Clause for alarm?

Most bands touring Chicago know the drill: If you land a gig at the Hideout, Metro or Empty Bottle, you don’t book another show in the area near that date. Doing so cuts the audience in half, disappointing both venues that’ve booked you, and perhaps cutting your own financial take and reputation (assuming you’re one of those bands that likes money). Sounds simple enough, right? But Lollapalooza, like many other large festivals across the country, makes this unwritten code official with its blackout period—or “radius clause,” in legalese—that, while understandable to some, is causing unease in others around town.

Here’s the deal: For 60 days before and 30 days after their Lollapalooza appearance, Lolla performers are prohibited from booking a show within 250 miles of Chicago (which includes Madison, Milwaukee, Champaign, Indianapolis, Ann Arbor and Iowa City). Does this mean Lolla is decimating the Chicago—or even the Midwest—music scene every summer, taking precious opportunities from small bands and the small venues that employ them? Or is Lolla helping more than it hurts, giving bands much-needed exposure? We caught up with musicians, club owners and others in the business to get their takes.

If a local band still wants to play in the area, are there ways around the clause?
Charles Attal, partner at Lolla parent company C3, and talent buyer for Lollapalooza We’ve made some exceptions in the past for some of the local bands that play earlier in the day at the festival.
Jeremy Bolen, frontman for Chin Up Chin Up, who played Lolla ’07 For us, and some other bands, too, [C3 was] pretty cool about the radius clause. We booked two shows [Ribfest Chicago and Schubas] within the window of the fest. [The clause] is more for the really big acts, like Radiohead.

Why do you think bands agree to the clause?
Tim Tuten, co-owner of the Hideout It’s simple. There’s gonna be hundreds of thousands of people there to see your band at Lolla. I don’t fault the bands.
JB C3 is a powerful company because they book Austin City Limits and other fests. You want to be on their good side.
Matt Mentele, booking agent for Lolla ’08 artist Ha Ha Tonka The Wilcos of the world can pick and choose their fests. But for us, even if the contract is somewhat demanding, this is a huge gig. C3 also hooked us up with the SoCo [Southern Comfort] Music Experience in Madison in September. And from my experience, most festival buyers are lenient and will listen to you in regards to the clause.

Are radius clauses really necessary?
CA We have to make sure that we at least make Lolla a special event. We figure keeping that three-month window in there is safe. Ninety-nine percent of the touring bands wouldn’t want to come back [to play Chicago] in two months anyway. In fact, some bands that would only hit Chicago once a year play Lolla and then are able to hit Chicago again in the fall [because of their resulting increase in exposure]. This is a massive destination festival, and we just have to make sure that nothing steps on top of us a month later. The bands don’t complain, to me, of wanting to play and not being able to.
JB The clause makes sense. They want to make sure their fest goes well. Look at Chicago: Any night, you can see a band that’s pretty good, so there needs to be a way to ensure people will want to come out to the fest.
Bruce Finkleman, owner of the Empty Bottle When we booked the Do Division Festival, we got a feeling for why a radius clause makes sense. We’re expecting our artists to draw a certain amount of people, and when [those bands] book a show the previous weekend in town and not many people show up to our festival, you notice. We ask for a $5 donation; I can only imagine what it’s like [to lose out on potential customers] on Lolla’s scale.

How does Lolla’s radius clause impact your own bookings?
BF As a club owner, it really takes down the talent pool. There’s a lot of dates we’ll have difficulty filling. There’s no other way to put it.
TT We have the Hideout Block Party every year, and we’ve now moved it to the last weekend of summer, September 20 and 21. And we had to move it because of complications from the Lolla festival. Every year, we can only find out which artists we’re going to be able to book after Lolla picks their artists, because they won’t let bands do both. So the bands we do get at the Block Party often have to proactively choose our Block Party. But Lollapalooza gobbles up nearly 120 bands, and how many bands tour in a summer? Five hundred? Maybe 300? One hundred and twenty is a big chunk of the pie.

How does the nationwide boom of music festivals—including Lolla—affect which acts you book?
BF The festival scene has gotten huge over the last five to six years. Now, there’s only a finite number of quality bands to go around.
TT Each of these new fests has their radius clauses. There’s a reason why we keep seeing Mr. Blotto at every street fair; touring bands are not allowed to play anywhere near these festivals.

Is Chicago as a whole benefitting or losing out by hosting Lollapalooza?
TT I love having Chicago on the map internationally—don’t get me wrong. But the model of Lollapalooza is: These guys fly in from [C3’s Austin, Texas, headquarters] and say, “Don’t play anywhere in the Great Lakes. From Memorial Day to Labor Day, don’t mess with us.” They put up some fences around one of our parks, charge $200 and say you can’t play anywhere else. It’s a very weird spaceship that lands. Then they donate some money to the parks, but for what? To fix up the park they just ruined? Also, I’m not sure a lot of these tourists that come in ever get out into the city. The only part of Chicago I see Lolla benefitting is downtown.
Nan Warshaw, Bloodshot Records I think Chicago’s local clubs are the real losers here. Not the huge venues, but all the 200 to 300 [capacity] venues have been negatively impacted. Lolla is trying to make nice with the local community [with the after-shows; see “Post-Lolla? Holla!,”], and I give them credit for that. And it’s better than the alternative: doing nothing.

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