GOING GLOBAL MUSIC SUMMIT 2017: Travis Banko
An interview by Sarah Kidd.
You may not be familiar with the name Travis Banko, but you would certainly be familiar with one of the most popular summer music festivals that he is involved in; that of St Jerome’s Laneway Festival. Banko is a multi-tasker of the highest order; he currently splits his time between booking/programming for Laneway Festival and artist management at Lunatic Entertainment. But just to top it off he is also one of the curators for Red Bull Sound Select in Australia.
When it comes to artist management Banko currently works day-to-day on several well established acts such as CHVRCHES, Gotye, The Temper Trap, Mansionair and D.D Dumbo. He is also currently managing and nurturing emerging London based act DRELLER.
Banko will be attending this year’s sold out Going Global Music Summit in Auckland, so I caught up with him the morning after the first official Laneway announcement to talk music and the industry that encompasses it.
I understand that you hold a Bachelor of Business (Music Industry) from Victoria University – do you believe it is necessary for people wanting to work in similar roles within the industry to have formal qualifications?
“I have a tertiary education and yes a couple of the others in the office do as well; one of our juniors is studying at university at the moment. I think it certainly helped, I have a business degree and it helped with the broader understanding of business terminology and dealing with the different aspects of the business, whether it’s the accounting side or having a broader understanding of global economics and all that sort of stuff to help plan festivals etc. in relation to the global market.
But at the same time it’s certainly stuff that if you have got the nouse, you can kinda pick it up on the job. So I don’t think you necessarily have to have a tertiary qualification”
Now you work closely with several bands as well as spend approximately 50% of your time with the booking and programming side. How do you juggle what I can imagine are two very different roles within the same industry?
“Working with a team is certainly a big benefit in being able to do both. I think the key difference is – for e.g Laneway – you know when the rough booking period starts, you know the rough timelines of when tickets go on sale and obviously the event dates themselves. Whereas the artist management side, timelines move all the time and can often be based on personalities – because you are literally dealing with humans as opposed to festival timelines that everyone knows need to happen when they need to happen or else we don’t have a festival – we obviously put timelines in place and schedules for touring but if the album gets pushed back by 6months then all of a sudden everything else has to move around that and there is not much that you will be able to do.
But both of them are pretty rewarding in themselves, you meet some pretty amazing people! When you start working with an act very early on and nobody knows their name or music and then over a few years they build up into a proper respected touring entity with a couple of albums under their belt; it’s a really gratifying thing to be able to work with the artist to achieve that”
Was it always your intention to perform both roles? Or did you kind fall into them and realise that you were actually pretty damn good at both?
(laughs) “I suppose I definitely had interest in both … always! So I guess the ultimate goal was going to be able to find a space to be able to do that. Danny Rodgers who is my boss and co-founder of Laneway; I came in working for him across Laneway and at the same time started working on the management side when Gotye’s stuff was really kicking off on a global scale. So I was able to get fully immersed in that and was able to see how a global campaign rolls out; ‘Somebody that I Used To Know’ continued to just grow and grow in various parts of the world which turned into its own unique juggernaut. It was certainly the perfect eye-opener to help decide whether you love it or hate it.
So from there the company picked up CHVRCHES, then D.D Dumbo, DRELLER and Mansionair. CHVRCHES are quite established now so that’s a good thing; the other acts are still developing in a grander sense. But yeah it’s the best fun; I guess it does give you both perspectives of both sides of the coin – festival and management.
Even being a booker on the festival side you get to deal with agents from all around the world who are pitching their acts to you for the festival, so as soon as you manage an act you know pretty quickly who are the ones that are genuine and do deals the right way without being overly aggressive or overly passive aggressive, so that certainly helps frame some context when putting a team around a new artist that we’re managing”
St Jerome’s Laneway Festival – even if you are not a fan of the festival itself you have certainly heard of it. What do you believe the success of Laneway has been, when so many other festivals have fallen by the wayside?
“The first one was fourteen years ago now in Melbourne, and then it slowly expanded out and around the rest of the country and then to New Zealand and Singapore of course. We work with great people over there and in New Zealand as well; Mark Kneebone, Manolo Echave, etc. they’re similarly likeminded people, they’re just big music fans at heart.
We don’t program anything onto the festival unless we absolutely love it; we have never tried to be that mega event that is trying to be everything to everyone. We ultimately want to be able to have the freedom to program it the way we want to and not beholden to having to have a mega headliner every year.
And then just making sure that the punters who do come want to come back; you know it’s never been perfect and there have been some bumps along the road, but we’ve always tried to have that strong food and drink offering, not just the standard beer that every festival does, we have some craft beer offerings, good food and restaurant partnerships; things that really expand the enjoyment for the punter on the day.
I think all those things help to continue to convey a message: Come to Laneway, you’re gonna find an act that you might have only just heard of and that you will hopefully enjoy on the day, there will be established acts as well and with all that combined hopefully the punter goes away at the end of the day and has had a brilliant time”
Obviously choosing a venue can make a huge difference to the success of an event as well. Auckland Laneway last year was held in Albert Park and it elevated it to something quite special!
“We are always trying to do better than just go to a footy field. Whether it’s Melbourne, Sydney or Auckland, there are sites that no one else usually uses for events so that makes it a little bit more special. Like that old Silo Park site, so beautiful with the water, and then as you say Albert Park last year was gorgeous. So yeah we look forward to ‘living’ there for as long as we can; I know the guys over there on the Laneway Auckland team had been working on that for quite a while so it was great to see it come to fruition last year”
Well I have always believed that music transcends age, and with a venue like Albert Park it meant that fans both young and old had a space that they could utilize to their benefit.
“Well with the programming side we had bands last year like The Chills etc. and those sorts of guys that had been quite seminal New Zealand acts; so to have that offering there where some older punters can come and find a nice happy spot under a tree and then the younger kids are in there going crazy, it’s a nice across the spectrum win!”
What originally motivated you to do what you do? Or did you just wake up one day with an epiphany?
(laughs) “You know it wasn’t actually too far removed from that; I wanted to do the typical kiwi thing that you do after high school and just go over to London for a couple of years – the extended gap year and kinda just look for what the next steps were.
I had always messed around with a bit of production and battle of the bands stuff when I was in my teens and always knew music is what I wanted to be in, and then coming back from London, and going to uni I did a music business degree. So that kind of opened my eyes to the industry and ultimately I came out the other side with a bit of an idea of what I wanted to do.
So you do your time; internships, volunteering at festivals, you do all the other sort of junior stuff and build your contacts etc. And then yeah when it comes to Laneway, I got the opportunity to jump in with these guys and it was like a no brainer!”
In other words you have to work from the ground up; there is no just walking in and instantly becoming one of the big players…
“No doubt about it; you know it’s almost a rite of passage. I mean even when I was interning at Mushroom – however many years ago that was, we still got The Temper Trap and Mansionair signed with Liberation who are one of Mushrooms labels – I am still dealing with some of the same people I was when I was interning.
It’s funny how if you have the right attitude, if you do business with the right people, and spend time getting to know them – you know it’s such a small industry – that eventually it will come back around to where if you stay in it long enough you are going to end up pursuing a career alongside some of those people. So yeah I think it is really important, but you have to have the right attitude, you can’t expect to come in and have it all and want it all right now, it’s just not the right attitude to have”
Do you believe that you can balance having a family while working in the industry or is it totally a young/single person’s game?
“Good point! I don’t actually have kids so I can’t answer that from the stand point. Looking at it from the perspective of some of the people I work with, they certainly live very busy lives and really I think it comes down to having a pretty supportive partner who understands that it’s an industry where there are going to be some late nights here and there and that there will be times when you have to go away for a bit. If you don’t have an understanding partner at home it could be a lot harder.”
So on a side note, are you musical yourself?
(laughs) “Awwww, you know not really! I did the usual thing growing up and played guitar for a bit and tried my hand at production stuff; but I worked out pretty quickly that the performance side was not really my forte.
I’m really happy with where I am on this side to be honest.”
Travis Banko will be appearing on two separate panels during Going Global 2017: The Next Big Thing (What’s the next big thing? Where do you see the music market being in five years’ time, or ten years? Are new trends emerging in music delivery or live performance that should be addressed?) & Booking a Booker (It’s hard to get a live career underway overseas without the assistance, contacts and local knowledge of a booker – but how do you get one?). Tickets have now sold out for this event, but there are limited tickets still available for Going Global Presents on Saturday night.
