A Cold Start after a Grinding Halt

As cases of Covid-19 increased through late Winter 2019/20 across New England and the world, rumors began to abound about shutdowns to curb the spread of the virus. Spring 2020 brought flowers we couldn't smell through our masks, and those shutdowns we all feared. What was initially thought to be a couple weeks turned into a couple months, six months, a year. Now nearly a year and a half later, things are just starting to get back to normal as cases of the Delta variant begin to rise and we must exercise caution to keep from having to shut down again.

Along the way, many gig workers lost their livelihoods, speakers and lighting sat in warehouses and storage units with nowhere to go, and we lost a number of venues that couldn't afford to pay rent on empty dancefloors. While the shutdown was necessary to help combat Covid-19 until vaccines could be developed and distributed, the live entertainment industry was hit with some of the longest reopening plans, and strict restrictions, with the additional burden of being gig workers, making unemployment benefits much more difficult to get even as relief packages were distributed to many others.

Venues had to be creative in the ways they could present music once restrictions began being relaxed. Even New Hampshire, which opened much earlier than the rest of New England, patrons were required to be seated during the first stages of reopening. Platforms Dance Club in Providence, RI, and Electric Haze in Worcester, MA were among the first to have live DJs for seated guests in the rest of the region. Venues like The Phoenix Landing in Cambridge, MA and Flask Lounge in Portland, ME took to livestreaming in order to fundraise and keep their nights alive and doors open. Some, like ONCE in Somerville, MA have had to move locations in order to survive at all.

Limitations on outdoor capacity meant that most festivals were cancelled and there was no call for the production crews and gear rentals associated with those large-scale events. At first what seemed like a dry Spring turned into uncertainty around when things would return to normal, then to a general expectation of Fall 2021 for festivals, arena shows, and other large events to resume. When Memorial Day arrived with full reopening, it was met with relief, but also didn't give much planning time for events in early Summer. Production companies had been told "we're not going to open back up until August. Then all of a sudden, they're like, Oh, just kidding, right? No, Open up the first of June."

Some companies have erred on the side of caution and have been watching data to determine when they will throw events again, while others have taken every liberty the states have offered along the way to bring music to people. I interviewed representatives from a few production companies and venues around New England to get some different perspectives on how they have coped with the pandemic and where they see the future of live entertainment. Their responses provide some insight into the moving pieces behind the scenes that bring the DJs and music we love to life.

Damien Paul - DJ/Event Production - Rabbit Revolution - Boston, MA

Rabbit Revolution has been a Boston institution since 2011, when they started producing events at Rise nightclub. They have since spread throughout the Northeast, but with a focus on Boston and Cambridge, MA. Known for the artistic and musical efforts put forth in their productions, Rabbit Revolution used their infrastructure and knowledge to help support the New England scene through the pandemic. I chatted with Damien Paul about the pandemic, livestreaming's place in music performance, and diversity and inclusivity as we rebuild the live entertainment industry.

*interview edited for clarity

Ryan:

When the pandemic hit and the ability to do live events was unceremoniously shut down, you transitioned Rabbit Revolution very efficiently as a platform for artists to set up their live streams when they didn’t have the infrastructure to do it themselves. What brought you to bringing that forth?

Damien:

I think when the pandemic hit we were all thrown for a loop, but I saw it as an opportunity. I felt at the time that a lot of my music industry and entertainment friends were pretty severely impacted, and I was in a position of privilege because I was still working at the time and I figured I would be able to weather the storm okay. So I wanted to spend time focusing on giving people a platform in which they can not only reach their audiences and remain connected to their communities, but also do some good for the community too.

Basically, every one of the events we hosted on our Rabbit Revolution platform was a fundraiser or for charity. That was my conditions and stipulations, whether it was to keep a crew’s expenses paid through the shutdown when they can’t do events, or if they went to advocacy causes or other types of charity. I wanted to make sure each one of our events online had a purpose. That was the focus of what I wanted to accomplish during the shutdown.

Ryan:

Now that live events are coming back, is this something you’re going to maintain, or are you going to move the focus back to purely live events?

Damien:

Over the past few months as things begin to return to normal, and as live events have become an option, there has been a diminishing attendance for streaming events. I think at least for the short term, people’s attention will be focused toward reconnecting with their friends and their communities. I think that’s great, because we really do need that in our area.

But the viability of streaming as a medium to reach an audience, I think people have really started to understand the potential of it. So while for me personally, I want to focus on getting back to some in-person events, I think it’s going to be hard to deny the impact that streaming is going to have on our communities. I think that we’re going to see that grow and evolve, but in different ways. Now that there are live events, streaming is going to have to show some compelling new ideas and approaches to how people consume this entertainment, so I think it’s going to evolve a little bit and I’m excited to see how that plays out.

Ryan:

With the forced digital interaction that we have gone through through the lockdowns and sequestering, do you feel that has been a good way to connect with people you normally wouldn’t have, or was the lack of person-to-person contact more inhibiting for your company?

Damien:

I think it was interesting in that it opened up some partnerships, bookings and collaborations that wouldn’t have been viable any other way. I think back, I had a lot of events on the channel, but the ones that stand out to me are some of the collaborative Ooze events that I did with Kerry (Quirk). We were able to connect with people from Australia and Russia. We had people from the UK, France, and Spain. These are all artists that the viability of having them come out to Zuzu, where the Ooze is normally based, would be pretty slim. Just because of the sheer capacity and attendance that can fit in that space.

It really opened up this new conduit to bring in audiences not only for our audience to hear new artists that they wouldn’t be able to, but also for those artists' fans to connect with the community in Boston as well and have this mesh that you couldn’t have in real life. I think that was really cool.I hope to continue to see a little bit of that, and I think as live events open back up I think people might look to streaming as a way to tap into those other communities and cross-pollinate crowds that normally wouldn’t come together like that.

Ryan:

With live events coming back, do you have any health or safety concerns?

Damien:

Of course it’s a concern. Thankfully here in Massachusetts, we’re a bit ahead of the curve in terms of vaccination rates and I think that’s incredibly promising. I think it’s important that we approach things with a bit of caution and as things open back up we should be prepared just in case things do flare up again. We may see ourselves in the midst of another shutdown. Probably temporarily, but the possibility is out there, and I think it’s important that we keep that in mind as we step back into this.

At least for me personally, it’s part of the reason why I haven’t first thing out of the gate tried to book a venue and been waiting for the last month or so to try and feel things out and see how things go, but later in the summer I’m probably going to look to dip my toe back in the water. I’m going to do so cautiously and hopefully with some precedents in place and seeing how other venues are doing it. Hopefully take some of those lessons learned and see how we can improve the safety and welfare of people that come out to our events.

Ryan:

Do you think that this is giving us an opportunity to rebuild the live entertainment industry in a manner which is more beneficial and inclusive as a community rather than some of the commercial archetypes that have been in place for the last 20 or 30 years?

Damien:

I hope so. We’re in a very vulnerable position in Boston. We’ve seen a shrinking number of venues and there already is a lot of artistic talent within the city. There just seems to be a lack of places for people to have that outlet. I’m hoping the pandemic hasn’t taken too much of a toll on those venues. I think the key to inclusivity is having a diverse offering of the styles and types of events out there for people to try to experience.

When you have a limited spectrum of offerings, unfortunately, I think a lot of venues tend to cater to things that I would say are more mass market appeal. Top 40, radio type events. It would be a shame to see Boston turn into that considering how many people we have pushing and pioneering the arts. If you think about art schools and music schools all within a few mile radius of Boston and Cambridge. There’s all this talent. I would hate to see that go to waste.

To focus on inclusivity in particular. I hope that becomes more of a strong focus, but the only way we can do that is by offering more opportunities to people to step up as event organizers and promoters, to book people that have been overlooked. Whether that be musicians or art of underrepresented groups, I think it’s important that we have promoters out there that want to try to push the envelope a bit there.

I think the only way we can do that is by having strong venues that are willing to be open and give people a chance that maybe haven’t done this before. I see a lot of that in Cambridge, so I think if it’s going to happen anywhere it’s going to be in that city. I hope that Boston takes notice and we start to see that trend permeate into downtown.

Ryan:

Any final thoughts as we start to reenter society again?

Damien:

I think this is an interesting time. We’ve had enough time away from events to really rethink the way that we do things, and I think you bring up an interesting point about inclusivity. But I think more broadly there are probably other opportunities as well to make our community a bit stronger, a bit more healthy. I think things like allyship and creating safe spaces in addition to inclusivity is going to be key to growing and building more of an underground community.

That’s really what I would love to see in this city. Bringing those elements together to create a place that can really foster the fringes and embrace the weirdness that makes Boston and Cambridge what it is. I think we perhaps haven’t fully catered to that and I think there are a lot more people who could be interested members of our community if we offered the right atmosphere for them, and I hope we can accomplish that together as a community.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Dreamcatcher - 7/31 - Sonia - Cambridge, MA

Stay up-to-date with Rabbit Revolution at https://rabbitrevolution.com

George Adler - Talent Buyer - Electric Haze - Worcester, MA

Electric Haze is a live entertainment venue and hookah lounge located at 26 Millbury Street in Worcester, MA, near Kelley Square. George Adler has been working there for four years, the past two as their main talent buyer, and sat down with me to discuss how the venue handled being closed during the pandemic, working within Covid restrictions, and what the future holds for the venue.

*interview edited for clarity

Ryan:

When the pandemic hit in March everything completely shut down immediately. What did you do to cope with the lack of ability to book live events?

George:

What we first did was gift cards and things like that to keep revenue coming in. Bills still had to be paid. There was still monthly rent. Then we did a few livestreams, which was kind of hit or miss. Mostly we just really kept quiet, did a little cross-promo for other companies and just kept our name relevant. We were hush hush until August, until the first wave of rule reductions began. That only lasted three weeks, because we weren’t following food protocol. We weren’t restaurant status for food.

Ryan:

You were one of the first venues around Massachusetts that had real indoor live, though seated, events once things opened back up.

George:

I think we were one of the first ones back in March to really kick off doing indoor stuff. The big thing about our venue is that it’s a hookah lounge, so because of that we have an incredible air filtration system already in place. We had the process of moving the air quickly, and we followed all the protocols for the town. They were very happy with how we did it. So we were working with, out of a normal 244 capacity, we were only at 64. It did fantastic! Almost all the shows sold out because people were just dying to see stuff. Everyone was very respectful. They had to wear masks while moving about. There was no dancing unfortunately, but people understood. Everyone was good spirited, they just wanted to get out and dance.

Ryan:

Now that the restrictions are lifted. We went step by step, very laboriously through all the phases up until Memorial Day, then everything opened like floodgates. Do you have any concerns about all of a sudden going back to full capacity?

George:

No not really, because we’ve been flaunting it for so long with the mandate that you don’t have to wear your mask while being seated at a restaurant. Right there, it kind of defeats the purpose. At that point, the line has already been crossed and it’s what the government thought was smart, but the general public knew a basis of how to continue. People who want to wear their mask wear their mask, and people who don’t, don’t. It’s a nice cohesive relationship currently.

Ryan:

Are you worried about any possible spikes from this and having to go back to a lockdown situation like the UK has recently gone through?

George:

I’ve been seeing articles about different variants and it does bother me slightly. So I have mixed feelings about it. We’re doing our best within the state’s legal limits. Our staff still wears their mask, and anyone who’s comfortable wears their mask. In terms of a resurgence of it, it is in the back of my mind and I think we should still be very wary of it. But it comes to a point where people are ready to move on and there is a vaccine for it.

Ryan:

Have you had any shortage of acts looking to perform?

George:

Shortage! No No. Surplus! There’s just so many acts. It’s great to see them coming out in droves. Everyone wants to play and it comes down to a point of who can you book, when can you book them. Because it was floodgates, the minute Memorial Day, the restrictions dropped, I got tons and tons of emails. It was great to see.

Ryan:

When we all went over to livestreaming. You said you experimented with it a little bit with varying degrees of success. Do you feel that it will remain and become an alternative venue, and will that impact live events much, or is it it’s own separate entity?

George:

It’s funny, I was talking to the owner’s about this too, because we have a livestream setup that we recently introduced to Electric Haze. I think it’s not a separate entity, but something that will become incorporated now. You see it with the Disco Biscuits with their Couch Tour. They've lately been livestreaming to a higher quality, and I think it’s going to become a second nature thing for people who just can’t make it out, that there will be livestreams. You have Nuggz, which is an independent company that records shows for people to listen to later. Because of Covid everyone is invested in this camera equipment they can’t return, so I see it becoming more of a commonplace thing and slowly evolving to where you can buy a ticket or a livestream pass.

Ryan:

Any final comments, hopes, or concerns?

George:

I don’t have any concerns. My heart wishes for the best. Let’s just take it one day at a time, be respectful of everyone, and hopefully all get back down to the dancefloor, safe and healthy.

Upcoming Dates of note:

Our House (monthly) with Mizeyesis (House set) and resident Sex on Decks - July 24, 2021

Haze Sessions 002 AG, Maximum Volume, Sinfonë, Nefu, Draza - July 30, 2021

Keep up with all the DJs, bands, and artists coming through Electric Haze at https://thehaze.com and follow George's other ventures with ShepHeard Productions

Michael Carcieri/HUGE - DJ/Event Production - Funky Communications - Providence, RI

Michael Carcieri, or HUGE when he is behind the decks, has hosted events with his crew Funky Communications since 2004. The crew mostly caters to the underground house and techno scene around New England, focusing primarily in the Providence, RI area. Michael and I conversated about gigging within Covid restrictions, live streaming impacts, and how Funky Communications is moving forward post-pandemic.

Ryan:

From an event production perspective, how has the pandemic affected your crew, Funky Communications? What have you done to offset the loss of live events?

Michael:

Throughout a good portion of the pandemic, we were able to host a monthly socially distanced outdoor event, called Feel Good. The biggest hurdle was making the space safe for patrons yet still keeping a feeling of togetherness. We were lucky that the venue we worked with went above and beyond to exceed recommendations and keep their doors open. Attendance restrictions were another issue. To only have 50 - 60 people at a show makes it tough to cover overhead. There were definitely a few months that I dug into my pockets to keep the night going and the talent paid. It’s what we do for the love of the music and the healing it provides. We have hosted one event since the lifting of Covid restrictions and it made the months of work worth it. A full dance floor and smiles everywhere.

Ryan:

Rhode Island allowed DJing with seated patrons earlier than many other states in New England. How helpful was that change, and what different obstacles did you encounter in preparing events for seated patrons?

Michael:

Rhode Island allowing seated events early allowed us to set the tone for what could properly be done with some planning. Venues had to think outside the box to make it feel like nightlife. The venue I have been working with, Platforms Dance Club, built individual sections for 12 group reservations, with enough room to move around and stretch your body while enjoying food and drink. Each area was served by waitstaff, so there were not many reason to leave your reserved area. Reservation size varied throughout the months in accordance with state regulations. I feel we showed many attendees and other venues that you can still make things work and keep patron safety first.

Ryan:

Has moving to a more digitally interactive world been beneficial to your production crew during the pandemic? How involved has Funky Communications, and you as HUGE, been in streaming events?

Michael:

The digital aspect has not been real beneficial to my crew. We have not hosted digital events. As a DJ on the other hand it has been beneficial. I have played quite a few live streams and been featured with artists and producers from around the world. The change to digital has also helped with reach of my weekly radio show on Sugar Shack Radio, Sunday 3pm-6pm est.

Ryan:

Once live events are in full swing again, will you continue or grow the digital presence you have, or will that time be refocused into live events?

Michael:

I will put most focus on live events, being that is my love. However, I won’t turn down an opportunity to reach a new audience on a live stream.

Ryan:

Do you have any health/safety concerns or hopes now that Covid-related restrictions are being lifted?

Michael:

I hope that numbers stay low and that the opening doesn’t turn around and bite us. People have been through a lot over the past year and a half and to go back would be devastating. We need dance floor healing and I hope we can continue to get our therapy.

Ryan:

Do you have live events already planned, and if so, where can we find more information?

Michael:

I have 2 monthly events Feel Good on the first Friday of every month at Platforms, and DiscoTech the second Thursday of the month at The Parlour. Both events are in Providence, can be found on Facebook or through old fashion flyers. You can also find Funky Communications Family and HUGE on Facebook and I will keep you up to date on everything Funky.

Ryan:

Any final thoughts?

Michael:

Keep it Real, Keep it Funky, Keep it Underground

UPCOMING EVENTS

Feel Good Fridays (monthly) - August 6, 2021 - Platforms Dance Club, Providence, RI

Discotech feat Matt Carey (monthly) - August 12, 2021 - The Parlour Providence, Providence, RI

Funky Communications Radio (weekly) - Sundays 3 - 6 PM EST - SugarShackRecordings.com

Chris Beaudoin and Vanessa Elise - DJs/Event Production - Sanctuary: A State of Mind - Maine/NH

Chris Beaudoin (DJ F13ND) and Vanessa Elise (Blk Widow) run The Sanctuary: A State of Mind from Maine. Producing a couple festivals, MoonFest and Spooky Bass, before the pandemic shut down live events, they have regrouped and relaunched in New Hampshire and Maine in preparation for their event Glow Hard in August. Chris, Vanessa, and I spoke about their background, safety precautions during pandemic restrictions, and what they have planned for the future.

Ryan:

Tell us a little about your production company. What brought you into starting to throw events and where you’re looking to go in the future?

Chris:

Well, I've been a DJ for like 15 years. I started out here in Maine back in like 2006 going to events, and then it grew out to a couple of years later, I moved out to Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. I DJ’d out there for a good 10 years and then came home, which was about four years ago. I took a break for a year, and then I started this production company and threw my first event, which is MoonFest. I did that with Rhythm Alliance, and Dave Level of The Get Down.

Since then, we've done Spooky Bass, and then those were (our) first-year parties. Then the pandemic came, and it kind of put a damper on things. Other than that, we have our residency in New Hampshire at the 603 Bar and Lounge. We do the fourth Saturday of every month. And then we've been planning our event, Glow Hard for August 6, 7, and 8. So far, we've only done smaller events. Smaller stuff under 300 people, and stuff like that, but we believe that we can rock in over at least 500. Now with COVID being past the pandemic stage. So we're really excited about that.

Ryan:

The pandemic, obviously, shutdown live events for the most part, but you were sort of at the forefront of pushing what we were able to do to be able to keep people coming out to live events.

Chris:

We had two events. We kept it with(in) CDC guidelines all the way. Mask, everything and even had two stages. As long as we had (no more than) 100 people per stage, they were fine with it. We've even had cops show up at one of our events, they were fine with us doing it. The only thing that was wrong was people parking in the roadway. It was basically just like a large scale house party at that point. But yeah, we did two during it.

Then with the 603, with their CDC guidelines, we had to sit down on the dance floor at tables, in groups. We did what we could, and we actually did get shut down on Valentine's Day because too many people came out. We were over capacity and the liquor Commissioner did shut us down for that one, but it was only an hour before the place closed down anyway.

Vanessa:

New Hampshire opened up before Maine did as far as the bars and nightclubs and they were under restrictions, but we were going there after they had lifted the ban up for going across state lines.

Chris:

That's when we started that up. Our first one was March. Valentine's was a little pre-thing, just getting used to the club and stuff. We dealt with the lower quantity of people, sitting down, contact tracing.

Vanessa:

All of our events, even the one we did last summer that was outside, (we abided) all the CDC guidelines, which at that point was as long as we were under 200 for the space we had and we were outside. We did contact tracing at that event too. And (from) none of our events that we've thrown at all since the beginning of the pandemic haven’t had anybody call us or tell us anything about any sort of outbreak.

Chris:

Also, when we came home, we were very responsible about this with her family and my family. My mother has lupus. Her father has sarcoidosis, which is an autoimmune disease, and he's only got 40% of his lung use, so we had to be very safe. We would quarantine, and then we would get tested within the week. As long as we were upfront with them, they didn't mind us doing that. So it was just a precaution, and it took a little bit to get to that point, a good like six to eight months. But then after that they saw that we were being safe and that we were being upfront about it when we would go out for our event.

Ryan:

Given that you have been abiding by all the guidelines and all the safety regulations, do you have any concerns about how everything in the northeast just sort of opened up all at once after we've been taking all these steps, or do you feel that it's the rest of the governments of the states (in New England) catching up to what reality is in terms of the risk of transmission?

Vanessa:

In my opinion, since we've been doing stuff in the 603 bar and lounge in Dover, New Hampshire, for at least a couple of months before everything just finally opened up here. Yeah. So it was something we were more used to when we go out and do our monthly events there. And I think I'm speaking for both of us. We think it's about time that things opened

up.

Chris:

Yeah, we feel that it is safe. Especially if people are being upfront and responsible about it, with their families that are compromised. Now that the vaccines are out it makes people feel a lot safer. Because the ones that were really against that (live events), at the beginning, they've actually had a change of heart recently and now we have their full support.

Ryan:

So you have Glow Hard coming up the first weekend in August. Is there anything else that you have upcoming or planning or now that we do have the ability to do larger and bigger events again?

Chris:

Yes, after that is our Halloween event. We have been throwing Spooky Bass, but we're going to change it this year. We've come up with another name for it. We're going to be having pre-fliers for that at Glow Hard that will be debuting there and we're going to call it Confession. That's our next event, which will be Friday and Saturday, the 29th and 30th of October, which will be my birthday bash. We're throwing the Harvest stage at Equinox festival in September. We're set up to do ThisFest in August. And then we have our monthly the fourth Saturday of the month at 603 Bar and Lounge in Dover, NH.

Ryan:

Where do people keep up with you on the internet?

Chris and Vanessa:

On Facebook. The Sanctuary. A State of Mind.

We've been trying to have more of a presence on Instagram, but Facebook is definitely our biggest spot where people can find it. In the next few months, we are trying to build a website, now that we are LLC and insured. That's the one big thing that we are working on right now that we know we need. Now that we've taken this to this level.

Ryan:

Do you have any other hopes or concerns going forward for live music in the area?

Chris:

I just hope that everybody stays safe so that we don't have another lockdown, to go back into another drought. You know, that'd be really cool if that didn't happen. I've heard some words about that there'll be a 50/50 chance here, but I'm just gonna stay positive, just like everybody else should.

UPCOMING EVENTS

Sanctuary Saturday (monthly) - Glow Hard pre-party - July 24, 2021 - 603 Bar and Lounge, Dover, NH

Glow Hard - August 6 - 8, 2021 - 4x4 Proving Grounds, Lebanon, ME

Stage takeover at Equinox Music Festival - September 9 - 11 - Freedom Field, Harmony, ME

Confession - October 29 - 30, 2021

Follow The Sanctuary: A State of Mind on Facebook for the latest on Glow Hard and their other upcoming events.

Shane Burke - Mutiny/Supreme Sound and Lighting - Hydrotechnics - New England/NY/PA

Mutiny and Supreme Sound and Lighting are names known across New England for raves and festivals, as well as equipment sales and rental. Hydrotechnics is a festival in it's 8th year that has grown from the past 20 years of building by Shane Burke. The festival takes place in NY, but the venue, New Echo Lake Resort, also hosts events by a wide range of New England crews. Shane and I spoke about his history in event production and equipment rental, the impact of the pandemic on the corporate AV world, and what timetables for events getting back on track realistically looks like.

Ryan:

Tell us a little bit about yourself, your event production, A/V rental and production services companies, and what areas of New England you produce events in.

Shane:

My company (Mutiny) started off by doing events, producing them predominantly in Massachusetts and Connecticut. That eventually moved down to me doing them in New York for a little while. Then I wound up back more in Massachusetts, and Connecticut; and now we have a campground up in Afton, New York. That produced a music festival (Hydrotechnics). This is our eighth year, if you count that COVID wiped out last year. So that's the stuff I'm doing with the with the rave production and festival production company.

As far as Supreme Sound and Lighting is concerned, I started doing that around 20, it basically grew out of the doing events. I needed equipment to do the events, and then I just had the equipment. So it was just kind of a no-brainer to start renting the equipment out to people. Massachusetts, Connecticut, Rhode Island, New York, a little tiny bit in Pennsylvania and New Hampshire, and Maine. That started as solely rave events, sound and lighting, and then eventually expanded out to me doing pretty much everything you could possibly think of from Comic Cons to college parties to graduations and commencements, weddings, trade shows, you know, pretty much the whole gamut of production services, and we've had some stuff with political events and protests as well.

Ryan:

So obviously, when the pandemic shut everything down, that killed live events from occurring impacted you, not only from the rave perspective, but also I assume, from the corporate AV perspective?

Shane:

Yes. The event production company is ultimately a hobby. It's always been a hobby, you know. It's never produced enough money. For a lot of people, they will refer to their production companies as a job, or companies, and they are; but to me, I picture a company as being something that's sustaining yourself and multiple other people, employees, etc. So the events are really just kind of a kind of a hobby, and they weren't doing well enough, or they're making money, but it was always just because we enjoyed doing it. The music festival got to a point where it was profitable. So losing that for the year definitely took a little bit of a toll on me.

The main brunt, obviously, being from the event production, we weren't allowed to work for two months straight. And then coming out of it, everything was just really, really small. Like you're allowed to have a max of 75 or 100 people or something like that and everyone needed these big productions, because there needed to be space between all these people. It just really resulted in us doing way more work for way too little money to the point where it was almost not really even worth doing the work. But it was just enough to really justify staying afloat. I was fortunate enough to do that, because of the scale of my company being small enough where I didn't have employees of multiple trucks to pay, insane amounts of insurance coverage that's going to stay whether I'm working or not. So it kind of helped me weather the storm a little bit. I also do gear rentals, and a decent amount of my income is gear rental. So as everybody was adapting to these new restrictions and having to find themselves getting new equipment for it to make sense. It was kind of like I was getting a cut of everyone else's little project. And even that wasn't that much. It was very sparse.

Ryan:

So did you see a large spike in gear rentals and gear purchases then during the pandemic for people who were getting ready for live streaming turning into those digital venues?

Shane:

I mean, I didn't really. We saw a lot of people buy DJ equipment, because the stimulus money was was hitting just right. I initially sold quite a lot of gear in March, because people didn't really understand what was going on. So a lot of companies were like, Okay, well, we're going to be sitting around twiddling our thumbs for a month or two, let's get all the gear in place that we need to have. And so really, there wasn't really too much being sold, except for essentially, DJ gear and things that were related to more of a hobbyist type of thing, like speakers for your studio, or little backyard barbecues and stuff like that. I personally didn't see too much action, because of things pivoting to digital. There were certain companies that heavily pivoted into that space. And there were usually really, really big companies that had a lot of the stuff in-house already and just needed an excuse to get it working, doing pretty much anything. So a lot of those guys pivoted to live streams and broadcasting livestream corporate meetings. That was a big thing that some people were doing, and they really needed it. I did not, I was getting by on the relief that I was getting, and the amount of rentals that I was getting. You know, by the time I had people pointing me in that direction, there were already a lot of people who were solid at it, so I just didn't really see a point for myself to be in there as well.

Ryan:

Do you feel like the advent of all the video conferencing and everything else that happened as a result of being forced to by the pandemic is going to affect the way your corporate AV events go moving forward?

Shane:

Me personally, no. Is it going to have an effect on the industry? Yeah, definitely. You know, there's a lot of stuff going in that direction for television and film production. They're building sets with video wall now. Which just basically just like, well, we can just put a ridiculous high def image behind these people so it looks like they're wherever we need them to look, and it looks more realistic. We're seeing some stuff like that go on in our industry.

There are some artists that found the streaming to work really well. And I think you're gonna see streaming concerts still exist to some level, especially if the artist is large enough to have that type of control. I could see some artists that are sick of touring, that are massive, massive artists deciding “Well, we're going to do a live stream event. You're only going to get it if you pay for it. There's going to be a lot of big production, and everything.”They developed the online sets as well, which was really interesting. I didn't get into any of that either. Butyou're DJing in front of your DJ set up on a table and it looks like you're in like some festival in the Netherlands and crazy big screens behind you and massive moving heads and stuff like that, that people were putting on their VR helmets and basically get new experience that virtual reality. So that was interesting, but then the thing is in Minecraft they were already doing that before the pandemic even hit. They were throwing these in person concerts and like Marshmello was like the first major act to play on Minecraft. And they made them his own little avatar, he still had his signature helmet and everything, and there were 1000s of people that were attended this Rave Party virtually. So I think there's definitely some merit to that and I think you could see that happening. I don't know if that's gonna affect the way that the events are laid out overall, but I feel like that'll at least carve its own its own little market, a niche market. There's a lot of anti social people that I think would be really into that as well.

Ryan:

So with live events coming back now have you have you started to see a uptick? Noticing that those things are starting to get booked in there for gear as needed or other signals that the industry is starting to bounce back a little bit?

Shane:

It's still gonna take a little bit of time. They kind of set us up for a timeline. And then they drop the timeline. We had Massachusetts say, no, we're not going to open back up until August. Then all of a sudden, they're like, Oh, just kidding, right? No, Open up the first of June. Now for example, we have Pride and for our company that does pretty well for us. A lot of people hire us during those couple of weeks of stuff in Providence and Boston. And when you tell everybody, hey, you're not going to be able to do all this stuff till August. Everyone who's planned Pride says, well, it's just not happening yet we’ve got to wait till next year, and it's bad. If they'd stuck with that end of May timeline sooner, then people would have been able to actually plan that stuff. You got to give these events, at least 45 days to two months worth of lead, depending on where they're getting produced. If they're getting produced in a city, you’ve got to deal with getting permission and pulling permits and all that stuff. Some of this is like a four to six month ordeal. So you can't really just flip the switch and all of a sudden everybody's working again. It's just going back to where we are. You have to restore the faith in the consumer as well. That's definitely been a barrier to getting us jump started. There's definitely some people that are still a little apprehensive and feel like we're risking stuff.

So we're what I'm seeing mainly is a lot of action in like September and October, because people, it's giving them enough time to plan. And those timelines already existed. I mean, back when this first started, Live Nation was like, yeah, we'll be back to work in September 2021. They had said that back in like March or April (2020) when this very first started. And I wasn't really believing most of the people that were saying what they were saying, but they were Live Nation that said that and I'm like, wow, they're accepting the fact they're not working for a year and a half. They know a lot more than I do. So we're screwed. And so yeah, I think when you're talking about larger scale events, a lot of these people kind of knew that September timeline was a thing. You've seen a bunch of things that pop up in September (2021), back in last September, October.

I threw a skating party, that if I would have had it two weeks later, we wouldn't have had to have masks on the entire time. So I care, I got out there early, but there's some people that just for all they know, we're going to shut down again in two months. But we aren’t going to, we see what the signs are now and it all looks fine. But in mid March, early April of this year was coming around, and we were starting to open up none of us really knew we were going to be good in two or three months. We were just hoping. So you're just not going to invest money and time and effort into that when you see the light at the end of the tunnel. And you're like, Okay, well, I can plan this for July or I could just wait till October and we’ll really be good by then. You know?

We crunched a lot of work in during May, because there were a lot of outdoor graduations that wouldn’t have been existed otherwise. So that kind of spurred a lot of stuff.

Ryan:

So do you have any other health and safety concerns about the fact that everything did just sort of open up like floodgates? I know at Echo Lake it seems at least that you take utmost precautions and make sure that you're going to err on the side of safety, but overall for live events in general.

Shane:

I've seen some images that make me feel like whatever I'm going to do is irrelevant, unfortunately. Not that that means we shouldn't be practicing safety, but I'm on my newsfeed a couple weeks ago, and there's parties in Texas, and you're looking and you just see a sea of people. I’m talking 1000s and 1000s of people, 10s of 1000s people. Big shows are back in those areas. And at the end of the day if there was really an issue, we'd be hearing about some stuff. We would already have massive breakouts, and I think we're gonna be okay. We're following state guidelines, and it gets to be tricky, because you try to do more than what the state does. And for some people that are still concerned about COVID they love it. They're like, Great, let's keep restricting people and making sure we're putting in whatever measures we need to because we're concerned something will happen. But if you're not somebody who is concerned about COVID, anytime you see somebody doing something more than the law, you're like, come on, the law says what we need to do. We already think the laws are ridiculous, we don't need you to be more ridiculous on top of what we think already, and what makes you feel like you know better. Because at the end of the day, I'm a rave promoter. Are any of us really an expert on any of this stuff? No. If you're turning to someone like me to determine how this should work then you're not in good shape. We want to act from a safe standpoint, but at the same time asserting yourself too much is almost to know-it-all-y, even when you don't really necessarily have anything to back it up.

That's been the really weird point about navigating all this is determining, what safety precautions are really not necessary at this point, and should start to be shed, and what do you keep? I'm in stores in Massachusetts right now and there's no masks anywhere. I went to one store this week out of every single store that I went to that had masks as a mandatory policy. So to go from that to right now, where we're telling people, they need masks in heavily conjugated areas at an outdoor Music Festival. Some people might look at that and be like, that's a little ridiculous, we aren't wearing masks anymore. Why do you all of a sudden feel like that needs to happen? But we've got almost two months until the show (Hydrotechnics), and things are changing very rapidly. We're just watching and seeing what seems like the general flow is of the average person going to this, and not going too much on the too cautious side, but also not throwing caution to the wind and entertaining conspiracy nonsense.

Ryan:

Other than Hydrotechnics, is there anything else in the next couple months that you would like to promote and make sure everybody knows about?

Shane:

It won't be until December, but our next major event is going to be Tropical Dreams. It's a multi-room, indoor hotel party, and we will have the whole hotel to ourselves. There won't be any outside guests that are attending the event. It's going to be five rooms of DJs and we're going to have an indoor swimming pool. One of the rooms for DJ sets is in the swimming pool area. It should be pretty cool. I'm excited. I've been looking to do a hotel event for a really long time, and everything just kind of fell into place to just run with it.