Business interview: CAA's Emma Banks on how to fill arenas and work with rock stars

Emma Banks looks out at 1200 of her music industry peers packed into every inch of the Grosvenor’s vast ballroom on Park Lane. The evening, held in her honour, has seen the talent agent become the first female industry executive to land the prestigious Music Industry Trusts Award, whose previous winners include Simon Cowell, Kylie Minogue and Sony Music boss Rob Stringer.

“This is a cross between your wedding reception and your wake,” she says. “This is probably the closest thing I’m ever going to get to a wedding reception… you can shag the bridesmaids. There’s no need for pity, it’s fine. I’ve done all right.”

It’s a typically witty take from one of a vibrant industry’s most colourful characters. As co-head and founder of American talent giant CAA’s London office she’s shaped the careers of stars from Katy Perry and Tenacious D to Kylie and Kraftwerk. At the recent Grosvenor bash Florence Welch, Beth Ditto and Texas performed and paid tribute to her.

The agency has clients in Hollywood, TV, comedy, sport (Cristiano Ronaldo, Harry Kane, Jose Mourinho) and does consultancy work. But music has formed the centre of Banks’ noisy 30-year career focused on working with promoters to book big gigs and tours for artists.

Banks is in high spirits when we meet at the gleaming Hammersmith offices of CAA, well established as one of the world’s biggest talent agencies, with the likes of WME and ICM.

A nifty manager has just worked out how to squeeze another 1000 people into a venue on the Red Hot Chili Peppers’ tour in Australia. “Finding those little bits that increase your margin, even on one show, it’s hugely impactful,” says Banks, who settles into a green armchair with a record player cushion.

She is striking in a blue floral shirt, chunky black boots and with a Caitlin Moran-esque white streak of hair framing her face. She’s swapped collecting jewellery for racehorses of late, but three sparklers remain on her hands.

We meet at a time of flux in her industry. With live music now the bulk of musicians’ revenues, the debate over resold tickets is raging. The Competition and Markets Authority has been probing the secondary ticketing sector, with marketplace Viagogo notably in the crosshairs.

“I do find it upsetting that people are buying tickets as a commodity to resell at sometimes huge mark-ups where the people that actually should be getting paid, the artists and the performing rights societies, the writers… don’t get any of it,” says Banks.

She says there’s much debate on how much to price tickets, and gigs are reasonably priced compared with West End shows: “If you took a purely commercial view then you should charge more, but then it means that some people can never see that artist and that to me is not right, and for most artists it’s not what they want.”

Banks is used to studying the economics of megashows. Her crowning glory was convincing the Chili Peppers they could fill Hyde Park, then selling out three nights of 85,000 crowds in 2004.

“When we went on sale, the tickets for the first show sold out in minutes. Literally. That was the fastest and the most tickets I had ever sold on one artist in one place in my career,” she recalls.

Other high points include when she helped Florence and the Machine become a last-minute Glastonbury headliner (“that was really special”) and touring shock-rocker Marilyn Manson.

“He’s been at times a challenging client, not necessarily because of him but because of the perception of him. We had enormous trouble getting a venue in London, people said he’s the antichrist, he’s satanic.”

Banks recalls being called up by promoter Vince Power asking for personal assurances that Manson wasn’t going to do anything illegal. “No, no, no,” Banks soothed. Manson did stay the right side of the law, merely stabbing himself in the stomach with a wine bottle. “He winds people up and is the smartest guy in the room,” she laughs.

Bloodshed aside, Banks reckons her life in rock’n’roll hasn’t contained too many lows. But she adds that the failure of some of her brightest hopes hurts. “It’s worse for them than it is for me, it’s their entire career, it’s part of my career and sometimes, for whatever reason, it doesn’t work out.” She doesn’t take the setbacks lightly: “I get emotionally involved. I want it to work, they are more than a product, it’s not a commodity.”

She adds that the death of mercurial singer Jeff Buckley, who she worked with closely, hit particularly hard.

The racehorse owner compares the gee-gees with her day job. “The majority of horses I’ve bought have been yearlings. They’ve never been ridden so you are literally buying the dream. A lot of the time you sign an artist and they may have played two gigs and you’ve heard one track and you think there’s something special there and you hope.”

She reckons soulful singer Celeste is her next thoroughbred and she’s retired her first horse, the Oasis-themed Mrs Gallagher.

Her equine passion began young, as one of the few young girls who actually got a pony. She grew up in Sandy, Bedfordshire, her ponies grazing in the field by her house. Her magistrate mother gave up work to become a “domestic engineer” with three kids while her father ran a listed grain merchants with his brother, eventually sold to US agriculture giant Cargill.

She dodged a career in landscape gardening by taking a job at agency Wasted Talent in 1990, weeks before CAA London co-head Mike Greek. Several rebrands and ownership changes later she became boss of booking agency Helter Skelter and then, in 2006, did a deal with CAA to open in London with Greek.

Times look good for CAA 13 years on. The Instagram era, where celebrities seamlessly promote brands by the bucketload, has played into agents’ hands. Banks’ phone buzzes with brand endorsements and crossover projects, like musicians appearing or writing music for films; clients writing books or public speaking. What’s more, markets like China are opening up.

“Artists often have residencies in Vegas, soon that could be Macau,” predicts Banks. And it works both ways. She says of Korean music phenomenon K-pop’s growth: “The world gets smaller but you’re going to need connections.”

There’s been recent speculation that Liberty Media, owner of Formula 1, is interested in buying a 10% stake in CAA, though not from its 60% shareholder, private-equity firm TPG which bought CAA in 2014 in a deal which valued it at $1 billion. “Way above my pay grade,” smiles Banks, supping from a pint glass of water. “I think we’re all of the opinion that it’s nice to be talked about.”

Artists CAA represented generated $5 billion in revenues in 2018 and Banks’ division moved into the black with pre-tax profits of £153,155 in its last filed accounts, for the year to September 30 2017, on turnover of £13 million.

The beautiful game is her third great love. Along with Sony’s Rob Stringer, she’s vice-president of League One table-toppers Luton Town, a team on the up with plans for a swish stadium. She says of the new digs: “I deal in gigs, a football match is like a gig. If you have got a limited capacity like Luton have of 10,500 it’s very hard to compete.”

Banks’ reputation appears bulletproof. Even rivals describe the executive as “a legend”. “I really respect that she’s one of the few agents not to move from agency to agency. And she’s one of the few well-established senior women in our industry,” says one.

Banks doesn’t see herself as a gender trailblazer, citing heroes like former Pretenders manager Gail Colson and Marsha Vlasic (Iggy Pop, Neil Young): “They were women who succeeded without making a big deal about it.”

Unlike many in her game, there’s no arrogant name-dropping about her daily brushes with fame and her no-nonsense tone suggests she can handle egotistical rock stars and tortured geniuses, no problem. “This is an incredible way to make living,” she said at the MITS, “and I am, get this, 90 status miles short of lifetime gold on British Airways.”

There’s plenty to suggest Banks’ career will keep on flying.