FEAR AT THE TOP: Ben Tillman talks Yours and Owls, COVID challenges and more

For Ben Tillman, disability is just an obstacle.

The live music entrepreneur sometimes forgets he uses a wheelchair, a reminder of a brutal car accident that resulted in a broken neck and long stay in hospital.

He doesn’t dwell, though he’s comfortable with discussing it all.

Tillman is the founder and promoter of festivals Yours and Owls and the Farmer and the Owl, he runs a label under Farmer and the Owl, which has released music from the likes of Hockey Dad, Bad//Dreems, Bec Sandridge, Totally Unicorn, and operates a talent buying company for venues and festivals – all based out of Wollongong.

In every possible way, Tillman isn’t your typical promoter.

For starters, he’s not a loud-mouth.

He was one of sparks that lit the “Don’t Kill Live Music” rally in Sydney, but hasn’t made a big deal of it.

He’s a sea of calm when everything around him is burning, his colleagues say. 

He never has, and never will use his disability to be a poster boy for activism, though inclusiveness is built into his business.

Ben Tillman

Y&O is fully wheelchair accessible, and its line-ups are typically diverse, though his booking strategy doesn’t adhere to quotas. Again, Tillman doesn’t shout about it.

Another trait he brings to the game, those close to him say, is his penchant for hires who are masters of their corners, and to let them run their own race.

Tillman stopped by The Brag Media’s headquarters for a chat with group Editor-In-Chief Poppy Reid and CEO Luke Girgis.

In a chat spanning nearly 75 minutes, Tillman goes deep into his personal and business journeys, and the challenges of operating a live-music empire during the pandemic.

“We can definitely improve on all the areas but we’re just doing what we identify as needing to be done,” he tells Reid. “We are so far from the end of perfecting (the model). There are so many new lessons to be learned, which will be then brought into how the festival-side, or any aspect of what we’re doing, operates.”

Watch the full Fear at the Top episode with Ben Tillman below:

This article originally appeared on The Industry Observer, which is now part of The Music Network.