Playing Devil's Advocate

I got an interesting phone call this morning. You might remember that I was one of the main organisers of a local outdoor music event here - the other organiser being our (ex) sound man. If you haven't read about that drama, you can catch up on it here. I think I left out a lot of the info on the business side of things though - but long story short, it's an event that he had put on himself the two years previously and it was very mediocre. It didn't get any commercial radio support and there were no well-known bands headlining, and the audience attendance was around about 800 max. Earlier this year we put the event on together - I contacted the commercial radio stations and built a good relationship with them, they sponsored the event and turned up on the day, we had one of the biggest bands in NZ headlining it and the turnout was an awesome 3,000 approx! Much better than the event over the previous couple of years. But at the end of the day, I got no recognition for my input and services and his company took all the credit. My company was listed as a 'sponsor', when in the beginning it was agreed that the event would be held "in association" with my company.

Anyways, our ex sound guy called me this morning - I hadn't heard from him since we decided to stop using him a couple of months ago - and asked if I would like to be involved in the event again next year. I have initially said yes, but am thinking twice about it as there's a few pro's and con's.

I think it's great to put a big successful event like that on your CV (especially organising it 2 years in a row), it's also good to remain as involved in your local music scene as possible - especially with having big bands headlining, it's always great to meet them and you never know what contacts you might make out of it. So those are the pro's.

The con's at this stage, really revolve around the drama of last time. However, I'm pretty sure if I make it known up front that I want my company to have more recognition for this, then maybe it won't be so bad. The band I manage won't be playing this time - which means it will take time away from my work with them. Let's face it, putting on a big event like this takes a lot of your time up. And the band are looking to have their album finished and ready for release by the end of the year... sooo... album release AND major outdoor event to organise. Is it possible? Or am I better to concentrate on one thing at a time?