Katmandu To-Do

Deep Purple and promoter Richard Coram are on the edge of getting into a legal tussle over the cancellation of the act’s show in Katmandu.

Coram, who’s head of Dubai-based Talent Brokers, was in London April 9 to talk to his lawyers four days after the act issued a press statement claiming the show was pulled because he had failed to come up with the money as per contract.

“Despite several assurances, Talent Brokers failed to deposit the band’s agreed fee into its registered escrow account, even though the band’s management allowed extra time for payment to be made,” it said.

At this point the story of the Deep Purple show that should have happened March 15 at Dashrath Rangashala National Stadium, a 15,000-capacity venue in Nepal, gets a little difficult to follow, largely because both sides have their own versions of it.

Coram says he didn’t actually sign a contract for the show, while Deep Purple agent Neil Warnock says there was an agreement in place.

Coram also has a letter from the Nepal Tourism Board, the local partner in Katmandu, requesting the show be postponed until April 26 because of “recent unpleasant political events.”

However, this letter – which was circulated to the local media – appears to have been sent 12 days after the original show was scheduled to take place.

Both sides agree they had dialogue about the problems both before and after the original show date, although Warnock says his only contribution to that dialogue was to chase the outstanding payment.

“How can an agent talk about rescheduling a date, when the money for the original date still hasn’t been paid?,” he said.