UTA’s Matt Meyer Talks Machine Gun Kelly, Tinashe Tours: ‘Everyone Said We Were Crazy’

Pollstar recently caught up with Meyer, who was in a good mood as client Halsey’s new album just dropped and following a recent high-profile Moment House virtual performance he helped put together as well.

Pollstar: How did the Machine Gun Kelly tour come about, especially as one of the first to announce after lockdown?

Matt Meyer: Obviously, when you have this rockstar, mega-star, mega-moment person, pulling him back was not easy – “Hey man, we can’t announce yet, we can’t announce yet.” But when we found a window, he was first up, first out and sold a quarter million tickets in one minute; it was insane. We were doing the Shrine parking lot and he sold 8,000 tickets on the announce, we flexed up prices and called Goldenvoice and added a Greek Theater, so he did 15,000 tickets in Los Angeles in less than 48 hours.

I give a lot of credit to the team, they took a lot of opportunities early. We did a big show in Jacksonville, Fla., (in April) where the managers got a hold of the mayor, and Dana White at UFC, it was a big UFC weekend, and we were able to do the first full-capacity show back at Daily’s [Place] amphitheater. 

The big strategic alignment was that the NFL draft was in Cleveland this year, and his hometown is Cleveland. The irony is the week we launched, at Rocket Mortgage Arena we had purchased a plane to fly above and promote ticket sales but he had already sold out so we had to change the wording on the plane to “Sold out! Tickets Not Available,” or something [laughs]. 

It was a huge moment. He took the draft opportunity to play and rocked it. He didn’t present a draft pick, because the pick got traded! It was a whole thing. But he went out and did his thing and predicted the Browns were gonna win the Super Bowl. I’m a Packers fan and I’m not shy about it. We have our talks on that. [laughs]

His whole team was fantastic – [co-managers] Steve Astephen, Ashleigh VeVerka, Andre Cisco – I’ve never had a management team come in before and say, “We’re going to amplify you.” When you have a management team that is hungry and feels that energy and matches it, it’s unstoppable. It’s really rewarding, honestly. I started working with him when I was begging festival buyers for slots – begging! He can do anything. He can rap, he can rock; if he told me he wanted to do an a capella comedian sketch, I’d believe he could do it. I’m proud of him on a human level. 

One common denominator I’ve preached with all my artists and the ones I’ve had the best relationships with is to not skip steps. Halsey, she started opening for The Kooks for $250 a night. She’s not getting $250 anymore [laughs]. With Colson, the same thing, we were on the fence about pushing [his upcoming tour] harder, we never had his statement before – sold-out, all-red tour, we hadn’t had that moment and now he had it. 

I’m having conversations right now with Tinashe in the R&B space, and Yungblud, and we’re not skipping steps. 

Tinashe just launched her tour. It’s her best tour to date; she sold out Terminal 5 in New York, we added a Brooklyn Warsaw, it’s going to sell out any day now. She sold out a Novo in Los Angeles, we’re adding a second. She sold out two House of Blues in Chicago – we’re not skipping any steps. 

Pivoting to specifically Tinashe and going back to UTA – the team for someone like her is insanely phenomenal. Melissa Newhart (Music Brand Partnerships Executive) – I think she’s brought in a dozen brand deals. We did a really cool deal with Reese’s Puffs that she delivered that the artist was thrilled about, Melissa Newhart and Riley Folsom (agent in Talent/Music Crossover), every day I’m getting a voice-over opportunity, I’m getting a brand opportunity, I’m getting an on-camera opportunity, the charity team – there’s a Foundation Team here, I’ve never had that before: “Do you want to do something with animals? Do you want to do something with youth, because that’s important to you?” That energy is how I feel my clients are able to cut through the noise, because it’s very organic to them. 

The sales speak for themselves when they put out really great bodies of work. I’m not in the studio making the music, but I hear what they’re putting out in advance, and working with the labels and managers and artists and making sure the plan we’re putting together is perfect. I think my track record with those artists, leading me to say, “Let’s please not skip steps, let’s do it the right way,” that’s just a winning situation.