WHERE TO SELL BEST, EAST OR WEST

The flagship of Finnish music export doesn’t get rich on an American tour anymore, so should they instead head for China where a band from Tuusula is doing their first international tour, financed with a government grant? HIM on stage in Boston, Snipe Drive in Beijing. After the gigs we talk about money.

HIM, Boston, April 2010

The sweaty Finnish musicians pack their backpacks in a crammed backstage room. 2500 fans have left the Boston House of Blues, and HIM face an all-night drive to Montreal.

The band from Helsinki had arrived in Boston from Pittsburgh only hours before their gig.

Despite the tight schedule, Ville Valo seems full of life. Even the reasons he gives for his decision to give up smoking are mostly related to music.

“The new songs have so many lyrics that I run out of breath singing them if I smoke.”

Touring the carpeted and overly air-conditioned America isn’t a party for the asthmatic vocalist. Valo says that the hotels they stay in are chosen based on the fact that the rooms must have windows that can be opened.

The majority of time and money, however, is spent on moving from one place to another.

“The distances and expenses here are totally insane”, Valo sighs.

***
You can’t escape the gloomy economic prospects in Boston: the street maintenance has been neglected like in a third world country.

In addition to the crumbling infrastructure, the hard times can be seen in the local rock business. Live Nation, the promoter of the HIM tour, has lately made huge losses even though the same company owns the majority of the tour venues as well as the majority of Ticketmaster, responsible for ticket sales. There’s more supply than demand.

“Way too many bands touring”, says Mika “Gas” Karppinen.

“Since people download the music and don’t buy the CDs, all the bands in the world go on tour to make money and a living”, Valo continues.

He remembers that on their last tour HIM played at a venue in Denver where in a few days time also Rammstein and Ministry had played gigs--both being bands that are targeted at the same audience.

“People don’t have the money to come see that many gigs which means that soon bands won’t have the money to tour. If the bands don’t tour, they’re not played on radio over here either. We’re coming to a point where everyone won’t be able to make a living doing this.”

“I guess our only chance is to go play gigs in China where apparently we have officially sold only one single copy of the new album”, keyboard player Janne “Burton” Puurtinen snorts.

Manager Seppo Vesterinen says that the new Screamworks: Love in Theory and Practice album, released in February, has so far sold a little over 50 000 copies in the US. The previous album Venus Doom sold about the same, while Dark Light, released in 2006, sold the 500 000 copies needed for a gold record.

***
“Nowadays record sales don’t correlate at all with ticket or merchandise sales,” Vesterinen says.

According to the manager, HIM will make at least one more album for the American Warner with which it has a recording contract.

***
The hardships of the record industry or the world economy haven’t however paralyzed the flagship of Finnish music export. The English tour in February and March was all but sold out, and the ticket pre-sales for the American tour have also been good. Although Valo admits that the concert venues haven’t gotten any bigger in America since the last tour.

HIM plays in venues with a capacity of 1500 to 3000 people.

“There’s the psychological aspect that we’d rather play in a bit smaller places that are sold out than in big halls that aren’t”, the singer explains.

According to Vesterinen, only bands that sell out arenas with a capacity of over 5000 make a significant profit.

“We can say with good reason that 90 per cent of the profits of this HIM tour go to cover the expenses and therefore the money stays in America.”

In addition to the costs of traveling and the rented equipment, the expenses are increased by the bureaucracy and the expensive lawyers and accountants that have to be hired to deal with it.

The band’s management has been honing their marketing strategies.

“We agreed with the booking agent beforehand that we would bring along more bands this time”, Valo says.

Live Nation believed that a package of four bands would sell more tickets and therefore also in Boston three rising American bands played before HIM. Their record companies have invested in promoting the joint tour.

***
After the gig, the members of the other bands pack their instruments in stuffed vans outside the House of Blues.

HIM and their crew, on the other hand, travel in two luxurious-looking buses. The band, which nowadays includes three fathers, doesn’t want to skimp on the expenses required for traveling comfortably.

“Instead of making a little more money but the touring being otherwise more inhumane, we decided to burn money to enjoy ourselves more,” Valo says.

[I didn’t translate the other part of the article talking about Snipe Drive’s tour in China.]

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