A CANDID CONVERSATION WITH MICKEY CURBISHLEY
SOLOTECH ’ S PRESIDENT OF LIVE PRODUCTIONS , U . S . & U . K , OPENS ABOUT HIS EXTRAORDINARY LIFE IN THE CONCERT BUSINESS , AND THE CURRENT STATE OF THE INDUSTRY
By Michael Raine
Mickey Curbishley literally grew up in the global touring business . His parents managed some of the biggest artists of the 1970s and onward . So , really , his current role as president of live production across the U . S . and U . K . for Solotech , a company he joined in 2018 , it just seems like a logical destination . And before Solotech , Curbishley held various roles as a part owner of Lighting & Sound Design , SVP of PRG ’ s concert touring group , and SVP of live events at TAIT , among other titles . But as a kid , he did not want to be in a pampered office ; rather , he wanted to get on the road , which he did at just 16 years old with AC / DC . From there , he spent more than a decade as a lighting technician , before a famous tragedy altered his career path .
Here , Curbishley discusses all this and more , including the current state of the live productions industry , in this wide-ranging chat with Professional Lighting & Production . We hope you enjoy !
This interview has been edited for length and clarity .
PL & P : What does your role entail on a day-to-day basis currently ?
Mickey Curbishley : The Live Productions Division of Solotech is essentially a logistics company , as you know , so it ’ s all about moving pieces of equipment and crew around and trying to manage clients ’ expectations . Much of the live events industry is struggling because of supply lines and crew availability , but there ’ s also the struggles that the actual artists are facing , as well , with their logistics and stuff . So , oftentimes , we ’ re finding now that there ’ s a lot of last-minute stuff because the process is just not as smooth as it use to
30 | Fall 2022 be . So , put all those things in together and it ’ s a perfect storm of complete chaos .
One of the things that we ’ ve done is , ages ago , we decided to not commit to anything that we couldn ’ t deliver , or that we didn ’ t know we could deliver . That , of course , is really challenging , because you ’ ve got targets to hit and we ’ re all trying to rebound from a terrible time where we ’ ve made no revenue for a couple of years . That balance is really difficult to find . There ’ s so many opportunities , and it ’ s so easy to be like , “ Oh my god , let ’ s take it and we ’ ll find a way .” In the past , you could always find a way , whereas now , you just can ’ t buy your way out of trouble anymore like you could before .
That ’ s been the day-to-day challenges , but on another note , you can definitely see the stability coming back into the business . Solotech — certainly Solotech US — has been built on large , global touring projects , and that ’ s where we thrive . We find it difficult to stop and start and do short runs because our machine is not geared up to the smaller stuff . [ Solotech ] Canada is and they have a different system up there where they can do thousands of gigs . Some of our peers are set up in a way to really grind it out . We ’ re set up to do the big global touring . Of course , what happened in the last 18 months is , although the business came back , it came back in such a way where the artists were grabbing what they could , the promoters too , and it ’ s been so disjointed . But I really do see now that we ’ re coming out of that chaotic period and there ’ s more stability now . We ’ re getting much more lead time on the big tours for next year . People realize about the challenges , so they ’ re coming to us earlier . Stuff that ’ s going out next spring and summer is already really being dealt with now . That ’ s a great relief for people like us because we can plan . That ’ s the big difference , really , in the last 18 months .
MICKEY CURBISHLEY
PL & P : Those supply chain issues were all over the headlines for the previous year , and you told me a couple months ago for a different article how difficult it had made life for tour-focused production companies with tight deadlines . Where do things stand now and in the near future in that regard ?
Curbishley : I don ’ t think there ’ s any secret in what I ’ m going to say because , as a company , we are like everybody else ; we do our budgets for a year and we try our very hardest to predict what ’ s going to happen in the next year . So , your [ capital expenditure ] budget is based on the last couple of years , so you work out what you think you ’ re going to spend on cap-ex over the next period . But normally what happens is you ’ re doing those calculations , let ’ s say , in the middle of the year , knowing full well that you ’ re going to start sending POs at the beginning of your ca-pex period , which is January . So , you start working in the middle of the year towards there and you start writing your POs over Christmas and January and that kind of thing . We ’ re writing POs now six to eight months out from when we need the gear because