Hot Seat: Dan Rosen – CEO ARIA
Sunday, December 1. Mark it in your diaries, with the words “ARIA Awards.” The Australian record industry’s flagship awards ceremony comes to the Star Event Centre. Returning this year is eventMichael Long, and Vicki Gerrans is back on board as broadcast producer. The ARIAs’ media partners from 2013 will return this year. Though not everything will be the same as last time. TMN caught up with ARIA CEO Dan Rosen for an inside look at the upcoming ARIAs, and to drill into some other pressing industry issues.
You’ve gone with a new venue. It’s state of the art. It’ll make the show for industry, in terms of hospitality, a lot more prestigious and intimate. Its room is for about 4,000, whereas the Entertainment Centre is about 10,000 and Allphones is built for about 20,000. You can make those venues intimate. This will be intimate.
So you’re scaling down this year? Not from an industry perspective. There’ll be the same amount of industry. In terms of the seating for industry it’ll be the same. But in terms of the general public, there’ll be much less tickets available. We’ve got the same media partnerships as last year with Nine Network, with Nova Austero, Triple J, YouTube. All our partners from last year have come back on board this year, which gives us a big vote of confident and stability.
Last year was the first ARIA Week. Will that happen again? Absolutely. We’ll be building on the success of last year which kind of blew us away. Last year for the ARIAAwards and week, Destination NSW estimated more than 3,000 people came into Sydney from interstate and international. It’s starting to be a significant boost to the local economy here and a great way to showcase Australian music. That’s something we’re going to build on this year, and broaden the week. We’ll have more venues involved in the week and more labels and partners doing showcase gigs and more nights going on in Sydney. We’re really excited about how that’s come together.
Another component of last year’s ARIA Week was the Electronic Music Conference. They’ve announced this year’s dates will be Dec. 2-4. Do you lose that from your planned events? No. ARIAs Week will start on the Tuesday before and run until the Wednesday after. It’ll be like an eight-day week… a Beatles week. EMC will be a continuation of ARIAs Week. You’ll have masterclasses and events we’ll announce in the coming weeks. What it did last year was get more of a conversation of music going on in Sydney and in the mainstream press, which is exciting because we get to exposure more talent and more artists.
What’s the configuration of the room and how will you use it? From the staging and the AV component, it’ll be the same footprint as last year, which looked fantastic with the moshpit and the unbelievable screen and the “A” and “B” stage. It’ll look the same but more intimate. For the TV it’ll look like the same scope and scale as last year’s. For the industry what we’ll be able to do, we’ll get all the industry together on the floor. That was one thing we learned last year; we had some industry on the floor and some in the bleachers.
There were some problems with last year’s event. Many folks had a big problem with the queues for the food. Will you address this year? Yes. Last year at the Entertainment Centre was in the round so there were food stations dotted around. Whereas this year the hospitality will all be on the deck overlooking the City of Sydney. It’ll all be in one area. It’ll certainly be a step up from last year.
What do you think is the general perception out there of the ARIA Awards? The brand is probably still tarnished from the 2010 show. This year we’ve had 50% more entries into the ARIA Awards than last year. It’s our highest ever level of entries. So in terms of an artist and industry perspective, interest has never been higher. Interest from a media perspective has never been higher, interest from an international perspective has never been higher. It’s the first year we’re broadcasting the show live all throughout Asia via the Australia Network. I think the interest level is as big and great as it has ever been. We continue to innovate, to improve. We listen to the industry. All we hope is that we can celebrate our industry in the best possible manner.
Do you have a similar budget on the show to last year? Absolutely. Having certainty in our partnerships has enabled us to plan and work with that budget.
Have you announced performers? No, not yet. The first performers will probably be announced at the nominations event on October 15.
It’s been just under three years since you came on board. Has the industry’s battle changed gear in that time? It’s a very exciting time for the industry. I sense there’s more optimism in the industry then when I started. It feels that people now are planning for what will be rather than what was, and that’s a big shift in what’s happening. The embrace of digital by the industry and increasingly by the music public is a huge positive for the industry. We’re doing all we can as an industry to embrace new business models. There’s a huge amount of Aussie talent coming through. We’ve had 10 No. 1 Australian albums, which we haven’t had since 2004. I think we’re starting to talk again about a golden period in Australian music, in terms of the artists and the creativity coming through. It’s an incredibly strong year for Australian music. I’m optimistic with the change in government, in terms of policy settings, that things will move in our favour in the coming year.
You just mentioned the change of government. Has anyone in the new government reached out to ARIA to talk shop? We look forward to working with the incoming Coalition government on a range of issues relevant to the music industry. One big challenge remains around the online protection of copyright and suggestions that copyright be relaxed. I’m encouraged by the recent reported comments from the new Attorney-General and Minister for the Arts, Senator George Brandis, who said that in this debate he is on the side of the artists, and on the side of the copyright owners and content providers. There are positive signs that we have a Minister who is receptive to working with us on this issue.
The industry won the simulcasting case. How does that damage the record industry’s relationship with commercial radio? That’s really for the record labels to answer. But from (the PPCA’s) perspective, the record industry and radio industry have a strong symbiotic relationship. And that will continue. And we’re seeing that with the ARIA Awards in that we’re partnering with Nova and Austereo. So, the record industry and radio industry will continue to work together. On the simulcast issue, now that the law is clear we look forward to sitting down and working on negotiating a settlement. The industry failed to overturn the statutory cap. You’ve pledged to keep fighting. What’s the situation with that ongoing battle? It’s exactly as you said, an ongoing battle. It’s something we’ll work on with the new government. It’s an anachronistic cap that doesn’t really serve a purpose anymore. It was passed in 1968 and we don’t think the government should be setting prices between two commercial parties, and certainly could not know what the price should be in 2013 back in 1968. We hope logic will prevail and that we’ll be able to get the law overturned.
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