Ex-UTA agent Ben Ward and manager Jules Chenoweth start Route One...

A new booking agency was started with ex-UTA agent Ben Ward and music manager Jules Chenoweth at the helm.

UK-based Route One Booking has an eclectic selection of acts such as Discharge, Fu Manchu, Voivod and Country-Star and Shooter Jennings, as well as emerging artists such as King Creature, Video Nasties, Daxx & Roxane and Blind River.

Ward, who is also the front man of the London heavy metal band Orange Goblin, said: “I’ve always wanted to start my own booking agency and have the freedom to work exactly how our artists want it. I think given the current climate in the live music industry, that time is now. “

Ward and his wife received a Metal Hammer Award in recognition of their efforts to set up a fundraiser to raise money for the staff of Team Rock music publisher after the company was put into administration in 2016. Before that, he worked for five years as a booking agent at UTA and previously at the management company One Fifteen, together with artists such as Pink Floyd, David Gilmour and Jools Holland.

I believe we have the right people and the right tools to look for new ideas and initiatives during this challenging time

Ben Ward, UTA

“I’ve worked as an artist, manager, tour manager and booking agent for 25 years. I have the necessary insight and experience and have seen this business from all angles, ”added Ward. “Alongside Jules at Route One Booking, I feel we have the right people and the right tools to look for new ideas and initiatives during this challenging time to make sure our artists and bands continue to be creative and fun.

“Our customers are our focus. We work so that you can work. If they don’t work, there is no business. Despite the uncertainty about a return to the live music scene as we knew it before the pandemic, it is. ”An exciting time to start this new company. “

The agency has already produced, which it also owns and operates, a successful, socially distant outdoor show at The Yard in Cornwall. It is run by King Creature and attended by 250 paying players with fully functional bars and merch booths. Route One Booking also offers its customers touring, backlines and links to digital music distribution company Route Note, of which Chenoweth is also a board member.

Chenoweth, who manages King Creature, signed by Marshall Records, said, “Route One Booking was born out of determination and entrepreneurship at a time when the proverbial chips are no longer available. In my business experience, these occasions are the perfect spawning grounds for a new dynamic business approach and a time to apply new exciting processes and ideas. With Ben Ward at the helm, Route One Booking will be dynamic and different. Over time, it will grow and become a leading independent booking agency, carved out of the ashes of now. be the foundation of the future. “

The move is the latest development in the agency world amid the industry-wide upheavals caused by the Covid-19 pandemic. Ed Sheeran’s longtime agent Jon Ollier confirmed last week that he is leaving CAA and starting his own company while fThe former Paradigm booking agents recently teamed up with former COO of Billions Corporation, Matt Yasecko, to create the new agency Arrival Artists.

In addition, five other ex-Paradigm agents have teamed up to create the new US talent agency TBA, while Sony Music Masterworks and independent touring entrepreneurs Stephen Lindsay and Brett Sirota announced the creation of RoadCo Entertainment.