MSG Buys Interest In Music Manager
Front Line Reps Eagles, Van Halen, Others
By Mike Farrell -- Multichannel News, 6/11/2008 9:45:00 AM
Madison Square Garden has acquired a minority equity interest in Front Line Management, a personal music management firm, from IAC/InterActiveCorp and Warner Music Group.
Front Line, led by Irving Azoff, represents a number of well-known musical acts, including the Eagles, Jimmy Buffett, Neil Diamond, Van Halen, Fleetwood Mac, Christina Aguilera, Stevie Nicks, Aerosmith, Steely Dan, Chicago, Journey and Guns N’ Roses. Terms of the deal were not disclosed.
“We invited Madison Square Garden to be one of the Front Line Management partners due to their extraordinary commitment to artists,” Azoff said in a statement. “MSG’s diverse resources complement our management mandate to create new and exciting artist opportunities and marketing platforms on behalf of our artist roster.”
MSG, owned by Cablevision Systems, includes the Madison Square Garden arena, Radio City Music Hall and the Beacon Theater in New York and the Chicago Theater in Chicago. Earlier this year several reports said that MSG was contemplating teaming up with IAC to purchase concert promoter AEG Live, but that deal fizzled when the parties couldn’t agree on terms.
Just what impact the agreement will have on MSG’s Fuse cable music channel remains to be seen. In recent months, Fuse has stepped up its focus on musical acts with its high-definition concert series, "Fuse Rocks the Garden," and has launched a new marketing campaign—“Music Is…”
