Music Festival Drive ins

September 17 2020

The drive-in industry marked the peak of the post-war auto and suburbia boom. It has been dwindling since the 80s. However, the pandemic is giving it a second wind.

The summer is usually a musical festival season. This year with social distancing, organizing events, and capitalizing on them have become challenging. That's when people started to combine the two business model- drive-ins and music festival- to counter the decline in entertainment revenues.

There's been a sharp monthly growth in drive-in concerts and events across the nation thanks to country music. Most of the concerts are happening at drive-in theater venues.

The drive-in industry, once a mainstay for movies, is now catering to all types of performances, from music to comedy to the circus, as the coronavirus pandemic continues to keep venues shut. Drive-in concerts have been way more prevalent in genres like country, rock, and folk as opposed to things like rap, electronic dance music, and R&B.

There have been a few notable performances that have popularized drive-in concerts, including Garth Brooks, Blake Shelton, and Metallica.
These performances each took place via video at drive-in theaters around the country. Drive-in concerts could be providing some new momentum to the drive-in industry during the pandemic.

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Music Label Helped by Drive-In County Concerts:

Big Machine Records is an American independent record label, which is distributed by Universal Music Group, specializing in country and pop artists. Big Machine is based on Music Row in Nashville, Tennessee. The label was founded in September 2005 by former DreamWorks Records executive Scott Borchetta and became a joint venture between Borchetta and country singer Toby Keith. The company concentrates on publishing, management, and merchandising and oversees imprints, such as Valory Music, that are part of the Big Machine Label Group.

Curb Records is an American record label started by Mike Curb originally as Sidewalk Records in 1963. From 1969 to 1973, Curb merged with MGM Records where Curb served as President of MGM and Verve Records. The record label specializes in rock, country, and pop, including several Grammy's awarded artists.

SESAC currently licenses the public performances of more than 1 million songs on behalf of its 30,000 affiliated songwriters, composers, and music publishers, which include such familiar names as Bob Dylan, Neil Diamond, RUSH, Disclosure (PRS), Zac Brown, Mumford & Sons (PRS), Hillary Scott of Lady Antebellum, The Avett Brothers, Shirley Caesar, Paul Shaffer, and Thompson Square.

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Funding & Deal Highlights:

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Squadle, a technology company that enables multi-unit operators to simplify complex operations and streamline food safety, today announced it has closed on its Series A financing, which will support the company's exponential growth.

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Astute, Inc. a leading customer engagement and Voice of the Customer platform, today announced its acquisition of Socialbakers, a market-leading unified social media marketing platform. The acquisition will allow global brands to manage research, content, engagement, social listening, and VoC in a single software-as-a-service platform.

Atar Capital, a Los Angeles-based global private investment firm, announced today it has completed the acquisition of WinCup from funds managed by BlackRock, Inc., a global investment management firm.

Activist investor Elliott Management Corp. has taken a stake in Noble Energy Inc., the energy explorer that agreed in July to sell to Chevron Corp. for about $5BN.

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