MUBUTV Insider Podcast Episode Transcript
[Jobst Neerman]

Ritch Esra: Jobst, thank you so much for joining us, we really appreciate it

Jobst Neerman: It's a pleasure.Thank you for your invitation.

Ritch Esra: You know, I always like to start these interviews with a question that I ask all the guests, which is when in your life did you know that the music business was going to be your professional career path?

Jobst Neerman: Maybe when I was eight years old. I was educated. I started with the flute, then I was a trumpet, piano. And then I started to sing. I sang my whole life. All the disco Bee Gees and so on. I performed, I say it in the house. And then I decided to study Opera singing. And then my parents told me maybe you should also learn a regular job. And then I had the chance to study culture management. So during my breaks, my holidays, I did several internships at the music festivals, classical music festivals. And suddenly our production manager from the classical music festival asked me after my opera singer exam, I did over 120 shows per year. And then he asked me, “Hey, there's a rock and roll company and they're searching for a guy who has some idea how to manage classical orchestras and crazy wilderness. His name was Nigel Kennedy. So can you think about if you can help them to arrange a German tour?” And it was a German tour of the Berlin Philharmonic Orchestra. And Nigel Kennedy. And I said, okay. And they paid me good. And then I realized they also did rock and roll shows. And so at the end of the day, I said, “OK, singing is wonderful, but I love this job, to arrange to build up tours, to be creative and so on”. And then I started to become a concert promoter. I managed artists. And all of a sudden, through many people, I met Jeb Lieber in Los Angeles. And then he asked me “Can you help me out in the studio? And then I had this close relationship with the studio here in LA, the Nightbird studios. And then I came back to Germany and I said, “OK, let's do what I learned”. So concept promoter and that is what I love. My love is to organize shows, to organize tours, to organize tours for international artists. I love it.

Eric Knight: Jobst what's the state of live music and the industry as a whole in Germany today?

Jobst Neerman: Getting more and more important. The people love live music. Besides the fact that we had the pandemic situation - at the end of day, people, they’re buying tickets again. They are visiting the shows. We are starting our live business by the end of March again means we had two years of no shows, no concerts. So let's see what happens. But I know and I really realized that the people, they’re hungry to visit shows to see artists, not to be at home, to have party, to have the social life back again. And you see it in restaurants and you will see it in the shows. Doesn't matter if it’s big arena shows or club shows. When my taxi driver to the airport in Berlin Saturday morning at 07:00, he said “Since 3:00AM I'm driving and my guests are a clubber and so on and they're not finished at four or five - they will go to the next party”. You said they’re so hungry, they need more and more and I think this is a situation at the moment in Germany and let's see what happened and hopefully the Pandemic situation will be over soon. At the moment the numbers are high, unfortunately. So hopefully we are not getting another lockdown but I doubt, I don't think so. But the people are hungry and they need music. I think music is one of the most important things in our life.

Ritch Esra: No, I would agree with you absolutely. Your company, Jobst RBK, you seem to be involved in a lot of areas of the business management, cultural events, promotions. Can you tell us about the company?

Jobst Neerman: The company is based on the traditional concept promoter business like, you know, to get international artists, bring them on stage in Germany. But Mima we extended our to the promote artists in Austria, in Switzerland, in France with our partners over there. So we represent for example, an artist like Bonnie Tyler in several countries so that we are doing the other thing is that we are thinking that we need to also do something for family entertainment means we are working on new concepts regarding family entertainment or readings for example. So that is what we developed during the Pandemic years so that we have to diversify our business. Then we have also a department with our young bookers who are really enthusiastic in booking upcoming artists. That's a really difficult business and I say always support what they are doing because they're working not for arena shows, they are working for club shows and they hope that 50 people are coming to see this and artists also. They have the whole hope in my colleagues to say hey, I trust you, I gave my career in your hand and please make us successful and this is a huge responsibility. And one of my colleagues has over 30 acts, he's 24/7,

Ritch Esra: That's a lot of acts,

Jobst Neerman: He loves it and when I tell him “Hey OK, they’re not coming on the same time”, and his hope is okay, that one act will be the act, right? So this is the booking department with smaller acts and we have also developed ideas. We are related to a bigger group, to the second biggest ticket provider in Germany and we are developing a new festival now - which is a mixture between good food, Michelin star cooks and good drinks, wine, champagne and rock. So we do this in a really nice area in south of Germany from next year. And we do this with one of the best wineries of Germany. And I think we need to develop new ideas, we need to develop new concepts for our target group because traditional wise, my parents went to classical concerts, to opera and so on. But that generation is now 50 years old. I grew up with all rock and roll, with Queen, with AC/DC and so on. And look at the AC/DC shows. Who are visiting the AC/DC shows, they're old, they're doing our 50 Cent. I grew up with 50 Cent and my son is 50 years old. He has listened to 50 Cent too. There was a gap between nobody was interested in the older artists, but now we have a revival of these artists and this is what we realize, that the heritage artists, they are really successful. Look at the tours: Genesis, Rolling Stones, AC/DC, Bruce Springstein, all these, The Scorpions. They are older, but the ticket sells are incredibly good.
Ritch Ersa: It makes me wonder. Michael Rapino addressed this issue a couple years ago here at a conference about four years ago and he said it concerns him greatly that when he looks at the World Concert market that the top moneymakers economically are in an age group that he sees coming to an end where they will not be able to perform. And when he looks underneath that, he sees very, very, very little. He doesn't see seven or eight people stepping up to do that. What he sees is a lot of people on the smaller end, a lot of 5,000 to 10,000 seaters, but none of the people like you're talking about like the Genesis or the Rolling Stones. He says that's almost like an era that he will see come to an end, which is interesting. And I'm curious if you see that as well. That seems to be what you're talking about.

Jobst Neerman: It's exactly right. What I mean is if you think about who will fill up stadiums in the future, maybe Coldplay, yes, U2, they're also old, meanwhile. But if they are not performing anymore, then you have a huge problem. And this is what I realized also if you are thinking about that, you're asking me how can we develop, how can we introduce new artists? And if I would know that, I would be a billionaire. I think because it's the most difficult thing to do. The most difficult thing. And I think we did the mistake - not yesterday or one week or one year or ten years ago. We made the mistake maybe 15 years ago because we were always focused on the bigger! I want to have this big actor, I want to have the bigger MP invested a lot of money into it. Who will promote it? Who is able to promote that? And then Live Nation grew up, you know, Live Nation, who always represents a big artist worldwide, usually. And now suddenly we like to wake up call hey, who is the next Genesis? Who is the next Rolling Stones? We do not have them. We don't need the next Stones, Rolling Stones, but we need all the arenas with their capacity around 10,000 to 15,000. Who can do that? Katy Perry. Yes, but maybe only for a five years. You have no guarantee anymore. And so this is a big mistake that we haven't invested. And that is also what I realized. We should have invested much earlier in new artists, much earlier because we will have a problem in five to ten years on our table.

Eric Knight: Let me ask you, Jobst, does RBK work with a lot of local German talents?
Jobst Neerman: No, unfortunately not. Because we are coming from the international area because my senior partner, Claus Burnish, he was Managing Director of Mama Concerts. Mama Concerts was worldwide promoter of Michael Jackson and so on. So we had this international thing, it's like in our DNA. But we are working on it. We are working on it. We need to do that. But it's a work in progress.

Ritch Ersa: Let me ask you, how is Germany as a music market? Because it's one of the most important markets in the world musically. How has Germany's musical tastes evolved over the last 15 years, in your mind? I mean, you've been on the front lines of it. So how would you say the tastes of the German music consumer have evolved over the last 15 years?

Jobst Neerman: It's a good question and a difficult question to answer. It's a mixture between two. German music means Hiphop, German hiphop and rap. And also not so internationally, not so many English music acts. So we’re really if you look in the radio stations, domestic artists are really present much more so than 10-15 years ago.
And if you see, and this is a problem to introduce international artists to the German market is because the radio stations are playing 60% to 70% German domestic artists. So the other 30%, all the international artists have to share. This means you have then Katy Perry, Ariana Grande, all the big stars. If you have them internationally, then have you for upcoming artists, little on, little share only. This means radio, to get to radio is becoming more and more difficult for international artists. For upcoming international artists. So it has to go through all the playlists. And this is what I realized. My son is 15 years old. He's not listening to radio. He has his playlist. They are listening to music on his Juilliard. And all of a sudden, four years ago, I realized when he was at the show, he was listening to Elvis Presley and I said, “Why are you listening? How can you listen to Elvis Presley?” He said, “Hey, it's totally cool. I love Elvis Presley”. And now they love all Eminem. All the artists from this generation is really they're listening to the music we grew up or we listened to 15, 20 years ago, but also they know exactly what happened today. So I think they have much more knowledge from music than we had at this age, because we only had to listen to radio stations. And then we were introduced to Sting and all these acts and said, oh, I like Sting, so I will buy a CD. No, a record at this time. A record. I think this is really and it's becoming, this makes it really difficult. You need the influencers, you need all the marketing, several marketing things to bring a new artist up.

Eric Knight: Jobst, what is your criteria at RBK for taking on a new artist as a client?

Jobst Neerman: Criteria is that more than three people of the team like the artist and are thinking, this artist is good. This is one policy we are doing. The other criteria is that the artist has to be able to tell a story, has to be authentic. And this is really important. If an artist is not touching me, I'm not interested to work with them. This is the most important thing for our business. Even when I managed artists, it was like, hey, I have to believe in the artist. Then we have a chance. If I see it only as, “OK, maybe I can earn money with this artist”. Forget it. You should not do that. You should be not the biggest fan, but because fan is related to fanatic. But you should be a little fan of your artist. It's a little bit critical with the distance, but hey, this is the best artist. If you see the USP, we need to find out what the USP is. If the artist has a USP, then we can book them. You only need a USPs position.

Ritch Esra: OK. USP - Unique Selling Proposition. Okay, that makes sense. You've talked about a lot of the challenges that new artists have in Germany with the 60, 30 and radio. What are the opportunities that exist for new German artists? I mean, how do new German artists break today in Germany? What are the opportunities that they have in that particular territory?
Jobst Neerman: Patience, you need a lot of patience! If I see some colleagues of mine, they invest nearly 5 to 6 years to develop an artist and that’s hard work, that’s really hard work. First, you need a team. Second you need a label who is willing to invest. It doesn’t need to be a major label but a label that believes in you and believes you could become successful. And then a lot of luck, a lot of luck. Its becoming more and more difficult. What I mentioned to Sat Bisla on Sunday, all artist have a vision. The artists that are performing at MUSEXPO they have a vision. They have hope and they have a vision of their career. And they have a vision that someone like me and my colleagues who are representing agencies and concert promoters they have hope, hey maybe they will pick me and help me become successful. This is a huge responsibility. And sometimes they are really disappointed if they don’t get picked up. Its a tough business. It’s more simple to handle big acts and say “OK, lets do an arena show” then to handle really sensitive upcoming artists because they hope they have this investment, emotionally and time wise investment they are doing in their career. You cant tell them, OK forget your career. No, it’s really hard. And if i would know how to do that, I would tell you.

Ritch Esra: I don't know if anyone knows how to do that. Really, I don't.

Eric Knight: Let me ask you, Jobst, is the German market open to certain styles of music more than others?

Jobst Neerman: The radio stations are dominated, the popular stations are dominated by remixes, by DJs. Robin Schultz and so on. By remixes. If you look at the top ten of the radio stations, Germany, the popular, conservative, then you have a lot of remixes of DJs there. Then you have a lot of this German hiphop which is really popular. It depends on the area. In Munich that area is a typical for classic rock. It's classic rock. Berlin is not a classic rock, it's independent. It's more and more independent and so mainstream. Yes, we have the mainstream thing, but which genre? Germany is not the hard rock thing, but hard rock is also, when you ask me what changed in the last year, the rock arrived in the middle of the society, meanwhile, means that girlfriends make their appointment to say hey, let's have a drink, we go into a club and listen to rock music and then they are drinking wine or whatever in a club. That changed 20 years ago it was only the rock fans were there. Now it arrives in the middle of the society. It's like it's hip to go to rock concerts. If we look, for example, to the AC/DC shows, they are all they're all… Unfortunately not anymore. But there were management, there were people who were top managers of huge companies and so on.

Ritch Esra:Yes, Germany was probably the biggest rock market in Europe for many, many years. In the 70’s and 80’s. In the early nineties too. I mean enormous hard rock. And hard rock did very, very well in Germany. Metal too. Yeah, exactly, very well. I see that RBK represents some of the world renowned acts such as Lenny Kravitz, 50 Cent, just to name a few. Do you represent them exclusively just for Germany or for other territories as well? And how do those deals work?
Jobst Neerman Only Germany. The deals, work with an agency and to make a deal and tell the agent that you are thinking that you are able to do the best job for the artist and to get the best result. That's it.
Ritch Ersa: OK. All right, great. That's honest and direct

Eric Knight: Jobst, let me ask you, are there any books or films that have really resonated with you, professionally speaking, that you could recommend to our audience? Anything that inspired you growing up or in the business, books, movies?

Jobst Neerman: I'm a huge fan of Richard Branson. I was like, Hey, what did this guy do? What did he do in his past and how he developed from a publisher for a student magazine to one of the most influential and open minded guy. And this is honestly, this is a guy who inspired me. And I just have on my iPad a book from him I read on my flight here to LA. Yes. Richard Branson. That's my guy.

Ritch Esra: Yeah. He's a big influence on me. Huge influence. And we had someone yesterday who worked for him, Phil Quatararo, who worked for Richard. And he said he was one of the best people he had ever… And Phil was the chairman of Virgin Records in America. He was the chairman of Warner Bros. Records. He was the chairman of EMI North America.
And he said Richard was one of the most influential people and one of the smartest people he had ever met or worked with in his life. So he knew Richard very well. He ran Virgin for eleven years in America. He launched America 1986 and ran the company until 97. So he knew Richard very well.

Jobst Neerman: In 2008, I arrived at the hotel here in LA. And Richard Branson was at the front desk with me. And I thought about it. Should I ask him now? Maybe you have five minutes only to talk with him about life, about how you sees life, the world, whatever. But I thought, maybe he's stressed, maybe no, I didn't do it. I should have done that. I should have.
Ritch Ersa: Yes, you should have. Yeah. Because it's hard. You never get those chances again. In 2019, it's January 1. It's 2019. It's New Year's Day. I'm on the corner of 75th street in New York City and Fifth Avenue, waiting for a friend, it's freezing cold, who comes walking by and stops and is looking in. And I recognize him, but Steven Spielberg. But I took the chance to talk to him. He was the nicest man. I just said, thank you so much for the brilliant work you've given us. And he couldn't have been more kind. He couldn't have been kinder or warmer or friendlier, but so I always try to take those chances if I get to meet my heroes. Because I know, like you were saying, you never get that chance again. OK, Jobst. What advice can you offer our listeners who are wanting to pursue a career in the talent agency business or in the concert promotion business like you have.

Jobst Neerman: I mentioned before that my wife is always telling me that “Jobst, you have the best job you can have on this planet. You can manage emotions, you manage emotions, you manage artists, you can do something good for people”. The people, if they're on the shows, they’re thankful, they are into the aesthetic, they have fun and you can organize it, you can manage that. So this is a gift, it's a big gift and I'm really thankful that I have the gift that I have sometimes a vision to say “Hey, let's work on this show and let's bring fun and music to the people”. To make this move is you have to be enthusiastic. You have to believe also in you because I started not with the big artists, you know, at the first moment you're working with small, small artists, you need to be open minded. You need to be, to develop the investment of time in new artists, It's the same like the investment of time for a big artist. And you should be, My voice teacher told me one thing, he said you always need a little bit of arrogance, Sicilian arrogance, is that thing your mom and your dad always said to you as a young boy, “You are the most intelligent, you're the nicest and most beautiful and so guy on the planet”. You should not believe that. But this is Sicilian arrogance.
Get to the people not arrogant but say “Hey, I can give something to you and because its a lot of press on your shoulder not a lot of, if you are not performing, as I said before you get disappointed from the artist you get disappointment from the agent. From everybody. So you need to be patience, you need to be motivated and you need to have a vision.

Eric Knight: Jobst, What advice would you offer our listeners who are wanting to pursue a career as a recording artist? what advice would you give them?

Jobst Neerman: They should have also what I said, they need a vision. They need a vision and they should be really motivated and they should accept 15 no’s minimum and say ok next. Maybe at some point I’ll get a yes. And i think that, don’t give up. If you believe in you, if you are listening to people and people are telling you are really talented and your music is really great, Believe in you and ask people and ask them for their really honest opinion. That’s really important. You need it, we need it. You have to reflect on yourself. If there’s, what I learned when I started opera singing, if someone is telling you when you are 17 years old or 16 years old, that you are really talented then you should study then you should invest all your time into that what you are doing like singing or rehearsing, trumpet playing whatever. If someone is telling you at age 30, you are talented, you should maybe think about switching jobs.

Ritch Esra: Very very very well said. Jobst I can’t thank you enough for doing this we really really appreciate it.

Jobst Neerman: Thank you

Ritch Esra: Thank you, so much, appreciate it.

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