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Chris Kansy: The Gaffer 2024

Currently steering Coldplay’s record-breaking Music of the Spheres Tour around the globe, production manager Chris Kansy is helping to establish new best practices for acts trying to minimise their carbon footprint. His efforts, over a career that now dates back more than 40 years, see Kansy become the first person to collect the Arthur Award for top production guru (aka The Gaffer), twice. Adam Woods caught up with him during the band’s recent Australia leg…

In the great twisted saga of concert tours, one line plots an unusual course across the past four decades or so, joining dots you didn’t realise were connected at all – from Joan Jett and the Blackhearts through Milli Vanilli, Nirvana, the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Nine Inch Nails, Mary J Blige, Roger Waters, all the way to Coldplay.

That line – which also takes in White Zombie, The Cult, Ozzy Osbourne, Jane’s Addiction, Mötley Crüe, Massive Attack, Janet Jackson, Tool, Muse, Beck, The Flaming Lips, and many more – is the trajectory of Chris Kansy: storied production manager, much-admired gentleman of the road, and first-ever double recipient of The Gaffer award.

Last time Kansy was Gafferised, it was 2012, and he was 14 months into The Wall Live, Waters’ arena- and stadium-sized resurrection of his 1979 Pink Floyd masterpiece – a show the production manager has nominated, in one of his many Radio Check podcasts with his brother Matt, as perhaps the greatest of all time.

This time around, however, he is behind the wheel of another show that may prove equally significant, in entirely different ways: Coldplay’s $1bn-grossing, consciously decarbonising Music of the Spheres Tour, which set out with a goal to reduce emissions from show production, freight, and band and crew travel by at least 50%, and has had great success in doing so.

“I went through this period of time where I had this reputation of being this guitar tech who could do production and everything else”

When Kansy checks in with IQ in late October, he’s on Australian time as the band prepare for eleven shows in Melbourne, Sydney, and Auckland. They haven’t played live since Dublin in September, and after Australia and New Zealand, it will be six more weeks before a pocket of dates in the UAE and India in January; then a couple more months before Hong Kong and South Korea in April. At 63, Kansy has developed a fondness for this superstar touring pace, and he freely admits it.

“They’re all family men,” he says of Coldplay. “They’re in their late 40s. They’ve got kids. They’ve got this expectation of a personal life. So, we don’t go out for four or five months straight. We go out for three weeks, and then we take a break, and I’ve learned to really appreciate that.

“Coldplay’s kind of wrecked me for touring. I’m not so sure that I could go and load in, do a show, load out the same day you loaded in, get on a bus, sleep for four-and-a-half hours, get up, and do it all over, which is what I have done my entire 40-plus years of touring. We’ll see if I’m able to do that again.”

If he never does, you certainly couldn’t accuse him of not putting in the miles, across a career that nicely illuminates 40 years’ worth of musical trends, from hair metal and grunge to mainstream arena and stadium shows of all kinds.

Having started out in the late 1970s as an in-house lighting engineer, working in clubs in his native Hartford, Connecticut and then in New York City, he was drafted by Joan Jett’s LD Bryan Hartley to fill in on a tour, then persuaded to stay on as a guitar tech when a vacancy opened up.

“The guys in the crew sort of gathered around and told me, and I said, ‘Hey, I do not do guitars.’ But they said, ‘Well, the management and the band like you, so if they ask you if you know how to do guitars, just say yes, and we’ll show you how to do it. We’ll help you through.’”

“Being by [the artists’] side or over their shoulder or in front of them during this process is fascinating to me”

By Kansy’s account, the experiment was only partially successful. “I was an awful guitar tech,” he confirms – perhaps over-modestly, given that he subsequently fulfilled the role not only for Jett but for Billy Duffy of The Cult and Megadeth’s Marty Friedman. “Well, you know what, I guess I was okay. I did it on and off from, say, ‘86 to ‘95. I just never really had the passion for it. I wasn’t a guitarist; I learned just enough to play one riff, which was The Cult’s Wild Flower.” He sings the two-note riff. “How basic is that? I just never really wanted to gain any momentum with it. It’s hard, as well. Pedals are complicated things…”

But on such unpromising beginnings are careers built, and Kansy began to find a niche for himself.

“I went through this period of time where I had this reputation of being this guitar tech who could do production and everything else,” he says. “In those days, when you were a production manager, you were also the stage manager, you were also the tour accountant, head of security, you advanced all the back-of-house stuff – it was a full thing. And I suppose I was known for being able to do guitars and all that at the same time. People kind of put up with my limited guitar tech abilities because they knew what else they got out of me.

“My first production manager job without having to do guitars” was an auspicious one: Soundgarden’s Badmotorfinger tour in 1991, right at the height of grunge. But it was a few years before he encountered the first in a line of uncompromising visionaries that would gradually bring an important theme to his career.

A Head Full of Dreams
“I started working for Nine Inch Nails in 1999,” he recalls. “Trent Reznor really listened to me, and I took part in the creative process, which still doesn’t happen to me very much as a production manager. Usually, there’s a creative team, and I bring their vision to fruition. But being invited into the creative team – I really enjoyed that.

“I love working for those kinds of people,” he adds. “I love working for Trent, I love working for Roger Waters, I love working for Robert Del Naja of Massive Attack, because they’re auteurs – their fingerprints are on everything, and they want to be involved, and being by their side or over their shoulder or in front of them during this process is fascinating to me.”

“It is a true rollercoaster”

A latter-day entry in that roll of honour is Coldplay’s Chris Martin, who may not be generally known as a dark genius in the Reznor/Waters mould, but who is nonetheless a strikingly hands-on kind of star.

“Chris Martin is involved in every aspect of the show,” says Kansy. And the thing I really respect about Chris is he never leaves well enough alone. He always wants to try something new, always wants to experiment with something. He always wants to improve the show, improve the audience experience. He does not want to champion mediocrity in any way at all.”

Kansy credits Martin and fifth member Phil Harvey for constantly keeping the show vital, in the knowledge that most fans will have a pretty good idea of what they are going to see long before the show arrives in their city.

“They’re always looking for the next thing, trying to find another way to improve the show. They know everything’s on YouTube, and they know everything is being captured.”

The consequence, says Kansy, is a show that offers one knock-out punch after another and never seems to lose its freshness. “Lots of shows have that thing where you’re building up to the big moment – you know, where The Wall falls down or whatever. Coldplay kind of has lots of little big moments throughout the show. You know, we open the show like most bands want to close their show. By the second song, there’s balloons all over the audience, you know? And then the third song, everything breaks down. And then the fourth song, the band goes out to the B-stage and plays a couple songs. And then back to the main stage, and then there’s pyro, and on it goes. It is a true rollercoaster.”

“We’ve got lots of little things that hopefully build up to a big impact”

Global Citizen
The tour has grossed $1.06bn in revenue from 9.6m tickets across 164 dates, making it the most-attended tour of all time and the second highest grossing. But its real influence looks likely to be the effort it has made to pioneer more sustainable practices in large-scale touring, from its mobile rechargeable show battery made from recyclable BMW i3 batteries to its use of renewable resources such as hydrotreated vegetable oil, solar power, and kinetic energy.

Over the summer, the band delivered an update on their sustainability initiatives, revealing that, on a show-by-show comparison, the current tour has so far produced 59% less CO2e emissions than their previous stadium tour in 2016/17, exceeding their original target. On Coldplay’s initiative, more than 9m trees have already been planted around the world, with a further million to be planted before the end of the year.

Kansy himself joined Music of the Spheres when it was already off the ground, replacing Jake Berry in 2023, 50 shows in. So he carefully bats away credit for the sustainability side, whilst being fully involved in the ongoing process.

“It was all here when I got here,” he says. “Even before I knew I was going to work for Coldplay, I knew they were going to go out with an ethos of sustainability. But you know, we’re always looking for that next thing. We run the show on batteries. We’ve got solar, we’ve got energy bikes, we’ve got energy floors. We’ve got lots of little things that hopefully build up to a big impact.

“Backstage, we don’t have plastic bottles. We all have our own water bottle. We fill up at bubblers. We try to be sustainable about the way we recycle. We’re sustainable about the way we order food and go through our food. We try to limit the waste. We’ve got a company called Hope Solutions that work with us, and we are always in contact with each other. Live Nation has a sustainability officer out on the tour with us to make sure that all the things you say they’re going to do come to fruition. It’s a constant thing.”

“We’re going to start doing these residencies, starting with ten Wembleys next year and then around the world”

Forty years into his touring career, Kansy is evidently energised by the new challenge of doing it all again but this time, as cleanly as possible.

“It’s a thing that I always believed in, even before Coldplay. I eliminated plastic bottles on Roger Waters and on Tool and on Massive Attack and all these other shows that I did. But it is a continuum. There’s no, ‘Okay, we’re sustainable now. What’s next?’

“We’re going to start doing these residencies, starting with ten Wembleys next year and then around the world. And when we start doing those, we’re going to try to make an even bigger impact. We’ll get involved with how the audience gets to the show, how they are fed and watered, all these things. Maybe we can bring in more solar, since we’re there for a while, and bring in bigger impact items to help make those special events even more sustainable than we do on tour, where there’s only so much you can do before you load out again.”

Clearly, Music of the Spheres is being watched carefully by other tours, and its innovations will inevitably trickle down across the business. This is meaningful work. But the important question is: How cross was Roger Waters when Kansy told him he was leaving him for Coldplay after 18 years?

Wish You Were Here
“Yeah,” says Kansy. “I remember the first time I saw him after he knew. I came in and he’s like, ‘Ah, so you finally got a real job.’ But I tried replacing myself, and they wouldn’t let me. I said, ‘I’m gonna find somebody to come in and take over.’ They’re like, ‘What do you mean, take over? No, no, no, we want you here when you can be here. Just make sure it’s covered when you’re not.’ And I was honoured to be considered in that way.”

As a result, Kansy remains the go-to man for both Coldplay and Waters, and, as he mentioned on his podcast, still touts Waters’ revived The Wall Live production as a high-watermark of arena entertainment.

“Coldplay is more of an extravaganza – it hits you in the face.”

“Well, that show was absolutely unique,” he says. “The technology was great, though there was not a lot of whiz-bang. It was rock & roll, performance, art, theatre – every angle of the entertainment world was there, you know. Drama. You know, it just had it all.

“There’s a story. You follow it all and it gets dark. It might have been different if The Wall record had just come out and we did a tour for it. But, you know, it had all this lore to it, all this reputation and expectation. We did 219 performances of that show, and I watched probably 85% of all of it. And I would only get called away to do other things. It was just a kinetic show in every way. Coldplay is more of an extravaganza. You walk in and it’s just smiles and eye candy and then bam – it hits you in the face.”

In the years between his two historic Gaffer Awards, Kansy has continued to finesse a remarkably high-end career, and it is safe to say he has continued to add plenty of tricks to his arsenal.

“I did a couple of campaigns with Muse, which were really, really interesting,” he says. “There was a lot of good high technology on the Drones Tour [in 2015-16], where we were flying helium-inflated objects around the arena – that was an incredible experience in the round. I’ve done two more Roger tours in the past decade, including the Us + Them Tour [in 2017-18], where we recreated the Battersea Power Station over the audience, which was absolutely fascinating.”

In 2019, heading into the pandemic unawares, Kansy was focused on an array of shorter jaunts. “I started the year with Massive Attack, and then went through the Smashing Pumpkins, and ended it with the Black Keys and then into Tool. I think [Tool guitarist] Adam Jones might be in that same category I discussed, with Trent and Roger and Robert. He’s got a huge vision for how Tool should be presented. One of my favourite bands to work for – I really, really like those guys.”

“I’m part of that overlapping generation… who kind of showed the industry how the future could be”

If Kansy’s career seems increasingly focused, that’s partly a function of big clients and an indication of not needing to grab any job going. “I guess I’m at the point in time now where, if I get a call about something I don’t want to do or I’m not interested in – and I get them – my response is always, you know, ‘Hey, thank you very much, it would have been an honour to work for you, unfortunately, I’m busy.’ Some of it is bullshit, some maybe not, but I’m too old and too far along to trudge across the country on something I’m not interested in doing. And there will be somebody else who would be interested in doing that.”

Kansy remains passionate about the business and a keen student of its evolution. A question about whether today’s regimented concert circuit is as fun as the crazy old one is met with an entertaining digression that charts the progression of touring productions – from Jimi Hendrix playing under a single spotlight, via Bill Graham’s decision to transport sound and lights for the Rolling Stones’ Exile on Main Street tour, to today’s eye-popping spectacles.

“Bill Graham is the godfather of production managers – the first one to really do what we do,” he says. “After that, guys like Michael Ahern and Joe Baptiste and these other production managers started figuring things out in a different way and developing how we tour, and then it really got ramped up when guys like Jake Berry got involved and really showed the industry how to tour properly.

“And then I’m part of that overlapping generation, with Jake and Opie [Dale Skjerseth] and Mark Spring, and that list just goes on and on, who kind of showed the industry how the future could be.”

Anyone you ask will tell you what makes Kansy a great production manager.

“Instead of looking for the next gig, he had this very Zen approach”

John Wiseman, nowadays PRG’s executive vice president for worldwide sales, has known Kansy since a Mötley Crüe tour back in the 1980s.

“I’ve found Chris to be one of the more interesting production managers that I’ve worked with, because he approaches it not just from an operational and straight-up production manager thing but really as an artist,” says Wiseman. “He has that artistic temperament, combined with the necessary ability to be pragmatic.

“I remember once, probably two decades ago, when a tour we were both working on was coming to an end, I said, ‘What are you doing next?’ And he had the most interesting answer. He said, ‘You know, John, I’m not exactly sure. I’ve got a couple of offers, but I’m going to look around until I find something that’s artistically rewarding and interesting.’

“Instead of looking for the next gig and thinking how he was going to make his house payment, he had this very Zen approach. There aren’t many production managers like that.”

eps managing director Sebastian Tobie first worked with Kansy on The Wall Live’s 2013 run through European stadiums.

“I experienced Chris as always approachable and supportive,” says Tobie. “And he was always ready to crack a joke when we met inside the last production truck to be loaded after every loadout, where he would personally push his production cases in position.

“My respect and joy working with him just grew over the years up to the current Coldplay tour and hopefully for many more years to come.”

“There’s no hierarchy with him at all; he’s one of the crew, and I think that wins other people’s respect on tour”

Brian Levine, TAIT’s president of projects, sums up Kansy as “a total legend in our industry” and suggests his second Gaffer Award is no surprise. “Chris has been a longtime client at TAIT and across all of the projects we’ve had the pleasure to work with Chris on, he’s made everyone involved feel like they belong,” he says. “Most of all, he’s created an environment where we can also have a little fun.”

Coldplay tour manager Marguerite Nguyen, meanwhile, has a personal reason for being glad Kansy didn’t come to his current role sooner.

“Chris and have known each other for nearly 20 years and have had many amazing meals around the world,” she says. “Funny story: he was up for Coldplay PM in 2008 and didn’t get the job, thank god. It went to Craig ‘Fin’ Finley, who subsequently hired me as his production coordinator. I would have to say, if that didn’t happen, I wouldn’t be here today, celebrating my 16th year with the band,” she laughs. “And here we are today, TM and PM.”

Rock & roll caterer Eat to the Beat is the only original vendor remaining in the Coldplay camp, having catered every tour since Parachutes in 2000, and newcomer Kansy meets with their approval. “He’s very approachable, very charming, he’s a good communicator,” says Global Infusion Group director Mary Shelley-Smith.

“It’s a very grown-up tour; everyone knows what they’re doing,” adds the company’s head of events, Kim Joyce. “He’s got respect throughout the whole production team. He’s always eating in main crew catering with everyone else – there’s no hierarchy with him at all; he’s one of the crew, and I think that wins other people’s respect on tour.”

“I’d say I’m a guy that values communication, that trusts people to do their job properly”

Parachute
What does Kansy himself think he brings?

“Well, I’m myself,” he says. “I’m myself. I have a style, you know? I mean, shows are always a little the same: you unload trucks, you set a bunch of stuff up, a band comes in and plays, and you break it down and put it in trucks. But there are myriad ways to do that, and every production manager is different.

“I guess I don’t really know what other production managers do, other than what I hear. I can’t go and watch them do their job. But I’d say I’m a guy that values communication, that trusts people to do their job properly. We have the best of the best on this crew, so I let all my department heads, my stage managers, everybody, do their job, but we talk every day; we sit down, and we regroup.

“I mean, there’s a small aspect of me being kind of the emergency parachute. I’m there to guide, I’m there to watch, I’m there to ensure communication. But I’m also there to make the big decisions. That’s what I’m getting paid for, and I’m comfortable there. I really think that I know what the right decision is. I’m pretty sure that I am the right person to guide that scenario when things are on the line.”

 


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Coldplay deliver UAE’s biggest-ever concerts

Coldplay completed their record-breaking four-night run in Abu Dhabi last week, achieving the largest and longest series of ticketed shows in the UAE.

Promoted by Live Nation Middle East and supported by the Department of Culture and Tourism Abu Dhabi, the sold-out Music Of The Spheres shows drew 200,000 fans across the four nights, surpassing the nearly 69,000 people who attended Ed Sheeran’s two sold-out concerts at Dubai’s Sevens Stadium last year.

The shows took place at Abu Dhabi’s Zayed Sports City Stadium which is now operated by Oak View Group and its Middle East partner Ethara.

Demand for the British band’s Abu Dhabi concerts was deemed unprecedented, with millions of fans attempting to secure a ticket.

Initially planned as a single show, the overwhelming interest led the band to add three additional dates, all of which sold out within hours.

The Middle East, one of the fastest-growing live music markets in the world, will be a key focus of this year’s International Live Music Conference (ILMC), with two expert-led panels: The Venue Boom and States of Growth.

“It has been an honour to bring Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres World Tour to the UAE”

“At Live Nation Middle East, we take immense pride in creating unforgettable events for the region, and it has been an honour to bring Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres World Tour to the UAE,” says James Craven, president of Live Nation Middle East.

“Organising the region’s largest concert series showcased the skill and hard work of our team, and we are deeply grateful for the support of the Department of Culture and Tourism – Abu Dhabi (DCT Abu Dhabi), Miral, and the dedicated team at Zayed Sports City Stadium.

“We also want to thank the local media for their invaluable role in sharing information with fans and ensuring the event ran seamlessly. We look forward to future collaborations with Coldplay and more exciting artists while continuing to deliver some of the most iconic events in the region.”

Coldplay will deliver another record-breaking show later this week when they perform at the largest stadium in the world, the 100,000-capacity Narendra Modi Stadium in India.

The second of the two Narendra Modi Stadium concerts, on 26 January (Republic Day), will be streamed live on Disney+ Hotstar, it was announced last week.

The band’s Music Of The Spheres tour has already set records as the best-selling and highest-grossing rock tour ever thanks to 10 million tickets sold and grosses over $1 billion to date during its three-year run.

Coldplay are represented by Wasserman Music’s Marty Diamond and Larry Webman in North America and WME’s Josh Javor for the rest of the world.

 


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Coldplay score biggest rock tour of all time

Coldplay’s globe-trotting Music of the Spheres tour has been crowned as the biggest rock tour of all time.

Since launching in March 2022, the Music of the Spheres jaunt has reportedly grossed $945.7 million and sold 8.8 million tickets, making it the highest-grossing and best-selling trek among rock acts in the history of Billboard Boxscore.

The British band are currently in the midst of the third European leg of the outing, which has also visited Asia and North and South America and is due to visit Australia and New Zealand later this year.

As reported in IQ earlier this year, the outing is also likely to see Coldplay make history as the first band (and second act after Taylor Swift, whose Eras Tour is categorised in the pop genre) to gross $1 billion from a single tour.

Among high-grossing rock tours, Coldplay usurps Elton John’s Farewell Yellow Brick Road Tour, which grossed $939.1m during its run from 2018-23.

The outing could also see Coldplay make history as the first band to gross $1 billion from a single tour

John broke the record in November 2022, dethroning U2’s 360° Tour, which earned $736.4m from 2009-11. Before that, it was The Rolling Stones’ A Bigger Bang Tour with $558m in 2005-07.

The all-time top 10 also features AC/DC, Guns N’ Roses, the Red Hot Chili Peppers and Roger Waters.

Based on ticket sales, Coldplay has held the all-time rock title since January, ending U2’s 13-year record with the 360° Tour, which shifted 7.3 million tickets.

The band, who are represented by Marty Diamond at Wasserman Music for North America and Josh Javor at WME for the rest of the world, have 21 dates on the Music of the Spheres tour remaining. They are strongly rumoured to be planning a 10-night run at London’s Wembley Stadium next summer in support of their upcoming new album Moon Music.

Go behind the scenes of the Music of the Spheres tour with IQ‘s tour report.

 


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PinkPantheress, Garbage cancel all 2024 dates

PinkPantheress and Garbage have each cancelled all upcoming tour dates for varying health reasons.

English singer-songwriter-producer PinkPantheress has axed all scheduled dates for the rest of this year, including opening slots on Olivia Rodrigo’s Guts tour and Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres tour.

The 23-year-old, whose real name is Victoria Walker, says she has “reached a wall which I’m struggling to penetrate” and that she needs to “focus on my physical health and overall wellbeing”.

PinkPantheress has been one of the opening acts on Rodrigo’s Guts tour since 19 July and was due to play support slots on it for several more weeks.

She was also due to open for Coldplay’s Music of the Spheres tour in Australia this November and perform at festivals including III Points (US), Field Day (UK), Summer Sonic (JP) and FORM (US).

“It is with great regret that we announce the cancellation of all our remaining dates for the rest of the year”

Elsewhere, 90s rock band Garbage have cancelled all remaining tour dates in 2024 due to an injury sustained by lead singer Shirley Manson, which will require surgery and subsequent rehabilitation.

“It is with great regret that we announce the cancellation of all our remaining dates for the rest of the year due to an injury that [frontwoman] Shirley [Manson] sustained on our recent tour in Europe that will require surgery and rehabilitation to correct.”

The band were due to perform at several festivals including Ohana Fest in California, HFStival in Washington, DC and Festival Hera in Mexico City.

During Live Nation’s earnings call this week, president and CFO Joe Berchtold played down concerns regarding increased tour cancellations of late, stressing there had been no more than normal.

“In terms of our cancellation rates, we’re seeing historical norms below last year,” he said. “They historically run kind of 4% to 5% of shows, about 1.5% of fans, absolutely in line with historical trends. I think most of the reports that we’ve seen have been efforts to take one or two data points out of a very large number of tours and shows, and we’re just not seeing anything unusual there.”

 


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Coldplay, Live Nation and more co-sign on sustainability study

A comprehensive study of the live music industry’s carbon footprint will be conducted by the Massachusetts Institute of Technology (MIT) and co-funded by Coldplay, Live Nation and Warner Music Group (WMG).

The report will suggest practical solutions to reduce the environmental impact of live music events “at every level,” from pubs and clubs to stadiums.

The partnership will kick off with an initial research phase focused on the UK and the US which will be presented as an Assessment Report of Live Music and Climate Change, anticipated to be completed in July 2024.

The report will aim to develop a comprehensive assessment of the relationship between live music and climate change, identify key areas where the industry and concertgoers can make tangible improvements to reduce emissions and provide a detailed analysis of the latest developments in green technology and sustainable practices.

MIT’s Environmental Solutions Initiative (MIT ESI), a leading climate and environmental academic research and solutions group, will recommend scientifically informed actions and policies that can be replicated across the live music industry to reduce its environmental footprint and establish a sustainable future for live events.

“I applaud the spirit of openness and collaboration that will allow us to identify specific challenges”

MIT Prof. John E. Fernandez, director of the ESI, says: “I’m delighted that we will be working with our partners to co-create recommendations for a sustainable future in music. As well as jointly funding the research, I applaud the spirit of openness and collaboration that will allow us to identify specific challenges in areas such as live event production, freight and audience travel, and recommend solutions that can be implemented across the entire industry to address climate change.”

Coldplay launched their current Music Of The Spheres world tour with a pledge to cut emissions by 50%. In June last year, the group issued an update on the tour’s sustainability initiatives, revealing that, on a show-by-show comparison, it has so far produced 47% less CO2e emissions than their previous A Head Full of Dreams stadium tour in 2016/17.

More than seven million trees have already been planted around the world, with one being planted for each concert-goer.

In 2022, Live Nation partnered with Coldplay and major public transportation providers to offer fans free or discounted rides to incentivise and encourage green travel. The initiative supported a 59% average increase in public transport ridership on show days across four US cities.

“We’re proud to share best practices and solutions developed by Green Nation in this report,” says Lucy August-Perna, director of global sustainability, Live Nation. “Helping accelerate sustainable practices benefits everyone who enjoys live music, while ensuring a strong future for the industry. We look forward to sharing the report with industry partners and fans alike.”

Interested in the intersection of sustainability and live events? Don’t miss out on the 16th edition of the Green Events and Innovations conference. For more information, click here.

 


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Coldplay countersue former manager for £14 million

Coldplay are counter-suing their former manager Dave Holmes for £14 million (€16.2m), according to a report.

It was revealed last month that Holmes is seeking more than £10 million (€11.7m) in allegedly unpaid commission in his lawsuit against the band.

Representatives for Holmes, who worked with the group for more than 20 years prior to being dismissed last year, say the band are “refusing to honour [his] management contract and pay him what he is owed”.  The group “vigorously disputed” the allegations and have now launched a counter-claim.

Court documents seen by The Times show that Holmes is accused of failing to “adequately to supervise and control” the budget for the band’s ongoing Music of The Spheres World Tour.

Among the claims are that Holmes ordered a $9.7m video screen – that was only used for 10 gigs and was too big to take on tour – and 16 bespoke stage pylons at a cost of €10.6m that turned out to be unusable.

“Had Mr Holmes exercised reasonable care and skill in the performance of his obligations, the band would not have incurred costs of at least £17.5 million,” it is alleged in the documents.

In addition, Coldplay allege that Holmes leveraged his position as manager to secure $30 million in loans from Live Nation, which they claim could have created a conflict of interest in tour negotiations.

Holmes is suing Coldplay in the UK High Court for breach of contract

“To the best of [our] knowledge… Mr Holmes used monies obtained by the loan agreements to fund a property development venture in or around Vancouver, Canada,” adds the band’s filing. “It is to be inferred that Mr Holmes was only able to acquire loans totalling $30 million at a fixed annual interest rate of 2.72% from Live Nation by virtue of his position as Coldplay’s manager.”

In a statement to The Times, Live Nation says that it “has a strong and longstanding relationship with Coldplay, adding that: “Any past dealings with their management team were considered an extension of this relationship.”

Holmes, who is suing Coldplay in the UK High Court for breach of contract, and the band began working together on two-album cycles from 2014, with his most recent deal, covering 2019’s Everyday Life and 2021’s Music of the Spheres.

He alleges that he began planning for the group’s next two albums – plus preparations for their 2024/25 tours – after his contract was extended to 2025. However, shortly afterwards, Coldplay claimed the deal had not yet been agreed to and that his previous agreement had ended.

The manager says he was then informed by the band’s solicitor that they wanted to change his role to ‘head of touring’ and limit his commission to just concerts. He alleges he was given two drafts of the new contract in August 2022, only for the band to later withdraw the offer and inform him through their solicitors that he was being dismissed.

A spokesperson for Holmes tells The Times: “Coldplay know they are in trouble with their defence. Accusing Dave Holmes of non-existent ethical lapses and other made-up misconduct will not deflect from the real issue at hand – Coldplay had a contract with Dave, they are refusing to honour it and they need to pay Dave what they owe him.”

 


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Coldplay tour passes seven million ticket sales

Coldplay’s all-conquering Music of the Spheres Tour has raced past yet another milestone after racking up more than seven million ticket sales.

The stadium tour, which began in Costa Rica in March 2022, is now the biggest-selling of the last two years, with a freshly-added second run of Asia shows for January and February 2024 still to come.

It has already comfortably outsold Coldplay’s previous A Head Full of Dreams tour of 2016/17, which was attended by 5.38m people.

The new dates commence at Philippine Arena on 19 January and include an unprecedented run of shows at Singapore’s National Stadium, which will see the band become the first act to play four nights at the venue (23-24 & 26-27 January). They will then perform in Thailand at Bangkok’s Rajamangala National Stadium on 3 February.

Fans can register for access to the ticket presale on 19 June, with a general sale to begin on Tuesday 20 June.

Coldplay will also make a limited number of Infinity Tickets – costing the equivalent of US $20 each – available for the shows at a later date

X-ray Touring-represented Coldplay will also make a limited number of Infinity Tickets – costing the equivalent of US $20 each – available for the shows at a later date. Infinity Tickets are released for every Coldplay show to make the tour accessible to fans for an affordable price. They are restricted to a maximum of two tickets per purchaser, and must be bought in pairs.

Last month, the group announced they are returning to Asia and Australia this November for a special run of stadium shows, including their first Tokyo shows since 2017, their first ever dates in Kaohsiung, Jakarta and Kuala Lumpur and a one-off performance at Perth’s Optus Stadium.

In 2022, Coldplay made history in Argentina by completing an unprecedented 10-night sellout run at the 65,000-cap Estadio River Plate in Buenos Aires, and recently became the first band to sell out four nights at a Spanish stadium on a single tour, drawing a total of 225,000 people to the Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys in Barcelona in May.

Earlier this month, the quartet revealed they have cut their carbon emissions by almost half on Music Of The Spheres, compared with their last stadium tour.

Revisit our in-depth look at the Music of the Spheres trek, first published in Issue 113 of IQ Magazinehere.

 


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Music of the Spheres – the tour report

While other acts opted to wait until 2023 for their stadium tours, Coldplay took a risk to push ahead this year with their Music of the Spheres tour. And the pay-off has been extraordinary, as fans starved of live music for two years are helping the band smash records. Gordon Masson reports.

With more than 3.5 million tickets sold in 2022, at the start of what is mooted to be a four-year project, Coldplay are in the midst of the biggest tour of their career – not a bad achievement considering it’s also the most eco-friendly stadium tour ever.

When frontman Chris Martin revealed the band would not tour to support their Everyday Life album in late 2019 but would instead try to “work out how our tour can not only be sustainable, [but] how can it be actively beneficial,” the industry wondered whether such ambitions were even possible.

But it turns out that those ideals had been simmering for a couple of years before the shock announcement, as stadia around the world were already on hold for the band’s current Music of the Spheres spectacular, which is laying down blueprints on how to dramatically reduce the carbon footprint of touring.

“To be honest, we started to plan this tour when we were on the last tour, in 2017,” band manager Dave Holmes tells IQ. “It seemed crazy at the time, but we were holding venues for 2022 and 2023, as some stadiums actually need to be booked that far in advance.”

“The rate at which they sold – I’ve never seen anything like it, especially in South America where we couldn’t put shows on sale fast enough”

Coronavirus meant that every act had to shut down touring activities, but with Martin’s bold pronouncement never straying far from the headlines, the decision to push ahead with the tour, as scheduled, when many other A-list acts decided to keep playing their wait-and-see strategy, seems to have paid off. Big time.

“We took a big risk in terms of holding these multiples. But the rate at which they sold – I’ve never seen anything like it, especially in South America where we couldn’t put shows on sale fast enough: they’d just sell out on the day,” says Holmes.

With sales for around the 3.5m tickets mark for this year alone, the gamble has been more than worth it. But the challenges the tour principals have had to overcome along the way have been considerable.

Strange Planning
Represented by Marty Diamond at Wasserman Music for North America, Coldplay’s agent since day-one for the rest of the world was Steve Strange, who passed away in 2021. X-ray Touring colleague Josh Javor worked with Strange for many years on the band’s live career and reveals that Music of the Spheres was the final tour they planned together.

“The first show in Costa Rica was very emotional because normally I’d be arm-in-arm with Steve on those occasions,” says Javor. “Steve had been talking about this tour specifically, for a very long time. The band’s last tour was ground-breaking, but it was all just building up to this. He knew that Coldplay would be bigger than they were on A Head Full of Dreams and the venues we booked and tickets we’ve sold prove he was right.

“Just as Steve predicted, this tour is the band’s biggest to date. It’s like his legacy, and it’s very sad that he isn’t around to see just how successful it is.” Holmes comments, “Steve was brilliant. It was never about the money with him: of course, he’d always fight for you to get the best offers, but his focus was always about building the right way; taking it step by step.”

“We sold all six stadium shows in one day, and we could have easily added a couple more dates if there had been availability”

Indeed, the band themselves had to be convinced about the scale of the current tour. “When we were putting the routing together, the band were definitely a little bit unsure,” says Holmes. “It was a little bit shocking for them to see the number of dates – the multiples, in particular. It was eye-opening for them just to realise, ‘Wow, this is where you guys think we’re at now.’ But it’s the biggest tour the band have done, and a lot of that is thanks to the work Steve Strange did over 20-plus years.”

Paradise
In addition to the millions of fans they are thrilling, Coldplay’s promoter partners are a happy bunch. With Live Nation promoting the tour, along with a number of local promoters in key territories, there is universal praise for both the band and their production crew.

At press time, Simon Moran’s SJM Concerts was co-promoting Coldplay’s six dates at Wembley Stadium alongside Live Nation’s Phil Bowdery. “The demand has been incredible,” says Moran. “There was a presale that offered tickets to anyone who bought the album, but when we did the general on-sale, we sold all six stadium shows in one day, and we could have easily added a couple more dates if there had been availability.

“Coldplay’s live shows are just legendary. The number of hits that they have and just the fact that their live performances are so engaging mean that word of mouth basically sells the tickets. A Coldplay stadium show is just a massive event because there’s so much goes into it.

“I’ve never known anyone who has not been blown away by their stadium shows, and I have to say that the current tour is just the best they have created.”

“The tour being eco was very educative for all concerned: the audience, the venue, and us”

Wembley Stadium’s senior commercial manager, James Taylor, notes that Coldplay are only the second act to sell six shows in one year at the new stadium. “This takes them to 12 shows in total and equals the all-time new Wembley Stadium record – a huge achievement,” he says.

“Demand for tickets has been amongst the biggest we have ever seen at Wembley and is testament to the ongoing popularity of the band, who continue to innovate and excite with every tour.”

In Poland, Live Nation’s Grzegorz Kurant is jubilant. “It was a triumphant return,” he says. “Their last show took place in Warsaw in 2017, and it was a great success, but the demand for this year’s show was unprecedented. If there were any new [ticket] releases they were disappearing in seconds.

“The tour being eco was very educative for all concerned: the audience, the venue, and us. Even though we all do our best to be more environment-friendly, the tour was a good reminder and educator of how much still needs to be done.”
PGE Narodowy stadium is also celebrating. “It’s not only the band but also the whole team of technical support and other coordinators who made the concert in Warsaw so special,” says venue manager Jarosław Bodanko. “It doesn’t happen often that the entire production team brings so much passion and commitment to the event’s creation. Coldplay concerts are not only a unique show for concert attendees but also an extraordinary experience for everyone working on its production.”

Kurant adds, “The band are on great form. The modernised [PixMob] wristbands with all the new features are astonishing. The only challenge we had was to find enough tickets to satisfy the demand.”

“We were just coming out of Covid, and we did not know how the public would react or if they had the financial resources to go to a concert”

That’s a similar tale worldwide.

Memo Parra, director of international talent at Mexican promoter OCESA, promoted the band for back-to-back shows in March at Estadio BBVA in Monterrey and a further two dates in Guadalajara’s Estadio Akron. Then, in early April, they smashed records in the capital city.

“We sold out four shows at Foro Sol – more than 250,000 tickets in total. They are the first international act ever to do that,” Parra reports. “It was a very important time for us because we were just coming out of Covid, and we did not know how the public would react or if they had the financial resources to go to a concert. But in the end, we were delighted. Coldplay are a class act, and it is great to work with them.”

Parra is also promoting appearances at Bogotá’s Estadio El Campín – a sales feat he again lauds. “It’s not easy to sell out two stadium shows in Colombia,” he says. “Coldplay are just huge in Latin America now, and we cannot wait to have them come back again next time.”

The most impressive sales numbers, however, belong to Argentina, fulfilling the dreams of local promoter Diego Finkelstein.

“We have ten sold-out dates at River Plate Stadium – that’s 650,000 tickets in one city – but I am not surprised because Coldplay have a huge connection with people in Argentina”

“We have ten sold-out dates at River Plate Stadium – that’s 650,000 tickets in one city – but I am not surprised because Coldplay have a huge connection with people in Argentina,” says Finkelstein who runs DF Entertainment.

“On the last tour, I had lunch with Dave Holmes and told him that we could sell out ten stadiums in Buenos Aires, but he was reluctant to commit to that many at the time. So when we went on sale, we went with four shows at River Plate and that was supposed to be the end of the tour leg, but the speed they sold out at was incredible, so I pushed for more.”

Praising Josh Javor for his part in proceedings, Finkelstein says the FIFA World Cup’s unusual November kick-off means a halt to domestic football, thus freeing up River Plate Stadium.

“We invested $2m [€1.96m] in pitch protection to persuade the stadium to give us more dates,” he continues. “It’s a once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to get so many dates at River Plate, so we begged the band to extend the tour. On 24 May, we put shows five, six, and seven on sale and they blew out in one day. The following week we sold out shows eight and nine.”

Coldplay were similarly blown away and recorded a video in Spanish to thank their Argentine fans. “It was perfect,” says Finkelstein. “The tenth show went on sale on 7 June and sold out in two hours. It was incredible, but if we wanted, the demand was still there to sell even more dates.”

“I came in just six or seven weeks from the start of the tour, so there was a lot of catching up to do”

Having already seen the spectacle in Chicago (twice) and Paris, Finkelstein is counting the days until Coldplay arrive in Buenos Aires. And citing the use of the third-generation PixMob – that in keeping with the rest of the tour are now produced using plant-based materials – Finkelstein believes that incorporating the audience into the show has elevated Coldplay to the top.

“What they deliver is this amazing immersive show for all the family. I cannot wait to see all ten shows in Buenos Aires.”

Don’t Panic
Another unforeseen challenge for team Coldplay happened earlier this year when long-time production manager Bill Leabody had to step back because of health issues. He recommended Jake Berry as his replacement, and thankfully the production guru was available.

“I came in just six or seven weeks from the start of the tour, so there was a lot of catching up to do,” says Berry.

As Leabody had spent months setting everything up, Berry found himself in unfamiliar waters, inheriting suppliers he hadn’t worked with before. “When I came along, everybody thought, ‘Oh, here comes the hatchet man: everybody’s gonna leave,’” laughs Berry. “But that was never going to be the case – there’s no point breaking up a happy crew. And besides, I couldn’t have found any suppliers able to do it in terms of equipment and the logistics that were already in place.”

“It’s a bit like stepping back in time for us old enough to remember the 70s and 80s, when we used to have to deal with carnets”

With Covid policies still in place at the start of the tour, the initial shows from Costa Rica to Mexico entailed lockdown bubbles. “Our policy would be if somebody felt sick, we would test; if they were positive, we would isolate,” says Berry. “That would mean leaving somebody behind, on their own in a hotel, and they’d catch up later. So that could be for ten days, but now it’s down to five days.”

Another dilemma to deal with has been the aftermath of Brexit. Berry is unfazed. “It’s a bit like stepping back in time for us old enough to remember the 70s and 80s, when we used to have to deal with carnets.” And he’s pragmatic about related issues. “New driver regulations and things that have changed because of the British structure in Europe didn’t really fall upon us – it fell upon the suppliers to make it work. We order what we need, and we expect the companies to do all the logistics.”

The Scientist(s)
Having very publicly proclaimed that touring would not resume until the band had figured out a more environmentally friendly way to hit the road, team Coldplay has been involved in an intense three-year period of research and development.

“Luckily for us, once Chris had mentioned it in an interview, we had an overwhelming response of people approaching us with different ideas and technologies,” explains Holmes.

As a result, the array of new tech and concepts that are being used on the production is extensive, including: state-of-the-art batteries supplied by BMW, wind-turbine technology on delay towers, solar blankets on unused seats in venues, trucks powered by Hydrotreated Vegetable Oil (HVO) fuel, and floor covers that can turn the kinetic energy created by fans dancing into electricity. More on the latter two, anon.

“Coldplay set a very high standard. They’ve invested a lot of time, effort, and money into trying to meet their sustainability goals”

Those measures have been put in place to meet the band’s pledge to make the tour “as sustainable and low-carbon as possible,” guided by three key principles: reduce, reinvent and restore.

Indeed, ongoing development will result in the 2023 introduction of generators that can run on either hydrogen, diesel, or biodiesel. “I wouldn’t want to say the name of the company behind them, yet,” states Holmes, “but their generators are a quarter of the size of the ones we currently use. And the fact they can be so versa- tile with different fuels will be a game-changer for the whole world.”

Other proposals, such as a bamboo stage system, however, had to be dropped, reluctantly. “We realised there was no guarantee that we could tour a bamboo stage everywhere in the world because different countries have different rules about bringing in trees, plants, and vegetables, and it would have fallen under that category,” says Holmes.

The Hardest Part
The band’s ambitions to cut the touring carbon footprint by 50% has forced suppliers and their logistics experts to take a long hard look at their own operations and equipment. But that task has, reportedly, been universally welcomed, as any savings made with Coldplay can be implemented – and improved upon – for future clients.

“Coldplay set a very high standard,” says Berry. “They’ve invested a lot of time, effort, and money into trying to meet their sustainability goals, and they’re so far ahead in their planning that government infrastructure is not up to speed. If it was a 100-metre dash, we’d to be ten metres in front of them at the finish line.”

“We feel proud to be part of their commitment to bringing music to the masses whilst being respectful of the world we live in”

As an example, Berry cites sourcing HVO fuel for vehicles as particularly irksome. “We used it wherever we could in America, but it was very regional,” he says. “It was great in California and places like Texas, but when we got to the east coast, it was really, really difficult. We are try- ing to set a standard, but the infrastructure isn’t there to support us.”

Determined to meet their targets, the band purchased 65,000 litres of HVO through truck- ing vendor Stagetruck, meaning the trucks were fully fuelled when they left the depot in England. “The idea was that we would buy more HVO along the way in Europe, but it’s just not avail- able in certain places, and it’s not worth the car- bon footprint to deliver it to the trucks onsite.”

However, the ‘green’ solution to that problem has been very grown up. “Now, when there’s a tour going out from the Stagetruck yard, they fill up those trucks with our fuel,” reports Berry. “The fuel is still being used to cut the carbon footprint. It may not all be on the Coldplay tour but it’s a very clever idea.”

For his part, Stagetruck boss Robert Hewett says, “We have a long-standing relationship with the band and spent time working with production to ensure we can supply the 40-plus strong team of trucks and drivers, to fit in line with their pledge to tour in an as environmentally friendly manner as possible.

“Along with staging, lights, audio, and cater- ing, we are also trucking two trailers of rechargeable [BMW] batteries, which [provide] power via solar photovoltaic panels. Our trucks are monitored to run as efficiently as possible, and the routing is carefully planned to ensure we are not burning extra diesel unnecessarily. It’s always a great pleasure working with Coldplay and their team, and we feel proud to be part of their commitment to bringing music to the masses whilst being respectful of the world we live in.”

“Everyone decided that even if it costs a little bit more money to get the same effect, if it has less environmental impact, we should do it”

Other suppliers have also upped their game in terms of reassessing efficient touring.

Nashville-based Strictly FX is supplying lasers, confetti, and pyro for the tour, which have also been put under the eco microscope. “All the confetti is biodegradable and doesn’t contain any PVC,” says the company’s art director David Kennedy, adding that their pyro product is also more sustainable. He notes, “There have been cost implications, but everyone decided that even if it costs a little bit more money to get the same effect, if it has less environmental impact, we should do it.”

However, he stresses that wellbeing remains paramount. “Sustainability comes second to the safety of something that explodes next to the band,” he says. “The flames use a standard fluid, so we’re generally getting that locally wherever we can because it doesn’t make sense to ship it. And the flame cannons themselves are now smaller units, so our freight impact is drastically reduced.”

Speed of Sound
On the audio side, Wigwam Acoustics has been working with the band for around 17 years, and company founder Chris Hill reveals the green goals of the latest tour mean that rather than flying most of the PA, “we’ve gone back to more conventional PA towers.” The company is also using equipment that requires significantly less power than on the previous Coldplay tour.

And noting the new leadership in the band’s touring set-up, Hill says, “When there’s a change of production manager, it usually means change everywhere. But Jake has basically left us to it because the audio department is kind of self-contained and doesn’t give him any grief.”

“Logistically, it’s been a major operation, as we have planned the most eco-friendly routes for supplying our equipment in all territories”

Indeed, highlighting the camaraderie among rivals in the audio business, Hill adds, “Going from zero into the summer madness where the challenges are not only with crew but also warehouse staff, manufacturers, and various supply-chain issues, has not been easy. Luckily, I have a great relationship with most of our competitors and most of them are good friends, so we all talk and try to support each other.”

When it comes to steel, Music of the Spheres is one of the few genuine world tours currently being serviced by Stageco, according to its project manager Dirk De Decker. “Logistically, it’s been a major operation, as we have planned the most eco-friendly routes for supplying our equipment in all territories,” he advises. “Jake Berry’s production team assess which local services can be called upon to meet the design’s requirements, and we provide the remaining custom elements that are irreplaceable.”

A significant engineering effort, four separate systems have been fabricated for the tour by Stageco. Two systems have been travelling around Europe while, to avoid shipping across the Atlantic, the other two were based in the United States. Each system is contained within 15 trucks and includes the materials to build each iconic part of the scenery, including the stunning moonrise arch.

In addition, Stageco’s crew – headed by Johan ‘Bellekes’ Van Espen, Stefaan Van Den Bossche, and a third team leader in America – build a50m upstage arc, two 23m high ‘pylons’ at left and right to support video screens, and a pair of custom sound towers, each with a large cantile- ver, designed in collaboration with Coldplay’s head of audio.

De Decker adds, “It’s a 72-hour steel build for us [with a single-day load-out]. All of the elements we are constructing are unconnected. No single element depends on the other, and this offers us a lot of practical flexibility on-site.”

“The artwork resembles galaxies in the universe, so the TAIT scenic team added designs in several layers to make it feel like the stars, words, and symbols were appearing from the darkness”

Another significant partner on production is TAIT, which is providing a custom mainstage sprung floor made to interact with the show’s various stages.

“Every deck surface is treated with an anti-skid treatment to allow the performers safety out in the elements, but more powerful than that is the hand-painted scenic over the entire stage,” explains TAIT senior project manager Shannon Nickerson.

“The production team provided renders and TAIT was able to create a system to paint the custom designs and layout words in Kaotican – the language created by Coldplay. The artwork resembles galaxies in the universe, so the TAIT scenic team added designs in several layers to make it feel like the stars, words, and symbols were appearing from the darkness.”

TAIT also constructed the show’s multi- coloured alien mirror ball, which houses eight lasers within it, meaning the cueing has to have pinpoint accuracy to ensure the safety of the audience.

Prospekt’s March
Among the most high-profile tech that the band is using on the tour is their kinetic floor covering – one of a myriad of products that specialists eps are supplying for the tour.

“Coldplay was my first tour, so I have an emotional connection to the band”

“Being involved on Music of the Spheres is a very special situation for me because Coldplay was my first tour, so I have an emotional connection to the band,” says eps chief Okan Tombulca.

“We do the barriers, the cable covers, the seat drapes, and we also have a solar system that we can place on the unused seats in the grandstands, depending on whether they face the sun or not. And, of course, we have the kinetic floor, which we developed together with a Dutch company to try to realise one of the ideas Coldplay themselves had.”

Indeed, Tombulca believes that the state-of-the-art floor might quickly pay for itself because it is no bigger than normal ground protection systems. “The truck space for the floor is probably around about the same,” he says.

PM Berry observes, “We have two of the kinetic floors – they’re about five-metre disks and they’re quite sophisticated. I tell people, ‘the more you jump, the louder the band will play,’ but we’re actually using the energy to help power the C stage a little bit for the lighting.

He continues, “They are brand-new so the technology’s not there yet where we can create enough energy to do it all. But back when the Vari-Lite first came out, there was only one moving light. Now there are 4,000, and they’re all 100 times better. So somebody will take this kinetic floor idea and build something that creates more energy.

“Their partnership with Coldplay is very experimental, so there will be successes and failures, but the goal is to try to change the whole paradigm of international touring”

“We’re learning as we go,” admits Berry. “We didn’t know it all to start with – certainly, I knew nothing – but it’s very, very exciting.”

Freight specialists Global Motion have worked with Coldplay for 16 years and have recently helped the band establish a new partnership with shipping giants DHL, which runs an extensive number of proactive sustainability programmes, such as windfarms in India and dams in Laos.

“We’ve worked lots with DHL in the past, using their infrastructure and helping them with projects, where the need arises,” explains managing director Adam Hatton. “Their partnership with Coldplay is very experimental, so there will be successes and failures, but the goal is to try to change the whole paradigm of international touring.”

Hatton believes everyone now has to make decisions on what is worth spending carbon on and what is not. “Everyone needs to carry less equipment internationally to make a difference,” he says. “That means less work and less profit for Global Motion, but in my view, going forward there will be more tours that are smaller, rather than the huge spectacles we’ve become used to.”

Ahead of personally handling the freight needs for Coldplay when they return to Latin America in September, Hatton reports that the crippling pandemic fees of up to six- and seven-times normal costs are gradually falling. “It’s now about 250% of where it should be,” he reports. “It’s a lot better than what it was and, personally, I don’t think it will ever come down to what the costs were pre-Covid.”

“Right now, you really have to entice local crew to come to work. Nobody’s going to show up if you’re going to pay them for four hours”

Immensely popular with contractors and their personnel, Coldplay are renowned in production circles for factoring in generous breaks to the touring schedule, often with a three- weeks-on, two-weeks-off rotation to allow band members and everyone else to spend quality time with their families.

Newcomer Berry believes such concepts en- gender loyalty, but he notes that the post-Covid scramble to assemble skilled staff has still been a significant test. “We’re not frugal on local crew because we want to get the production up and running quickly and tweak it in the same day before going into 3 or 4 o’clock in the morning,” explains Berry.

“Right now, you really have to entice local crew to come to work. Nobody’s going to show up if you’re going to pay them for four hours. It’s not worth it – they won’t show up. So you need to consider day rates. And if you need 20 hands, you always book 24.”

Appreciative of the way Coldplay take care of their crew, Wigwam’s Hill tells IQ, “They’ve al- ways tried to do the right thing, and we’ve always felt like part of the Coldplay family… it makes people go the extra mile because they’ve been looked after.”

Explaining that the generously scheduled time off also allows suppliers to carry out maintenance on equipment, Hill adds, “The amount of consoles we have on this tour is quite spectacular. Because we had some custom built, we took them back in the break between Paris and Brussels and literally stripped them down, fixed a few bugs, and serviced them.”

“Sustainability is now ingrained in every event, production, and tour we cater for”

With more than 300 mouths to feed on a show day, caterers Eat to the Beat have a 14-strong party on the road with the band – a far cry from when the company worked on Coldplay’s first tour in 2000.

“Sustainability is now ingrained in every event, production, and tour we cater for. We’re constantly striving to minimise our carbon footprint, and Coldplay is no exception,” says Kim Joyce, Eat to the Beat account manager. “Specific examples include sourcing local produce; accurate head counts to reduce food wastage; minimising single-use plastics and having a varied selection of delicious plant-based meals in our menus.”

She adds, “We have a relay system in place whereby we send an advance team on to the next city on the tour to source the local produce. We have completely cut out plastic-bottled water on the entire tour. We have aluminium bottles or cartons of water, and everyone has a refillable water bottle for use at the water cooler. We’ve also given everyone an Eat to the Beat branded mug and reusable coffee cup with a lid, which has massively reduced waste.”

In My Place
One major factor in the band’s plan to cut emissions is the tour’s residency feel – stopping in capital cities for multiple dates.

“You can’t tour in a sustainable way by travelling every day,” states Javor. “The great thing about Coldplay is there is such demand in each country and city for them: they can sell 180,000-200,000 tickets in Berlin; Frankfurt, Brussels, and Paris are similar. And when we look at where the audience is travelling from, they’re not travel- ling that far – they’re mostly locals – so we’re cut- ting down on carbon footprint for the fans, too.”

“It might sound crazy because of the volume of tickets we’re selling, but there’s still a fair amount being left on the table”

Berry observes, “You can recite the European tour on a postage stamp – three Frankfurts, one Warsaw, three Berlins, four Parises, four Brussels, six Wembleys, and two Glasgows. That’s Europe. And then we go to South America where, once again, the band is so popular that we can afford to stay in cities for two, three, four, six dates, and in the case of Buenos Aires, ten nights.”

Agent for North America, Marty Diamond, had the band play a dozen shows in May and June. “Josh [Javor] and I work in lockstep in terms of the scheduling and the band’s availability, while we also work very closely with our promoter partners,” says Diamond.

He says that while Coldplay are capable of playing multiple dates in the metropolis cities, for the first US leg of the current tour, “We were trying to cover off a lot of territory in a very short period of time, so that’s why most of the cities were just single dates.”

Diamond reveals the band will return for another stadium run in America in 2023, adding, “The band are always pushing the envelope in terms of creativity. This tour just takes everything to the next level.”

Javor says that plans for the current tour remain consistent with previous outings. “When Coldplay last toured in 2017, we left a lot on the table even though we sold out everywhere. It might sound crazy because of the volume of tickets we’re selling, but there’s still a fair amount being left on the table this time, too.

“We’re playing eight stadiums in Brazil, plus a 100,000-capacity festival – Rock in Rio. We’re playing ten shows in Argentina, two shows in Colombia, two shows in Peru, four shows in Chile. It’s huge but, in truth, we could have sold more.”

PM Berry is a newly converted fan and is also looking forward to the record-breaking run in Argentina. “I love the energy that Coldplay have,” he says. “It’s a family show where you can bring your three-year-old kid or your 80-year-old grandmother, and they’re all gonna leave singing or whistling a song. And that’s why we all do what we do.”

This feature appeared in the current issue of IQ Magazine (113), which can be read here.

 


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Coldplay tour tops 4m ticket sales, extends to ’23

Coldplay have announced UK and European stadium dates for 2023 after their Music Of The Spheres world tour surpassed four million ticket sales.

The band, who completed their six-night sold-out run at Wembley Stadium last night (21 August), have now confirmed the tour will extend into next year with new concerts added in Portugal, Spain, the UK, Italy, Switzerland, Denmark, Sweden and the Netherlands.

The global trek, which began in Costa Rica in March, heads to Glasgow’s Hampden Park in Scotland later this week for two shows before switching to Latin America in September.

“It’s such a groundbreaking tour in such a challenging market”

“We had no doubt it was going to be massive, but to be able to pull off what they’ve done is a very unique thing that would be tough to beat,” the band’s agent Josh Javor of X-ray Touring told IQ earlier this summer. “We’ve broken a bunch of records already.

“It’s not very easy to define a specific window of how long this tour will run. There are lots more places they still want to play, so we will continue as long as they want to. It’s such a groundbreaking tour in such a challenging market. A lot of other things in the world are just not selling at the moment, but it’s completely bucked the trend.”

The tour has also been heralded for its groundbreaking sustainability initiatives, including a show powered by 100% renewable energy in almost all locations; the world’s first tourable battery system (made from 40 BMW electric car batteries); power bikes and kinetic dancefloors allowing fans to help power the show; solar panels and wind turbines at every venue; a pledge to cut tour emissions by 50%; incentives to encourage fans to travel by green transport; and one tree planted for every ticket sold.

The group’s previous A Head Full Of Dreams tour was attended by 5.28m people

A report by Bloomberg says Coldplay have been charging an average of US$77.80 per ticket.

The group’s previous A Head Full Of Dreams tour of 2016/17 was attended by 5.38m people across 122 shows for a total gross of $523 million.

The full list of new Music Of The Spheres tour dates is as follows:

Estádio Cidade de Coimbra, Coimbra, Portugal (17 May)

Estadi Olímpic Lluís Companys, Barcelona, Spain (24-25 May)

Etihad Stadium, Manchester, UK (31 May-1 June)

Principality Stadium, Cardiff, UK (6 June)

Stadio Diego Armando Maradona, Naples, Italy (21 June)

Stadio San Siro, Milan, Italy (25-26 June)

Stadion Letzigrund, Zurich, Switzerland (1 July)

Parken, Copenhagen, Denmark (5-6 July)

Ullevi, Gothenburg, Sweden (8-9 July)

Johan Cruijff Arena, Amsterdam, Netherlands (15-16 July)

The next issue of IQ features an in-depth look at the groundbreaking Music Of The Spheres tour. Issue 113 of IQ is out next week.

 


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Coldplay tour app helps fans plan green travel

Coldplay have launched a free app for fans as part of their pledge to make their ongoing Music of the Spheres world tour as eco-friendly as possible.

Since the Tyndall Centre’s 2021 Super-Low Carbon Live Music Report concluded that fan travel accounts for the largest part of tour-related emissions, the app allows fans to plan low-carbon travel to and from shows, with those who choose green journeys rewarded with a merchandise discount code.

The app – made in partnership with SAP – is available to download now for iOS and Android devices, and will also measure total fan-travel carbon emissions so that the band can “drawdown these impacts via high quality nature-based solutions such as reforestation and soil regeneration”.

Alongside the fan-travel calculator, the app also offers Coldplay-themed games and AR experiences, exclusive behind-the-scenes content, photos and videos from every show, plus news updates and tour information. The band will also stream the full audio of an upcoming date exclusively via the app.

“They’re not just talking about doing something, they’re leading by example”

The Music of the Spheres tour, which kicked off in Costa Rica in March, heads to North America this week before touching down in Europe in July.

Having previously put touring plans on hold to investigate how to make their concerts more sustainable, the announcement of Coldplay’s 2022 tour came hand-in-hand with a 12-point plan for cutting their carbon footprint.

“They’re not just talking about doing something, they’re leading by example,” the band’s agent Josh Javor of X-ray Touring told IQ last year. “I think you do need bigger artists to show other people how it could be possible to change.

“I was involved in the parts I could be, like figuring out how we can try and cut the carbon footprint by staying in the same place and playing more shows. It’s very different from the standard tour where artists do one or two shows and then move on in order to visit as many places as possible.”

 


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