVER STORY
Live Music Crisis?
City council declares state of emergency in live
music capital.
By Thom White
AUSTIN August 25, 2008 -- Among a chorus of voices sounding the alarm, Music Commission member Jill George says there is a "live music crisis" here in Austin. Earlier this year, the Mayor's office and City Council coordinated for the creation of a 15-member Live Music Task Force (full list below) with what appears to be a clear goal: "Save Austin Music" (But don't disturb the neighbors!)
After the City Council approved creation of a Live Music Task Force on January 31, the offices of Mayor Will Wynn and Councilmembers Sheryl Cole and Mike Martinez appointed the Task Force on February 28.
The Austin Chronicle's Katherine Gregor wrote extensively on the Task Force's movers and shakers in the July 18 issue. In sum, she explained the problems facing Austin musicians and club managers as being the result of an "out of whack" economy: "The supply of musicians eager for gigs far exceeds the number of venues that reliably pack a paying house; as a result, bands play for free or at a net loss."
The Live Music Task Force is holding monthly public hearings at City Hall on the second Monday of each month until October, when the four task force subcommittees will issue their findings and recommendations in a report to the City Council. City appointee Jill George says the fundamental goal of the Live Music Task Force is simple: "protecting live music while preserving the quality of life."
The Live Music Task Force will be divided into subcommittees addressing four core issues affecting Austin's live music industry:
-
Further codifying what are "Entertainment Districts"
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City relations with venue owners: building requirements, redevelopment financing, tax breaks and incentives for favored venues
Noise ordinance and the "thump thump" issue
-
Welfare programs for professional musicians (city-subsidized medical, dental, psychiatric and drug abuse services)
City council may vote on new live music ordinances this fall
In November, the City Council may vote in new regulations regarding the noise ordinance, a new permitting process for live music venues (indoor and outdoor), city funding for welfare programs for musicians, and a city-sponsored "public education" campaign exhorting the populace to "support Austin music" and attend more live music events.
Mayor Wynn indicated that he wants to create programs where the city will throw in money to subsidize certain people in Austin's live music industry. He told the Chronicle, "[J]ust like we found money to spearhead co-investments with the Chamber [of Commerce, the "Opportunity Austin" initiative] … five years ago - in a really, really tough budget - we need to find resources now to get serious about supporting the microeconomics of live music."
The Mayor has made the Live Music Task Force a top priority for his chief of staff Rich Bailey. The Chronicle reported, "A passionate advocate, Bailey has been intimately involved in the details of the four subcommittees' work, personally attending every possible meeting and shepherding the group's success."
Despite the apparent live music "state of emergency," Mayor Wynn has attempted to remain publicly positive about the future of live music in Austin, and even issued a bold mayoral proclamation declaring 2008 to be "The Year of Austin Music." He also urged Austinites to get out of the house and see at least one live show a month.
Councilman Mike Martinez is also staying closely involved in the process with the appointment of his executive assistant Bobby Garza to the Task Force (Garza also moonlights as a keyboardist).
Can a PR campaign bring out the crowds?
The chair of the entire Task Force is Paul Oveisi, owner of Momo's (a club upstairs from Katz's Deli on West 6th) and former owner of the Steamboat on 6th. Oveisi maintains that the Task Force's overall goal should be to increase the total paying audience at live music events in town.
Austin Convention center spokesperson Rose Reyes told the Chronicle (7/18/08), "If Austin residents, as well as visitors and tourists, really started going out -- into the clubs, filling the seats -- part of the problem would solve itself. Musicians are not getting paid well because they're not getting big enough crowds."
Mr. Oveisi appears to favor a city-sponsored "public education" campaign encouraging Austinites (through mass media ad buys that they hope people are paying attention to) to see more live music. If more people make a habit of attending live music shows as a result of this PR campaign, there will be more money for venues, promoters, and even performers.
According to the Chronicle, this proposed propaganda campaign benefiting the local live music industry would entail hiring a public relation firms (who would "create" the message) and then require up to $1,000,000 in payments for purchases of advertising space (pay outs to billboard companies, printers, television and radio stations, newspapers and magazines, and internet marketing professionals) to make the campaign truly pierce the public's consciousness.
If the public education program helps quadruple the audience at live music venues, Mr. Oveisi will consider it a success. But David Rockwood of the advertising firm GSD&M says this goal may be overestimating the power of mass media propaganda. "I think an effort could be made successfully to increase the live music scene in Austin. But would it increase fourfold? Will most Austinites really dedicate themselves to going out to see it once a month? I doubt it."
The rise of Red River
Sixth Street has long been a main attraction where tourists and locals can imbibe beer and booze, and witness the live music action. But a funny thing has happened over the past decade or more as the "Sixth Street" live music scene has moved up a block to 7th St., and all along Red River up to 10th.
One
Austin observer, Ki Gray, has written how the Red River scene differs
from the blues-rock redux that seems to dominate 6th Street: "As
opposed to the dueling piano players or slew of cover bands normally found
on 6th Street, the bands on Red River are playing all original music,
and hoping to find enough fans to build up a following and gain some recognition,
since the money they will take home is usually based on the number of
people coming through the door."
In 2003, the Red River scene became official when "scenesters" started their own magazine, Rank and Revue, to promote local stars and venues on the strip. The Austin American-Statesman commemorated the zine's one-year anniversary (1/15/04) and recounted how the magazine got started:
A year ago, the 36-year-old scenester [Wendy WWAD] and her business partner Brenna Parthemore started a biweekly tabloid newspaper, Rank and Revue, designed to promote the Red River scene in all its rear-kicking glory…. Neither of them had much of a writing background, though WWAD does have radio/TV/film and English undergrad degrees from UT. Parthemore is a hairdresser. The two then went door-to-door to club owners with their idea. "Woody at 710 gave us some (seed) money," says WWAD. "So did Emo's, so did Red Eyed Fly, Beerland . . . All the clubs that are focused on in there are the ones that gave us money in the very first place."
Rank and Revue is no more, but the Red River scene has continued to blossom.
James Moody, co-owner of The Mohawk (912 Red River), and one of a select group of venue managers to earn a spot on the Live Music Task Force, is optimistic about business prospects on Red River. He told the Chronicle (7/18/08), "[O]n Red River, I don't see the market declining at all. We've been able to succeed and grow in concert with the other venues along Red River." He also told the Austin Business Journal (7/6/07), "Red River could be Austin's most popular district, even more so than Sixth Street, in the long term … We don't know, but that's ideally what you'd like to see."
Despite the dire warnings about the music scene from people like Jill George and Troy Dillinger (chief spokesman for the movement to SaveAustinMusic.com), in the summer of 2007, several venues along the north end of the Red River live music strip announced renovations and expansions to accommodate bigger crowds. The king of all Red River venues is Stubb's BBQ's outdoor stage (now advertised as the Waller Creek Amphitheatre, 801 Red River), and the Austin Business Journal reported that the venue is set to get even bigger. The Business Journal reported, "When Stubb's own $5 million expansion is complete, its capacity will rise from 2,100 to 3,000. The project, which is expected to start this fall, will include a 1,400-capacity indoor nightclub and a reconfigured outdoor amphitheater."
Across the street from Stubb's are two adjacent properties, Club de Ville and The Mohawk, whose owners have also announced big expansions. Michael Terrazas (co-owner of Club de Ville) and James Moody of the Mohawk also work as business partners in the live music promotional company Transmission Entertainment. The Austin Business Journal reported (7/6/07):
Michael Terrazas, co-owner of Club de Ville, says he plans to spend around $250,000 to expand his club's live music area to accommodate about 700 people, add a new bar and install bathrooms. He'll be expanding into a parking lot that's part of the Club de Ville property at 900 Red River.
For the last 10 years, Club de Ville has been an integral part of the district, which is bookended by music venue Emo's at Sixth Street to the south and Stubb's to the north. Next door to Club de Ville is The Mohawk, a newer addition to Red River that opened a few months ago and is undergoing about $150,000 worth of renovations.
James Moody, co-owner of The Mohawk, says that the venue will soon boast a music viewing area called the "Green Room" on its second level and a 1,000-square-foot rooftop deck. The renovations will up the venue's capacity to 700. Terrazas is also an investor/partner in The Mohawk.
Live Music Task Force
Brandon Aghamalian, Political lobbyist, Hillco
Partners
Bobby Garza, Councilman Martinez's Executive Assistant
Rose Reyes, Austin
Convention and Visitors Bureau
Jill George, Music Commission
Don Pitts, Music Commission
Saundra Kirk, Planning Commission
David Sullivan, Planning Commission
Paul Oveisi, Momo's
(Task Force Chair)
Charles Attal, C3
Presents
James Moody, Transmission
Entertainment; The Mohawk
Steve Wertheimer, Continental
Club
Alex Gonzales, Austin
Latino Music Association
Harold McMillan, Diverse
Arts Production Group
Adrian Quesada, Musician, Grupo
Fantasma
Scott Trainer, Neighborhood Representative
---
Get Involved!
Live Music Task Force Calendar of Public Meetings
City Hall, Board & Commissions Room (301 W. 2nd St.)
September 8 -- 6:00 pm
October 13 (if necessary) -- 6:00 pm
New condos and the noise ordinance
Oddly, despite these three expanding music venues which are blaring loud music outdoors on a regular basis, directly across the street from Club de Ville, the Charleston, S.C.-based real estate management / investment company Greystar Real Estate Partners, LLC has decided to construct high-priced apartments for people seeking peace in the inner city. Rent for a one-bedroom starts at about $1,200 per month, and two-bedroom go from $2,000 a month and up.
Greystar's Red River Flats development is emblematic to many of a change now underway in downtown Austin, as new condo-dwellers move into their high-priced digs, and then use the city government to order the bars, clubs, and honky-tonks to "please turn it down."
Last year, there
was a
lot of talk about the city reducing the maximum sound decibels that
amplified music could be played after midnight, but the City Council ended
up delaying action after an uproar from clubs and musicians who said many
clubs would simply stop their live music at midnight, reducing the number
of slots for bands on a bill, thus hurting the bottom line for everyone
involved.
Brandon Aghamalian, a part-time musician and full-time political lobbyist for HillCo Partners (offices in Austin and Washington, DC), is on the Sound Enforcement Subcommittee, which may propose controversial changes to the city's noise ordinance. Mr. Aghamalian, a graduate of the University of Texas law school and UT's LBJ School of Public Affairs, told the Chronicle (4/18/08) that the city will need to take into account the "thump thump issue, the unique nature of bass noise and the way in which it can skew sound readings."
The Austinist gave an in-depth account on the Sound Enforcement subcommittee meeting in May, and reported that a large contingent of "anti-loud music" residents turned out. The Austinist reported (5/20/08):
The auditorium crowd was only about a third full, and the overwhelming majority of people present were residents who were displeased with the amount of sound coming from venues in the Central and South Austin areas. Just under 10 citizens got up to share their testimony with the subcommittee panel. Only one of them represented the music industry.
The rest of those who spoke out were concerned residents ranging in attitude from downright angry (one resident from South Austin compared the music he could hear from his bedroom at night to being "terrorized") to eagerly seeking a balancing solution that would benefit everyone. It's worth mentioning that most of those who spoke against live music venues seemed to come from the Barton Hills and South Congress neighborhoods.
Some of the citizen suggestions at the meeting could seriously hamstring music promoters and make it more expensive to put on shows. Some residents proposed:
1) Allowing police officers to issue tickets for violation of the noise
ordinance, even without a complaint from a neighbor.
2) Requiring that all music venues employ an on-site sound engineer during
shows.
3) Banning outdoor venues, and enforcing new "soundproofing"
requirements on all indoor venues; no open windows or doors allowed (in
order to limit sound "leakage").
City funding welfare services aimed at musicians
Some of those involved in the Live Music Task Force believe that subsidized health care and psychiatric counseling may improve the quality of life for professional musicians. The "Program Assistance for Local Musicians" subcommittee will be considering ways for the city of Austin to give taxpayer money to existing programs of this type, such as the Health Alliance for Austin Musicians (HAAM) (See list of HAAM Board of Directors here).
The Health Alliance for Austin Musicians was started in early 2005 to coordinate getting musicians signed up for health care through their network of service providers. HAAM has formed alliances with Seton Hospitals to provide primary health care; St. David's Community Health Foundation for basic dental care; and employs the SIMS Foundation's network of psychiatrists to offer counseling for depression and drug addiction.
On their web site, the SIMS Foundation (See list of Board of Directors here) explains the origins and purpose of the organization:
[T]he SIMS Foundation was founded in 1995 by the friends and family of Sims Ellison, a young Austin musician who died that summer from suicide after battling depression. Their aim was to provide low-cost counseling and other mental health services that would be tailored specifically to the needs of our musicians and their loved ones … More musicians flock to Austin every year in search of an inclusive and inspiring community in which to work. Unfortunately, with the rising cost of living and increasing competition for jobs in the music business, many of these musicians find themselves struggling financially and emotionally. The challenges of being a musician can include personal issues such as depression, anxiety, relationship problems, and alcohol and substance abuse. … "SIMS saved my life," is a quote that has been repeated by SIMS clients throughout the years.
Austin Musicians' Housing is another organization that wants to provide specialized attention to another need for Austin musicians: a roof over their head. Two ladies, Heather Carmichael and Kara Remme, founded the group as the Austin Music Co-op in 2004, renting out a former nursing home off North Loop as living quarters and practice space for about 25 musicians.
In 2005, the building was sold and Ms. Carmichael and Ms. Remme no longer run that operation, but that is when they expanded their mission from mere property management to creating a "clearinghouse of information for musicians seeking homes." The Austin Business Journal reported (9/26/06):
The group is working with city and business officials to learn about the array of available housing programs -- such as down payment assistance, government-subsidized apartments or private developments aimed at diverse buyers. The organization will also help other co-ops get off the ground and is seeking a new home of its own.
New city music office?
Chairman Oveisi also favors creation of a city music office that would provide service to venue managers and show promoters to help "navigate" city departments. Some Task Force members told the Chronicle that they want this to be a powerful department with "authority to enact solutions."
The city already has the Economic Growth and Redevelopment Services (EGRS) office, and the City Council recently created a Cultural Arts division within this office. One sub-argument about a proposed Music Office is how or whether it should subordinated to these other city offices.
If the music office is recommended and created by the City Council later this year, there is already talk that Jim Butler, manager of the city's "Creative Industries Development" in the EGRS office, would be the preferred choice to head this new office.
The future of live music
The Live Music Task Force is not really such a new idea, as then-councilman Will Wynn proposed a similar initiative in late 2001. The Daily Texan reported (12/11/2001) on what Will Wynn hoped to accomplish at the time:
Councilman
Will Wynn said the musicians themselves should be the ones that benefit
most from any recommendations that the committee makes. "Ultimately,
who we need to help out are the musicians," Wynn said. Wynn said
one of the ways the city can help is by offering breaks on the utility
bills venues pay. Since the utility company is owned by the city, Wynn
said the city could conceivably offer discounts to venues with the understanding
that the savings are used to pay musicians.
The Daily Texan reported on the state of the scene at the time, using one Erick Frazier of the band Yard Arm as their prime example of the Austin musician's lifestyle:
Frazier came to Austin from Arlington after getting involved in the Dallas music scene. Three of the four band members are UT students, including Frazier's brother. "We came here because we heard about Austin as the live music capital and thought it would be a good opportunity," Frazier said. "And there is a lot of opportunity, but the pay is almost nonexistent." … He added that if it were not for his parents' assistance, he most likely would not be able to survive solely as a musician. "There are so many bands in Austin that [venue owners] don't have to pay the band," Frazier said. "They take advantage of that."
A week after the Chronicle's report on this year's Live Music Task Force, music observer Mike Krug wrote in (7/25/08) and asked music industry types some "tough questions" that should be honestly addressed before we can be certain that the grand economics of live music are "out of whack" and that the city needs to come to the rescue.
He advised aspiring professional musicians that, "Musicians need to analyze what they are doing and ask themselves some tough questions. Are we writing the best songs we can? How do we really sound? How good is our show? Why should people pay to see us?"
And to those who put on the shows, "Venue owners should study the habits of successful clubs. Most of the so-called live-music venues in this town have dismal PA systems. Shouldn't this be the venue's primary investment? This includes sound engineers. The art of being a sound engineer is a dying one. Venues also need to make sure that their stages and light shows are as good as they can possibly be and that shows run in a professional manner."
It remains to be seen how the city's money and "support" will affect or help the music scene, but Mr. Krug's recommendations to bands and club owners would require a search for more fundamental (independent) ways to keep their audiences coming back and the money rolling in.
Thom
White is editor of CITIZINE, a music and news magazine based in Austin,
Texas.
Contact Thom @ CITIZINE@CITIZINEmag.com
* * * * *
Health Alliance for Austin Musicians -- Board Members
Betty Dunkerley, ex-Mayor Pro Tem, Austin City Council
Lidia
Agraz, VP of Public Affairs, Time Warner Cable
John T. Kunz, President, Waterloo
Records & Video
Karen
Bartoletti, Shareholder, Graves
Dougherty Hearon & Moody
Edward
Safady, Chairman, Central Texas Area, Prosperity
Bank
Robin
Shivers, the Shivers Group and President, RRS Management
Tim
Taylor, Partner, Jackson
Walker LLP
Richard Topfer, Topfer
Family Foundation and Managing Director, Castletop
Capital
Carol Clark, General Counsel, St.
David's Community Health Foundation
Marsha Cook, Executive Director, St. David's Community Health Foundation
Jesus Garza, Executive Vice President and Chief Operating
Officer, Seton Family
of Hospitals
Diana Resnik, Senior Vice President, Community Care, Seton Family of Hospitals
Ray Benson, Chairman, SIMS Foundation (musician in Asleep at the Wheel)
The SIMS Foundation
Board of Directors
Mark Grossman, Chair-Elect
Anthony Haley
Catarina Sigerfoos
Fletcher Brown
Ron Byrd