If
Sonar is where you get your hip-hop, indie rock and electronic dance fix, read on.
Steve Gordon and Evan Weinstein—the guys who booked and promoted big names such as Mos Def, Talib Kweli and Method Man at Sonar—are now working for
The Ottobar,
8x10,
Fletcher's and
Bedrock.
The switch won't affect Sonar's short-term schedule, in the sense that acts in-contract with Sonar before Gordon and Weinstein's move will still play at Sonar and shows listed on the club's site will go on. However, the schedule's not as full as some Sonar fans wish, and the long-term effects aren't quite clear, yet.
Weinstein isn't spilling details about why he and Gordon, who founded the company
Steez Promo in 2007, split from Sonar, but admitted he and Gordon "don't see eye-to-eye with the management over an invisible contract."
Rumors about the dispute between Steez Promos and Dan McIntosh, Sonar's owner and manager since mid-2007, sound like the beginnings of a VH-1 "Behind the Music" episode. Some say Gordon and Weinstein wanted more money or more control over shows, and accuse McIntosh of having withheld Gordon and Weinstein's pay in the past. McIntosh didn't respond to our interview requests.
Currently, booking and promoting duties at Sonar are divided between in-house promoters, Chad Moore of Give Productions based in Northern Virginia and Lisa Chaplin Suit, founder of Baltimore Music Conference. Moore and Chaplin will book two Saturday shows a month and occasionally others as they come up.
"Steve and Evan were booking pretty much the entire club," Suit said. "Chad and I have taken over the DJ and electronic band side." Suit added, "We're definitely getting in touch with Sonar's roots. That's how Sonar started and that's my concern, making sure dance music stays there."
Gordon and Weinstein are setting up shows for The Ottobar and 8x10, but aren't the only promoters for those venues.
The pair is planning the
Show Me What You Got! MC Battle at Fletcher's on March 4 and the 10th Starscape Festival, which takes place in June. They also expect to begin managing Pasadena (the band from, you guessed it, Pasadena), and trying to make Bedrock Baltimore's next live music hot spot.
