Concert Flop A Mystery

Promoters of a March 31st hip-hop concert at the Albany Civic Center in Georgia are scratching their heads over the extremely low turnout despite big-name artists on the bill.

About 500 tickets were reportedly sold for the show that was to feature Three 6 Mafia and Juvenile, among others.

An hour after the doors opened, seats were still empty and the acts hadn’t hit the stage, according to local TV news station WALB.

Civic Center Promotions Manager Tony Ford told WALB he was surprised the show was a flop.

“Our community has not turned out like they need to. Makes it a little hard for us when we want to schedule another top-notch package, but we’re going to keep trying,” Ford said.

He added that past events have been successful because of the walk-up business but admitted the facility hasn’t pushed advance ticket sales much.

However, event promoter H2 Entertainment and others are reportedly thinking twice about booking a big-name act at the 10,300-capacity facility.

“No time soon, we can’t take this chance anymore. It would be different if the Civic Center and the City of Albany were sharing the risk financially, but they’re not. It’s on H2 Entertainment,” promoter Valerie Randolph-Towns told the TV station.

Another promoter, Gilbert Udoto, said statistics show that the Albany market has been a losing proposition for major act promoters in the last six years.

An April 9th George Jones concert, canceled because the singer was ill, had sold a couple of thousand tickets, so Ford is said to be rallying promoters to keep the big-name acts coming.

Pollstar‘s attempts to reach Ford were unsuccessful at press time.