UPDATE: “We got fucked,” Patrick Carney says.
The fallout from The Black Keys‘ cancelled fall arena tour continues. New York Times reports that the band fired its managers, Irving Azoff and Steve Moir, after cancelling the tour. A representative for Azoff confirmed the move to Billboard and called it an “amicable parting.”
The band didn’t directly acknowledge the cancellation immediately, which many speculated was because of low ticket sales. When they did release a statement, they promised an “exciting, intimate experience” on new North American dates, which have yet to be announced. Stay tuned.
The cancellation has generated a ton of discussion on social media, and more recently, a bunch of articles speculating on whether the bottom is falling out of the concert business, also citing Jennifer Lopez’s cancelled arena tour. New York Times‘ piece continues:
Armchair analysis of ticket sales has become yet another element of modern fandom to be memed and weaponized, upping the stakes. As industry watchers on social media race to demonstrate the dominance of their favorites, screen grabs of available seats for upcoming concerts have gone viral, leading to media coverage.
“I feel like people online just sort of realized that you can look at seat maps and see how shows are doing,” said Sam Hunt, an executive at the touring agency Wasserman Music. “So I think part of it is that maybe not a ton has changed in the touring business — not every swing is a home run — but people are paying more attention to it and having a typically internet-y response.”
Read it in full here.