The Columbus Music Commission’s Big Gig

Tim Fulton 00:08Welcome to the Confluence Cast, presented by Columbus Underground. We are a weekly Columbus-centric podcast focusing on the civics, lifestyle, entertainment, and people of our city. I'm your host, Tim Fulton. This week: how do we take a music community and turn it into a music economy? I sat down with Walker Evans, editor and co-founder of Columbus Underground, to break down the findings of a new study commissioned by the Columbus Music Commission. We dig into the $1.3 billion valuation of our local music ecosystem, what's working, what's missing, and what it might mean to create a music district in the city. We also talk about how music fits into Columbus's broader identity, and whether a more focused approach could help the scene grow. You can get more information on what we discussed today in the show notes for this episode at theconfluencecast.com. Enjoy the interview. Sitting down here with Walker Evans, the editor and co-founder of Columbus Underground. Walker, how are you?

Walker Evans 01:13I am doing better every day.

Tim Fulton 01:17Had quite a summer.

Walker Evans 01:17Yes. Haven't we all?

Tim Fulton 01:17Indeed. Yeah, I suppose so. Here today, I think the first thing we wanted to talk about was, the Columbus Music Commission just commissioned a study about the state of music in Columbus, and sort of recommendations for what can be better, what can be improved upon, and where we are right now. So what did the study say?

Walker Evans 01:46The big number attached to the study was, you know, what the music economy equates to currently. And that number is $1.3 billion. And that is a mix of what musicians are paid, what is brought in in terms of tourism dollars. And this is from the singer-songwriter playing during happy hour down at the local bar, all the way to the big shows that sell out nationwide arenas. The Coldplays, to use a very current band to reference.

Tim Fulton 02:18Okay. What else? Talk about sort of the methodology for the study, because it's a pretty deep dive.

Walker Evans 02:24Yeah, and I gave it kind of a heavy skim, so I would recommend anyone just go read it for yourself if you want the full — it's like 30-ish pages, I think. But there's a helpful infographic.

Tim Fulton 02:18Oh, yes.

Walker Evans 02:24And so it was commissioned by this Austin-based consulting firm called TXP Inc. And it took a look through, again, the numbers of what that sort of stuff means, but also comparing to some other comparable metros, and I would say also non-comparable metros, like Los Angeles. And I think what it said we excel at is diversity of music types, diversity of venue sizes, things like that. We have a very young demographic in Columbus, so it is a music-consuming community, generally speaking. I think what we fall short in, which is sort of stating the obvious, is kind of the industry side of it. The music industry largely exists in a handful of cities in the country.

Tim Fulton 03:25Yeah, it's New York, Nashville, and LA. Austin, I guess, to an extent.

Walker Evans 03:29To an extent. Chicago to an extent, you know. But so, some of those things, can we even replicate in this era? I think Nashville really might have been the last one to be able to plant that flag, in a way that, like, in the '90s — oh, Seattle is like the new music capital, through all the grunge and alt rock sort of stuff. I don't think you can really build that anymore, in a way that, like, regional sounds used to exist. Motown in Detroit, and the Memphis sound, and that sort of stuff. Everything is everywhere now. And, you know, K-pop is everywhere.

Tim Fulton 03:29Yes.

Walker Evans 03:29That's not a regional sound anymore, you know what I mean?

Tim Fulton 04:14Yes, yeah. Well, and that's your philosophy about a lot of things, right?

Walker Evans 04:18The internet, for better or worse, has just made everything everywhere. If there's a hot restaurant trend in New York today, it'll be in Columbus tomorrow. It doesn't take five years for the Midwest to catch up to the coast. Enjoy your ramen.

Tim Fulton 04:31Yeah, yeah. Well, and I think the interesting thing there is that Columbus has always sort of been that way. It has always been, you know — I don't like the phrase "Test City USA," but it has always sort of been like, oh, we're going to have a little smattering of this and a little smattering of that. And that basically has become our identity, right? And so everywhere has become that.

Walker Evans 05:00Yeah, and I feel pretty strongly about that. Like, we always beat ourselves up for not having a more recognizable brand. We've got to put Columbus on the map — what's it going to be? And you look at a city music-wise, you look at something like Seattle or Nashville or Austin, to use these examples. Maybe Austin's a little more blurry, but Nashville is the country music capital, right? Does everyone who lives in the Nashville metro enjoy country music? I would doubt that. I'm sure there are people that hate it. Same way, like, Vegas. Does everyone in Vegas gamble or work in the casino?

Tim Fulton 05:35It is an industry, part of it, yeah.

Walker Evans 05:39But I mean, you could work at, like, a tech startup in the suburbs of the Las Vegas metro area, and, like, never go to the Strip.

Tim Fulton 05:47Right, absolutely. But also, fun fact — Las Vegas, I think, still, this is true, they have more churches per capita than any other. And it's not like Elvis churches.

Walker Evans 05:57Real churches. Not the little impromptu, like, "I met this person yesterday and we're getting married today."

Tim Fulton 06:04Exactly, yeah. Not the chapels. What are the other recommendations that it has?

Walker Evans 06:13There were a couple of big ones. Let me see — there were three, like, major bullet points. Number one was: create a visitor-centric music marketing campaign with existing partners like Experience Columbus, potentially like OSU, different things like that, kind of leveraging some of the big 800-pound gorillas in town. Which, you know, I could see benefits to, to an extent. Experience Columbus has a lot of industry-based sort of pillars, like the coffee trail or the distillery trail. They could do a music trail, or something like that. But also, people don't really think — so my snarky pushback to that was going to be like, "Oh good, we're going to try to rebrand ourselves as a music place now." But I don't think that the coffee trail really — I don't know that it's bringing in any tourism. However, I also don't think anybody thinks of us as a coffee place, except for you being the proprietor of the Columbus Coffee Festival.

Tim Fulton 06:13We planted that flag 10 years ago. Indeed, we're there now.

Walker Evans 06:13Yeah, we did it.

Tim Fulton 07:21But yeah, I think a music-focused, like, adding a pillar there would be good.

Walker Evans 07:25Well, and I think that the trick too is that, like, if you're into coffee and it's like, "Here's 30 local roasteries you should check out over the next couple of months," and you go and check them all off — if you're a coffee fan, you'll go check them all out, because they're all coffee, right? If you're a music fan, it's like, well, are you into pop? Country? Heavy metal? Are you into the symphony? Are you into vaporwave? Are you a K-pop? Are you into, like, shoegaze, lo-fi? You know, there's so many different options for that. I think it's tougher to say, like, "Oh, you should go check out Dick's Den and the Lincoln Theatre and Sweeney's on a Friday night." It could be all different kinds of music at all different price points too. I mean, a cup of coffee is generally around the same sort of price. Are you dropping $1,000 on Taylor Swift tickets at Nationwide Arena? Are you going to, like, a free night at Sweeney's?

Tim Fulton 08:26Yeah, yeah.

Walker Evans 08:31It's just tough to, like — I feel like it's tough to just wrap one big — and that's why something like Nashville has been successful, because it's one genre. But also, I look at the success — it's also the worst genre. Hot take.

Tim Fulton 08:31What's that?

Walker Evans 08:31I said it's also the worst genre. Country music.

Tim Fulton 08:31That's fair.

Walker Evans 08:31Especially the fake, like, pop country. Okay, let's save that for another episode.

Tim Fulton 08:54I guess I look at the success of — first of all, music festivals tend to kind of migrate to one genre, generally, right? Sonic Temple. Even Lollapalooza, it's like, it's all pop music, basically. But some of it's rap, pop music, and some of it's —

Walker Evans 09:15Yeah, and Breakaway is a good example of that too, where it's like, it's hip hop, it's EDM, it's — yes, but it's all the zeitgeist.

Tim Fulton 09:22But also, then I look at the success of things like South by Southwest, where it truly is like, oh, I'm going to see something that I've never seen before, or something that I've never considered, or really solid examples of very different genres. So I guess there could be a spot for it. I mean, we've tried to do some music-festival-y kind of stuff here — and I'm not talking about, like, ComFest or Independence Day. I'm talking more about, like, multiple venues, trying to emulate a Bonnaroo or South by Southwest.

Walker Evans 09:54Yeah, yeah. And there's been a mix of success and failures. I think for every FMF — which I was just talking to someone about the other day, Fashion Meets Music Festival, it was around a couple years and it's not around anymore, correct — there has been stuff like Breakaway, which is a gigantic success, and they do it in multiple cities now, and it does really well. Sonic Temple, again, I think sold out all three or four days this year. I mean, it was, like, traffic jams on the highway because it's so popular. And so I think it's easy to look at something like South by Southwest and say, "We want that," and it's like, well, we already have different versions of that. Like, can we just support and grow what we already have, or do we need to create an entire new wheel from scratch?

Tim Fulton 10:42Fair point. What are the other recommendations?

Walker Evans 10:45Yes, that was number one. One of the other ones was: invest in music-based economic development efforts. I'm not entirely sure what that means, other than just funding Music Columbus, through this organization that commissioned this study, basically.

Tim Fulton 10:56Yeah, which, you know, fair point.

Walker Evans 10:59You know, they are an advocacy group, they want to continue to exist and do more to help. But the second recommendation, which I found to be the most interesting one, was to create a music district.

Tim Fulton 11:14Okay, and there's not really quotes, for people that are just listening.

Walker Evans 11:18I don't know why I did that, because I'm reading it and there are quotes on it, so — I'm using literal quotes, "music district." Through branding efforts, special zoning accommodations. It points out that other cities that have things like this oftentimes you have to go lighter on, like —

Tim Fulton 11:36Oh, restrictions, like public noise.

Walker Evans 11:41Noise. Aren't they — noise restrictions, things like that, in places like, again, Nashville, Austin, Los Angeles, that have, like, a neighborhood or a strip or something like that designated as kind of the music zone.

Tim Fulton 11:55So — and I realize that I'm sort of thinking of it as, like, nightclub zones, but —

Walker Evans 12:05Yeah. When you think of Nashville, what is it? Is it Broadway? Yeah, the main strip through there. It's very Park Street-esque, if you wanted to make a comparison.

Tim Fulton 12:13South Street in Philadelphia, or Sixth Street in Austin. Sixth Street, yeah, where it's just all these venues and stuff. But it's also just a lot of bars. And so we've had the Brewery District — we've had, we still have it, well, but it's not as active right now. There is not a bridge to there right at the moment.

Walker Evans 12:38Correct. But it was, like, the nightlife district of the '90s.

Tim Fulton 12:43Yes, yeah. And then in the 2000s we had Park Street, which has kind of gone away too. Like, it is not the number of venues, the popularity of venues, that was, like, the spot to go to, right? And it sort of benefited from, when the Gateway was coming, all the South Campus bars got torn down, so the college kids didn't have anywhere to go, right? And this leads into a whole larger trend of, like, well, kids don't drink that much anymore, and they aren't as social, and they like sitting in their dorm doing their gummies and playing their video games. Nothing wrong with that. I guess I don't know if a music district would be successful.

Walker Evans 13:32Yeah. Well, and you raise a great point: is this a music district for all music lovers, or is it a nightlife district for people under the age of 35?

Tim Fulton 13:40Right.

Walker Evans 13:44You know, well, because on Sixth Street too, I doubt you see anyone there who's, like, 60, who's really into, like, the country music act that's playing at the bar. They're like, "Hell no, I'm not going down there on Saturday night." Right? It's just drunken children and fighting.

Tim Fulton 13:55And cover songs. Like, yeah, a lot of, quote-unquote, "working musicians" who are hired, like a trivia host is hired to come in and, "Hey, you're going to play for four hours." Or, like, a friend of mine happens to be a pianist at the Top Steakhouse. Like, that's a working musician, absolutely. I just don't know if we need it. It just sounds like an entertainment district kind of idea.

Walker Evans 14:26Yeah. And not to go off on a total tangent, but this study does dive into some of those numbers, because they did some public polling. We, I remember, we filled out a survey as, like, a music-industry-adjacent — we publish and we write, we cover the music scene as a publication. But a lot of the survey, like the other branches of it, were: are you a musician right now, do you have a day job, all that sort of stuff. So there are some numbers, and they kind of pointed out that we are on the lower side of people who are able to support themselves financially, like sustain themselves just on music gigs. Like, a very high percentage of them need to have a second job or a primary job, which then takes away from their creative endeavors, because they've got to go do whatever sort of thing they've got to do for work, versus, like, write new songs and be out there practicing.

Tim Fulton 15:12Yeah. So, I mean, at the end, these goals seem fine to me. And I want a burgeoning music community. That's, like — I want art, like, I want, you know —

Walker Evans 15:24So my big question about the music district thing: do you take an area that already exists and blow it up? Because when I think of music district in Columbus right now, I'm thinking of the two blocks of Old North, between, like, Hudson and Arcadia, Dodridge, like that whole area up there, where you've got Space Bar, Ledo's, Dirty Dungarees, Ace of Cups — excuse me — Bossy Grrl's. I looked the other day, there's, like, eight venues in those two blocks, and more if you have a couple of small bars too. And, like, a record store. But also, what's up there? Especially as you start to expand outside of those two blocks, there's Rumba Cafe a little bit further away, there's Dick's Den a little bit further down, south on High Street. But you've got, like, gas stations, and like that gigantic parking lot where, like, the Rally's and the Goodwill is. And so it's like, if that's going to be developed and filled in, it's going to be an apartment building, like every other — yeah. Are there going to be accommodations for, like, more music sort of stuff around there? And what does it look like to accommodate that from, like, an economic development standpoint? Do you put, like, bollards so that, like, maybe on Friday and Saturday night you shut that street down to be pedestrian-only to make it easier to, like, bounce between venues, and throw some food trucks out there — Sixth Street — put up a temporary stage in the parking lot outside of Ace of Cups or something, so there's, like, more of a festival atmosphere? Because to me, that builds upon something that's already there. And also, like, talk to all those venues and see if they even want any of this, right? This is just my, you know, my five-second thoughts on it. Or looking at an area like Franklinton — we talked about Sweeney's, but across the street, Secret Studio, they're already doing, like, very music-focused, and I think that's sort of the plan for that street in the long term. Do you support that, or do you say, "Oh no, we're going to just pick a random spot downtown and, like, build from scratch"? I think that's where we could get into the, like, everyone just starts rolling their eyes, and we kind of set up for failure, because we're not building upon an existing culture, we're trying to just completely reinvent the wheel. And I hope this doesn't go that direction. I don't think that it would, but, like, sometimes things in the past have gone that direction.

Tim Fulton 17:51What infrastructure do you think it would need in order to be successful, besides just, you know, closing a street, putting some food trucks out there? Like, do you think it needs hotels? Do you think it needs — you know, we mentioned the noise ordinance thing. But, you know, there is an area commission. There's the campus area commission, and then there's the —

Walker Evans 18:26I was going to say, you're just going to block outside of —

Tim Fulton 18:28Clintonville. So, yeah, and I assume they butt up against each other. I will look at the map, and I will put it in the show notes.

Walker Evans 18:37The ravine or whatever is, like, the divider there. You go another block north. Like, luck? No, I know where —

Tim Fulton 18:44I just don't know if the area commission properly covers — not every part of the city is represented by a commission.

Walker Evans 18:51I believe everything that we're talking about is University District Area Commission. Yes, that's what I think, all the way up to the Clintonville line. I'm 90% sure. Look at them. We'll look at that. I mean, again, like, really, these people know better than anyone else. So ask them what they need in terms of support. And a lot of times it just comes down to, like, money and funding. And I'm sure some businesses are more successful than others, and some are probably just struggling to keep the lights on sometimes, especially if it's like, "Oh, we've got this band from Idaho coming in on a Wednesday night, and we're struggling to sell tickets. Like, how can we offset that with grants or some other sort of funding?" If we want this to be committed as a music district, a lot of times it's just like, throw money at it. Give people money so they can be creative without worrying about paying the rent. You know, that's part of it, sometimes.

Tim Fulton 19:48Well, and to GCAC's credit, they do do artist grants for musicians. Additionally, when they partner with the other organizations, they're like, "Hey, we'd like to have some buskers, like, at Gallery Hop," there is an edict that it is, "You will pay this person."

Walker Evans 20:07Yeah. And I think too that, like, if we want to create a true music district, it has to be something that, like — let's make sure that if we're going to plant a flag and put a spotlight on this, that we're getting the type of people and the quality, like the music lovers, to gravitate toward this, rather than just saying this is a nightlife district. Because I'm sure if you said, "Hey, Ace of Cups" — and I want to speak on their behalf, of course — what if we just got, like, a ton of, like, 20-year-olds to start showing up every Friday night? They don't — I don't think they'd be like — right? They want people there who are there for the music. So how do you kind of navigate those waters?

Tim Fulton 20:49What I will say, to that little area, is credit it: all of the venues do a good job of booking shows of pretty diverse types of music and diverse quality of music, honestly.

Walker Evans 21:07Like, I went to — and again, this is, like, a little bit — this is, like, a few blocks south, Dick's Den — I kind of got dragged there with some comedian friends on a Tuesday night. It's bluegrass night, why not? And I'm like, whatever. I enjoyed O Brother, Where Art Thou? — it's, like, my only connection to bluegrass music. And we went there on a Tuesday night at, like, 11 o'clock, and the place was fucking packed. Oh yeah, wow. And, I mean, that was, like, a talented band, and whatever, you know — I'm really there for the music, but, like, everyone else was, and it's like, this is great. Like, if you're into this scene, and you know this scene, and you know this exists, like, this is probably your favorite thing in the city. And that's awesome.

Tim Fulton 21:45Well, and I think — I'm talking myself back from not thinking this was a good idea. It is sort of, like, events like that happen. And also I see, you know — I don't get up to Ace of Cups as much as I'd like to, because I'm getting older, but you see that there is certainly an appetite, right? I don't know that sort of the cross-pollination of it will happen, because it doesn't happen right now. It's been a very long time since I've gone from Ace of Cups to Ledo's to what used to be Kobo and is now Space Bar.

Walker Evans 22:23Well, and if you're not — I feel like music festivals are the time when you're like, "I'm going out and I'm watching 10 bands in a row, and I'm going to just sort of day-drink and get sunburned and be on my feet all day." I think normally, if you go out to a show, you're kind of like, "I'm going to go, I'm going to watch, I'm going to go home." Yes, maybe get food, and where's my reservation beforehand? I mean, I went to a concert a month ago, and I was tired after standing inside the LC — wait, the LC, KEMBA, sorry.

Tim Fulton 22:56Is a Columbus history, but —

Walker Evans 22:58Yeah, I'm sorry, I'm sorry. But yeah, I mean, you know, I walked there, and I watched the show, and I walked home, and the last thing I wanted to do was repeat the whole process again, next door, or, you know, for whatever was going on. So, yeah, I don't know. I think it's interesting. I think there's something there. And I hope, if that recommendation moves forward, that stakeholders are involved. Absolutely, a thoughtful process. I think the other thing too — and we could probably spend another hour talking about this — is that, like, you know, arts districts used to be the thing. And the Short North was and is still our arts district, right? A lot of people say there used to be more galleries, it used to be more artist-friendly, artists could afford to live there. And now it's a little bit of everything for everyone, which is kind of the natural progression for arts districts all over the country. This is not a Columbus problem. But as some of the art galleries have either been priced out or have just looked to move for different customer bases, we've got galleries all over the city now. We've got murals all over the city. We've got pop-up events all over the city. So it sort of begs the question, should arts be sequestered to one specific geography and metro area, or should we have the arts in every community? And most people would say we should have the arts in every community. So now you've got Franklinton Fridays, we've got these downtown galleries at Gay and High, every suburb has art galleries. Like, that's a good thing, generally. So should we be looking back to this old model of, like, we need to establish a music district, or should we just be thinking about, like, how do we make more live music and more music industry opportunities for working musicians region-wide? That's an excellent point, but it's hard to put a branding campaign on that.

Tim Fulton 24:43That too. Yeah. I mean, you're saying everything. It's sort of a "yes, and," right? It's like, yeah, that's a good idea, but, like, how do we make sure that we're fostering growth all over? So, yeah.

Walker Evans 24:56It's tougher to get people's attention. Like, "Pay attention, music is important, pay attention to this," and then just be like, "There's a little bit of it everywhere." And it's like, okay, well, that's not cool, that's everything, that's everything, everything is everywhere. All right, but great information. I recommend everyone read the study. We did a quick little write-up, but linked to the PDF. So, yeah, it'll be in the show notes, I assume.

Tim Fulton 25:22Indeed it will. Yeah. Walker, thanks for your time.

Walker Evans 25:22Thanks.

Tim Fulton 25:37Thank you for listening to the Confluence Cast, presented by Columbus Underground. Again, you can get more information on what we discussed today in the show notes for this episode at theconfluencecast.com. Please rate, subscribe, share this episode of the Confluence Cast with your friends, family, contacts, enemies, your favorite musician. If you're interested in sponsoring the Confluence Cast, get in touch with us. We can be reached by email at info@theconfluencecast.com. Our theme music was composed by Benji Robinson. Our producer is Philip Cogley. I'm your host, Tim Fulton. Have a great week.