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Viva Events takes a risk on age-defying music

HOLY HOLY (DAVID BOWIE’S ALL STAR BAND) at the Opera House (735 Queen West), Tuesday and Wednesday (January 12 and 13), 8 pm. $35. ticketscene.ca. See listing.


Who is the last musician you would expect to see onstage in Toronto in 2016?

Siouxsie Sioux? Marianne Faithfull? Kate Bush?

Promoter Dante Brando wants to book them all.

“I had a vision six months ago. I turned 45 and I was like, ‘You know what? I’m going to go after what I want to do in life,’” he tells NOW. “I want to bring back the legendary acts.”

Brando, who spent 15 years booking indie bands like Tokyo Police Club, Protest the Hero and My Darkest Days under the banner Music City, launched the music promotion company Viva Events in October with the backing of five investors from Montreal and Vancouver (whom he declines to name).

His plan is to book 30 to 40 shows this year across Canada, including classic acts from the 70s, 80s and 90s who haven’t appeared onstage in Canada in over 10 years.

So far, he has a dozen gigs confirmed for 2016, including two dates with German punk icon Nina Hagen in February, two events with burlesque performer Dita Von Teese in February, three dates with disco and dub queen Grace Jones in March and three concerts with new waver Gary Numan in May. [Update: Gary Numan said in a Facebook post that the Toronto shows are not confirmed as yet.]

On Tuesday and Wednesday (January 12 and 13), he brings Holy Holy, a new supergroup featuring David Bowie collaborators Tony Visconti and Woody Woodmansey, to the Opera House for a performance of the recently departed pop icon’s third album, The Man Who Sold The World. The band is continuing their North American tour in the wake of Bowie’s death on Sunday, January 10, following a battle with cancer as “that’s what he would have wanted,” Woodmansey said in a Facebook post.

Brando calls his approach to booking “the jaw-drop factor.” 

“I love that because, at the end of the day, I couldn’t give a shit about money and everybody will laugh when I say that,” he says. “I don’t think many people are catering to my age group. Am I the only person dying to see Grace Jones in Canada? I don’t know. Am I that different or am I really tapping into something a lot of people are interested in?”

Historically, Toronto is a tough market for so-called “legacy” artists. To succeed, Brando will have defy the odds by persuading picky older audiences that the rarity factor is worth the expensive ticket price.

Graces Jones’s March 24 date at the Sony Centre will be her first Toronto performance since a 1998 appearance at an Art Gallery of Ontario fundraising event affiliated with an Andy Warhol exhibit. (Ticket info for the Sony Centre show has not yet been announced.)

An icon of the 70s and 80s, the Jamaican singer continually wins rave reviews for her ferocious, flamboyant one-off festival shows, but she does not tour.

Many acts on Brando’s bucket list are based in Europe, in their 50s and 60s, and only sporadically play live, meaning any promoter hoping to bring them to Canada has to make the trip worthwhile.

Hagen, a punk and new wave cult act who has segued into jazz, is flying in from Germany with a 10-person entourage (including five band members) to play a full rock show at the Opera House on February 5. It’ll be her first concert in Toronto since a 2004 Lee’s Palace date for late promoter Will Munro’s queer rock n’ roll club night Vazaleen. And given her age – 60 – potentially her last. Brando is hoping fans will cough up $75 per ticket.

“I’m getting a lot of push back on ticket prices,” he admits, adding he eventually hopes to offset prices through sponsorships and meet-and-greet VIP packages. 

To book Jones, Brando spent six months “begging and pleading” with her agent, who was standoffish at first. In the end, he persuaded the star to fly to Canada from her home in Paris by offering a three-date run in Montreal, Vancouver and Toronto.

Since he succeeded in doing five dates in Ontario and Quebec with 80s synth-pop act Howard Jones last fall off the back of a Hugh’s Room booking, his strategy has been to offer multiple cities. That way, a trek is financially beneficial to both parties: the per show rate is cheaper for Viva, and the artist, agent and manager get more money.

“When I tabled bringing Grace Jones to Canada everybody was like, ‘It’s not going to happen,’” he recalls. “At the end of the day, a three-city offer is going to beat out a one-city offer. It’s just mathematics, really.”

For Collective Concerts owner Jeff Cohen, the math around bringing a legacy act to town for a special event doesn’t add up.

His company focuses on artists that draw young audiences, but he brought older acts the Violent Femmes and UB40 to play the Toronto Urban Roots Festival.

He calls Viva’s model the “festival model” because festivals have grants and sponsorships that can cover pricey headliners who may not be touring.

“The minute you start flying someone in when you don’t have a government grant or sponsors, it’s a huge economic risk,” he says, adding that risk is greater when the target audience is older music fans.

Cohen says most older Torontonians are selective when it comes to evenings out, view concerts as a luxury and may have seen an act many times already.

“Any venue and promoter in this city that has specifically marketed to an older audience with a higher ticket price, it has not worked,” he explains. “But maybe this will be the change. If it works, more power to the people doing it.”

Cohen says an audience in Toronto known to pay higher ticket prices for legacy acts is the LGBT demo – who happen to be a big part of Hagen and Jones’s respective fan bases.

Meanwhile, the 200-seat Roncesvalles club Hugh’s Room targets older fans at steep prices. Folk legend Judy Collins’s upcoming March 12 show there cost $90 in advance and $100 at the door, for example. 

“So it does work, but is that a business that has sparked a lot of spinoff businesses like it to open? No,” says Cohen. “It’s cool someone is taking a risk to bring in things that make the city more diverse. It takes a lot of chutzpah, but it’s not the greatest model.”

Money aside, there are other reasons why a promoter might not want to gamble on a cult act with an infamous history.

Brando learned that the hard way after he booked former Stone Temple Pilots frontman Scott Weiland and his band the Wildabouts at Adelaide Hall on December 1.

The show was Weiland’s last.

Two days later, the 48-year-old was found dead on his tour bus in Bloomington, Minnesota. In addition to a litany of medical disorders, the Hennepin County Medical Examiner’s Office determined the cause was an accidental overdose and found cocaine, alcohol and the amphetamine MDA in his system.

Brando chokes up and starts to stutter when asked about Weiland.

“It’s shocking to me that it’s still affecting me this much,” he explains. “I didn’t know him but I spent the last show of his life with him and a lot of shit happened that I replay over and over in my head.”

Brando has been turning down requests from media outlets since Weiland’s death, including several from celebrity news site TMZ. He has also rebuffed collectors interested in buying leftover tickets and posters from the final gig, which he is considering giving to CAMH and MusiCares to auction off.

“Frankly, it’s been a nightmare,” he says. “It’s just disgusting to try and cash in on any of that. I’ve seen people who were there that night trying to cash in and it’s disgusting.”

Moreover, the show was a financial disaster. About 146 people turned up at the 475-person-capacity Adelaide Hall, and Viva lost more than $10,000.

According to Brando, Weiland’s rider included some sobriety requirements such as no alcohol on the bus, but “that was far from the truth. That’s the only thing I’ll say,” Brando states, adding that when he drove the rocker to radio station Edge 102 for a press opportunity “[Weiland] was very distant.”

“I’m honoured that people say, ‘You had the last show with Scott Weiland’ but I would never have wished that on anyone,” he says. “There’s nothing I could say that would change much.”

Will he think twice about booking musicians whose reputation precedes them?

He admits he is “deathly afraid” of meeting Grace Jones. After all, her rider – which she published in her recent memoir – lists six bottles of Cristal champagne, first-class airfare, the presidential suite at a five-star hotel and two dozen unopened oysters, because, as the rider states, “Grace does her own shucking.”

“But that’s the thrill,” says Brando. “You don’t know what kind of person you’re going to get.”

His bucket list for 2016 includes Faithfull, Culture Club, Adam Ant, Sioux, Jewel and most impossible of all Kate Bush.

In 2014, the reclusive English singer/songwriter played 22 shows in London – her first live dates in 35 years – and promptly returned to radio silence when the run ended.

“I’d pay triple the price of a Madonna ticket for Kate Bush, and I think there are a lot of people like me,” Brando says. “I will not sleep until I get her, but I will probably never sleep again for the rest of my life.” 3

kevinr@nowtoronto.com | @kevinritchie

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