Grammy new artist nominee Kahan a hot ticket in Ottawa, across country
Vermont singer-songwriter Noah Kahan is responsible for one of the fastest-selling concerts to come to Ottawa since the pandemic.
The twangy troubadour plays Canadian Tire Centre on Tuesday, and while there are still a handful of exorbitantly priced tickets available on Ticketmaster, the vast majority of the approximately 13,000 available seats were snapped up within 24 hours of going on sale last September, said Ali Shafaee, the Ottawa-based regional vice-president of Live Nation Canada.
The demand was similar across the country, prompting some observers to wonder exactly who Kahan is and why he's so popular. His indie-folk style is not far removed from Mumford and Sons or the Lumineers; it's catchy and relatable but hardly groundbreaking.
Or is it?
In an industry filled with auto-tuned vocals and digital beats, maybe Kahan's mash-up of folk, pop and country sounds fresh. And maybe the honesty of his lyrics in talking about anxiety, mental health and bad habits is connecting with a pandemic-weary generation.
“It's just good music,” said Shafaee. “He came out with good music, made people feel good and it resonated during a time like the pandemic when everyone was all over the place.”
There are other reasons, too, behind Kahan's success. The 27-year-old, who signed a record deal in his teens, got a nice boost on Tiktok, where the song Dial Drunk, his collaboration with Post Malone, reached a massive audience, leading up to the re-release of his 2022 album, Stick Season (We'll All Be Here Forever). And of course, a nomination for this year's Grammy Award for best new artist didn't hurt either.
Shafaee sees Kahan as part of a new generation of headliners to emerge in recent years, their success driven by social media, streaming services and playlists more than radio or any other traditional form of media. Along with Kahan, other artists making a leap to headliner status in recent years include Zach Bryan, 28, Morgan Wallen, 30, Tyler Childers, 30, and Sam Hunt, 39, four men whose sound lands more on the country-music side of the fence.
But with major stars like Taylor Swift, the Rolling Stones and Beyoncé preferring to play multiple shows in the biggest cities, mostly because their tours are huge, challenging-to-move productions involving 100 or more trucks of gear, a new generation of artists is good news for the rest of the concert industry, particularly in cities such as Ottawa that lack grand stadiums.
Overall, Shafaee said Ottawa is experiencing a “very strong ” ticket-buying market in 2024, with upcoming Canadian Tire Centre shows by Queens of the Stone Age (April 12), Tim Mcgraw (May 3) and Avril Lavigne (Aug. 14) on track to selling out. Snoop Dogg's just-announced June 11 show is off to a great start in the presale, he added, and Sam Hunt's Sept. 27 date is expected to sell well, too.
“Right now the market is doing great when it comes to live music,” Shafaee said.
“In general, we're seeing the local Ottawa audience is definitely supporting the large-scale concerts. But I would say the audiences have been really supportive of shows coming through here for different-sized rooms, as well. Bronson Centre and Algonquin (Commons Theatre) are doing well. It's been a good year.”
What's more, the popularity of Lavigne's show in August is a clear sign of a shift in the Ottawa market, Shafaee noted, adding that he's working on a slew of shows for the fall.
“The Avril date is a great way of illustrating how the music scene has really grown in this market,” he said. “Typically you never want to do an indoor show in the summer because everyone wants to be outdoors at festivals. Normally Ottawa is a festival city in the summer so to have a show like that sell out in the middle of summer is really great.”