Behind the High Cost of L.A.’s Rock Dreams : In role reversal, bands pay promoters for precious exposure : ‘Pay-to-Play’

The Sunset Strip stands as a beacon to aspiring rock stars around the country. No club scene outside of London has introduced so many top-level rock bands. The legacy began in the ‘60s with such innovative forces as the Byrds, the Doors, Buffalo Springfield and the Mothers of Invention. It continued in the ‘70s with the Eagles, Van Halen, X and Motley Crue, and on into the ‘80s with Guns N’ Roses, Los Lobos, Poison and Jane’s Addiction.

Hoping to tap into that success, bands of all varieties--from country-flavored rock and punk to speed metal and glam rock--have migrated here, dreaming of the day when they’ll find their names on the marquees of such legendary clubs as the Troubadour, the Roxy, the Whisky and Gazzarri’s. That migration continues today, but bands had better have some money in their guitar cases.

Under a controversial but apparently deeply entrenched “pay to play” system, as many as 800 bands are currently paying club promoters to be on the bill--often $1,000 or more.

In most cases, promoters rent the clubs for specific nights and then “charge” the bands to play on those nights. These promoters say that the “charge” is justified because exposure to record company talent scouts in the clubs often leads to big-bucks signings, yet few of the bands draw enough of a crowd for the promoters to make any money.

Scott Hurowitz, general manager of the Country Club in Reseda, suggested that most of the venues involved in the “pay-to-play” system would close if not for the revenue coming in from these shows.

Whisky general manager Louie Maglieri cites lack of record company support as another reason for the dominance of pre-sale ticketing in clubs on the Strip.

“In the old days when we booked the room ourselves the record companies used to blow a lot of money here every night,” he said. “Back then we had unlimited bar tab accounts with eight labels who used to pack the room with their employees, so it didn’t really matter what we made at the door. But those days are over. Record companies are not into doing heavy promotion anymore.”

After two decades of booking his own shows at Gazzarri’s, Bill Gazzarri was forced by soaring insurance costs to begin renting out his club in 1985 to independent pre-sale ticket promoters. But he believes bands stand to gain by the new system.

“Before the promoters, I used to be open only on Thursdays, Fridays and Saturdays. But now bands get exposure almost every night of the week and as a result more groups are making it big much faster. Look at Ratt, Warrant and Guns N’ Roses,” Gazzarri said.

“It all boils down to one thing. We’re in the business of selling talent. If a band has the talent and uses the machine that is currently in place it now takes almost no time for that talent to succeed.”

Some of the clubs, however, aren’t exclusively pay for play. The Roxy, Whisky and Country Club also rent to promoters who book “name” acts and pay them to perform because these bands can normally attract a healthy crowd. And not all bands play the game: Most pay-to-play activity involves commercially ambitious hard-rock and heavy-metal bands, as opposed to the underground and “alternative” rock bands that still play for money at numerous rooms around town.

The “charge” in the pay-to-play system, the promoters argue, is simply a way of making the bands share some of the expenses--or, more bluntly, help guarantee a profit.

Bill Graham, the nation’s most prominent concert promoter, attacks the practice.

“Unfortunately, there always seems to be someone out there ready to take advantage of the desire of an artist to be seen and heard,” Graham said. “People putting on these types of shows are not promoters. They’re entrepreneurs.

“What they try to do is conduct their business with somebody else’s money--the artist’s money. The only thing they contribute is their entrepreneurial zeal.

“A show built on this premise does not sound like an evening of lyrical or musical discovery to me,” Graham said. “But it certainly is a sad commentary on the times, isn’t it?”

Mark Mason is a 29-year-old rock singer who has run into the system, paid the price and now is doing something to fight it.

Mason grew up in Huntington Park with his own rock ‘n’ roll dreams. He headlined Gazzarri’s on the Sunset Strip for two months in 1983 with a hard-rock group named Exception. He was paid $400 a night, and he thought he was on his way.

Two years later, after going through a variety of other bands and a tour opening for Van Halen, Mason approached the nearby Roxy, which for much of the last decade was arguably the most important pop showcase in the country. He thought he could ask for at least $500 or $600 for a show, considering his background.

Mason was stunned to find out that the only way his band could step on stage was, in effect, to pay the club promoter to appear at the Roxy.

Mason may have been stunned by the “pay-to-play” terms at the Roxy in 1987, but he accepted the deal. His band, in effect, paid $1,000 to do one show there. He subsequently paid another promoter about the same amount to do another show at the Country Club in Reseda.

Technically, the money isn’t a charge. Here’s how pay-to-play works: Promoters typically book from four to five bands on a bill, allowing each group about 45 minutes to perform. All acts are required to sign a legal agreement binding them to sell between 50 and 125 tickets for the show. Ticket prices range from $3 to $12, depending on the date and the band’s position on the bill.

If a band is required to buy, say, 125 tickets at $7.50 each, the band can then sell those tickets to fans and earn back the $1,000 so that it doesn’t cost them anything to play the club. But most of the new bands don’t have enough of a following to sell anywhere near 125 tickets, and there are only so many times they can get their friends and relatives to attend.

Most musicians involved in pre-sale ticket contracts receive no payment for their performance, nor any percentage of the door or bar. In addition to buying tickets, bands have sometimes been required to pay additional charges for radio and magazine advertising. And there’s more: Some promoters have been accused of tacking on rental fees for such amenities as risers and sound and lighting equipment.

The practice was going on at some clubs well before Mason was introduced to it at the Roxy, but it has grown substantially since then. Among other Southern California rooms that frequently or exclusively operate on a pay-to-play basis: Goodies in Fullerton, Industry in Canoga Park, the Country Club and the Waters Club in San Pedro.

After the Roxy and Country Club dates in 1987, Mason and his band, declaring that it was too expensive to keep going that route, began concentrating on non-pay-to-play venues in outlying areas. But he knew that the Hollywood clubs were where the real action was and where he stood the best chance of getting seen by the record companies.

So he decided to make his frustration public.

Though he says he was warned that he would be blacklisted at some clubs if he launched a public protest of the system, Mason said he received enough encouragement from members of such major bands as Kiss, Motley Crue and Guns N’ Roses to go forward in creating a new, grass-roots coalition of local musicians called Rockers Against Pay-to-Play (RAPP).

In the last few weeks, RAPP has taken to the streets, picketing clubs such as the Whisky, the Roxy and Gazzarri’s. The organization has only about 100 members at this point, but lots of bands share the resentment of the pay-to-play system, Mason says, and he hopes to recruit more of them. RAPP is calling on all local bands to participate in a Labor Day weekend boycott of all pay-to-play establishments.

“I just couldn’t stand it anymore,” Mason said. “I had to put this protest together. The pre-sale ticket policies adopted by club owners and independent promoters have got to go. Not only is this practice destroying a lot of good bands, it’s screwing up the integrity of the entire scene.

“A lot of new bands with members younger than 22 years of age have no idea that musicians used to get paid to play music at Gazzarri’s and the Whisky. Pre-sale ticketing is all they’ve ever done. Pay-to-play promoters are bringing up an entire generation of musicians who don’t even know they’re getting ripped off.”

Pre-sale ticketing has redefined what it means to be a working musician in Los Angeles. Not only are bands expected to perform music for nothing, promoters encourage them to spend every free moment developing mailing lists and canvassing local hangouts with tickets, flyers and business cards.

“It seems senseless for musicians to go out and try to sell tickets every night to a bunch of people on the street they don’t know,” said Todd Michael, guitarist and singer in the rock band Rain on Fire. “That’s a promoter’s job. Artists are supposed to spend their time rehearsing and writing songs and creating music.

“Promoters don’t care about music anymore. They don’t care about the quality of bands. Anybody who can sell a hundred tickets has a guaranteed spot on a show. It’s not about how good you are, it’s about how much money you have.”

“I think it’s absolutely obscene,” Joey Gold, drummer for the rock group Love Hate, said of the pay-to-play system. Before his band was signed to Columbia, Gold says Love Hate was too poor to pay for its tickets.

“We couldn’t scrape together $15 for a set of bass guitar strings,” Gold said. “How were we supposed to come up with $750 for a gig?”

Rock bands aren’t the only ones who complain about pre-sale ticketing. A growing number of in-house booking agents, deejays and talent scouts are voicing concern over the controversial policy.

“Pay-to-play is a travesty,” CBS Records A&R; (artists & repertoire) representative Danny Krash said. As host and talent scout for the cable television show “Rocking in a Hard Place,” Krash is vehement in his opposition to shows that feature pay-to-play acts: “It’s just another example of how musicians in this town are being taken advantage of.”

John Axelrod, A&R; representative for Atlantic Records, also disapproves of pay-to-play promotion. “Bands are not supposed to act as bankers for the clubs. Their job is to play music,” Axelrod said. “Promoters need to understand that the bands are the ones who are doing the clubs a favor by playing for them and not vice versa.”

But, according to promoters, pre-sale ticketing is getting a bum rap.

“Everybody likes to blame it on the promoter, but the bands are just as much at fault,” said Nelly Alloun, owner of Whoa Nelly Productions. “They don’t think about all the expenses promoters have. We’re just trying do our jobs.”

Up until six months ago, Alloun booked pay-to-play shows at the Country Club in Reseda. During her tenure there, she developed a reputation for being a tough, no-nonsense promoter--one unafraid to collateralize debts by impounding gear or taking bands to court.

Although she no longer promotes concerts, Alloun still has opinions about pay-to-play: “If the bands in this city could draw a crowd the way bands did 10 years ago, we wouldn’t even be talking about pre-sale tickets right now.”

Producing live music in Los Angeles is not cheap. According to promoters, a typical pay-to-play show costs about $3,500 to put on.

The standard rent for a club on the Strip runs about $1,500. Advertising expenditures vary dramatically, but average out at about $1,000. The price of stage technicians and security costs about another $1,000.

Nevertheless, the number of pre-sale ticket promoters is on the rise.

“The good thing about pay-to-play is that it almost always helps unknown bands enhance their draw,” Jason Lord said. Lord’s company, Jungle Productions, is one promoter booking shows at the Country Club.

A former musician once subjected to pre-sale ticket policies himself, Lord believes that when a band is featured on a “sold-out professional presentation”--the kind he says his company provides--its ability to become recognized increases.

Amazon, a hard-rock band from Philadelphia, agrees with Lord. According to band leader Tom Vitorino, Amazon has pre-sold tickets for a number of promoters, including CIA and Marcovich Entertainment Group.

“When we first started out, I was in shock. I didn’t think it was too fair,” Vitorino said. “But when you have something worthwhile for sale, people want to buy it. The world is run on a money basis.”

Some promoters believe pre-sale ticket shows give bands a good return on their dollar. “When I hear the term ‘pay-to-play’ it drives me up a wall,” said Marcelle Broomall. “I don’t think any of the bands on my shows are being cheated at all.”

Broomall is the head of Hi-Times, a company that promotes pre-sale ticket shows at the Roxy. Like Jungle, Sidekick and Future Star Productions, Hi-Times prides itself on producing what Broomall calls “stylistically cohesive” shows, headlined by signed acts.

“Believe me, I feel for this situation,” Broomall said. “But you’ve got to understand what’s going on in Hollywood. Everybody is doing the pre-sale thing. I have no choice. I would love to see pre-sale absolutely stop, but it’s not going to happen.”

Although he did not invent the concept, the individual most often credited with popularizing pre-sale ticketing is Paul Shenker. In 1983, Shenker was brought in as an independent promoter to beef up attendance and book at the Country Club.

Back then Shenker refused to book more than three bands on a bill. He sprung for the cost of advertising and gave each act a cut of the profits. These days Shenker heads up Future Star Productions and spends most of his time managing bands.

“Pre-sale has gotten to the point where it’s an abusive policy,” Shenker said. “Somewhere along the way, promoters took a left turn.”

As the cost of rent, security, sound, and lighting equipment escalated, promoters increased the number of acts presented on each bill. To cover overhead and augment profits, promoters began to increase the price and the number of tickets bands were required to pre-sell.

Three years ago, Dave Snyder, nightclub business representative of the Musicians’ Union Local 47, tried to stop pay-to-play by attempting to negotiate a perfunctory performance fee for showcase acts with local club owners, but his efforts proved fruitless.

“The union has fought pay-to-play for years, but it’s just degenerated to a ridiculous point,” Snyder said. “It’s hard to believe, but we met with as much resistance from the musicians as the club owners.”

In reaction to the pre-sale ticket phenomenon, various non-pay-to-play clubs are trying to attract industry attention with unique showcase concepts.

The Coconut Teaszer invites industry representatives to attend a showcase called “L.A.’s Best Kept Secrets” every Tuesday and also features weekly club residencies for bands they feel deserve exposure. The Whisky puts on a “No Bozos Jam” every Monday and Wednesday, spotlighting dozens of unknown local acts. Beginning in August, the Palace will host a biweekly forum called “L.A. Alive” to focus attention on undiscovered Southland talent.

In-house bookers such as Lucretia at FM Station, Dobbs at Raji’s, Wayne Mayotte at Club 88 and Michael Nason at the Red Light District staunchly oppose pay-to-play promotion. Other venues such as Xposeur 54, Sasch, the Anticlub, Club Lingerie, Madame Wong’s and the Club With No Name also manage to keep their doors open without resorting to pay-to-play.

Some observers feel the pay-to-play system has damaged the reputation of local rock clubs.

“You can’t count on any consistency in quality like you used to,” said the Country Club’s Lord.

Agrees Dayle Gloria, proprietor of the Club With No Name (formerly the Scream): “Before, when a group played a famous club like the Roxy or the Whisky, it was a signal to the community that the band had really made it. Now it doesn’t mean a thing.”

Another problem with pay-to-play concerts is that they give headliners a false sense of security. Gloria says that headlining acts begin to believe that they are selling out venues on the strength of their music, when in fact their audience is really just an assortment of individuals who bought tickets from the other bands on the bill.

“It’s pitiful. These guys are out selling tickets to their mothers and their fathers, their neighbors and friends,” she said. “Sometimes it’s even worse than that. Many of them are buying the tickets and just giving them away.”