One has to worry about the logic of the All Star festival

OK, So each year MLS does a day before kind of festival that often includes players from both teams and some entertainment (often by the artist that performs at halftime of the All Star Match). Today the announcement on the “MLS All-Star Jam” was made and here are the details:

SOULIVE TO HEADLINE MLS ALL-STAR Jam CONCERT NEXT TUESDAY, JULY 28, in PARK CITY

Critically-acclaimed Royal Family Records Artists to be Joined by Ogden’s Shaky Trade for All-Star Eve Bash at The Canyons Resort

SANDY, Utah (Tuesday, July 21, 2009) – With the excitement surrounding the 2009 MLS All-Star Game ramping up towards next Wednesday’s big game in Sandy, Rio Tinto Stadium invites music and soccer fans to gather on Tuesday, July 28, for the MLS All-Star Jam concert and fan festival, being held at The Canyons
in Park City (4000 The Canyons Resort Dr.) from 7:00-10:00 p.m. MT.

The FREE evening of fun and music at The Canyons’ Resort Village will be headlined by New York-based recording artists Soulive, with Utah’s own Shaky Trade serving as the opening act for the outdoor concert. The MLS All-Star Jam festivities will also include an autograph sessions with select MLS All-Stars and Real Salt Lake players, the roster of which will be announced this weekend on Real Salt Lake’s team blog, Behind the Shield, located at www.RSLtotheCore.com.

This past March marked the 10th anniversary since Eric Krasno, Alan Evans and his brother Neal Evans got together for the first time as Soulive at a home studio just outside of Woodstock, NY, and over those 10 years the group has covered a lot of ground, both musically and literally. In addition to traveling to nearly every corner of the world and across America dozens of times, not many bands can say they’ve recorded with Chaka Khan, Dave Matthews, Talib Kweli and John Scofield, nor can many bands open for The Rolling Stones on one tour and have Stevie Wonder sit in with them on the next tour. The musical relationships the band has developed, from the aforementioned artists to Derek Trucks, Susan Tedeschi, Robert Randolph, Joshua Redman, Kenny Garrett, Fred Wesley, The Roots, Ivan Neville and so many others, speak volumes about both how versatile these talented musicians are – between jazz, hip-hop, rock, soul, funk, R & B, Blues, there is not much the band hasn’t done.

While ten years is something to celebrate, Soulive is not a band to look backward. Unencumbered by record contract and fully equipped with a state-of-the-art recording studio, Soulive has embraced the new music business model by launching their own record label, Royal Family Records. With a focus on digital distribution, the label will be an outlet for all Soulive recordings – including their most recent EP release, “Up Here”, as well as numerous Soulive-affiliated and nurtured projects. To dig deeper into the Soulive sound and find out more about the band’s various projects, visit www.Soulive.com.

Opening for Soulive will be Ogden-based Shaky Trade, formed in 2004 by childhood friends Billy Bommer (saxes, vocals), Greg Shaw (bass), and Simon Crompton (guitar). Picking up their respective instruments in high school, the trio played in and around the Utah scene with several local groups before recruiting Chris Clemons (brass, vocals) and Michael Wong (drums) to the band’s ranks. The five were able to find common ground and inspiration in groups as disparate as Red Hot Chili Peppers, Phish, and Jurassic 5, and a potent sound began to take shape, evolving with the addition of members Brad Wright (guitar) and Ryan Conger (keyboards).

Consisting of fresh horn licks, a rock solid rhythm section, and tasty melodies, the group quickly established a fiercely loyal fanbase. After releasing their self-titled debut album in early 2007, Shaky Trade continued performing relentlessly, garnering a reputation for their sweaty live shows and tightly constructed tunes that continued with last November’s release of “Code Green.” To sample Shaky Trade’s music and find out more about these talented local artists, head over to the band’s official website, www.ShakyTrade.com.

Tickets to the following day’s 2009 MLS All-Star Game remain on sale, with prices starting at $35 (KFC Colonel’s Corner, North Goal, South Goal and Upper Deck), and continuing at $45 (Corner Flag), $60 (Lower Sidelines), $105 (Front Row and Midfield) and $200 (Club Seats). To purchase tickets for the MLS All-Star Game’s first visit to Utah, please visit www.RioTintoStadium.com, call 1-800-838-3380, or visit the Rio Tinto Stadium Box Office, open Monday-Friday from 10 a.m. to 6 p.m. local time.

So my confusion is two fold, first why would you do this in Park City? Honestly most of the RSL fan base and visitors coming from out of town for the All Star Match live or will be staying in the valley, do they understand the impact of traffic, parking, and overall inconvenience? Second, are you kidding me one has to wonder what the percentage of MLS fans are that are jazz fans, or how many will have ever heard of this group?

Is the attempt to get only a small group of fans to show up? You have to wonder why you wouldn’t want this event at your own venue, you have a huge area for parking, you have a stage area already set up, you have plenty of room for other activities both inside and out of the stadium. It would be a great chance to once again showcase you stadium to potential fans, but nope we head up to Park City and whether it is intentional or not make the event inconvenient for most of your fans.

I am hoping in the very near future that fans hear about practices (open to the public) for both the MLS All Star team and Everton, perhaps autograph sessions with both, prematch activities at Rio Tinto, and while I have serious doubts that events will be scheduled around the fans (given that the match is midweek and following a holiday-UT based-weekend). The shame of it all is that once again it looks like a great chance to do some good things in the community and RSL drops the ball yet again.

Here is what I would have done at the RSL level:

Worked with both teams to schedule open practices on Tuesday morning/afternoon, given tickets to season ticket holders and local youth organizations, have a meet your RSL players event afterwards with photos and autographs. I would have had as autograph session with the All Stars and Everton and either offered it only to people with tickets for the event or sold tickets to it, I would have held this again at Rio Tinto Stadium for maximum exposure. I would have set up either in the Carnival real area or one of the parking areas an interactive fan area designed around youth and featured local youth soccer opportunities (easily could have sold space to vendors both local and national) and run this at the same time as the open practices.

At a MLS level:
I understand that they want to get ESPN2 to cover the match but a midweek match is simply a pain for fans, I would go for a weekend event, even if you have to have your match on a Monday (MLB All-Star). I would turn the match into a real event, schedule practices the day before an open them to the public, but also have some other activities involving the inactive MLS All Stars (skill competitions, rookies vs. coaches or some type of a short scrimmage match) turn this into a real event for the hosting team and city. I understand that all your thinking about it TV coverage but when your average match is only getting watched by a couple hundred thousand fans, making a impact with 30-50,000 local fans or potential fans is far more valuable.

Get some real talent to show up and be your entertainment, no more acts that nobody has heard of, either get real name up and coming talent or some act that might be past their prime but still has some type of name value. Understand your demographics and schedule entertainment and events based on that, if you really think Soulive is reaching your target audience then hire a new marketing firm because SUM Is lying to you. Oh wait Don is SUM and Don is MLS, so Don stop lying to yourself.

OK, it is a workday and I need to get back to work.

OFF MY SOAPBOX

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