Weekly Skews - S6 Ep22: Good Skews – The Crack in Live Nation's Monopoly (with Devon Léger)

Episode Date: April 25, 2026

Live Nation's predatory grip on live music is finally cracking — and a homegrown, hyper-local music scene is rising up to take its place. Matt sits down with longtime music publicist and industry expert Devon Léger to talk festival season, why the corporate giants are getting pinched, and how Live Nation's monopoly playbook (own the venues, the artists, the tickets, then jack up prices) is running into real backlash. They get into the surprising forces reshaping the industry — from Gen Z drinking less to indie festivals outlasting the Coachellas of the world — plus how house concerts, co-op venues, and immigrant music scenes are quietly building a more sustainable future for live music. If you're feeling discouraged, Devon's prescription is simple: go to a show.Follow Devon's work: Seattle Picks on Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/seattlepicks_206 Seattle Picks on TikTok: https://www.tiktok.com/@seattlepicks Hearth Music: https://www.hearthmusic.com KITHFOLK newsletter: https://hearthmusic.substack.comThis episode is sponsored by ZBiotics. Go to https://www.zbiotics.com/SKEW now. You'll get 15% off your first order when you use SKEW at checkoutWeekly Skews is brought to you by Americans United for Separation of Church and State. If you believe religious freedom is supposed to protect everybody, not be weaponized to turn away good families, visit https://www.au.org/crooked to learn more and become a member today.

Hey, y'all, it's Matt Hildreth for another episode of Goodskews. Today's good news. Live Nation's predatory grip on the live music industry is finally cracking, and a homegrown music scene is rising up in its place. Joining me to dig in as longtime music publicist and industry expert, Devin Leje. We're going to talk festival season and why the corporate giants are getting pinched, and how house concerts and small town venues are quietly building up the future of live music. Well, Devin, thanks for joining us.

It's festival season. There's a lot that's happening. Live nations in the news. Some of it's probably good news, which is good for good skews, but some of it maybe not so good. So when you're looking at what's happening in the festival world right now and the live music world in general, where do you start that conversation with people, especially those that maybe aren't a part of the music industry.

Yeah, it's hard to say. I mean, there's a lot of doom and gloom, you know, we keep hearing every single year we hear about the festival bubble bursting, you know, and the festivals are still here. So it's kind of hard to interpret what's going on. And the reality is that there's like some really specific forces at play here that are really kind of surprising and interesting and maybe not what you'd expect. And they're really pushing music festivals pretty hard right now. But, you know, I mean, I think like in terms of like the good news, bad news,

news about music festivals is that we're starting to see like big kind of mega corporate festivals have a hard time. I mean, you mentioned about Cochella that they had like the least amount of music you said for the highest ticket price this year. So, you know, you know, these big festivals, they're not immune. They're getting pinched pretty hard. And the problem is that when you're operating a festival like at that level, you know, you're operating it for money, right? But then like the indie festivals, the festivals that people go to in your area and your local region. Those are not operated for money. Those are operated out of a dream. You know, somebody wants to throw a great party or wants to have all their friends out, wants

to book the best bands that they love, found a great place to do something fun and wanted to build community. So what I'm seeing is that those festivals are surviving. And then we're seeing larger corporate festivals start to tank. And it's like, you know, I think that's good news. So we're going to get into this a little bit more and talk a little bit more about the details. but could you maybe just set the stage for folks on your career, the work that you've been doing? I think it's really interesting, especially if we're talking about really authentic music, roots music or whatever kind of music that people are into and the smaller scale festivals that are happening versus the Coachella or kind of the stereotypical big commercial music. Maybe you could just situate us in how that relates to your career over the last several years and how you come to this industry.

Yeah, well, I've always, I'm a music publicist primarily. That was my work. I had my own firm for a long time. And I worked for festivals. I worked for Merlefest, Pickathon, Earl Scrugg's Music Festival, North West Folklai Festival. I worked for a lot of different festivals. And I always, I worked with, you know, great artists. And I never really wanted to be part of like the big industry. So I was usually, they'd usually leave after they got their start with me and then go to the big publicist, you know, who had to play the game. I just wanted to have a good time and support music I really believed in. So that's all I ever. really cared about. And my work now is I started a new publication called Seattle Picks. And the goal of that is to talk about, you know, music coming to Seattle. I'm based in Seattle. And we're seeing, you know, so few media outlets really cover like local, regional scenes. So I thought it'd be fun to just do like a social media first publication where we talk about shows coming, interview Seattle artists, talk about the Seattle music scene. So that's been a lot of fun. Yeah, that's my background. Maybe you could talk a little bit more about Seattle as an example. I think a lot of people know. about Seattle from like the 90s grunge scene, but there's actually quite a different, or there's really a diversity of music in Seattle. And so everybody knows Kurt Cobain and all the other 90s grunge singers.

But maybe you could use Seattle as like a microcosm for what's happening in music right now. Walk us through about like, you know, how you understand Seattle as a place where music is happening. And then also maybe tie it into, what you're saying in terms of what's happening in the industry. Because I think for those that are on the inside, they kind of see it. But if you're if you're kind of new to this or maybe just a casual observer of the music industry, it might be harder to see it if you don't have that context.

Yeah, yeah. So I'm from Seattle. I've been to Seattle about 20 years. I'm not from here originally. But, I mean, I've seen the music scene really change. You know, I mean, Seattle's maybe a little bit different than some places because it has a really high cost of living. My friend Kevin Sir was just on a podcast today. and he was talking about how Seattle is,

the cost of living is based around the tech industry, not around the cultural industry. But on the other hand, he was saying that the cultural industry is like how people know Seattle. Like they know Nirvana. They know the kind of cultural aspects of Seattle. And people like to pin a lot of, you know, civic pride around that.

But then you have to really back up that civic pride with really concrete actions. And what we're seeing is the cost of living is so high in Seattle that artists are getting priced out pretty heavily. They go to Portland, Detroit, Los Angeles. I mean, if you're getting priced out and going to Los Angeles, that tells you how bad Seattle is. So that's put a big crunch on stuff.

But there's a lot of stuff that, you know, there's a lot of stuff in Seattle that I think you see elsewhere as well. Like, you know, independent venues are struggling. Artists are struggling. It's hard to have inflation be so high and everything be so high and watch the economy start to tank and then realize that people just aren't spending as much and going out to shows as much.

You know, I'm hearing that show attendance is in decline kind of across the board. And then the other really crazy part, that is like really one of the major parts about all these issues we're seeing in the music industry is that weirdly the next generation doesn't drink. So you wouldn't think that that would be. And I think that that's admirable. It's true. They don't drink as much as yet previous generations, you know.

But that decline in alcohol sales is actually one of the biggest drivers for the decline in the music industry because so much of the industry is based around alcohol sales. I mean, I used to work at a festival where it was a lot of. Like if it was a cloudy day, not even a rainy day, keep in mind, this is Seattle. But if there were clouds in the sky, we'd be like, oh, shit, we better have some meetings after this because we're about to lose so much money. Just the fact that it wasn't sunny, which means people would be sweating and want to drink a beer, was like a major driver for us. You know, if we had like two or three cloudy days and one rainy day, like we were, it was a major problem for our organization. So it's crazy how much the industry runs in alcohol sales and how.

the next generation not drinking so much has become a massive driver for change, I think. Well, I mean, like I said, you know, it's laudable. I think that's great that the next generation, I mean, alcohol is not a great drug. Right. So who wants to criticize them for, you know, it's great. But the industry better pivot fast and like invest in kombucha futures or something because. When was the first time you realized, like the music industry was struggling when it came to live to live music? I mean, I think that you just kind of see the change.

You hear from people. You see venues start to close. I worked a lot with pickathon. And, like, I watched them really kind of have to strip that back. When it started, when I first went, I was going to pickathon, like, it was insane. They had, I'd never see anything like in my life. They had two main stages so that you would never have a stage down. You know, usually at a festival, like, certain times you've got to put the stage down and not have any music so your people can rest.

So, you know, you can, like, kind of have a break. for your crew, but they had two separate crews so they could just switch to the next stage after every act and not have to do with the sound check either. Because sound check is another reason you have a stage down. So the fact that they had two main stages just so the music would not stop for one second the entire day, I was like, this is insane. And they're still doing amazing, really innovative work. And they're really pivoting very hard and interesting ways, but they don't have two main stages anymore. You know, there's just no way you can support the kind of insane dreams of the music industry anymore. I think it has to become really practical.

And what are some examples of those pivots? I mean, venues are pivoting to mocktails. We're seeing that right away. Every bar I'm going to recently has a lot of mock tales. You know, artists are pivoting to social media, digital marketing because they don't have enough of a journalistic ecosystem to support them. You know, used to be back in the, that's why I started Seattle picks. Like back in the day when I was in Seattle, you know, if the stranger said there was a show, a stranger wrote about a show, you'd be like, oh my God, this sounds cool. And you'd go there and everyone would be there, and this show would be sold out. And people would be like, this is amazing. I'm so glad we heard

about this. And we don't have that anymore. Like, you know, I miss those days when, like, people were really clued in and like, what's cool in town, what's happening that I got to go see and be part of, you know. So I started at Seattle Pix's in a sense because I wanted to bring some of that idea back, like curating and telling people what is going to be interesting and who's coming to town, you know. I think artists are really, you know, they're pivoting to their own bases to their fan bases and pivoting away from the industry because the industry is not supporting them. Give us an example of the type of coverage you do on Seattle Picks because I follow you on Instagram. I think it's really great stuff. But for some of the listeners, and we have a lot of

folks in Seattle. So maybe you could just give an example of the type of thing that you're promoting and watching it in the region. Yeah. I mean, I did a feature on a an artist van Bully. She's an R&B singer out of Seattle. Really cool artist. They do really beautiful music. And we talked a bit about the free Congo hashtag because they're part Congolese and talked about, you know, the fact that, you know, the pressures that the Congolese culture and government and economy is under right now from the West. And then another artist was coming to town, Kia Tabassian to play with his band Constantinople. He's Persian or he's from, he's Iranian. And I asked him, I said, you know, it feels like the history of the.

of the West is a history of conflict with Persia. And he had the most beautiful response. He said, you see it as a history of conflict, but I see it as a history of inspiration. If you go back and look like so much music has been shared between the West and Iran that fueled centuries of innovation. So, you know, I think it's moments like that where you have some kind of local connection to something and you hear someone's story in a way that feels really personal and changes the way you look at larger, you know, larger movements in society.

That's what we're trying to get at is to tell these really interesting and powerful stories from that person's perspective. And it seems like you've been talking a lot about Greenland and it just seems like there's a really interesting connection there. I know we did a festival together with Madrona Fest and you kind of clued me into some really amazing artists from Greenland. But it seems like there's a lot of overlap with current events and the local community. events, live music. Yeah, after we get off this, after we stop talking here, I'm going to go and write my article on Greenlandic music for band camp.

That's my next project. I'm writing a feature on that about Greenlandic music, and I worked a lot with Simon Lynch, who came out to Madrona Fest. He lives out in Port Townsend, you know, and I think that, I mean, Greenland seems so far and so distant, and everything he's saying is so absurd. Like, it's just

it's so absurd that it has no meaning to us, but it has very real meaning to Simon and to his family and to his community and to the Inuit of Greenland. They take this very, very seriously. And it was really powerful to speak to him and just try to understand how much this idiotic rhetoric affects him personally. You know, he lives, he's lived in America a long time.

He loves this country. And he's just in shock that, that, you know, a long time ally. You know, I think his perspective was like, you know, he almost liked it better when we didn't know about Greenland. He liked the, he liked having a place that was his own, that was an Inuit, you know, run society, self-reliant, really powerful, you know, family ties. And now all eyes are on Greenland and the pressures of the world have come to bear for no meaning. You know, there's no purpose to that meaning. And so with Seattle Picks, you're connecting those conversations that you're having

with the artists before they come to town and play a live show with the actual venues. Talk a little bit about that venue element and how this seems like a kind of mutually beneficial agreement amongst all parties. Yeah, we're going to try and build that out as to be more venue reliant. We want it to support the venues. You know, I think that the venues, you know, there's not really much way you can talk about. On social media, there's not much way you can talk about stuff coming in town other than like put up a poster or maybe an artist does a video, you know, there's not much that you can really do. So we're kind of trying to provide another way, like to provide a little context behind the show so you can see what's important about the show and why you should go. And the

venues so far are really liking it, you know, that gives them a lot to work with. And, We're going to be working, I think, more closely with them. Also to talk about the venues, we have really cool venues in Seattle. You know, I go out to Connor Byrne pub all the time. And I remember when it was like a really awesome Irish pub that was run by an Irish fiddler. And I go and we'd all like fiddle and have a great time at these jam sessions. And now it's cooperative. It's one of the, it's kind of a new model.

We talked about, you know, pivoting. This was one of the main pivots was that when Connor Byrne was no longer able to be sustainable as like a private, as a public venue, a music venue with, you know, rising rents, rising costs. They're in the middle of Ballard, which is really gentrified and really changed. They switched to a co-op model and built it more around building community through the model. And that has been really successful for them. And we're going to talk about Live Nation and some of the stuff that's happening on a much kind of bigger level, a much more commercial level in a minute, because I think that's something that a lot of people are following. But you were the first person back when we first started working on Madrona Fest, which is, you know, the local event that we do here in our community.

I think we may have, I think I may have promoted that on weekly skis at one point back last year, maybe. But you were one of the first people to really advocate for a small music festival. And I'm wondering if you could talk a little bit about that. I think a lot of, like, I've been to like Jazz Fest in New Orleans. I've been out to the gorge in Washington State to see Willie Nelson and Billy Strings. and Bob Dylan and, you know, I think a lot of people have seen music at a stadium. But I hadn't really experienced how cool it was to do a really small music festival. And for those that haven't been to one of those, can you just talk a little bit about what that is and why you believe so strongly in those?

Yeah, I mean, I think that the point of a small festival is to build community and that's what's really special. You know, you know, it's also about kind of an immediate experience. You know, if you go to see, you know, a lot of festivals are like out on big fields, you know, it's like, or a field or a parking lot. You're just basically in this huge open area in this big crowd staring at a distant performer on a jumbotron, you know. And that's cool. I mean, there's nothing wrong with that experience. But it's not as visceral as it is when you're like immersed in an actual local environment, you know, when I worked with like pickathon, like we were really nestled deep in the woods and the stages were built into the woods and made from, you know, tree branches. you know, that was the kind of immersion I really liked.

And then, like, with Medrona Fest, another thing, too, to think about is that, you know, a lot of these festivals come into rural areas and kind of just, like, set down in the rural area, you know, a lot of pretty big festivals are usually rural because it's hard to sustain a major festival in an urban setting. But the problem with that is that you're kind of, like, imposing the festival on the rural community. And that creates conflict, and I've seen a lot of conflict over the years around that kind of thing. So that's why I like to have Madrona Fest was that that's what a community festival can be. It's not like this giant farm.

It's not like Woodstock where they, you know, mowed a giant field and a ton of hippies flooded this community, right? Everyone's like, what the hell is happening? Yeah. That was cool, but that doesn't build community. That just builds a moment, you know. Whereas like what Madrona Fest and other festivals are doing, if you can integrate more closely with the community and involve the community, then you're like showing what makes it. this place really special, bringing art to it and putting art into that setting and then

creating a community to sustain that. And these kind of like small festival models, they will survive because the community will support them. Whereas, you know, like a big festival like Coachella, you're like, you're going there to see a celebrity or to take your Instagram picks. Like you're not, it's mercenary. You're not there because you love the town of Coachella, the environment of Coachella, you know.

You're celebrating despite where you are. are it doesn't it's not something that is going to be ultimately really sustainable unless you want to just funnel money into it you know which they do speaking of funneling money into live events um for i'm sure you've been watching uh the live nation stuff yeah can you just give us a 30 000 foot idea of what's happening and you know how this fits into the context you just laid out for people in terms of, you know, alcohol sales are down. It's getting harder to do live music. There's the media landscape is changing. There's not as much local media to promote local events. That's all happening now through Facebook, which has been sort of monopolized. But yeah, maybe if you

could just talk a little bit about how you understand what's happening with Live Nation, that I think would be helpful for folks. Yeah, I mean, Live Nation, Live Nation is, it's really basically a monopoly. I I mean, they're monopolizing the music industry at a really high level. You know, they're a huge promotion company, so they put on shows, they put on really large artists. They have exclusive contracts with very large venues so that their artists are going through all the biggest venues. You know, and touring at that level is a major beast, you know, these are like fleets of semi-trucks that, like, pull into huge venues to unload for like a week. Like, in a sense, you know, you need that kind of like large infrastructure. what you don't need is monopoly and predatory practices.

So they also own Ticketmaster, which they force everyone to use as their main ticketing company. That's the monopoly, right? Like you control the venue, you control the artists, you control the production of the show. Now you control the ticketing as well. So they're setting artificial rates of what the market has to pay for tickets to these events. And they're just starting. I mean, the newest thing is dynamic pricing where they're going to start inflating ticket prices depending on immediate demand, like Uber essentially.

If there's a ton of people wanting to leave the airport at the same time, Uber gets crazy expensive. Same thing with these tickets. So they're divorcing the ticket prices from any sense of reality. And none of it trickles back to the artist. It just goes into their coffers. The lawsuits really uncovered what they say about it internally and how they're taking people for a ride. And they're predatory. I've seen it firsthand.

In terms of music festivals, you know, they sent in a music. So they've been really gunning for Portland, Oregon. They really want Portland's been fighting them for years and years to keep them out of Portland. Because they have, you know, I think Portland's like the only, maybe the last city in America that doesn't have a live nation presence, I think. And they really want a place in Portland. So what they would do was they put in a huge festival, farewell festival that was like right in between Portland and Bend. And they targeted it and built it to kind of go after other festivals to kind of suction up ticket sales. and suction up interest and attention.

You know, there's festivals in Ben. There were festivals in Portland that were affected by this. These are small independent festivals, just people dreaming and trying to build a community. And they just go in with tons of money, just a flood of money in a huge venue. And they just suck up the whole ecosystem like a vacuum. And they're kind of doing that to try and move into Portland. And then I just read today that looks like they're going to have a major venue, 3,500 cap venue in downtown Portland coming 2027.

So they finally broke Portland. So they'll have a foothold in Portland as well now. And Portland's mad for Portland. The community is the music scene's furious because they're concerned about how this monopoly is going to affect, you know, people who are just trying to make a living and build something. But like I said, you know, ultimately, you know, this is for large artists. These are for, these are for the huge tours. You know, this is something my friend Kevin Surs has a lot too is like you can spend 500 to 1,000 to 3.000. thousand, five thousand on Taylor Swift tickets or you can find the Taylor Swift in your town and spend

15 bucks and go to a show and support an artist at home. There's a million great artists in every city, you know, and all those artists are deserving of our money and are building a really great community that we can be part of. And Taylor Swift coming to a live nation amphitheater outside your town is not building a community for anybody. So I think I, I, despite all this crazy stuff that's happening in the music industry, I am just in love at how these, these, independent festivals and promoters and artists are building their own way forward in a really community-centered way that I think is sustainable when the giant money pits are not sustainable. Weekly skews is brought to you by Zbiotics pre-alcohol. Zibiotics pre-alcohol probiotic

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You know, and I grew up in the deep south, faith was woven into everything, you know, Sunday mornings, and the way everybody talked to and related to each other, dictated everything about everybody's lives. And I understand what real faith means to people. You know, I know how important it could be. had honestly kind of saved my me-ma on her later years. That's the truth. And I know that real faith does not need the government picking winners and losers to survive. What's happening right now is not about protecting religion. It's about using religion as a cover for blatant discrimination. Here's what that looks like on the ground. Americans United has real clients, real families, who have been turned away from taxpayer-funded foster care agencies like Liz

and Gabe Rutin-Ram, a Jewish couple in Tennessee, my home state, ready to foster to adopt. and they're turned away because they're Jewish. There's also Amy Madonna, a Catholic mother of three, rejected because she wouldn't sign an evangelical Protestant statement of faith. Fat Mama Roof and Bryn Esplin, a same-sex couple shown the door entirely. These are qualified people who want to give children who need a home a home. They're trying to do a good thing. And the state, using your tax dollars, refuses to let them do so, told them no,

based on what they believe and who they are. That's not religious liberty. That's the government putting its thumb on the scale. for one version of religion and using it to keep kids out of loving families. If you believe religious freedom is supposed to protect everybody and not be turned into a weapon against everyone else, visit A.U.org slash crooked to learn more and become a member today. That's AU.org slash crooked. One of the things that I'm really excited in is something we've been working on,

we've been talking with you about at least, is, is, uh, is, uh, the organization that I work for, we're doing a tour where we're calling it the Backroads Tour. So shout out to that. And anybody who wants to check that out and go to Backroads. com. But we're working with artists that are connected to communities in different regions. But one of the things I'm really excited about is there's a handful of places where we wanted to do a show,

but there wasn't a great venue. We're doing it in my hometown in Brookings, South Dakota. We're hosting it at the local band shell. You know, this is a, you know, everybody, most people from small towns or rural communities might remember kind of the band shells from the 40s and 50s when they you know the community put in a city park and then you put in a band shell where literally the like community orchestra will play but we're going to have some some kind of feisty Americana music celebrating the 250th anniversary of the United States and really the rural people that you know fought for progress over the years so it's going to be an exciting event but what's really cool to see is a lot of my friends and families and families. family of friends that I grew up with are working together to put on a music festival. And I think that's an interesting skill set that people have that they might not realize. And so in addition to going to live music and attending live music, buying tickets at live music,

I'm convinced that more people than might realize are able to host live music. And that's something that I've seen a lot as well. Something you and I have talked a lot about is the rise of home shows. Do you want to just talk about kind of the home show movement? I think people might know it from kind of the punk scene, but it seems like it's happening in a lot more places as people respond to really what I would say is the insidification of the music industry by monopolies like Live Nation. There really seems to be an authentic pushback, which is really exciting. Yeah, I mean, you're talking about two things there.

I mean, I think one thing is that a lot of rural areas have really awesome venues that exist already that are just not being used. You know, like, for example, I've put on shows in like Grange Halls. Those are, most rural venues have beautiful, beautiful old halls built in like the 30s that are great for event production, you know. So I feel like there's a lot that can be done in rural spaces and in urban spaces too to look at underutilized venues and to kind of build out that infrastructure. And then the other thing you're talking about is like the house concert phenomenon, which is actually really functional. You know, house concerts are basically like anyone in a community who likes a band, you know, just has them out to their house. Often they play acoustic. You know, the band usually keeps all the money.

You know, it's not something that people do to make money. Though weirdly, they did try and gamify, they did try and commodify house concerts. The Sofar Sounds built a whole national network of like basically house concerts in urban spaces and then like proceeded to do all this sketchy stuff, taking money from artists. So, I mean, even that mark, anywhere there's money, the industry will eventually take notice and try and mess with it.

But house concerts still go. strong you know i talked to an artist who was like a french canadian artist and he was in probably the biggest like folk band out of french canada they used to play like or you know stadiums like they used to play huge venues it was like a 15 person band and he said he's like i made more i make more money touring and doing house concerts just me and a fiddler than i ever did in this huge band because it's true a huge band you have so many costs and you're so much money to move and to get everything moving around you don't keep only you only keep a portion of the money from the ticket sales you know so many other people have their hand in the pie that you don't get that much. But house concerts,

the artist keeps all the money. It's really fun. People, you know, build you, it helps people become event organizers and helps them kind of build a community around the music they love and helps the artist get support. I'm, I'm very, I've always been bullish on house concerts. I think it's a, there are fun experiences and artists. I often hear from artists are the best shows too, because, you know, even if you're playing acoustic, like, you know, having a microphone in front of your face is a divide between you and the audience. And I found as a concert promoter, if you can ever remove microphones or get people just to cue into, you know, acoustic music, it's unbelievable how much more connected they get to it,

you know. So I think it's a great, it's a great, great model. Any model that foregrounds fans first, community first, is a winning model. I think there's just no way around that. So where could somebody start if they're wanting to do like a house show? I mean, is it really just as simple as getting some friends together? they're raising two or three or $500 and then reaching out to some musicians in your community and saying, will you come play my house? Yeah, it really is as simple.

I mean, just you have to have a space that can fit 20 to 30 people and you have to have friends that would want to come out to see a show. I mean, that's it. It's as simple as that. You can start with a, you know, just hit up a local artist and say, hey, would you want to do like a show? I mean, if you have some money, give them a bit of a guarantee. You know, otherwise, often artists are looking for kind of informal shows that get them something. or if you have a friend in a band that's coming through town, that's a great opportunity to, you know,

a lot of bands want to come through your area but aren't going to get booked in, like, the main venues, you know, because there's so much kind of overload right now of artists. So they're looking for alternatives, you know. And go to check out other house concerts. I think there's a national website for house concerts that lists, like, kind of the more prominent ones. So you can check that out and, you know,

kind of poke around your community and attend other house concerts and see how they work. But, I mean, generally, yeah, it's like a potluck. And you just have your, you clear everything out of your living room and put up a bunch of folding chairs. And the artist plays, like, that's it. It's as simple as that. And you get an amazing experience, an amazing, beautiful experience that everyone enjoys. I think it's a great metaphor for a lot of people kind of pushing back against the, you know, AI and the billionaire class that's taking over everything just to look at the economics of it, that if you're not paying, you know, venue fees, if you're not paying for, you know, all of the different things.

that come with running a venue that if ticket, if that's all going to live nation and ticket master anyway, although I think we should support local venues. So you should definitely go to your local venue and buy tickets because there's no substitute for that. But if you don't have a good live local venue, you can really make the economics of it work out. I mean, how many people do you? I mean, I'm not going to do the math because I'm bad at math, but it doesn't take that many people coming and paying $15, $20, $30, $50. And if you get, you know, a couple dozen of them together, you can actually get some bigger artists than you might expect.

Yeah, artists aren't going to make that much on the shows they're playing in your town anyways. I mean, for the most part, you know, they're touring to sell merge. They're touring to increase streams and build a community. You know, they make money, but, you know, they stand to make maybe more in some cases at house concerts. If it's a successful house concert, you know. Yeah, it's a model. I think any model that is more DIY right now is going to be working really well.

And the other thing I should say about house concerts, too, is there are usually all ages. And we've had a lot of troubles with all ages shows. Certainly in Seattle, a lot of places do not have many options for all ages shows, which means anyone under 21 is not getting a chance to see live music and isn't getting to understand the magic of live music and the music industry. And it's a huge problem that we've seen a lot of people trying to work on house concerts, and you mentioned like punk shows, DIY house shows, and there's like three,

there's like three different major kind of underground backyard punk shows networks going on in Seattle that are really popular. Those are a little trickier because like a punk and electric bands need to be amplified. When you bring in like an amplification and a sound system, then you really are becoming like a concert promoter, you know. That's kind of what I think is cool about house concerts in like roots music is that it's easy to do with acoustic.

you don't need the sound system. And I love following you on social media because you're talking about a lot of different types of music. It's not just like traditional, you know, roots music in terms of what people think about in roots music. You were doing a video the other day about record, what was it, source recordings of music from India, which I thought was super fascinating. A full 78 RPM records out of India from the 1930s. Yeah. And it was great music. It was, I, uh, so people should go and, and watch it, watch it on Instagram because I loved your fascination of the kazoo.

And you were talking. Who did you? There was a recording from the 1930s of Indian kazoo playing that was pretty sick. Yeah. It was so, it was, that was such a fun video to watch from you. But, but, but it seems like, um, this idea of gathering and listening to music together, that, that kind of seems like a universal human thing. Can you talk about how different communities express that? I always feel like every time I talk to you,

you're watching some new niche, you know, community, like a trend that's emerging that's super massive in other places that most people that just pay attention to like the top 40 would have no idea that's going on. But like within their niche, it's a really massive movement. Yeah, I mean, I think, Fortunately, the reality is that, like, in the Western world in America, we're probably one of the worst places in the world to understand music. I mean, we really don't. There's a whole, I mean, you see it in the most obvious way in the way Republicans have relentlessly targeted the arts. And you see it in subtle ways in the way that people don't think that working as a musician is a real job. I think that the devaluation of the arts is a fundamentally Western value. And the reality is that the rest of the world does not feel this way. And they support the arts. You know, and I think you see that if you look at like immigrant communities in America, like, I mean, I had a case study at one point. It was a little old at this point, but I was looking at like Mexican Banda and Mexican-American Banda and Banda dances in Seattle. And I talked to folks and it was unbelievable how much that community supported the arts. I mean, they were paying, you know, like $100 a ticket and there were 500 people showing up, you know, one Bonda band in Seattle. They made so much money. They couldn't handle the amount of money they were making. They had to say, you know, they had to.

split into two different bands to try and like keep moving with all the money pouring in, you know, or go to like a, you know, a Balkan event, a Balkan dance, you know, see people dancing around the hall. Every time they walk by the musicians, they slap money on the sweaty bodies. Like, you know, this is just like cultures that want to shower the arts with money. You know, not to say that being an artist is easy in other parts of the world. I just think that the idea that the arts is not a fully valuable thing is purely a Western, is really a Western idea. and that we really don't understand how much immigrant communities especially really appreciate and support music. You know, there's a lot of, even in Seattle, there's amazing immigrant musicians who just, you'll never hear them ever, outside of their own communities because there's no reason.

Why would they, you know, we struggle with this a lot when I booked festivals in Seattle was like, why would they play a festival to people who don't understand this music and aren't going to pay them hardly anything when they can just play a wedding or an event in their own community and get tons of money? You know, I think that we really have this conception that, you know, that this, the way we're looking at arts is really the universal. And it really isn't. It absolutely isn't. There's a lot we can learn. You know, I mean, I've seen entire empires built by like a handful of people, you know, to the point that they're selling out some of the biggest arenas in Canada. And only when they sell out the biggest arena in Vancouver does anyone notice.

You know, that was with the Punjabi community. I was watching that carefully. I was watching them rack up just millions upon millions of views on their videos and not as single person in Canada in the press had any clue who they were. And the second they sell out like Rogers Arena in Vancouver, which is the biggest venue in Vancouver, basically a sports arena. Bam, live nation's there. Warner Music all of a sudden has an Indian music wing, you know. So it's like it takes, it takes an incredibly long time for like the larger music industry to wake up to what's happening. And the reality is there's people who are just moving fast and

doing amazing things that we're not even seeing. You know, I think that that's crazy we're not looking for that kind of innovation and also the idea of a professional musician seems different in the united states as compared to other places i think we have this idea that like if you're if you're if you're any good at your craft you know you'll be somebody that i know your name and you'll be playing stadiums when in fact i think some of the best musicians i've ever met you know have day jobs and some of the worst musicians have big time deals talk a little bit about that. Yeah, I mean, I mean, actually, really, the point that I'm always kind of harping on that I think is really truly mind-blowing is that, you know, virtually every other nation in the world, the federal government supports the arts. You know, Canada, it's like unbelievable how much money there is available to artists that are federal grants. And it's not that anyone can get the grant. I mean, there's, you know, serious levels of curation and judgment that go into awarding the grants. But on the whole, you're able to get grants not only to build your own art, but to also explore. that art. So, you know, you get grants to, like, tour. You get grants to get a publicist to

help your tour. You get grants to go to, like, conferences and present your music, you know. And on the one hand, it's spreading Canadian values and Canadian perspective around the world, so it's great in that sense. And the other hand, it's just a very un-American idea that the federal government should support the arts. And like I said, like, I mean, countries all over the world do this. This is very, very, very common, and there's a lot of money available. And, only in America have I ever encountered a complete unwillingness to have that conversation, you know, not just are the Republicans trying to defund NPR. That's like, that's like the, you know, not even having National Public Radio was one thing,

but we're talking about like a national organization that would grant deserving artists lots of money to record albums, go on tour, and travel the world. Like, just saying that out loud seems like a fantasy when I say it, right? But this is the reality for almost every. everybody else in the world, just not here. And that's crazy. And you mentioned all of these beautiful spaces in rural America. It's not just rural America, but those are the ones that come to mind for me that were built in the 1930s.

Well, the reason they were built in the 1930s is because FDR and the Works Progress Administration invested in them. That's, you know, the festival we do here in the Seattle area with Medrona Fest. It's in a civic center building, a building that was built in the 1930s or 1930s. 1940s, gorgeous little building kind of out in the rural community. And I don't know of any policy in America right now other than just maybe some facilities grants at USDA that would ever go to a place like that. And they would never make it to a community space. I mean, they would be, you know, rightfully so, building a hospital or something like that. Like, we're not even funding our hospitals, let alone. Cifican Expos. But there was a, there was a time when we

did that. And I think when you look back on, you know, like even just like I like country music, you look back on like the golden age of country music, a lot of that was coming out of the 30s and 40s. And I think a lot of people rightfully tie that to the dust bowl. But there was also a policy landscape that was supporting it. Yeah. And they were going out, making field recordings of artists and trying to really track it. You know, I think that what's, what's hardest about all this is like, I understand the idea that like maybe the arts are something kind of ephemeral that are difficult to find value in. But the reality is that like festivals and events bring in colossal amounts of money. It's one of the largest economic drivers in Washington State. You know, if you look at how much

money a festival can bring to an area, it's amazing. You can track that money and you can show how much money a cultural event can bring. You know, someone that made a point too, you know, that people recruited all these tech workers to like Seattle. Part of the recruiting is like Seattle's a really fun city. Come to Seattle. There'll be music. There'll be all kinds of. of stuff happening. There's great nightlife. Like, that is what tech companies are using to recruit people to their company is the cultural quality of the city they're in, but they're not paying in to keep that culture going. So I think that that's really insane to look at, like, just what an economic driver of the arts is

and to still not see that it's being funded or supported in any way. You know, I think that that's kind of where the concept of America breaks down for me. It's like if we're going to have to live in lay stage capitalism, can we at least get some capitalism up in here? Like, let's make some money, okay? Yeah, I guess we can't even have that because of ideological differences. And I think that what we've seen in some of these festivals, I'm trying to remember the one. Was it timber or there's other ones where you have like very specific examples of the community sort of reviving through the arts? And I think about that too for places that I grew up, I mean,

my hometown was a great place because there was always something going on. I mean, not something in the sense of a big city, but something. And once you start losing that cultural capital, it seems like other things start falling apart. All right, well, we got a couple of minutes left here before we got to go. But I'm just wondering kind of last question before we get into more about how people can follow you. What is the thing that you think is the best news right now in the music industry? I mean, the best news is watching a bit of, push back against monopoly, that's huge. And watching push back against Spotify, that's huge.

Watching people mobilize to push back against these incredibly predatory mega corporations that are decimating our cultural landscape, that is huge and that's wonderful. But like I said, what's giving me the most hope right now is understanding that even if the industry is tanking and the economy is tanking, people still need person-to-person connection. They still need to appreciate the arts in person and connect with artists. And I think that, you know, even if we see ticket sales decline because of the prices and the economy, I think there's always going to be a need for that. And it's not going to be easy for artists or easy for the, you know, the music industry,

but there's always going to be a need to appreciate music in person. So I think that always is going to give me hope is watching how it changes people and how much people of any stripe, of any political belief, of any background, how much they appreciate watching live music. That's an incredible thing to see. And if you're feeling like you don't have a lot of hope or if you're feeling discouraged, go out to a show.

You'll feel better. And where can people follow you? You've got a couple of different things in addition to Seattle Picks. Maybe say again where people can follow you with Seattle Picks. Yeah, check out Seattle Picks on Instagram and TikTok. I'm kind of sticking it to those for now. And then I have a weekly newsletter for people who want stuff in Seattle. And then you can follow hearth music on Instagram as well.

and that's where I look at some of the kind of weirder stuff. I got to work on a post about new bluegrass coming and then I really want to work on a post about Mauritian classical music. Well, I'm excited. I always read it. You always have some of the best music. It's always really, really good.

So people should definitely check it out. Devin, thanks so much for joining us. Thanks for having me. That was fun to chat.