From Bill Graham Presents: My Life Inside Rock and Out
Bill Graham with Robert Greenfield
Doubleday, 1992
Posted by BlueTrane on Steve Hoffman Music Forums
Ira,
Just now seeing your thread, now unfortunately closed, so I can’t add to it.
Is this a photo of the industry professionals meeting that Bill Graham discussed in his memoir?
From the memoir:
BILL: We did the national Dylan tour followed by the Crosby, Stills, Nash, and Young tour followed by the George Harrison tour right at the very end of the year. One right after another, and it took me and the company into a different realm, creating what eventually became a very problematic situation. In each instance, the artist did not go to an agency which then contacted the local promoters about shows.
We booked the tour directly with those promoters in each town or with the facility in that town. We were not agents, and we did not use agents to do the work. This was a big break from the standard format of a promoter buying talent through an agency. Which led to the agencies getting nervous that I was trying to put them out of business by doing their jobs for them. Eventually, there was a showdown with the agents and managers on Long Island.
I was invited to this open forum. A group of mainly agents but managers as well. There had never before been anything of its kind. I mean, a meeting of the boys. Somebody had rented an estate in Long Island that was huge. Although they had asked me to come, I had gotten word that it was, “Hey, Bill. Meeting.” Like I had to be there.
They were angry with me for cutting tough deals and coming into their cities with the acts I had taken on national tours. The major agencies thought this could be the start of a trend. Major artists bypassing the agency system. All I kept saying to them was, “This was a one-of-a-kind situation. I felt like doing this, and that’s the way it’s going to be.”
If I had to be there, then at least I was going to get some enjoyment out of it. Because everybody was there. Frank Barsalona and people from William Morris and ICM and MCA. Managers, agents, and promoters. I felt like I was being made to stand up in front of the union, even though there was no union. There were no rules of any kind in the business at that time. Yet I was being called on the carpet for what I had done.
I knew the meeting on Long Island was going to be held in this huge round room with all these limos and fancy cars outside. So I got a hold of someone at Central Casting in New York. The meeting was called for in the morning from nine-thirty to noon and then there was a break for lunch. At one, we would all go back to the meeting table. The morning was pretty much sparring and feeling each other out. The killing was going to be done in the afternoon.
Before lunch, it was all still dancing. “Bill, you’re bringing that tour to my city? I’m excited. I’m exalted. You’re bringing that show to Cleveland!”
They were sharpening the guillotine. This was appetizer conversation before the trial by fire. I was the piano player they wanted to shoot.
After lunch, I sat down and I did something I’d never done before. I lit a cigar. My back was to the big windows facing the room. The shades were open. As a sign to my guys.
Just then, six limousines pulled up. Out of each one of these six limos came five bulyoks. Guys dressed like “The Untouchables,” Elliot Ness-style. Spats, boutonnieres, top hats, dapper collars. East Coast movie gangsters. Each carrying a musical instrument case. They all got out of their cars and came through the front door. The first guy was the biggest toughest meanest guy.
All he said was, “Awrite! Everybody siddown! Nobody moves!”
I saw some people in the room going, “Ha, ha, ha!” Some froze right away. The guys started going along the wall around this room until they were in position five feet apart all around the people. Serious and in dead silence. Nobody really understood what was going on.
The first guy put his cello case down on the table and leaned toward me and said, “Excuse me, boss? Is everything satisfactory?”
I took my cigar out of my mouth, flicked my ashes into the ashtray, put on my best Al Capone face, and nodded approval. That was the next signal. All the guys put their cases down on the table and opened them up. They took off their jackets. They were all wearing suspenders. They folded their jackets neatly inside the cases. As they went out the door, in big letters on the back of every guy’s shirt, it said, “BILL GRAHAM PRESENTS.”
It definitely unnerved a lot of the people in that room. It was my way of saying to them that I knew who they thought I was.
In terms of what was discussed afterward, I myself would not have wanted someone else to bring an act into the Bay Area when I was the one who had built the act there. By day’s end, I’d agreed to forego national touring in the best interests of the industry. Not that I was that generous. I knew full well that the major agencies, at their whim, could freeze me out of business in the Bay Area by not selling me talent. So much for national touring.
PATRICK STANSFIELD: After that meeting in Long Island, Bill agreed to back down and not force this sh-t down other people’s throats. The meeting was significant because in most of these promoters’ offices now, you can find a picture of the meeting.
It’s like the little sign you used to see in every barbershop. “THIS IS A UNION SHOP.” That little picture shows that these people are part of the system.