Quote:
Originally Posted by bmt322
I wonder if they'll do Maryland Heights next year. I know attendance was bad in 2013. Maryland Heights would be one of the major beneficiaries of a weekend show over a Wednesday show. It's always been a solid market, a staple on the tour. It used to have two-night stands, it opened several tours, and the market has 2 live trax releases. The last time they skipped it was in 2007 and they followed it up with a stadium show in 2008.
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A couple things I can say here on that....
STL is the biggest pin point for country music. Like people from all over the country come to the STL amphitheater for country acts and they sell out QUICK. I know, strange. But, VZW Amphitheater in STL books all their country acts as soon as humanly possible. And, as common sense would lead, most big name country artists want to come through on a weekend (Fri/Sat). That being said, other artists have to take the "leftovers" of dates so gone are the days of DMB coming through on weekend/big nights. If you've noticed, they haven't had a weekend, opener or 2 nighter here in several years. In addition, and I hope it's OK to say, DMB contractually obtains a LOT of the profit margin for their tour stops...bleeding into the venue revenue. So, business is a big deal.
2007 wasn't "skipped" as much as it was the scheduling differences. VZW slotted them for early in the tour, per normal schedule, and they decided to start late due to the arrival of Dave's new addition to his family. STL has had lacking attendance for a while now. The market has shifted and to be honest, so has the fanbase. As a 28 year old and someone engaged, I wouldn't want to spend 2 days of work vacation, hotel, expenses, etc for a show in the middle of the week if I were to have to drive and see them here in STL on a Wed. For STL to work again during the week, they need to be an opening show of the summer again or have a drawing opener like they used to (OAR, Lumineers, etc); or, go to weekends (which would be tough because of the above reasons). Finally, the Midwest Bank (N. Island) is a LN venue. With that being 4.5/5 hours away, it sucks the life out of the STL market. Why not wait another couple weeks to travel to a big city like CHI on a weekend and see TWO shows? So, there are a lot of schedule and logistical reasons why STL isn't doing well with DMB any longer.
I do not have concrete information about next year for DMB in STL, however.
Cheers everyone