Wasserman Music adds executives to agent team
Talent agency Wasserman Music has announced the addition of four executives to its worldwide agent team.
Josh Dick and Jonathan Insogna join as VPs, based in New York and Nashville, respectively, while Rebecca Prochnik joins as a director based in London and Gideon “Shay” Royale joins as a director based in New York.
In a career spanning more than 20 years, Dick began as a booking agent at The Agency Group, working with artists including A$AP Rocky, Danny Brown and Yelawolf. He then switched to artist management, guiding the careers of acts including Macklemore & Ryan Lewis and Flatbush Zombies.
In his new role, he will continue to represent Flatbush Zombies as their agent for North America, among other clients.
Country and Americana specialist Insogna joins after 17 years at WME. His clients include Morgan Wade, Yola, Cam Whitcomb, Drew Erwin, Joshua Quimby, Max McNown, and Theo Kandel. He is a member of the Country Music Association and the Academy of Country Music and served on the founding board of advisors for the To Nashville, With Love Fund.
“We are excited to welcome Josh, Jonathan, Rebecca, and Shay to our growing global team of outstanding agents and career strategists”
Prochnik founded the London-based independent Earth Agency in 2014, before moving to UTA in 2021. She will represent artists including AJ Tracey, Black Lips, Calibre, CASISDEAD, Decius, Fat Dog, Frost Children, Ghetts, Jme, Kode 9, Mala, Paranoid London and Warmduscher.
Royale began his career as an advisor under the umbrellas of Wells Fargo, Merrill Lynch and MJ Capital Partners, later joining the Global Sports and Entertainment Division at Morgan Stanley. He has since worked with music artists as a manager and A&R consultant, most recently leading the indie incubator and artist development company, All Season. He also co-founded the community-based ticketing platform TBA.
At Wasserman, Royale will lead the agency’s growth in the Afro-music space, with clients including Victony, Black Sherif, Gabzy, Blxckie, melvitto and WurlD.
“We are excited to welcome Josh, Jonathan, Rebecca, and Shay to our growing global team of outstanding agents and career strategists,” says Lee Anderson, Wasserman Music EVP and managing executive. “Their unique backgrounds and experience will help to drive Wasserman Music’s accelerating growth across global territories, emerging genres, and innovative new ways to serve our valued clients around the world.”
Headquartered in Los Angeles, Wasserman operates globally across 27 countries and more than 62 cities, including New York, London, Abu Dhabi, Amsterdam, Hong Kong, Madrid, Mexico City, Toronto, Paris and Sydney.
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UTA launches Hear This showcase series
UTA has announced the launch of a new curated live series, Hear This, in the UK to showcase emerging artists on its roster.
The inaugural event, which will take place at The Grace in London on Tuesday 10 May, will focus on R&B and soul, with performances by Claudia Valentina, Menlia and Tolü Makay for an audience of carefully selected industry figures and new music fans.
The series is designed to provide early amplification for hotly-tipped acts in the early stages of their careers. Future events, set to take place every three months, will continue to spotlight the most vibrant emerging talent, genres and cultures surrounding the international agency’s London operations.
“The true strength of an agency is measured equally by its ability to develop new talent, as it is in elevating established acts”
“The true strength of an agency is measured equally by its ability to develop new talent, as it is in elevating established acts,” says Rebecca Prochnik, UTA’s director of growth and strategy for UK Music. “The more we proactively cultivate spaces for showcasing the artists, scenes and cultures that we’re most excited about, and the more we work on bringing game-changing opportunities to the table, the better equipped our new artists are for success.”
Tickets for Hear This are priced at £6 plus booking fees. Industry figures are invited to reach out to UTA with guest list requests, although availability is limited.
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Agent Rebecca Prochnik switches to UTA
Senior music agent Rebecca Prochnik has joined UTA as director of creative strategy, UK music.
At Earth Agency, which she co-founded in 2014, Prochnik represented a roster of independent artists including Skepta, AJ Tracey, JME, Deerhunter, Vanishing Twin, Kode 9 and Black Lips.
“The times we’re living through have expanded all manner of approaches and perspectives across the board,” says London-based Prochnik.
“I’m delighted by this unique opportunity to combine energies with the incredible, in-depth universe of UTA to lift the roof and broaden the pathways in what is an immensely transformative time for artists and agents alike.”
“Rebecca has an unparalleled reputation for helping independent talent break into the mainstream music landscape”
“Rebecca has an unparalleled reputation for helping independent talent break into the mainstream music landscape, and she has demonstrated exceptional creativity and entrepreneurship throughout her career,” says Obi Asika, co-head of UTA’s UK office.
“She has achieved great success in her leadership of Earth Agency, and we are thrilled to welcome her to UTA.”
Earlier this year, UTA acquired Echo Location Talent Agency, which was founded and led by Asika. The deal brought artists including Diplo, Major Lazer, Marshmello, Alesso, Wizkid into the UTA fold for international representation.
Asika now leads UTA’s UK office alongside Neil Warnock.
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Agents of Change: The agency business in transition
On 20 October, five US agents, all formerly of Paradigm Talent Agency, announced the formation of Arrival Artists – a brand-new booking agency with offices in New York, Los Angeles, Chicago and Seattle, a roster that includes the likes of Sufjan Stevens, Khruangbin and BadBadNotGood, and a partnership with European agency ATC Live for global representation of acts shared across both rosters.
Following the termination of hundreds of jobs by the Hollywood-headquartered global agencies since the start of the coronavirus pandemic, it’s the kind of news observers of the agency space have come to expect – a group of agents from one multinational join forces and go independent – and follows the launch of two other new US indies, TBA Agency and Mint Talent Group, in late August and mid-September, respectively, and the likes of Route One Booking and Jon Ollier’s One Fiinix Live in the UK earlier this month.
The resurgence of the independent agency, and the apparent fracturing of the corporate giants following years of consolidation, is being watched closely in the broader live music world, where rumours abound of further agency launches and rebrands – including in Europe – in the months ahead.
Nowhere is this more the case than in London, where recent mergers include Primary Talent with ICM Partners and K2 Agency with Artist Group International. And while uncertainty reins, takeovers, strategic pacts and new ventures will all be under consideration for every business.
“It’s clearly a very challenging time for anyone working in live music at the moment,” says ATC Live’s Alex Bruford, whose roster includes Nick Cave, The Lumineers, Metronomy, Black Pumas and Fontaines DC. “No matter the size of the business, if your company relies on live touring, and there is no touring, it’s very difficult.”
“The idea in agency culture has long been geared towards an idea of ‘the bigger the better’”
“Clearly, we all have had to face major challenges in 2020, and we will continue to have significant challenges thrown at us for some time,” agrees Angus Baskerville, partner at 13 Artists, who works with artists including George Ezra, Brittany Howard, Jamiroquai, Michael Kiwanuka, Benjamin Clementine and Paolo Nutini.
But are ATC Live, 13 Artists and other UK-based indies such as ITB, Asgard, Midnight Mango and smaller boutique firms, better placed than their corporate cousins to survive, and even thrive, during the current crisis? With concert activity on hold, is it actually a blessing to be free of the structure of a large company – and are we witnessing a new era of independence in live music booking, the likes of which we haven’t seen for the best part of a decade?
Bigger: not always better
The past seven months have done much to expose some of the myths of pre-Covid thinking within the business, according to Earth Agency’s Rebecca Prochnik, who represents artists including Skepta, JME, AJ Tracey and Nines. “The idea in agency culture has long been geared towards an idea of ‘the bigger the better’,” explains Prochnik. “For a long time, the structural strategy of the larger agencies has been upscaling teams around artists, to provide a more intensive job. While I understand the reasoning, the model creates a lot of employment volume, and in fact the potential for disconnection that has never made full sense to me.”
“Sometimes I look at some of the bigger agencies, and you have too many agents or bookers squabbling over every artist that comes in,” echoes Obi Asika, founder and CEO of Echo Location Talent (Marshmello, Da Baby, Wizkid, Chase & Status, Pendulum, Major Lazer, Giggs). “Many artists have multiple agents, in part to ensure no one agent has too much power over the wider agency. That’s not workable anymore. There’s no guarantee this [a concert-stopping pandemic] won’t happen again – you’ve got to be careful of your overheads.”
“Some large businesses will have been better protected than other large businesses going into this, and I’m sure it’s the same for the smaller ones,” adds Baskerville. “Saying that, I do believe the independent sector has the possibility of thriving in 2021 and beyond, as we’re required to modernise and refresh approaches to the way we work – and do that quickly.”
“Independent companies have been able to be more nimble and adapt faster to new ways of working”
For many of the bigger, multinational agencies, the financial impact of this “surplus” is amplified by huge levels of corporate debt, which in some cases amounts to many times their annual revenues.
According to investment banker Lloyd Greif, Endeavor – the parent company of WME – is shouldering a staggering US$5.1 billion debt, while CAA has $1.15bn coming due in 2026, in addition to a $125 million revolving credit facility. Paradigm, meanwhile, is believed to owe around $80m, following multiple debt-financed acquisitions over the past decade.
Paul Boswell, of Free Trade Agency (The National, Tones and I, Wilco, Tash Sultana, Violent Femmes), says he believes that while the live entertainment shutdown is “clearly bad for all,” it will “hurt those that practice borrow-and-buy capitalism the most.”
“As an independent business, we’ve always been careful not to fall for the seductive culture of living beyond our means: even if money is flowing, we’ve stayed low to the ground on spend,” adds Prochnik. “We’ve always had a culture of working remotely – of needing an office solely for the wellbeing and connection of our staff community, rather than for external business. Throughout my career, I’ve taken my meetings in cars, in cafes, in parks, on the phone… It’s really only ever mattered that I can relate well and do a creative job for my clients as needed.
“What Covid’s done is blow away the myth that an independent attitude is a quirk. Big offices, gleaming receptions, plaques on walls, meeting rooms, games rooms, listening rooms… At the end of the day, those things are all just optics, and ones which suddenly seem tremendously outdated. None of those things shape business in a meaningful way…”
“When the dust settles, there are going to be huge changes”
“The importance of having an office as a status symbol – that, for me, has gone,” adds Asika. “You don’t need a shiny office, and you also don’t need people coming into work every day; if you don’t trust the people working for you, that’s a problem. I’ve enjoyed being at home with my family, and I want that flexibility for my business and staff.” “This virus is terrible, but there are potentially worse ones in the future,” he adds. “And when that comes, you want to be the little speedboat nipping around, not the big cruise liner…”
Agrees Prochnik: “Independent and smaller agencies tend to have a shared personality of sourcing and creating whatever there is to do, thinking outside the box, breaking moulds in order to make business work. I think this inherent culture of flexibility, nimbleness and creating value out of thin air is invaluable in these new times.”
“We’ve seen with companies across our sector, from agencies to promoters to ticketing companies, that often the larger the organisation – and therefore the higher the overheads – the harder hit they have been,” says Bruford. “In many cases, independent companies have been able to be more nimble and adapt faster to new ways of working, new opportunities and the changing landscape.”
The great equaliser
According to Asika, “When the dust settles, there are going to be huge changes” across the agency sector as a result of the current “correction.” “From the value of artists, to where people work, what people have started in this time, what new companies pop up… there are all these things happening in the background, and it’s going to have a long-term impact,” he predicts.
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