The Hold Steady’s Franz Nicolay testifies before Congress in LiveNation/Ticketmaster hearing
“We simply want to be able to retain and manage the relationship between musician and audience without the influence of extractive corporate power,” Nicolay said during his testimony.
Photo by Rob Kim/Getty Images for The Recording Academy
On Monday, May 18, Hold Steady keyboardist and Band People author Franz Nicolay testified during a congressional hearing tied to an ongoing federal antitrust case. This is not the first time Nicolay has testified before Congress. Back in 2016, he lobbied for the Fair Pay For Play Act, a proposal that would amend copyright law to allow musicians on sound recordings to receive radio royalties. As a lifer touring musician who’s played with bands like Against Me! and World/Inferno Friendship Society—and, more recently, as a chronicler of the crucial-but-oft-overlooked lives and work of backup singers, session players, and touring band members in his aforementioned book—Nicolay has a keen understanding of the value of entertainment workers and the stakes that people like him are up against. Monopolies like the one created by Live Nation and Ticketmaster only accelerate the exploitation of artists and their labor.
Two years ago, the Department of Justice filed an antitrust lawsuit against Live Nation/Ticketmaster, alleging that the company violated federal anti-monopoly regulations. Earlier this year, the DOJ and Live Nation settled, supposedly at the encouragement of President Donald Trump, avoiding a monopoly breakup. Maryland Representative Jamie Raskin led the most recent hearing on the lawsuit and subsequent settlement, which aired during a three-hour broadcast on C-SPAN. In his testimony (approximately 55 minutes in), Nicolay explained how “live music hasn’t been a healthy competitive market” but “a vertically integrated corporation that controls venues and tour promotion and ticketing and artist management… the epitome of the kind of monopolistic power that antitrust law was created to address.”
Nicolay also spoke about the ways predatory ticket pricing and lack of market regulation degrade the relationship between artists and audiences, maximizing corporate profit at the expense of both parties: “We simply want to be able to retain and manage the relationship between musician and audience without the influence of extractive corporate power. We try to do business in a sustainable way that embodies respect for fans rather than squeezing every last dollar from them. And we want the opportunity to partner with companies that share those values.”
You can watch Nicolay’s full testimony in a video posted to C-SPAN’s official X account, and read an expanded version of it on Nicolay’s Substack, Piano Fighter.
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