DOJ lawsuit against Live Nation could affect major Iowa music venues

The antitrust lawsuit, filed in Manhattan with the support of 30 state and district attorneys general, accuses Live Nation and its subsidiaries of “running an illegal monopoly over live events in America,” according to The Associated Press .

Live Nation has been accused of stamping out smaller promoters, overwhelming ticket-buyers with excessive prices and fees and ultimately hurting artists. While the company has long denied violating antitrust laws, the Justice Department claims Live Nation is “using long-term contracts to keep venues from choosing rivals, blocking venues from using multiple ticket sellers and threatening venues that they could lose money if they don’t choose Ticketmaster,” according to The AP .

Ticketmaster, which merged with Live Nation in 2010, is the world’s largest ticket distributor. According to its annual report, Ticketmaster was used to sell over 620 million tickets in 2023. The company also controls more than 265 North American concert venues.

Here in Iowa, Live Nation operates the newly opened Vibrant Music Hall in Waukee. As of last September, it also holds a majority share of First Fleet Concerts, a company that books venues across the state. Despite DOJ claims that Live Nation is forcing its competitors out of business or into mergers, the relationship between First Fleet Concerts and Live Nation is welcomed by First Fleet Concerts founder Sam Summers, according to Axios . Summers cites longstanding relationships with Live Nation agents as a benefit to the Iowa music scene, with Iowa venues now able to book even more national acts.

Live Nation’s Executive Vice President Dan Wall published a lengthy rebuttal on Live Nation’s website . “This lawsuit against Live Nation and Ticketmaster won’t reduce ticket prices or service fees,” Wall stated. Wall argued that Live Nation is at “the low end of profitable S&P 500 companies” and therefore cannot be a monopoly. He also claims Live Nation’s acquisition of concert promoters is not anticompetitive. “DOJ is not helping consumers with their actual problems,” Wall concluded. “This is why the government has never been less popular—because they pretend they are fixing your problems when instead they are pandering to a narrow set of political interests.”

According to Wall, Live Nation executives met with the DOJ multiple times in the weeks preceding the lawsuit. This suit was decades in the making, with Ticketmaster under scrutiny even back in 1994 when Pearl Jam first filed a complaint with the DOJ. The DOJ declined to bring a case at that time, but after Live Nation was more recently found to retaliate against venues that don’t use Ticketmaster, along with artist and fan outrage at ticket prices, the DOJ is now set on breaking up Live Nation and Ticketmaster.

This case is really just beginning — the DOJ's success in breaking up Live Nation and Ticketmaster, or toppling their supposed monopoly upon the live events market, remains to be seen.