I live in a smaller, but still relatively big, city in the Northwest. Similar vibe to Portland but smaller.
I searched and counted a total of 6 venues that use Live Nation.
(To be fair, it had more listed, but a couple have been closed since before COVID so Live Nation isn’t exactly updating this list regularly. At least one of these venues has changed hands of ownership a few times in that time, so are they still contracted with Live Nation? Who the fuck knows, I’d have to ask in person to know for sure.)
Other than a Performing Arts Center, basically all of them have much weaker attendance for their shows than pretty much any other venue that isn’t associated with Live Nation.
Literally, I can count, off the top of my head, more venues that don’t have agreements with Live Nation. All these venues get tons of locals showing up, partially because of how cheap the shows are. We also still have a handful of weird houses that do punk shows.
Also, some of these Live Nation places are literally just fucking Old People places, like the local Elk’s Lodge. Nobody is doing wild concerts at the fucking Elk’s Lodge.
Live Nation can have a presence in your area and the local music scene can still be thriving outside of it.
Portland isn’t the only city that still has a vibrant local music scene, with or without Live Nation.
Also, some of these Live Nation places are literally just fucking Old People places, like the local Elk’s Lodge. Nobody is doing wild concerts at the fucking Elk’s Lodge.
Some of the best shows I’ve ever been to were at an Elks or VFW. Often they’re the only venues available in suburban and rural areas. And they’re usually priced reasonably.
I worked a number of punk & blues shows at Elks (Portland & surrounding Northwest).
One that will always love in heart & memory: Polkacide! Hardcore 2/4
They rolled up from California & played a gathering at the Elks Lodge. Perfect size & Elks are always ready for & expecting drunks. Thankfully, none of the shows had drunken outbursts. People are just happy to see the bands they love at their neighborhoods grandpa’s lounge
Here’s just one hypothetical based off available reporting, court cases, and leaked documents:
Artist A has a history of performing at independent Portland venues but also tours the country and therefore has to use LN venues and TM services.
When LN opens their Portland location, Artist A will have to either start using the LN venue, or find that the rest of their tour has suddenly run into financial issues with LN pricing and rebate schemes.
So Artist A switches to Portland LN venue, and magically those issues start to go away.
And that’s just the artist side, LN pulls variations of this monopoly abuse with local venues who refuse to Ticket Master, or sign with LN.
I’m not even doing their criminal behavior justice and the real examples are significantly worse then what I quickly typed out. This will only harm artists, local venues, and Portland, if allowed.
I understand how they operate. I gave a personal example of how almost nobody goes to local Live Nation venues because of the expense when there’s a bunch of cheap, local shows in similarly-sized venues.
Does it mean “Artist A” doesn’t come to our city? Yeah, who gives a shit?
Losing one artist isn’t the implication…it’s losing all your independent venues because they won’t financially survive being blacklisted by every artist that hopes to tour anywhere else because LN is a monopoly…
So goodbye independent venues and hello to exponentially higher prices, because that’s what monopolies do…
Although I’m guessing places like the Elk’s Lodge still take money at the door.
I wonder if they sometimes operate like Uber Eats where they buy the ticket on your behalf and charge you a premium for it even if they don’t have a deal with the venue?
When they announced that they were adding ad breaks I decided it was something I didn’t need to watch live. Then I saw the highlights and decided there’s no reason to go back and rewatch it.
Doesn’t matter whats said. I have the choice between a guy who stutters. A condition that doesn’t affect intelligence or mental faculties in any way. Or I have the choice of a convicted felon who has clearly only cares about himself the the point of mental instability.
I’m voting for Biden. Not because he is the best person for the job but because the alternative is a complete fascist shit show with all of his ignorant bigoted sycophant regressives willing the destroy the country. Not to return it to what it was in the past. Instead they seek to create some fantasy dictatorship that never was.
Nobody came away from the debate concerned about his stutter. This is like someone on the right calling Trump “a guy who speaks his mind”. I’m voting Biden too, but do you honestly think that’s why many of us will be holding our noses while doing so?
I’m pretty bad at speaking off the cuff but by all measures, I’m fairly intelligent (went to a competitive school for undergrad and got good grades, etc.)
It would be at least comprehensible that China is risking world war over this island if it made some kind of strategic sense as a conquest, but reunification appears very much just plain ideological. I hate that.
China is currently boxed in by American aligned entities. Every island off the Chinese coast large enough to throw an airfield on is controled by an American ally with American military forces on it. Taiwan is of massive strategic value because it would allow Chinese vessels to access the Pacific Ocean unimpeded.
American aligned because of China getting ever more aggressive. Even Vietnam is now looking more to USA because they don’t trust China anymore!
There used to be good progress before XI Jinping, but XI is an old school hardliner and wants everybody to yield to the party, and foreigners to China, because they’ve become a super power.
Chinese political threats extend also towards EU countries, and are becoming extremely tiresome. China is becoming a bully.
Even Vietnam is now looking more to USA because they don't trust China anymore!
Vietnam (like so many smaller states) is playing both powers against each other to maximize their own gains. But they are tectonically unable to move away from Chinese influence.
I heard a quote from a Vietnamese diplomat that the US was a great mistress - it's very exciting, you can have a lot of fun. But when you come home, the wife is always there.
@BakerBagel “American aligned entities” seek alliances because of China’s aggression, and they do so by collaborating not just with America but also with each other, e.g., Japan, the Philipines, Australia, and others. These countries collaborates voluntarily with each other because of China’s imperialistic behaviour in the region, not because China is “boxed in” by any Western “entity”.
Beijing has been disputing a lot of its neighbours’ sovereignty on land and at sea, including India’s and Russia’s, and neither India nor Russia are exactly what I would call “American aligned entities”. As <a href="" rel="nofollow">@Buffalox</a> already said, even the single-party communist country Vietnam with a similar authoritarian system seeks stronger ties with the USA rather China.
Taiwan is of massive strategic value because it would allow Chinese vessels to access the Pacific Ocean unimpeded.
China has been accessing the Pacific Ocean unimpeded for decades now, no one questions that. The reasons why China wants control over Taiwan are manifold, one being Taiwan’s prominent role in the global supply chain, another is that it would give China better access to the South China Sea and its estimated reserves of 190 trillion cubic feet of natural gas and 11 billion barrels of oil.
But who would run? Harris? She can’t beat Trump. The Dems would have to pull another Obama out of their hat, and I don’t think one exists. Bernie’s too old for another go. No one likes Warren. Pete is gay (too many haters).
See, this confuses me. I’m not saying you’re wrong, I mean there must be a reason Biden came out on top in the 2020 primaries, but all the time liberals tell me they would vote for a houseplant over Donald Trump. Literally any Democratic candidate would pass the test of not being Trump, so why couldn’t any candidate win?
Solid blue will vote solid blue. The election isn’t determined by those people. It’s determined by swing states. Lots of people just don’t vote if they don’t like their options. Those votes matter.
Trump isn’t some mythical Boogeyman who only Biden can beat. That’s not my gut feeling, that’s what the recent electoral results and polling data shows us.
But putting that aside, that doesn’t mean the DNC should be rigging primaries because they think they know best. That’s how Trump won in 2016, and why we just witnessed Biden sun downing on a debate stage.
I don’t mean by literally stuffing ballots, but via mostly boring administrative and bureaucratic maneuvering. Although, some state Democratic parties did actually cancel their Presidential primaries entirely, which frankly should be illegal.
Nothing I’m saying is breaking news. This was covered at the time, and has seen a small resurgence in coverage since the debate.
I think The Lever actually just republished the reporting they ran at the time.
I mean, not trying to bash Biden, just being fucking honest here.
What did people expect from the guy who responded to years of anti-police protests that were basically asking “please stop killing us” that were responded to by police by becoming a police riot by… *checks notes… massively increasing police budgets nationwide.
What dictator? Trump was in office already and I don’t remember him being a dictator. That’s just MSM talking points. He never even said he wanted to be a dictator. He made a joke about the left freaking out about it…and they did.
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