Cary Caldwell
Superstars, secret service and smokes
Morrissey had a problem. The Englishman, former frontman for The Smiths, was scheduled to speak at the prestigious South by Southwest (SXSW) festival in Austin, Texas.
Affectionately referred to as ‘‘South by’’, the influential annual event boasts film, live music showcases, art, comedy and gaming over two weeks each March, attracting 300,000 visitors to the city, including music industry heavyweights scouting for talent.
Landing a gig at SXSW can do great things for an act.
‘‘The room was full of 800 people waiting for Morrissey to do an interview,’’ explains Christchurch man Cary Caldwell, who works behind the scenes as SXSW manager of planning.
‘‘One of his managers came out and said to me ‘Morrissey can’t go on because he’s got no idea what the temperature of his beer is’.’’
‘‘I said ‘Take his beer’s temperature? No, no, not at all’.
‘‘He said ‘this could be a deal breaker, he could pull the interview’. I said ‘OK, fine, let me know’ and started walking away. The guy came running after me, I said ‘dude pull the show or don’t pull the show. If you want to pull the show let me know and we’ll get up on stage in front of all the reporters and say Morrissey isn’t going to speak because we couldn’t measure the temperature of his beer’.’’
Morrissey duly got on stage, with journalists from around the world none the wiser.
Caldwell says he ‘‘fell’’ into a behindthe-scenes international career in music.
‘‘I’ve always loved music but I do not have a musical bone in my body myself. I’m too nervous to even go on stage to put the glass of water out for the band.’’
But behind the scenes, he is regarded by his peers internationally as a superstar.
He left Christchurch to visit friends in Austin 16 years ago, wound up volunteering at SXSW in 2003 and has ‘‘never left’’.
For years, Caldwell split his time between the US and New Zealand.
‘‘When I wasn’t working on SXSW, I worked as a tutor for the Linwood Urban Music Academy (LUMA) in Christchurch and did some tour managing.’’
When we speak, Caldwell has just come out of a security briefing in Austin.
‘‘My main role as part of the security team leading into the event is looking into threat awareness, VIP security liaison and any stalker alerts or threats, as SXSW is extremely conscious of safety.
‘‘I now work fulltime for SXSW as the planning manager with our logistics group.’’
Caldwell often liaises with the Austin Police Department, US Homeland Security, FBI, US Secret Service and, ‘‘on rare occasions’’, the CIA.
At last year’s SXSW he helped coordinate security for 87 VIPs, including the Irish Prime Minister and the Crown Prince of Norway.
‘‘This year one of our guest speakers has a list of five or six known stalkers so we have to prepare for that. The US Secret Service are easily the coolest law enforcement agency to work with – super chill, extremely polite and absolute professionals.’’
In 2016, for example, First Lady Michelle Obama was a keynote speaker.
‘‘We didn’t think she’d have time for a photo but her secret service and her head assistant wouldn’t have any of it and rounded us up and pushed us past all the other waiting dignitaries who were left behind the curtain.’’
As the picture was taken Caldwell started getting ‘‘worrying’’ calls from the ‘‘parrot mic’’ on his shoulder.
‘‘Mrs Obama said ‘sounds like you’re a wanted man... thanks for all your help’. I shook her hand and ran off. Our security had found a suspicious package and we needed to inspect it as quickly as possible. Thankfully it turned out to be nothing.’’
Born in London, Caldwell considers himself a New Zealander as he grew up and went to school in Christchurch.
In the late 1980s he moved to Sydney and found himself sharing a flat with a band called The Australian Doors Show. He worked the door for them at gigs.
‘‘When I moved back to London they came over for what ended up being a fourmonth tour. I remember the Doors management in LA sent someone over to check the band out because they were getting these huge royalties payments from The Australian Doors Show.
‘‘The last show we did was a threenight run in London and backstage people like Robert Plant were there.’’
A conversation backstage led to Caldwell being offered a job managing the merchandising crew on U2’s Zooropa tour.
‘‘In Rome, 1993, U2 Zooropa were playing three nights. The U2 crew set up The Riggers Arms backstage. Paul Oakenfold, the DJ touring with Zooropa, played and Larry Mullins and The Edge were bartenders and served the crew.’’
During the 1990s, Caldwell toured with Pink Floyd on their Division Bells tour, and the Rolling Stones, Van Halen, Bon Jovi, The Who, KISS, Metallica and Michael Jackson, among others.
Which great musicians are nice people too?
‘‘Mumford & Sons, Dave Grohl, T.I.,Snoop Dogg, Bruce Springsteen, Pete Townsend, Courtney Barnett.’’
The worst? ‘‘That’s easy – Manowar.’’ For nine years, Caldwell also worked as event support manager for British festival The Great Escape.
He also played a part in helping Mumford & Sons on to the international stage.
In Brighton in 2008, Caldwell, his wife and a British ‘‘lawyer friend’’ stopped into the Prince Albert Pub after a night out.
‘‘We walked into a packed room, capacity of this place is about 70, and Mumford & Sons had just started their set. We just stood mesmerised. As soon as they finished, Sarah raced for the stage to see if they needed legal representation,’’ says Caldwell.
‘‘I handed my SXSW card to Marcus from Mumford & Sons and asked if he could pass it on to their management. Next day I got a phone call from management asking if they could play SXSW that year and we essentially made that happen.’’
In 2009, Mumford & Sons played a show in a hotel lobby at SXSW.
‘‘Marcus played a guitar case because there wasn’t room to put his bass drum... the person responsible for their success in the United States happened to be walking through the Hilton lobby as they were playing... an offer was made.’’
Caldwell is an unsung hero in terms of supporting New Zealand musicians on the world stage too.
‘‘Once a New Zealand act has been invited to SXSW, I’m always happy to answer any questions, provide advice and, wherever possible, try and add their names to any specific performance lists for consideration.’’
The best rider request he’s seen for SXSW was from a band ‘‘trying it on’’.
‘‘Their rider included a case of whisky, case of vodka, case of tequila, 12 dozen cases of beer, dozens of juices, sealed meat trays, sealed bags of fruit etc. It ran up to $US6000 and someone was about to sign off on it until I saw it. I checked the band’s touring schedule. They were about to start a US tour the day after playing SXSW and it was obvious they just wanted to stock up the tour bus. Fair play to them for trying but it was just unlucky that it was shown to me first.’’
Several years ago, Caldwell set up 212 Music Group with his wife, Charni Silk, also from Christchurch, and two friends. Based in Brighton, it specialises in festival management. It has an office in Texas and plans to open another in Melbourne shortly. In the next year the company will set up a vinyl release section.
‘‘212 Music Group has just finished Clockenflap festival in Hong Kong,’’ he says. ‘‘On the waterfront its capacity is 40,000 with headliners Interpol, David Byrne. We are the artist liaison operation and bring crew in from around the world. For the Hong Kong festival we sent three people from the UK, three from the US, one from Iceland and one from Australia. We also do festivals in Vietnam, the US and in the UK.’’
In January, Caldwell will start working 16-hour days, seven days a week on SXSW.
‘‘A lot of people think SXSW is a music event but really it is five different conferences. Just ordering coffee for staff for the event, I don’t get a lot of change from $20,000.’’
His favourite SXSW moment? Lemmy Kilmister of Motorhead fame was booked as a guest speaker. He walked into his dressing room and Caldwell says the first thing he noticed was two ornaments on a shelf.
‘‘Lemmy said ‘are they for sale?’ I said ‘I don’t know, mate, they’re not mine’. He said ‘does that mean if they’re not here when you come back you don’t care?’ When I walked back into the dressing room I saw the two ornaments sticking out of his bag.’’
Caldwell and a colleague walked behind Lemmy as he swaggered down a hallway to his speaking engagement.
‘‘It was the middle of a government building with strict no-smoking rules, he was smoking a cigarette. My colleague whispered ‘Lemmy is smoking’. I said ‘you’re welcome to tell him to stop smoking but I’m not going to’. She said ‘no, I’m too scared’.’’
They had a whispered conversation to the effect that to replace the carpet covered in ash on Lemmy’s walk was going to cost $80 per square. It was a long walk.
‘‘Lemmy must have heard us talking because he stopped and looked at us. Then he took one long drag on his cigarette before dropping it on the carpet and stubbing it out with his boot.
‘‘He said: ‘I suppose we better get this motherf...er on then’ and walked in.’’
A year later, Caldwell was in his colleague’s office and noticed a damaged carpet square.
‘‘I said ‘Is that Lemmy’s carpet?’ She said ‘hell, yeah’.’’