Rockin’ The Island: Ibiza Rocks

There have been no reported incidents of TVs being thrown out of windows or Rolls-Royces driven into the pool, and it’s not quite on a par with L.A.’s scandalous den of rock excess, the ‘Riot House’, but you can be sure of one thing: you won’t get much sleep if you stay at the wild and ever-so-slightly edgy Ibiza Rocks Hotel.

    Last year, the Ibiza Rocks live music season moved into what was formerly the Club Antonio Paraiso Hotel in San Antonio and kick-started the next phase of an entertainment revolution on an island renowned for its hedonistic dance music culture.

    With the hotel newly re-branded for 2009, this year’s season offered one show a week from June 16 until September 8. Assembled by commercial manager Shane Murray, the line-up featured headliners The Ting Tings, Friendly Fires, Pendulum, The Kooks, Calvin Harris, Keane, Groove Armada, The Enemy, Dizzee Rascal, Vampire Weekend, MGMT, Soulwax and the Klaxons, whose closing show — with support from The Big Pink — was attended by a record audience of 2,000.

    The brainchild of Andy McKay, co-founder of the legendary Manumission nights at superclub Privilege, and his wife Dawn Hindle, Ibiza Rocks made its début in 2005 at a time when the dance scene was stagnating. And over the years that followed, the event has had a knack of promoting bands just before they’ve become household names.

    “Coming from the Manumission background and having been the largest promoters here for the best part of 15 years, we understood the dance culture,” said McKay.

    “The money that was being being pumped into the island from corporate sponsorship was so huge that it was propping up something that should have been in decline, so it continued to be big.

    “Between 2000 and 2005, Ibiza went from being a place that had been leading youth culture to a place that was lagging behind. I started to question why an 18 year old would aspire to going on holiday in Ibiza anymore.

    “At the time, I was Manumission’s promoter, pulling 8,000 people in a week but I didn’t fancy my chances of continuing to attract what was becoming an aging population in those numbers. So it was essential to reposition the perception of what Ibiza was.”

    Ibiza does have a very colourful history of live music, as I witnessed myself on my first visit in 1983. However, there are very few people here who remember anything about the island before dance kicked in during the late ’80s and early ’90s. Interestingly, McKay was a regular live gig-goer in his youth and fell into the dance scene by accident.

    “I’m still much more into live music,” he insisted. “So the opportunity to promote bands here was very appealing. We started with electro bands like LCD Soundsystem and The Rapture, and got to the stage where we wanted to book rock bands who couldn’t possibly be linked to the dance market.

    “It needed a new form of branding and that’s how Ibiza Rocks was born. We were lucky to get this going just before Radio 1’s daytime playlist crossed over into the kind of music we were supporting.

    “The original concept was meant to be the meeting of the two worlds, where we’d attract rock fans who wanted to dance, and dance fans who wanted to rock. But there was an immense amount of hostility towards what we’d done. We were perceived as having stabbed dance music in the back and the dance community felt we’d betrayed them.

    “I was stunned because fundamentally Ibiza is a very diverse island and it should offer a range of entertainment alternatives.”

ENTER THE CHIEF
TPi’s Tour Manager of the Year in 2008, Mike Darling came to Ibiza Rocks with the Kaiser Chiefs in the event’s début year of 2005, when the bill also included The Kooks and the Futureheads, and the gigs kicked off around 4am.

    Adlib Audio was involved early on, installing a PA system in a side room at the massive Privilege nightclub — the home of Manumission.

    The following year saw Darling, the Kaisers’ regular TM, receive the phone call that would change everything. “I appreciated everything that Andy McKay was trying to do with Ibiza Rocks and when he called to ask if I knew anyone who’d make a good production manager, I checked my diary and offered myself!

    “Adlib’s Andy Dockerty gave me a good reference and came over to Ibiza with me that March to check out Bar M, by the beach in San Antonio, as a new venue for 2006.

    “It was a big challenge and probably a lot more fun than working with another band while the Kaiser Chiefs were busy recording. Andy’s been a great help to me throughout and was very accommodating when it came to doing the deal on the JBL VerTec line array that we eventually bought.”

    In 2006, with a 14ft2 stage constructed with Tomcat truss especially for the 1,000-capacity Bar M, the scene was set for Channel 4 and BBC Radio 1 to record the action as Kasabian played a pair of shows and the Klaxons performed acoustically.

    Darling invested in quality backline from Fender, Vox, Marshall, Orange, Ampeg, Gretsch and Nord with Hardcase and BSH Transit Cases — and brought Prism in from the UK to manage lighting.

    “I knew that television would be involved that year, so I didn’t see the point in filming inside a club that could be anywhere,” said Darling. “We’d have to move it to somewhere with some attractive scenery that presented more of the Ibiza feel. Bar M was small but the perfect solution at the time.

    “The fun location was enough to coax bands to come and play here, and it was my job to make the gigs work even though our resources were fairly limited back then. The great thing about the Ibiza Rocks gigs is that everyone who attends them is on holiday; they’re not going to work in the morning and you can tell.”

    Ibiza Rocks continued at Bar M into 2007. But there was trouble ahead when, as a result of ‘blurred’ licensing laws, the local rozzers issued a ‘precinto’ and stopped The Streets from performing.

    “It was embarrassing to have booked a band that weren’t able to play, and very disappointing for the fans who made the trip specially. With the credibility we’d built up, it was crucial that the season continued, and so Andy [McKay] and I visited one of the local politicians the Town Hall in a mission to keep our event outdoors.

    “I explained how we organise the events and we ended up bartering over the remaining four dates, two of which had the [now-mega] Kaiser Chiefs and the Arctic Monkeys headlining. We negotiated our way around keeping those at Bar M, and then staged the We Are Scientists gig on the tennis court at Pikes Hotel and the Fratellis/Soulwax gig in the seal pit at a former zoo! It was all arranged very quickly and was a great exercise in lateral thinking, but clearly we had to find a new way forward for 2008.”

RESIDENCY
Last year marked a turning point for Ibiza Rocks. While the San Rafael Hippodrome — the terrace of a horse racing track in the middle of the island — provided a festival feel, another venue, the Club Antonio Paraiso Hotel enabled gigs to be split between two locations.

    A new Tomcat One outdoor stage, designed by Tomcat UK and Prism Lighting, with decking supplied by Prism, was purchased along with stage barrier, cycle rack and Heras fencing from Eve Trakway, and pipe and drape, and a fine bill of acts included The Enemy, The Zutons, Pendulum and Dizzee Rascal.

    When the 2008 season ended, Ibiza Rocks’ principles formed an events company and went into business with the Club Antonio Paraiso, agreeing a licensing deal that enabled its re-branding as the Ibiza Rocks Hotel. The Hippodrome was dropped and this year the hotel became, literally, a one-stop shop for accommodation and live entertainment.

    Andy McKay wasn’t slow to spot a gap in the market. He explained: “I wasn’t aware of any branded hotel in the world that catered for the under 25s and it seemed that the whole industry had ignored that age bracket, as if they’re not worthy. In doing so, they’ve missed out on a massive opportunity — one that we are fully embracing.

    “So while other people were looking to open little boutique hotels in Ibiza Town, I wanted to open a large one in San Antonio that delivered a very attractive package to a young audience. I mean, the hotel is the gig and that’s a very powerful concept. A lot of tour operators are sitting up and taking notice because we’re doing all of this with just a website and no marketing budget.”

    Darling is thrilled by the future prospects that this residency will offer. “To finally have a home that can host the entire season, and enable us to improve standards and efficiencies is really exciting,” he said.

    “I’ve always been very focused on the long-term credibility of the event, so I’m keen to give bands, artist managers, tour managers, agents and record companies a good impression. We’d already built up the infrastructure in terms of the personnel and the way we run things, and our stage is now a permanent fixture.

    “I heavily subscribe to Andy Dockerty’s philosophy of the people being as important as the equipment. I’ve been able to find and develop some great young people here — like our stage manager, Joe Clark, and Cliff Dooner, our head of security — and have been able to build on their enthusiasm and dedication to make them into very useful people who are a credit to the event.”

    Planning for 2009 began at the start of the year. The four-year deal with event sponsor Sony Ericsson had come to an end and the team were forced to ride solo with considerably less working capital.

    McKay: “I’m grateful that Sony Ericsson put so much investment into a brand that we owned and I’m sure the benefits were mutual, even though we’d never turned a profit.

    “When the deal ended it felt like it would be a difficult task to make the events stand on their own two feet, but we’re doing it. We’ve just closed a deal that gives every resident of the Ibiza Rocks Hotel a free gig ticket, and the value of that deal dwarfs the Sony Ericsson sponsorship anyway.

    “I’m certainly not saying we’d never have another headline sponsor, but I’m not rushing to put anyone else’s name in our plectrum logo because we’re a youth brand in our own right now and it’s one that’s growing stronger all the time.”
   
CONSISTENCY
With the absence of headline sponsorship funding, there was talk of minimising outgoings by sourcing more localised PA and lighting equipment, but Darling was adamant that standards remained consistent.

    “I suggested to Andy that we invest in a PA, lights and staging ourselves as it would save us money over a long period in rental and trucking costs, plus bands would be confident of what to expect when they arrive.

    “We were able to raise money to buy the PA, lights and Tomcat truss through our deal with the hotel, and my relationships with Andy at Adlib and Mark Jones-Roberts at Prism proved to be very valuable when it came to our terms of payment.

    “I was conscious of providing a first-class sound system that catered for everyone even though we were limited by budget. We ended up going for an analogue Soundcraft Series Five 48-channel desk at FOH and a 48-channel Soundcraft MH3 for monitors. They might not be everyone’s first choice in today’s market, but they’re familiar and engineers can go a good job with them, especially as they get plenty of soundcheck time here.

    “Although digital consoles would appear to be the way to go, and we did have a Yamaha PM5D last year, opinions are divided as to which would be the best brand. That said, we’re certainly embracing the possibility of going digital, maybe next year or in 2011, and giving touring some level of continuity. We’ll always have the analogue option as a fall-back though.”

    Commissioned on-site by technical manager Declan Fyans of Adlib Audio, the JBL VerTec rig was always going to be the optimum choice as it had proven itself each year since Ibiza Rocks began. “It’s great for combatting noise problems because we can direct it accurately so that sound doesn’t spill out over the courtyard [the hotel is five storeys high].”

    Powered by Crown VZ5000 amps and processed with BSS Omnidrives, the system comprises 12 VerTec VT4888 line array elements, six Adlib DF418 subs and four Adlib AA 122 full range infills. In the outboard rack there is a BSS FCS960 stereo 31-band graphic EQ, four dbx 1066 stereo compressors, four Drawmer DS201 stereo noise gates, a Yamaha SPX 900 and 990s, and a TC Electronics D2 delay.

    Monitor world features 12 Adlib AA152 wedges and an AA215 drum sub, plus a sidefill containing an Adlib FD2 hi-pack and DF415 sub per side — all run by Crown amps and dbx 480 DriveRack processing. Yamaha SPX 900 FX, Behringer Composer XL compressors and BSS Opal gates are in the racks.

    A comprehensive set of Shure microphones — along with a few Sennheiser drum mics and AKG condensers — rounds off the spec.

    At the beginning of the summer, Darling was dividing his time between the UK and Ibiza as he co-ordinated deliveries from Adlib and Prism with trucking company Fly By Night.

    As well as staging, audience risers and Steeldeck stage risers, the package from Prism included 16 Martin Professional MAC 250 moving head spots, 30 1W LED PAR 64s, four 4-way bars of PAR 64s, four 2-cell Domino mole units, two Pani 1200 long-throw followspots and a Look Solutions Unique2 haze machine. Everything is controlled by an Avolites Sapphire 2000 desk.

    “Both the sound and lighting systems need to be solid, and we chose the LED PAR cans because they’ll go the distance,” commented Darling.

    “I liked the ‘open-air’ feel of the Tomcat truss at Bar M so I wanted to replicate that here. We’ve got a roof over the stage and can close down the sides if we have to, but I prefer to keep it as open as possible, like an amphitheatre, so that people can watch from balconies without sightline restrictions.”

BUILDING AN EMPIRE
Although it operates on a different level, it’s possible that the Ibiza Rocks brand — and its potential for global expansion — will eventually catch up with the success of the Hard Rock empire.

    As well as the hotel, it already boasts a diner, a TV show and a very credible clothing and accessories range, designed and managed by McKay’s wife, Dawn.

    And now, not only are there plans to rebrand the local Bar M in line with the Ibiza Rocks theme, but the proposed introduction of a ‘sister’ event in neighbouring Majorca next year is also gathering pace. Majorca Rocks anyone?

    In closing, Andy McKay commented: “I’m very proud of the way the events have gone this year, and I’m especially pleased with how Mike Darling and his team have managed the production side in such a smooth and skilful manner.

    “It’s interesting to me that it’s only now, with our Reclaim The Dance Floor event, that we’ve filled the space in which our original concept was going to be. It’s been an uphill struggle but I think that we’ve finally arrived at a place where a more open-minded culture exists.

    “We’re now looking at extending the season from 13 to 15 or even 20 weeks over the next few years, and if the appetite is there, you can be sure that we’ll deliver.”
TPi