Auction Net Might Gain an Edge
Could 'Music Rising' Auction Have Ripple Effects?
By Kent Gibbons -- Multichannel News, 4/11/2008 11:01:00 AM
The Edge is at it again.
U2’s ace guitarist and falsetto vocalist will be front and center at a May 31 celebrity auction at the Hard Rock Cafe in New York’s Times Square, benefiting Music Rising, his three-year-old campaign to aid musicians whose livelihoods were devastated by Hurricanes Katrina and Rita in the Gulf Coast region. The auction's called Icons of Music 2008.
A year ago, Edge donated a 1975 Cream Gibson Les Paul guitar at a similar event at the same locale, listed at $60,000-$80,000. It sold for $240,000.
The cable-TV angle? Startup Auction Network, a Tulsa-based Web and cable network headed by a passel of former TV Guide Network executives in Oklahoma, will do a six-hour interactive Webcast of the auction, working with Julien’s Auctions of West Hollywood, Calif.
While Edge is front and center on the Julien’s Web site, sitting behind a gorgeous tie-dyed looking guitar, other items in the lot will include a signed Miley Cyrus guitar, suits worn by The Beatles while promoting A Hard Day’s Night, a Miles Davis owned and used trumpet – 400 lots in all.
The Wire has been trying to connect the dots. Work with us: The Cable Show is in New Orleans May 16-18. There are efforts surrounding the show to benefit denizens of the recovering host city. Auction Network, which announced launch plans in July 2007, is on the exhibitor list (Booth 3341).
What better way to promote the auction, the network and add some star power to the Cable Show than to bring in The Edge?
Auction Network has nothing to say on the subject, officials tell The Wire. But we remain vigilant.
