Industry Noize: AEG Ponders Hallett’s Replacement

While the UK rumour mill churns about Rob Hallett’s departure from AEG and his likely replacement, London-based tour coordinator Andrew Zweck has indicated he’s not about to step into the company’s European hot-seat.

Accepts the award for international promoter of the year at the 19th Pollstar Awards

“This is not correct,” he told Pollstar, when asked if he’s about to replace Hallett at AEG, categorically denying the rumour mill stories are true. Zweck seemed a good candidate to take the spot, though.

The head of Sensible Events has worked with Harvey Goldsmith and more lately with Live Nation, and – even more pertinently – for the last four months with AEG as tour coordinator for the European leg of its Rolling Stones tour.

He took on the latter role at time when Hallett was still in place, with another year of his contract still to run. Zweck also has an enviable and proven track record of producing his own mega-scale global tours for the likes of Roger Waters, Depeche Mode, and Mark Knopfler.

A rumour that Barrie Marshall – whose Marshall Arts has been almost half-owned by AEG since 2006 – will take over Hallett’s role has been muddied by yet another saying Hallett will return to Marshall Arts, where he worked before joining the UK’s Mean Fiddler Music Group in 2005.

AEG hasn’t responded to questions about Hallett’s departure or his replacement. He’s since said he was less happy at AEG after former live music president Randy Phillips had his relationship with the company terminated at the end of last year.

He could break the silence at an upcoming conference appearance, however.

“At the Reeperbahn Festival, Hallett will talk about his career and his plans for the future,” says a press release from the German conference, which runs in Hamburg Sept. 17-20.

The mystery surrounding Hallett’s departure from AEG started with a week of waiting for an announcement that he had left at all, which came after Pollstar printed a story about his rumored exit.

The long-awaited press release only said he’d “ended his relationship with the company with immediate effect.”

Hallett’s replacement will need to at least organise the European end of tours from U.S. acts, as Hallett did with the likes of Backstreet Boys, Jennifer Lopez, Justin Bieber, Usher, and The Black Eyed Peas, and run the company’s annual shows in London’s Hyde Park.

For the moment, AEG production director Jim King is overseeing this year’s British Summer Time shows in Hyde Park with a lineup that includes Neil Young & Crazy Horse, Arcade Fire, Black Sabbath, Tom Jones, Boyzone, and 10CC.

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