Putting the ‘live’ in Live Nation: Artists stream shows during pandemic
Live Nation is promoting its "Live From Home" concert series to help fill the void without concerts during the COVID-19 pandemic.
Live Nation is promoting Crew Nation, an fundraising effort to benefit concert touring and venue crew members who are out of work due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
The worldwide COVID-19 pandemic has essentially pulled the plug on actually attending concerts for the present, but a new performance series by Live Nation is hoping to help fill the void.
Live Nation’s “Live From Home” series, it turns out, is aptly named. The entertainment giant is presenting a full slate of diverse artists performing songs and sets of varying lengths — some pre-recorded from past shows, many of them from the performers’ homes or studios.
As Live Nation says on its website, “Just because we’re keeping our distance doesn’t mean the music has to stop. Join us daily for live streams from around the globe — follow artists live from their homes as they share music, stories and more.”
As one might imagine, this is no small undertaking. Take for example, the Friday performance schedule. Starting at 6 a.m., presumably EDT, the “Live From Home” series will feature performances from 91 different artists, spanning a time frame of more than 15 hours, with the final streams beginning at 9 p.m.
Fans can visit livenation.com/livefromhome to not only check out each day’s schedule, but also to click through to the live streams. It should be pointed out that the streams will be available on several different platforms. Some will go to YouTube, others will be live broadcasts on the likes of Facebook, Twitter, Instagram, Twitch and others.
One of Thursday night’s main highlights was a near-15-minute live clip of The Black Crowes at The Chapel in San Francisco. While this clip was taken from a performance before an audience on March 6, before the pandemic fully hit the US, it premiered with Thursday’s special viewing.
Some of the artists scheduled Friday include Provo’s own The Aces (noon EDT on Instagram), Pete Yorn, AWOLNATION, Third Eye Blind, Cold War Kids, Alessia Cara, Jeff Tweedy and Black Stone Cherry, among many more.
The series will continue for the immediate future, with new artists being announced each week.
Live Nation is also promoting what it is calling Crew Nation, a fundraising effort to benefit all those who make a living making live shows happen. Specifically it is geared toward helping out touring crew members and venue staff who have all been greatly affected by the loss of income due to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Live Nation has committed $10 million to Crew Nation, with an initial payment of $5 million and then matching dollar per dollar the next $5 million donated by artists, fans and employees. Fans can visit livenationentertainment.com/crewnation/ for information on donating or purchasing merch that supports the cause.