Andy Frasco's World Saving Podcast - EP 6: Don Strasburg (AEG Presents) & Kunj Shah (Live For Live Music)

Episode Date: May 8, 2018

Twofer coming at ya! Our guests Kunj Shah (Live For Live Music, Plexus Ent. Group) and Don Strasburg (AEG Live, Phish Promoter, Red Rocks Amphitheater Agent) share with us a glimpse behind the proverbial curtain of live music and festival productions. A new voice has entered the din of the WSP: his name is Dolav. And Dolav LOVES the Utah Jazz... This is Episode 6.  To keep up with the podcast, follow us on Instagram @WorldSavingPodcast For more information on Andy Frasco, tour dates, the band and the blog, go to: AndyFrasco.com For more information on our guest, Kunj Shah, visit: https://liveforlivemusic.com/ Don Strasburg, visit: https://www.aegpresents.com/ Produced by Andy Frasco Yeti Chris Lorentz Engineered by Chris Lorentz Featuring Arno Bakker Shawn Eckels & Andee Avila Brian Schwartz ... and Dolav

Here we go, one, two, three. Well let me tell you a story About Lake Charles, Louisiana A night where my friend had so much fun He had so much fun Well he went to a dive bar That never closes And that's the night that he fell in love

That's why they call him Raw Dog He dubs the dick He was late in the evening And she might have been thick He was licking her pussy Up against the wall He sticked his dick in the grease

And said how are y'all Well he checked As the close was clear So he whispered in her ear To let him Fetch for some protection Well he reached down in his pocket And he came up empty handed

And that's the night that he got the hurt That's why they call him Wrong Dog Dumpster Dick It was late in the evening and she found him in a fit He was licking her pussy up against the wall He sticked his dick in the grease and said Howdy y'all You're listening to the World Famous Podcast, let's go!

I feel like shit today. Yeti. Welcome to my hometown. What did you do to me last night? We were at Tom Graney's last night. This is why I don't take Fridays off. This is the first Friday we've ever had off. What time did you start yesterday?

I mean, we drove eight hours. Then we had a day off Friday, so we thought we'd come here an extra day early. And now I'm here, and then we hung out, and I got so excited, I drank like an asshole again. It's like, you know that moment in a blackout when you wake up? Oh, I don't know. You're a loyal man.

I've never been blackout drunk. I've never been blackout drunk. But continue. I want to hear this when you like wake up in a frantic that you sent people text messages you don't know what happened oh shit what do I do what do I have to undo

shit thank god I used to send dick pics I don't do that anymore women love that especially when it comes out of nowhere with zero context ugh I hate that feeling that anxiety that you're trying to bring ex-girlfriends back into your life at a 4 a.m. existential crisis because you're lonely.

Because you're lonely. I've been doing that less as I get older, but in my 20s, I was just... Putting a coal into the fire. Fuck. You're talking all these different people that have been in the industry. We've got Mike Dillon.

Carl Denson. Carl Denson. We did Carl. These are guys that are over 50. Both of them. Carl's 62. Denson's almost 50. He are over 50. Both of them. Carl's 62. Denson's almost 50. He's probably 50. No, Carl. Oh, yeah, yeah.

Denson's 62. And then Mike Dillon's 52. Yeah. These guys, they've been in the industry for a while. You got Bob Ware coming up. I mean, this guy that started the stone or the dead. Dead Yeti. Oh, my God.

People are going to be so pissed. They're going to kill me. I'm sorry. Name five Grateful Dead songs I can't I'm straight up I can't either I got to do my research before I go into the

no I'll admit it but here's the thing so this jam you've come into this kind of your own in this jam scene you know I mean you're getting you just got booked again for Jam Cruise next year. We did. And you jumped.

You were telling me, like, you don't have to put numbers out there, but you guys moved up a spot or two. Yeah, yeah. I mean, our little font on the festivals are getting a little bit bigger now. This is good. And that's big stuff down the road.

You were talking about, like, we're looking at a bus now instead of a sprinter. And that's big stuff down the road. You were talking about like, we're looking at a bus now instead of a sprinter. And that's huge stuff. And that's, but this, the way that happens, you and I were talking about this earlier. The way that happens is you do what for the next four months? Play 25 festivals. Yeah, we're playing 25.

But that's what's helped our career so much is the festival scene. How much year over year are you going back to those venues, to those things? Yeah. We're like a lingering band where like the promoters will invite us back for a couple of years in a row until I'm absolutely obnoxious.

You know, until or because of maybe both, maybe both. Cause you did, you got, I remember here in Macy, we'll play a festival and then we'll, we'll do a repeat act.

They don't normally do repeat acts next year or later. And yeah, that's what's helped me build my career because you get the first taste. Kunj talks about this a lot. Soft tickets are important. If you don't know what a soft ticket is, a soft ticket is a venue like a festival or an open air fest or like a town community show.

And they're not coming for you. They're just coming for the experience. They're coming because it's going on. And then there's, and Kunj also talks about the fact that there's venues that create that. Like he mentions the Brooklyn Bowl. Like I go, he says, you know,

like I'll, anyways, we'll listen to it. But I think it's great that this happens and you get this difference between the hard tickets where they're buying Andy Frasco and the UN ticket on Eventbrite or whatever and that's where they're going versus, oh, I want to go to this festival or I'm going to go to this

venue because they always have good music. You guys are playing Electric Forest in Michigan this year. Electric Forest. We've got Mountain Jam. Mountain Jam. Yeah, 25 festivals we're doing. We have-

Fro Fest. I mean, all this stuff. We started a festival in Utah called Fro Fest. We're going to Europe. We're open for the Foo Fighters. Oh, we were talking about- Yeah, we were- Oh, that's right.

You're opening in October. June. June. Close. I'm getting all my dates wrong. Way close. This is why we can't black out before we do a podcast. That's why I can't hang out with you. I'm only- I'm going to my dates wrong. Way close. This is why we can't black out before we do a podcast. That's why I can't hang out with you.

I'm only, I'm going to tell my management, we should only hang out for three hours a day. Not two days in a row. This is what happened last time. You come over here, you come, we come,

I meet you at the bar with you and you're all smiling. I'm like, oh fuck, here we go. Here we go. We're about to drink. We're about to drink. But yeah,

we do, yeah, festival scene, it's here. We're here. We're about to drink. Yeah, we do. Yeah, festival scene, it's here. We're here. We're in spring, and festival scene is arriving. 25 in the next four months. Yeah, so this episode is basically about the music industry, the other guys that you don't really see. The promoters, the bookers, the people that make it happen.

Yeah. We got Kunj from live for live music coons if you don't know what live for live music is it's a media company that is basically the tastemakers of the jam scene on the east coast and they're starting to spread all around the country he owns a management company he's got bands like spafford and aqueous and all these other bands that have hard pronouncing names oregon freeman or what is it oh this has a band called oregon freeman like that's a pretty good name that's i mean those guys morgan free oregon freeman oregon they're yeah i guess i haven't heard them i saw oh speaking of funk bands i think we were talking about this i saw a funk band

that i make i was excited to get involved with or to see. Five Alarm Funk. Yeah. We were talking about that. I felt like I played with them. These guys. I know I did. Canada.

Canada Cats. Canadian band. Yeah. They're up for a Juno in Canada. What the fuck is a Juno? It's the Canadian Grammy. Really? Yeah.

Is it important or no one gives a fuck about the Juno? Well, I mean, it depends on who you ask I guess I think I mean they were stoked on it like it's I mean

is it a big deal in Canada yeah I think it is I mean it's right up there with Boxing Day that's pretty good

I don't know if that's it but no they're up for Album of the Year Instrumental oh nice and I caught these guys

at the venue you guys are playing at tonight and that's why you've been asked what's the difference between album the year instrument so like they don't fuck this singer they're mostly i mean the guy can sing he's he's totally got i'd be so pissed off if i got an award for album of the year instrumental as a instrumental album of the year he's he's a band leader he's a band leader like me that's this is what i'm gonna get my band we're gonna get album of the year besides the vocals everything else was great except that i love that

i love when people come up to me hey man your show is amazing you are a good front man like thanks bud they don't know what to say. Great entertainer. That's like, thanks. They come in here like, Hey, I'm going to suck your dick, but where is it? That's exactly what it is.

You know, I, I love the compliment. Um, one of these days they'll, they'll talk about my songwriting, but until then, one, two,

three, four, like a, like a goddamn, just kicking it off every time, like a animal um but yes industry it's it's important to know that these tastemakers are building the scenes we got don strasburg on on this podcast today who basically books the talent for red rocks started this festival that's basically coachella of Denver called Grand Dusey that we're playing on.

Thanks, Don, for booking us on that. And we have Kunj. So Don does basically the Northwest. He runs AEG Northwest. So he started the Fox Theater. He helped rebuild the Fillmore. He basically built Denver's music scene into what it is now. And now it's like, it's Jam Mecca over there.

It's amazing. Like Red Rocks, 9,000 seats. He's booking 100 plus shows at Red Rocks that are selling out. That was the first place I smoked weed. Red Rocks? Yeah. At a show or were you just like hiking? Counting crows. I love them. Did you see weed. Red Rocks? Yeah. At a show or were you just like hiking? Counting Crows.

I love them. Did you see it with Wallflowers? No. They were solo. Yeah, they were solo that night. And it was dope. It was in July. It was the middle of summer.

I was down there for doing an event and they happened to be playing and the whole crew went up. It was crazy. All these bands that are out there, Leftover Salmon, Galactic. My boy Vince. Yeah, thank you Dave Schools for producing a record. whole crew went up it was crazy all these bands that are out there uh leftover salmon uh galactic all of yeah thank you dave schools for producing a record that helped him produce a record that sounds good uh great actually thanks hype man um but all of these bands like when they started out

they weren't huge you know and and they did and the grateful dead i mean people are just like what the fuck are these guys like just rolling around and then suddenly they started this falling fish the same thing and you were saying that scars guard strasburg strasburg whatever is it or you're saying that he uh created this this scene yeah he brought fish to denver right you were saying like and i was like wait i thought they were they're not from denver i know but that's got to be so monumental like bring a band that has such- I mean, like, they're an East Coast band. He talks about this, how he booked them for, you know,

X amount of money, a thousand bucks. Just got them out there. And they just showed up. The craziest thing I heard about Phish is that they all have PhDs. PhDs? Yeah. I don't know enough about Phish. No, like, pretty huge dicks. I could see that. I don't know enough about Phish. No, like pretty huge dicks.

I can see that. I can see. No, but they're all smart guys. I mean, smart people. I wonder if you're in a band like Phish, do you get pussy? I mean, I'd imagine. I think so too,

but are they the guys who are like, oh no, it's all about the music. Or is it like, do you think like in the younger years they're fucking party? I think they were part. I don't know. No, you've been doing this for 10 years. I was fucking partying. Yeah. Let's face it. When you're at a festival, you're getting drunk. You're getting fucked up. Yeah. You know, it's like, you can't really remember. Oh my God. Track six was tie. You just remember the moment in the set. It's so easy to record a show that you could bring that memory home now. I think that's how all these jam bands got so successful. The Fish of the

World, the Umphreys and McGee's of the World are really smart businessmen because you're bringing that experience home with you. And if you're a good enough musician where when they bring it home and it doesn't sound like shit, you know, you're going to build fans for life because they remember the experience and that's why like i appreciate coons and don so much they're so smart of understanding what people want and what people need and how to build a festival that works and how to build a media company that people are interested in that you know they're the future of this music industry you know they're the bill grahams of the world now like the new age bill grahams uh-huh and um yeah these interviews these two interviews are gonna are you talking about billy graham yeah dude these guys want

i'm telling you like bill graham yeah strasburg used to work for bill graham what yeah strasburg is a g dude yeah he's like He's like old New York mafia style. Oh, my God. I didn't know this. I've heard the interview, but I didn't know this about him. Strasburg is the man, dude. He's like one of my idols. Like, I thought I was going to be a promoter when I was, before I learned.

That's what you started doing. Yeah. Like, I wanted to be Don Strasburg without even knowing who Don Strasburg was. You know? So, you guys, we're going to do two for one. Two for one. We got Donny Strasberg. We'll hit you up.

We'll give you a little segment before we hit up Don Strasberg or Kunj's. I don't know which one we're going to start with, but we'll get it. Enjoy, guys. You got two for one. Two for one. Two for on the nickel.

World saving podcast. It's festival season. Enjoy. It is like a beer. It's like holding a beer. I like holding this mic stand like this. I feel powerful. We're here, guys. New York City or Brooklyn. Beautiful place, Kunj. Thank you. It's a nice, nice spot you have here.

I'm with Kunj. He is the president of Live for Live Music and owns a management company. What's the management company called? I'm a partner in the management company. Partner? Yeah, it's Plexus Entertainment Group. That's what it's called.

So management, he basically has a foot in the music industry that I love. I mean, I'm in this jam world. I think you're more than just the jam scene too, but you've really built your career off the jam scene and stuff. Yeah, I mean, the jam scene, the funk scene, jazz. The jam scene is funny because there's the jam scene and there's jam bands, but a lot of what constitutes the jam scene is not really jam bands.

You have a lot of funk bands. I mean, you're technically now in the jam scene after Jam Cruise, but you're not a jam band. You have bands like Lettuce. You have bands like Galactic. It's just bands that are good. Is it a culture? It's definitely a culture.

I think it started with bands that really, you know, like the Grateful Dead and kind of made its way down. But I think it's just an appreciation for live bands. And I think that's what it really comes down to with the jam scene is just people who like bands that like play well live. Yeah. You know, I was a promoter, but I was in the pop punk scene. So I was basically building shows to get these bands and try to take off a few bands.

And basically, I feel like you and Peter Shapiro are really the tastemakers of this scene. You guys run your own publishing companies. You guys basically filter the media in there. run your own publishing companies you guys basically filter the media in there and you're picking bands that you really love to really uh like and like to help to help grow their path as well like you're i i consider you as just as much of an artist as the guy who plays guitar in the band or the guy who sings in the group or bass or drums. I mean, you're just as important for someone's development as a group as in all those guys, right? Yeah, I mean, Pete Shapiro is definitely a hero of mine.

What he's done with Relics and the magazine and what that magazine has been able to do for a lot of artists and a lot of fans in the scene has always been inspiring to me. I could always look at what he's doing on any given day and be inspired by it. And, you know, we're just trying to do something similar to what he's doing. And by doing the things that inspire us and inspire me. And, you know. What's inspiring you right now?

You know, there are a lot of bands out there that are really making some waves. I mean, you know, I think the bands that I'm, I'm working with are doing really well. Spafford, Aqueous, Oregon Freeman, Munyon, but there's also, there's, there's something in the water right now. And people are, people are making their way back to, you know, to the jam scene and kind of really digging the old school four-piece, five-piece jam bands. What do you think that is? You think they're over the DJ scene? Well, I think the EDM scene is definitely not as big as it used to be, but at least the commercial EDM scene is kind of dissipating a little bit. But there's some stuff in the EDM scene, the electronic music scene, that's just phenomenal. That's really taking things to another level that I think, you know,

you can't even do with traditional instruments. So I'm not really a purist that says instruments can be the only thing that, you know, bands with instruments are the only way that bands can be a live band. You look at Pretty Lights live band, you look at, you know, some of the stuff that these electronic based artists are doing. And it's phenomenal. That's pretty cool. I really dig it. I'm starting to dig it more and more now that they're adding more live increments to it.

Then what do you think it is? Do you think it was just an oversaturation of festivals? I think it's the festival. You'll see the festival market definitely… It feels like it's just so many of them. There were so many of them. And I think the bubble did pop. Yeah.

And what you're seeing is a lot of festivals disappeared. And now the counter-argument to that is kind of… You know, you got to be careful because now a lot of the bigger companies, the bigger promoters… You don't mind if I smoke, do you? Yeah, go for it. A lot of the bigger promoters, you know, the ones I won't even mention because they're too powerful. But they're starting to buy out all the major festivals.

And then you have these gigantic radius clauses. Are people trying to buy out like promotion companies too, like yours? I'm sure there are. I mean, it started back with the EDM scene where SFX was buying every little promotional company that there was. Live Nation was a conglomerate of different promotional companies around the country. I think that's slowed down now, but they're buying festivals themselves. Oh, really? Yeah.

AEG's Live Nations? Yeah. They own Live Nation as Bonnaroo, you know, there's a, and you're, you know, you have the bigger festivals that are now owned by these bigger conglomerates. They're now, they kind of, you're not, if you're a band, you're only able to play one big festival in the Northeast, one big festival in the Southeast, one big festival on the West Coast, because otherwise're radiused out yeah of all those festivals and a lot of these festivals are amazing opportunities for a lot of these bands to really showcase themselves in front of a larger audience but you sometimes also see that bands now don't have the ability to play for you know they can't play more than two or three shows in an area where they have fans so an artist like like yourself, you're not able to work. And what you do is go out and play shows. And even though you are able to play shows,

you have the means to play shows, you have your truck, your bus ready to go, your trailer ready to go, you physically can't play those shows because there's something in a contract that says you can't play here. So it was getting oversaturated, but it wasn't a bad thing, in my opinion.

I think having that many festivals and bringing that culture to a regional level wasn't this horrible thing that was happening. And we have to be careful that doesn't go the other way. We want to make sure there are, you know, where the mid-level festivals do exist so that smaller bands can survive. Yeah, because I feel like, as a manager standpoint,

you know, like, if I'm getting, okay, cool, I'm doing Bonnaroo, but they're only putting me on a one o'clock on a small stage, like, the radius, that radius clause isn't worth it when you could play main better time slots at all these mid-level markets and like have 2,000, 3,000, 4,000 people at each show. And it's not just because you're on a Bonnaroo list or something, right?

And I think that's really important for managers to kind of, you know, think about is when they get an offer, you know, not to always open their eyes when, you know, they see a Bonnaroo offer or a big, you know, a Bonnaroo offer, playing Bonnaroo is a huge, huge deal. And, you know, I would usually almost always recommend taking something like that. But when you're looking at playing a festival and you have a huge radius and you can't play anything around the area for three months, sometimes you have to wait out and see if you want to play four or five festivals that are kind of on the mid-tier and be able to provide

that experience for more fans. And maybe you do one year, you play the bigger festivals. The next year you come back and you play five of the mid-level festivals. Oh, so that's how they run. It's like a wave. Yeah, you wave it. You play what you can, but you make the smart strategic choices. Because I felt like what you did, which was smart with Spafford,

is you did a lot of those mid-range festivals and you pushed them hard and all those markets and all those jam scenes that are big, like the ohios of the world and the northeast of the world and the southeast festivals and you you basically put them into all the markets that could get you know bonnaroo's interest now because now you're selling hard tickets and we also have you know uh great agents you know aaron pinkis yeah lee and Pincus and Lee Anderson as well. And they definitely are able to get some offers from some festivals

that maybe wouldn't think to look at a band the size of Spafford. So we have two of our bands at Paradigm, two of our bands at Madison House. Both great agencies. Yeah, I love Madison House, dude. They're good people too. Who are you with? I'm with New Front House. Both great agencies. Yeah, I love Madison House, dude. They're good people, too. Who are you with? I'm with New Frontier. Oh, sweet.

So, like, Greg Little. It's fascinating because, you know, it's like agencies are just like management companies, too. It's like you have to find the right agency that will develop your act because, you know, it's like it depends on the roster, what can help. Do agents work more about finding

bills for artists than managers do? I think it's definitely, you need a solid partnership. Management, in my opinion, should always have a pretty good idea of how routing works. I actually, I also rely on my other management partners, Dan Rosinski and Michael Colton to also have an in-depth knowledge of how routing and tour routing works. And, you know, we all play different ideas off each other. And, you know, my partner, Dan has a very, he's able to look at basically the country and be like, all right, these are the markets we want to hit and kind of present it to our agents. Whereas even our agents will have a totally different idea of how they want to do it. And it comes down to figuring out the balance of how it's all going

to play out in the end. And I think it's important for managers also to know when to say no and something doesn't work or a room doesn't feel right or a market doesn't feel right or we're not ready for that market or we should go to a bigger room in a market. Whereas I think the agents are the best at beating up promoters, people like me, on the other end. It's also nice to be on the other end of it. Yeah, now you see both sides of it.

Now I see both sides of it. Wow. Isn't that funny? Catch-22. You would never think five years ago when you were trying to get the best deals from these guys, now you're trying to get the best deals for your guys. And it's funny. Sometimes I'm even beating myself up for my bands.

That's what all good managers do. Yeah. and it's tough. You finally get to see why the agents were beating up things. The expenses that go into a room, the expenses that go into a door, the expenses that go into having a crew. Life on the road is expensive.

It's expensive. It really is. No matter what a promoter thinks they're paying a band and how grateful the band should be for having some sort of offer, they don't realize how much goes in. The bigger the band gets just means the crew gets bigger. The lights get bigger. The whole system, the whole business behind it is bigger and it costs more so like just even even operating the op it's it's tough as the band gets bigger the tour gets bigger oh yeah costs get bigger and just even routing through a specific city like there's a certain amount of money that just needs to be there for the band to exist yeah it's so true and especially now you're in a point where like you said clause, where you can only hit these markets one time a year now?

Or do you try to hit them? No, we work around it. And we're able to. But if you're not… So how many times is your boys doing each market a year? It depends. I mean, we usually want to hit something in the fall. And then maybe again in the winter.

Maybe you just do the fall once a year. You want a solid tour in the fall and then maybe again in the winter. Maybe you just do the fall once a year. You want a solid tour in the fall, a solid tour in the winter, spring time. And maybe do, if you're going to do

a market once a year, you're probably going to want to play it in the fall and then come back again in the fall. It depends. Sometimes you want a hard ticket and a soft ticket.

I mean, it depends. I mean, it depends on the band. I think it's important for all bands to build hard ticket history. You know, I mean, it depends. I mean, it depends on the band. I think it's important for all bands to build hard ticket history. You know, you can go into a room… Well, for bands who don't know what hard ticket and soft ticket…

Explain to them what hard ticket is and what soft ticket is. So, a hard ticket is, you know, a straight up venue where you're playing music hall in Williamsburg and you're selling $15 tickets. You have to earn each ticket that is sold. Like there has to be a fan that goes,

I'm going, yeah, I'm going to this show to buy a ticket for, uh, Andy Frasco tonight. And that's the reason why I'm going to the music hall Williamsburg. Um, sometimes with venues,

one of my favorite venues, Brooklyn bowl, I'm going to Brooklyn bowl because it's thursday because it's friday and i know they're gonna have good music that's very fascinating so it's a it's kind of had like half and half soft ticket and hard tickets it's a it's a you have some diehard fans that are go to brooklyn bowl because the the programming they do there is phenomenal yeah yeah but sometimes people just go because it's also a bowling alley i go sometimes because i know there's going to be good music

because their talent buyer, Lucas Sachs, curates a phenomenal calendar year-round. But sometimes they just go because that's the thing to do. So you don't always know how many tickets you're worth in a specific room or in a specific market. So that's hard tickets. Yeah, that's a specific market. So that's hard tickets. Yeah. If it's,

that's a soft ticket. No, soft ticket, but hard ticket is selling a venue, a show for, they are coming to see you. You're the only night or one of two or, or co-bill.

And a soft ticket is if you're on a festival or like a free show that has correct. Yep. So, I mean, or, or just like a room that is considered a soft ticket play. I like the Brooklyn ball. Oh, okay. So Brooklyn ball. Yeah. Okay. Correct? Yep. So, I mean, or just like a room that is considered a soft ticket place

like the Brooklyn Bowl. Oh, okay. So Brooklyn Bowl. Yeah. Okay. That makes sense. Well, and that can go both ways as well.

I mean, it's tough. I mean, what really, you know, a soft ticket is kind of what you're presenting. Or like those Central Park shows are soft tickets. Yeah.

So a Central Park show is a free ticket, right? So you sign up, you'll see people that are going to Central Park that, you know, just live in Manhattan. They go to things at Central Park. Yeah.

So I like this because I could go back and forth with your management brain and then your promoter's brain. So let's go back to your promoter's brain now. Okay. So you see a band and say you're running a festival. You have only six or eight bills and you need to look at hard ticket. Do you look at hard ticket sales or do you look at this band's done the jam cruise the soft ticket

like what would you it's a bit of both I mean I'm lucky enough to curate festivals like Brooklyn Comes Alive is a festival yeah that's sick that's a hard work

that's like 20 venues right no no why is that lineup so big why is there so many people on that thing so we only do three lineups

three venues three venues and the lineup sometimes comes last year's lineup we did two days so we did you know there was over 30 35 sets and we highlight each musician and a festival like that we kind of curate based on musicians we want to see uh play with other musicians or you know projects that musicians have been passionate about but never had the opportunity to, you know,

put them in a certain place. And we're able to, it's a very musician forward festival. And it's very, it's very, it's a nerds nerd festival. Like you have to be a, like,

no, not a casual fan. That's going to go see Mo on a Friday night is going to come to Brooklyn comes alive. It has to be somebody that knows every member of the band. Yeah. Want this project play with this other band specific guy.

Like it makes it a tougher festival to sell to people because it's hard to market, you know, each musician's name, but we keep it that way. We want to make it

an event where we're highlighting each and every musician that's on the lineup. But I forgot why we were even, you know, when I was looking at festival lineups and I'm looking for a band to book, I mean, a lot of it's on the lineup. But I forgot why we were even... Oh, when I look at festival lineups

and I'm looking for a band to book, I mean, a lot of it's instinct as well. I mean, because when you book a festival with how early you have to book them these days... Yeah, how early do you have to book it? I mean, six to eight months if you're late. 10 to 12 months if you're smart. There's some festivals that even book

before their event this year takes place. So it's tough. So you have to have your finger on the pulse and really kind of have an idea of is this band going to be worth as many tickets in eight months. And you also have to look at your whole lineup. I think a lot of times,

if you book a bunch of bands that make sense on paper, it doesn't really translate well when you look at an overall lineup. Sometimes you see a lineup like, this looks good on paper, but when you see the full lineup together, it doesn't really have a theme. It doesn't have a vibe.

It doesn't really... That's important. Yeah, and you look at the festivals that are owned by radio companies, you know? it doesn't really have a theme it doesn't have a vibe it doesn't really that's important yeah and you look at the festivals that are owned by radio companies you know I don't really want to

call specific ones out but like don't but call them out but like talk that shit talk that shit bro I don't know

say like you know what Mountain Jam looks like the you know now I think you know I think that's Town what a mountain jam looks like the yeah and you know now i think you know

i think that's town square media and uh it looks like a lineup that is based upon how many plays each one of those bands get yeah and that's in on the radio and i'm sure that works is that bonnaroo though too and coachella or no bonnaroo is i think it's booked now by live nation and used to be done by Superfly. Oh, I get what you're saying. So like the radio shows like the Kiss FM. Yeah. Acoustics.

So there's some festivals now like Mountain Jam that are owned by radio companies. Yeah. In general. And I'm not, or people, sometimes people book festivals based on just sheer numbers. And you find that it doesn't it doesn't sell as well it doesn't look it doesn't translate as well

because there's no vibe if you look at a festival like Huluween that's a great one that's one of my favorite festivals we stumbled upon me and my fiance stumbled upon your set

at Electric Forest and it was just it was unbelievable this was like 3-4 years ago we had just started dating then and we now you're married and then we're about to be married but uh that's thank you um and we just stumbled upon the set and we were like this is amazing this is so much fun you're shotgun and beers you're crowd surfing you're just being an absolute maniac. This is the best thing ever. So when Sarah was putting up an article

about 10 of the best things that you can only find at Electric Forest, you were in that. You know, you're one of the top things. And that was only because we had stumbled upon the set. We had seen it. We enjoyed it. We loved it.

And then we were able to put it out there. Because we put it out there, a lot of people were turned on to your music. And we got on way more festivals. You hooked us up, man. I'm telling you, you're the ringleader, dude. All right, last question, bud. All right.

If you could book the dream festival of bands dead and alive what would it be that's a tough one i mean i mean you could you could do just give me like top give me just six uh cream grateful dead um jimi hendrix i throw in fish in there because they're my favorite band Dead. Jimi Hendrix. I throw in Fish in there because they're my favorite band. Fuck yeah. Damn. Rolling Stones. Stones. And what about like any

upcoming bands that you love? We'll add your bands that you manage to. We'll add them on there. But who else? Like Lettuce. You still love Lettuce? No, I mean, I throw... Like Lettuce. You still love Lettuce? Yeah, of course. I love that band.

How many times have you seen them? I don't keep track of bands. Even Fish, I've definitely seen over. You're always out at shows, dude. After 200 times, I realized that it's no longer... 200 times, you're a fucking animal, dude. It's no longer a badge of honor. It's just a badge of shame.

I've seen this band every time. And it's still good though because you keep going. It's still amazing and I keep going. But yeah, I just,

you know, I just, I love seeing these bands and you're right. These bands, they earn the undying loyalty of their fans because they put,

they go out of their way to put on a different show every night. They go out of their way to really, you know, do something special each and every single night and give it their all. You're like the ultimate groupie. Basically. That's what it comes down to.

What do I do? I'm just a really big groupie. But that's, I mean, you need that. You need the Penny Lanes Or this shit Will not go down Kunj I love you buddy Thanks for doing this With me man

Of course man Check out Live for Live Music Check out all his bands Kunj is the tastemaker Of the jam scene And if you don't know him You will soon Thanks for listening buds

Thank you man Take care buddy It is halftime At the Enni Fresco Interview Hour Here's a quick message From the UN It is halftime at the Enni Fresco interview hour. Here's a quick message from the U.N. Hello, everybody, and welcome to Dolab's weekly sportscast. He's talking shit about the game.

He's got a weird fucking name. It's sports with Dolab. This week, we're going to be talking about some NBA playoffs. All right, let's get into it. Utah Jazz, NBA playoffs. We're fucking taking it this year. Fuck all the fucking haters. We're in the fucking playoffs.

We're in the playoffs. No more keywords. They're not going to be in the playoffs. Fuck you. We fucking won. See, bitch. First round against the playoffs. Fuck you. We fucking won. First round against the Thunder. Three stars by ass.

A bunch of fucking chumps. He really loves the Utah Jazz. If he had the opportunity, he'd lick their ass. It's sports with Don't Love. Fuck you, Andy Frasco. Woo-hoo. Smells like weed. It smells like the weed. Fuck you, Andy Frasco. Smells like weed. It smells like the weed.

Andy's taking the pot. Andy's taking the pot. Don Juan Julio Strasburg. Andy, taking the pot, Frasco. I'm bringing the weed into AG office. Do you take the pot or do you take the weed? I take the pot sometimes and sometimes I inject the weed. You know, my business partner here, he sometimes asks, do you take a pee-pee or do you leave a pee-pee?

That's a good question. I think philosophers will be stumped throughout the years about this. I mean, it is a really interesting question. Don, how we doing, buddy? I'm good. Good to see you today, my friend a really interesting question. Don, how we doing, buddy? I'm good. Good to see you today, my friend. Thanks for everything. People don't know who Don Strasberg is.

You're living under a rock in the music industry. He books Red Rocks. What do you run, Denver AEG? I'm the co-president of AEG Presents Rocky Mountains and AEG Presents Pacific Northwest. That's amazing. Tell me how you got started, man. You're a Colorado guy your whole life, right?

No, no, no. I grew up in New York. But you went to college? You went to college? Yeah, I went to college at Colorado College in Colorado Springs. Nice. What part of New York? Westchester County.

Nice. New Yorker. The only thing more sheltered than the children is the taxes. Nice, man. Did you always want to be a promoter? You worked at the Fox, right? Was that your first gig? I opened the Fox.

You opened the Fox? Yeah. How'd that start? What is… I was in 19… Were you renting the space? Nah. Okay.

So, it was 1992. And I was in college at CC. Call it a college. And I was promoting shows at the college, you know, like one of those, like it was called Live Sounds. I think it still is. The student, you know, activity board that, you know, did concerts. And I started promoting Phish at Colorado College. That's what I heard. Because I wanted to bring Phish to Colorado because I was a college kid. And I'm like, dude, I want to bring my favorite band to Colorado.

And, you know, this was like Phish was playing, you know, the Paradise in Boston. And that was the biggest room they were playing. Really? You know, it was a big deal. Were they just doing East Coast runs? Yeah, they had come to Colorado once that I hadn't even known about. But they had never really played outside of you know you know vermont and massachusetts and um i remember the first time they went down and played wetlands it was a big deal i mean it

was like six dollars and they sold it out you know and that was like 90 what was the cap of wetlands 800 um it's crazy and uh what i remember um yeah i mean like like, you know, it was me and my buddies. And we had decided, you know, Phish was our band. And, you know, I had to bring him to Colorado. And one thing led to another. And I got him to come to Colorado College. What was the guarantee at that time? Well, actually, behind you on the wall is actually the proposal for that show to come.

Well, see, what happened was, was that I was at school and yeah, you'll see right there, it says 1,500 bucks. 1,450 to be exact. Actually, no, no, no, no, no. Hold on. Well, to be clear, the offer, I think it was 1,450, maybe $1,500, but also was two hotel rooms for seven people because, you know, they had to sleep somewhere.

There was a $50 intensive advertising budget for a campus blitz. What would that involve? Putting up posters and writing a big sign up, you know, putting a big sign up over the student center that said fish is coming. Um, but, um, so, you know, obviously we wanted to bring fish to Colorado and, um, you know, I had no idea what I was doing. Um, and, but I wanted to get my favorite man to come to my college. And so what happens is, is that I, I'll never forget it. I was walking through like the quad, it's the campus in September. And I saw this guy, he was a friend of mine. His name was Tim Swope, I think.

And he was running the outdoor recreation committee. And I said, you know, hey, I really want to get this man a fish. He's like, you got to totally get fish. We'll get you the money. And I'm like, oh man, the guy who runs the ORC committee can help. So of course, I dug into it. And well, one thing led to another.

And obviously, he didn't have very much money. He had like 300 bucks. That would, you know. So I wound up going through the year and engaging with their manager who, you know, managed them for a long time. A guy named John Paluska.ka you know we were all babies i mean john john had been a manager for them like eight months you know and i had to go in front of the color to college you know civic you know board you know like the student funding board and put a proposal together like why so our idea was to do a show with them on Earth Day

a free show on Earth Day at Colorado College in 1990 so I put this proposal together yeah it's okay come in

I'm actually doing an interview I need boss man do the crossword anyway I don't know if you spliced this up do you

yeah I spliced it up yeah you're right it's 2018 Don Juan I got you who cares anyway you're the boss

so anyway the I went in front of the committee I had to type up a whole thing so behind you on my wall is a dot matrix print out of that actual proposal

that was used that day and I went in and I said like, you know, this great band from Burlington, Vermont, they just got signed and are releasing their first CD. And they got signed to Absolute A Go-Go Records at the time. This is way before they were even on Elektra or anything. And, you know, the only product they had at that point was Junta, their tape, basically. How'd you hear about Phish? I lived in Burlington, Vermont for a summer.

And all my buddies were like, yeah. And we used to go to like, you know, not even Nectar's. We used to go to this place called The Front and see them. And we had to sneak in because we weren't 21. I mean, we had to like, you know, literally sneak in. And so basically, I made the proposal and I had to put this whole thing together. You know, Fish is a great band and, you know, it's a, we don't need alcohol on Earth Day. People can have fun without alcohol, but I need $1,500 to pay them.

I need $800 for a sound system. Looking back on it, it was a couple of interesting things. One was the date was, I think, April 20th, which now is a pretty famous day at the time. It was just Earth Day. It wasn't 420. But the other thing was that, I think it was April 20th. I'm not sure. You can look on that thing.

The second thing was that there are pictures of it. And it was this amazing little site they had at the college. It was on this flat concrete thing. The Mount Pikes Peak was just right behind them. Now, when I look back later, I realize that one, April 20th, you know, is, you know, look, it's okay to do, we do some shows outdoors, but it's dicey. I mean, it could snow, you know. Second thing is there was no roof on the stage. Nothing.

It was just the band playing. You know, I didn't know you needed a roof. What's a roof? And I remember the band started playing late and we were having such a good time that Chris Corota started running around between the set break and had to start setting up lights because they didn't have any lights. So he just put a couple of light trees up, you know. And actually on the tape, it's kind of funny. The band calls me, they gave me a nickname Dandy Don. And on the tape, I was listening to it a while agoandy Don and on the tape I was listening to it a while ago

and Paige comes on at the end and I guess I told them they go can we keep playing I said you know yeah but everybody's got to clean up so he's like Dandy Don says

if everybody cleans up we can do a couple more songs and it's on the track it's on the it's on the tape of course you have it right it's everywhere I mean it's a

and the thing what makes okay we're really diving in here, but what makes that show, besides being really the first thing I ever really did for my life important, there was a guy named Mike Grace. And Mike is still very active today. He makes these things called Grace Amps. And he makes these like Mike Pre's, like really high-end, high-end studio. Boutique amps and studio. Very high-level studio stuff. You know, reducing the whisper and the noise, whatever.

I mean, like really, if you've got a studio, you probably have the top studios in the world probably have, you know, Grace equipment, Grace design equipment in it. Well, he was a young guy too. And he had just put like a little multi-track recording unit into like a van. And somehow he got in touch with the band and they had multi-tracked the show. It's 1990. The band wasn't even on a major label. They weren't multi-tracking their shows. I mean, maybe once or twice, if even, but it wasn't like something that

just had, you know, it was before Pro Tools this is before this stuff didn't exist so it was like you know I remember after the show the band all ran off the stage and ran to the van to listen because they were so excited but there's

you know obviously because of that the tapes are absolutely spectacular and actually moving forward Mike did a bunch of Colorado run of the last couple years

he had you know made a couple really good so Mike was basically one of the founders of doing these live shows no no no but he just was a for fish like for fishes like i don't know if he nah he just was like he i mean there are people taping the band yeah nobody who was like plugged right in yeah to their equipment and actually mixing it down on the live multi-tracking it you know that

was a relatively new thing but that's you know you know, fish history, et cetera. But anyway, that's how it got started for me. Wow. And what happened was, was that as we started doing this, Paluska and I, they didn't have an agent at the time, Paluska and I said, well, if they're going to come to Colorado, where else can they play? And we helped them set up a few other gigs. They came out and they started playing the 156 seat venue and at university of colorado called quigley's club 156 because it held 156 people it was the first show then they played this bar called jj mccabe's then they went up and we set them up to go do like some bars in the mountains like the eldo and the fly me to the moon saloon and tell your ride eldo and crustabute i think

they played the inferno and steamboat how old are you when you're doing all this? I was 21 maybe. And I mean, they were like 24, 25, you know? And so anyway, obviously it was a huge success and it was so much fun. And so after that, I wound up parlaying that to running the student, you know, activity committee called Live Sounds at Colorado College, where I started promoting all the shows the following year. And I kept working with Phish. Well, one thing led to another. I had an idea from a friend of mine to open a venue in Boulder. And, you know, Boulder needed a new venue. And this is, you know, 26 years ago now.

And, you know, my community wasn't really that focused on Denver. It was all about Boulder. Really? And yeah, Boulder was all the, you know, hang out. So Denver wasn't a music scene back then, really?

It was, but it wasn't like a Grateful Dead type music scene. Denver was more, you know, Denver. And it was a, you know, more,

you know, Colorado tradition would have been more of the, you know, more traditional music. Also, Colorado was steeped in history in the 70s with like Firefall and John Denver. A little lighter, you know, all kinds of sugar. It was different. Boulder was the place where a band like Phish was going to break, not Denver.

Yeah. It changed as the years went on. But Boulder was absolutely the place. I mean, we didn't go to Denver. We had no desire to be in Denver. Everything was Boulder. So I came up with the idea to open a club in Boulder. Long story short, by miracle and the grace of everything, we, me, myself, and my partners wound up opening the Fox Theater in Boulder in 1992. So that was my first real official foray

because now we owned a club in Boulder, Colorado, on the hill, which is the Fox and has been for 26 years. And once that happened, you know, you're in. Because I'm 23 years old. I'm booking a club in Boulder. And, you know, all hell has broken loose. All hell has broken loose. Being a 23-year-old in Boulder. And, you know, all hell has broken loose. All hell has broken loose. Being a 23-year-old in the music scene,

how was… Was it just a party? Was it drugs? What was the drugs then? Acid? Or… You don't have to say you did it. The drugs back then.

I'd say a lot of Advil. Advil? Yeah, Advil. I don't even think they had to leave then awesome we did a lot of advil took a lot of advil well that's exciting um so 23 you're in the fox theater you uh built this thing up so from there how many years were you doing fox until aeg became well there was some things in between so basically um okay so the Fox is operating, 92. We built the Fox, me, James Hamilton, Dave McKenzie,

John O'Leary, and Dickie Sidman. That was the core partnership that opened it. Dickie was the elder statesman. He was like 40. He was an old fucking man. You know, he was fucking fossil. That's the perspective that we had back then. Anyway, unfortunately, really sad,

three years in or two and a half years in, Dickie got cancer and passed away. So we were all kids. I mean, we were young. I mean, we needed an elder statesman around and we were young and we were like now really on our own. And thankfully, Cheryl Liguori, who was our GM at the time, took that mother goose kind of role. But we all had to grow up pretty kind of quickly. And we were growing up. We were learning. I mean, there's no way to learn like that. You can't beat learning like that.

About five, six years later, give or take, Chuck Morris, who was Barry Faye's partner, was one of the real legends of the concert business in Colorado, still is. He reached out to me and said, hey, I want to meet up and everything. And we just started talking and I didn't even really understand who Chuck was. You know, I knew who Barry was.

I don't know if Chuck Morris. I mean, I was, I lived in Boulder. I was pretty young. All I cared about was like waking up. You know, my day consisted of Boulder. Like, I would get up, I would go to the office,

go to the Fox at like 9, 30, 10 in the morning. I would work on the phones all day. At six o'clock, I'd put the phone down,

I'd walk downstairs and start night managing to open for the club that night. Then, all, we'd be there and not that this was me,

mind you like you know i don't think i was the greatest night manager i might have spent a little less time managing than i did you know enjoying the fruits of owning a club yeah um but then at 2 a.m 3 a.m once the bands left i would go down to the kinkos down the street and make posters and literally like and it was before we had, like, really computers. We had, like, the internet didn't exist or barely existed. So, literally, I would go down and, like, cut out, like, I would blow up on, like, a basic, like, old Apple computer. And, like, and then glue the words, like, you know, to the piece of paper.

And then Xerox it. And then, like, walk over and the dude at Kinko's was my friend. So he'd give me the posters for free. And then I'd make like 300 posters. And I would just use impact font. I still do this day. Impact font, impact font. And I would do it all impact font. And then I would walk around Boulder, like around the hill area where all the students are until like 4.30 in the morning. And I would personally put up every freaking poster, go home, go to bed, wake up at like, you know, four hours later, four and a half hours later, go back to the office and do it again every fucking day for at least a year and a half.

So how many years until the Fox was the shit? Like that was… You know, we thought we were the shit the second we opened. Of course, Donnie. But, you know, I mean… When did it start really growing? Like you're getting bands… You know, what happened was that, and like, remember, you know, I mean... When did it start really growing? Like, you're getting bands... What happened was that,

and like, remember, it was our community. So like, in 93, Dave Matthews played there. It was $5. But like, very quickly, a lot of these bands that were part of our community

started to break. So suddenly, you know, it just, you know... Perfect timing. Yeah, it was great. And so we... What happened was, is I did that for a long time. And then, I think it was great. And so we, what happened was, is I did that for a long time.

And then I think it was in 97, 98, I met Chuck. And Chuck and I started talking. And basically, Chuck decided, what happened was Barry Fay. Barry was the old titan of Colorado. He was the mob boss promoter from the 60s in Colorado who ran this place and this community with an iron fist. Was he in the East Coast here too?

I don't know where Barry was born, but I mean, Barry was, you know, he's pretty famous and you can look up Barry Faye, but we worked with Barry a little bit through a guy named Bill Bass, who's still around. But anyway, Barry was going to retire. So what happened was, was that now there was this kind of,

what's going to happen? Barry decided he was going to sell his company. What's going to happen? How's this going to evolve? And what was going to happen was, I mean, I wasn't really part of, most of the kid booking clubs, you know? Chuck was going to happen was, I mean, I wasn't really part of, I was just a kid booking clubs, you know. Chuck was going to go and run the company, Barry's company.

And he was going to run the company. And at the last second, and I was interviewing to get a job there. The last second, they decided not to give Chuck the job. And they decided to bring in a new person from out of town to take over the company. And they said, Chuck, you can have a consultant thing. Chuck got really bummed. And he went and met with the guys at Bill Graham Presents in San Francisco and said, look, I don't want to be a consultant. I want to do this. Screw these guys. Let's do our own company.

They said, yes. He said, I want to hire this guy, Brent Fidresi. And I want to hire this guy, Don Strasberg. And Don has the Fox. And the Fox is not making money. We never made money. Yeah. Like literally, they make a dime.

We were losing money every year. I mean, like holding on for dear life, you know? I mean, I remember Dickie's phone on it. It said it had a little, you know, for all you who have been around a little bit, when the phones actually weren't these digital things, had like a little thing where you put your little phone number and you write your phone number.

In that, he took it out and wrote, don't panic. I love that. You know, like from the bill collectors call. Yeah, dude. I remember one New Year's, we had to borrow money from my grandparents to make a deposit, you know, because it was so tight. Anyway, what happened is that Chuck made a deal with them, calls me and made a deal with them and says, look, I want you to come in a couple days a week.

I want you to kind of move over slowly from the Fox. I don't want you to leave the Fox right away. I know that's what's really important. And the relationships you create at the Fox are everything. But I want you to have a vehicle to move these bands and be bigger. And I don't want, you know, the other guys aren't giving you a job and, you know, we should work together. And Brent had worked at Faye concerts as well. And Brent was coming on full time. They wrote a nice check to the Fox to help us kind of write the books a little bit. And I remember it was like 70 grand and we blew it up

like we had won the lottery yeah yeah how old are you here 26 28 at that point or something um 29 um and um then um that's what started chuck morris presents bill graham presents yeah Chuck Morris Presents, Bill Graham Presents. And very quickly, the whole roll-up of all the concert promoters happened, and that was Clear Channel. At the time, it was in Clear Channel. It was called SFX. They bought Bill Graham Presents and thereby bought Chuck Morris too. So we became SFX. So very quickly, we became part of this national conglomeration

that today is Live Nation. It went SFX. It very quickly, we became part of this national conglomeration that today is Live Nation. It went SFX, it became Clear Channel, then it became Live Nation. So slowly but surely, I evolved to where I was going one day a week at the Fox, four days a week until pretty much I was full-time in Denver. At that point, you know, we had gone from zero market share to like 80% market share. So we had pretty much crushed the guys who Chuck, you know, who wanted to give Chuck a kind of a nothing job. And Chuck came back and said, you know, you made a bad decision. 11 years ago, an opportunity came up for Chuck, Brett, and myself from the Anschutz Entertainment Group to open a Colorado office. And we were all at Live Nation.

And each one of us got a separate offer. And I decided that for me, it was the right decision. And so lo and behold, we all wound up coming together and basically started AEG Presents Rocky Mountains. And that was 11 years ago. And so what happened was we had gone from 80% of all the shows in Colorado to zero. We had built the Fillmore in Denver and all these things.

So it went to zero. But we were going to rebuild it. And now 11 years later later we have rebuilt it oh my it's unbelievable i feel like denver is now top tier market right yeah it is and i think part of it is when we built the fillmore in denver when we were a live nation, I think that's when everything changed. When I think myself and my kind of core community, when we all got to be like 33, 34 years old, we're like, okay, we're graduating out of Boulder. We're moving to Denver, a lot of us. I think we brought a lot of the music scene with us and we kind of impacted Denver. And I'd say in the last 15 to 20 years,

since, you know, Denver has kind of become more Boulder. You know, Boulder is awesome still, but Denver has become a hipper, a better, you know, back then it was a cow town. Not quite a cow town, but it, you know, a lot of things happened here too. I'm not going to say it was us because Coors Field downtown,

a lot of certain infrastructure things happened, probably the new airport. Things in denver that that really changed but yeah you know denver's when did red rock start blowing up well red rocks when you started running that well i don't run it or book it i mean we a lot of people book it but when i booked a lot of shows there we booked the lions here lions sheriff shows there basically about booked the lion's share of shows there. Basically about, I don't know, about 10 years ago when we opened AEG, we just figured we should really, we just started stepping on offers at Red Rocks. We just started getting more and more aggressive and realized that Red Rocks was just such an incredible place

as she shows that we could book more shows there. And I think partly also, as the world became more interconnected digitally, the Red Rocks experience became more of a national and international phenomenon rather than like, you know, people heard of Red Rocks or U2 did their thing up there. But I think once the, you know, really people started getting digitally connected,

I think it became the thing to do. Like, let's go to Colorado to see our band at Red Rocks. And we started realizing that, you know, we weren't only just selling tickets to Colorado, but people, it was a big deal. Bands were playing Red Rocks the first time and people wanted to fly in to see them do it. Which kind of elevated the ability to sell tickets. And, you know, we started, but, you know, doing 20, 30 shows was a big year at Red Rocks. We're going to do 120 this year ourselves unbelievable Don

one last question I know you're a busy man you're working while we're doing this so check it out if you could build the ultimate festival say five bands

or six bands dead or alive what would it be? the ultimate festival five bands six bands dead or alive two stages you only get two stages so what was it okay? The ultimate festival. Five bands, six bands, dead or alive. Two stages.

You only get two stages. So… What was it? Okay. So I have three days? You have three days. Well, obviously,

it's a hard one because who… You can just do top B. You don't have to do mid-tier. Do I have to like tell which slot they play? No, no, no. Let's keep the mystery.

Well, actually, give me the headliners. Don't give me, no, no. Let's keep the mystery. Well, actually, give me the headliners. Don't give me the headliners. Let's say this is a co-bill. Well, here's the thing. If any band, any time, any place could play it,

and let's just say they're at the peak of their career. Yeah, peak of their career. Okay, so I would obviously be an idiot if I didn't invite the beatles of course i you know let's go with beatles 69 abbey road moment okay i think that would be the moment where you'd want to see the beatles live yeah you know in your backyard yeah i think you would be

i would personally be lost if I didn't put The Grateful Dead in there. What year? That's a tough one. I would probably put The Grateful Dead in around 82. You know, where they were like just dirty and just mean. And it was...

But I could go to 77 or I could go to 69, but I'm going to say 82. 82. Or the great days of 83. Yeah. People will fucking thrash me on that. I mean, 80, 81, the early 80s. I just don't, I think that you have to invite Led Zeppelin.

Led Zeppelin, you know, 73. I mean, come the fuck on. I mean, right? You have to bring him. Now, I got to say that, you know, it's hard to imagine doing something like this without the Rolling Stones. Yep.

I gotta say that, you know, it's hard to imagine doing something like this without the Rolling Stones. Yep. I would probably say, now, modern bands, because obviously I've named four old bands. Phish be there? I was going to put Phish sixth. I was going to put Radiohead fifth. Yeah. But not, I would put Radiohead from like the OK Computer tour.

Oh, wow. Yeah, I see that. You know? I mean, Phish is hitting it so hard right now. You could get him right now. Now, look. I've left out Pink Floyd. Yeah. It's pretty hard to leave out Pink Floyd.

Yeah, it's true. I mean, and then there's like… The up and comes. I mean, modern- there's like, I mean, modern wise, you know, it's hard because you've seen what the history is of those bands. Yeah. So you can look back with this, you know, with this, you know, view of the past, you know what I'm saying but you know who knows 20 years from now when you're like you know going you know well you know

my morning jacket could occupy that but there it's still you're still in it and you know it's always hard I think people always

look at it and say like you were there when and then like you know how do you not invite Jimi Hendrix I just can't speak to Jimi Hendrix as much because I never

had the opportunity well and also you don't hear as much live Hendrix per I just can't speak to Jimi Hendrix as much because I never had the opportunity. Well, and also you don't hear as much live Hendrix per se. You have some, but you know. What else? What am I missing? You got anything that you would, am I missing anything?

Is it all about a vibe for a festival or is it a numbers thing? Okay, well, first of all, look. What I want from music and what other people want from music are probably some different things. And sometimes the same, sometimes they're different. A 22-year-old kid today who's listening to, you know, whatever this person's listening to, not a kid, but a young person listening to this stuff, their perspective on music

is a lot different than mine and what they're hearing and what they want and how it's releasing there. It's different, you know? So I can't, you know, but what I want to me, there's something that I grew up on the Grateful Dead. So to me, it's this elusive, like where everything comes together and it's perfect. And with that live experience, it's just everybody coming together and where something just incredibly special happens in that moment and you can't recreate it. You can't even put, you can listen to it later

and you hear how great it was, but just nothing like being in that room in that moment. And it's not like going to the theater. Like a lot of times today, even back then too or whenever, but going to live music can be going to the theater like a lot of times today even back then too or whenever but you know going to live music can be going to theater you know um and bless them all but you go see a roger water show right now it's incredible it's absolutely incredible it will be the same show

night after night for the most part yeah you go see fish it will be completely, you have no idea what you're going to get. The band doesn't even know. I gel on that. To me, that's what I want. And I want, that's why the New Orleans sound, I want to go in and be like, you know, something just happened in this moment because the group of people that were put together

and the band fed off them and it created this. And you don't know. And that's what drives me. So a perfect festival is going to highlight that yeah totally it's it's changed over the years now a perfect you know but a festival means a lot of things to a lot of people it could be you know it's music it's also just experience yeah you know totally don thank you so much for your time man really means a lot and i just want to say personally thank you for helping me build my career. You found me, my manager.

You're the best, my man. Build me in Denver. I love you, man, so much. And thank you so much. Thank you. Maybe we should put Coltrane or Miles Davis on that show.

You got to put some jazz in there. I think so, too. What about like Dr. John or like Monk? I would go Monk myself, although I would probably go, what's his name? I'd probably go cannonball adderley

oh my god i i kind of like well you know i work with kamasi yeah kamasi who's just a monster yeah i wish we we just did jam cruise this year he was on it last year he's he's sick dude his new record oh my god his new music's coming out it is mind-blowing awesome all right peace love you buddy thanks love you too bye hey it's schwartz um you know it's interesting for me to come into work on a monday morning and see all these emails and get all these messages about your weekend um look you want to do these high dollar street fests i I love them. You love them. That's great, but you need to cater the set. You can't play blame it on the pussy in front of kids or families or whoever. You have to know your audience. Please get it together and just

maybe just delete blame it on Pussy. That's ridiculous. Now, a message from the UN. Have you felt overwhelmingly horny? Did you ever have an encounter with a female who wasn't your spouse? Did you get into that not-so-romantic-but-X-rated-rated action filled night? Does it make you feel guilty? Does it make you feel embarrassed? Does it keep you from looking your wife straight in the eye? Listen to our track Blame It On The Pussy and find your relief.

Blame It On The Pussy will get you back, will provide instant relief. Confront your loved one, backed up by our top song blame it on the and get your redemption now on spotify and itunes blame it on the there you have it pretty fascinating stuff huh it's? It's an eye-opening look into, I mean, like you said, these guys, both of them respectively, created where... Tastemakers.

Yeah, they're the world, and it's the world you live in, right? That Andy Fresco in the UN lives in. And like I said, every time I hear these interviews and everything, it's just more exposure for me to just be like, wow, that's crazy,

and just see how connected it is, you know? Yeah, you realize how small the industry is. Right. Guys, if you haven't subscribed, please subscribe.

We want to, we want to show the world that, we want to show my mom that it's just not just me and Yeti talking to each other. Right. We got to, now we need to show some

fruit for our efforts. What are you doing with your free time, Andy? Well, I'm just starting a podcast. I'm still talking into microphones. Still talking into microphones. My narcissistic self. Yep. Tour dates.

Check out andyfrasco.com to see what Yeti's doing on Instagram. It's pretty fun. I am Yeti. I am Yeti. And... Y-E-T-I. Y-E-T-I.

This has been fun so far. I think we're going to make it. What was our goal? How many were we supposed to do before we thought we were going to get canceled? We said if we can lay... What did we say? Don't ask me what we said in an episode. I listen to an episode once and then once we get the final cut,

I'll listen to it. Or I'll skip. And then I don't listen to it again because I'll just think about it. Yeah, me too. That's why. Yeah, this is good. This is good. Eddie, we're getting better at this stuff. I hope so.

I'd like to see improvement. We've done podcasts now. Within myself. In four different states. Has it been four different states? No. Two different states. Four different places.

Four different places. It's crazy. Love you guys. Be safe. Comb your hair. And we'll catch you on the next one, dude. Thank you for listening to episode six of Andy Fresco's World Saving Podcast with Yeti. Produced by Andy Fresco, Yeti and Chris Lawrence.

Please subscribe and rate the show on iTunes and Spotify so we can make this a worldwide phenomenon. For info on the show, please head to our Instagram at frescoandyeti. For more info on the blog and tour dates, head to andyfresco.com. For more information on our guests, Don Strasberg and tour dates, head to andyfresco.com For more information on our guests Don Strasberg and Kun Sha, head to aeglive.com

and Live4LifeMusic featuring special guests Andy Avila, Sean Eccles, Brian Swartz and me said the voice over. Catch you when we catch you. See you soon.