If you’re touring, you likely know about the Master Tour program from Eventric. Well, the company’s offerings are about to get bigger and bolder. “We’re excited to be releasing Master Tour Venue, which will standardize all the venue tech packs and make the advancing process easier and more secure through our new venue advance portal,” says Eventric CEO Paul Bradley, noting that the new Venue Tech Pack system offers seamless communication between a tour’s production and the venue. “It’s going to allow venues to upload and manage time-critical production data and share it across Master Tour’s community of active touring users,” Bradley says. “We’re excited because it’s going to ensure that the most in-depth and up-to-date production information is distributed and available instantly.”
And that’s just one of the developments coming out of Eventric, which today serves clients beyond the music touring industry including theatrical tours, sports, film and TV, and even private family vacation planning.
A Roadie’s Story
Bradley says his story is “not unlike many roadies’ stories.” He grew up outside of Chicago where he learned to play the drums, and then headed to Drake University in Des Moines. While there, he got involved in promoting bands and setting up concerts. After graduating with a degree in Journalism/Mass Communications, he headed back to Chicago and did “everything I could to get into the business.” Bradley’s first industry job was at Tantrum Records, a small record label that focused on indie bands. “The 1990s were a great time to be in Chicago, as bands like the Smashing Pumpkins, Urge Overkill, Material Issue, and Wilco were exploding. This label was part of that scene.”
He was helping with marketing and management with one band in particular, The Drovers, an Irish music-influenced rock band. He even drove them around in a Ford Econoline 250 for eight months. Then when their drummer quit, he added that job to his resume. “I was supposed to just fill for two weeks, and ended up playing with them for nine years,” he says, adding with a laugh: “Honestly, I think they were more impressed that I could parallel park the van with a trailer than anything I did behind the kit!”
Bradley put the inevitable down-time that happens when touring to good use and started creating a touring database of contracts, hotels, and guest lists. Ultimately Ian Kuhn, who had been touring with the Smashing Pumpkins as an audio engineer, joined The Drovers’ crew. Turns out Kuhn was exploring a similar idea, “but what he had was far more advanced.” They partnered and over the years started to develop a software program to meet the needs of modern touring.
Kuhn then got offered to be Dave Matthews Band’s monitor engineer and has been with that organization ever since. An early version of Master Tour was road tested with DMB, then shared with acts including Third Eye Blind, Foo Fighters, and Coldplay.
Copies on DVDs were given away, and then Bradley and Kuhn incorporated Master Tour as a company in 2000. (In 2009, Bradley, as sole owner, rebranded as Eventric so he could expand the product and start selling Master Tour as a professional standalone system; Kuhn would to focus on his role with DMB, whom he still tours with.)
Master Tour Venue and Live Access
Money was raised, professional programmers and developers were hired, an executive team was put in place, and the software caught fire. It has been used on thousands of tours and today over 250,000 industry professionals have relied on Master Tour to manage their touring needs. Today’s Master Tour offers a host of features to track routing and schedules, guest lists, transportation, lodging, and flights, and Bradley says it is the industry’s most complete venue and hotel database. The system also allows customizable visibility and sharing for band which is critical for keeping the right data accessible to the right people.
Covid brought all the growth to a halt, but it didn’t stop progress. The Eventric team used the time to make their products quicker, cleaner, and better. Since the re-opening of concert touring the business has flooded back. With all the bands touring and schedules being especially tight, Master Tour is in more demand than ever.
Another Eventric platform used by hundreds of tours is Live Access ticketing.
“Live Access is great for managing your ‘friends and family’ tickets, as it provides a way for the artist to sell coveted tickets to people they want to take care of in a secure, consistent way,” he says. This is much needed because it’s not necessarily comps (though that option exists) but is by invitation only. It captures and manages ticket requests from those 200 to 1,000 people who need good tickets at face value without jumping through the manic hoop that is general consumer ticketing. “This is a nice way to take care of those who the band wants to have good seats at a fair price,” he says. “This is especially needed when the band does those big hometown gigs and record release kick-off shows.”
Looking Beyond
“Now we’re in a good position to explore new areas and serve a wider client base,” he states. At the recent National Independent Venue Association (NIVA) conference in Washington D.C. held last month, they unveiled Master Tour Venue for those arenas, music halls, theaters, and clubs which will include a standardized tech pack for promoters and venues to share. “We have the records on 15,000 venues in our Master Tour database, and now venues and promoters will be able to maintain up-to-the-minute details to be made available to any tour coming to the venue or considering coming to the venue.” Among other mission-critical specs, this will offer load-in information, production contacts, stage size, shore power, and rigging details. “The challenge for tours is knowing exactly what that venue has and doesn’t have—and that information can save the tour and the venue thousands of dollars. It’ll help make advancing way more consistent and efficient.”
Coming in 2024 is Master Tour Crew, which will be a “LinkedIn/Career Builder” for touring professionals. “It will bring some visibility for those looking for additional work and tours needing personnel,” Bradley explains. “And it’ll have the history and skills of the live event professional, references, and more. Big and small tours will be able to count and rely on the standardization.” He notes that so often when a tour starts off, it’s a matter of hiring who you know and who you’ve worked with before—but what if they aren’t available? If you need a Lighting Director, you’ll be able to find one in Master Tour Crew. “It’ll also be valuable for the tour coming into town that needs to pick up a day rigger or a carpenter; and vice-versa as it’s also for that crew member who is mostly busy with a particular band but want to make themselves available when their band isn’t touring.” Like the Venue product, it will be up to the individual to maintain their account. The Eventric team is also planning to partner with other critical industry services such as payroll companies and travel agencies.
Mental Health & Health Care
But Bradley is also looking at an even bigger picture. “We’re forming partnerships to see if we can combine our talents to be even more helpful to the industry.” Later this year Master Tour will introduce a new in-platform integration spotlighting Backline (https://backline.care/), a 510(c)(3) non-profit. Backline is a mental health and wellness resource for the music industry that provides streamlined access to critical resources. This new portal will also direct users in crisis to local and national hotlines. “This is Master Tour’s first step in expanding our offerings to include health and safety resources,” Bradley says. “Backline is doing great things and we want to help them get the word out with a platform that makes it easier for event professionals to get what they need and to do it through mobile apps.”
On the mental health issue, Bradley understands there is still a stigma and is thinking if he can put it on a platform and make it easy to access, more would do so. He is also working with MusiCares, another non-profit that provides a safety net of health and welfare services to the music community.
Bradley’s overall goal is leveraging Eventric’s position and technology to bring more services to touring professionals beyond gear and logistics. “We would like to partner with a reasonable healthcare provider to create a platform where those in our business could get their healthcare needs met. Those on the road sometimes put in 18-to-20-hour days and don’t have the resources to get help when they need it. The question at Eventric is always, ‘what can we do to make the lives of those in live events better?’ ”
You can learn more about Master Tour from Eventric at www.eventric.com
