No other figure has done more to shape the Australian music industry than Gudinski.
In a key interview at the 2010 Bigsound conference in Brisbane, Gudinski told this reporter how, at just seven years old, Michael flexed his growing entrepreneurial muscles on the day of the Caulfield Cup, when he charged race participants for parking spaces in an empty block.
Gudinski would go for bigger things.
In 1972, at just 20 years old, Gudinski launched Mushroom Records, which would become the largest independent record label in Australian music, and later its editorial arm Mushroom Music, which remains the country’s leading independent label.
Mushroom had initial success with Skyhooks, whose debut album, Living in the 70s, stayed 16 weeks in the first place in Australia, selling 240,000 copies, a feat that no Australian album had achieved at the time.
Over the decades, Gudinski would guide the careers of countless artists, from Kylie Minogue and Jimmy Barnes to British signings Ash and Garbage.
In 1998, MG sold Mushroom Records to Rupert Murdoch’s News Limited Group (now News Corp), whose profits allowed Gudinski to realize his dream of building an independent music power, covering tours, record labels, publishers, merchandising, booking agencies , film and television production and creative services.
Today, the Mushroom Group covers more than two dozen businesses and brands, from Frontier Touring to The Harbor Agency, I Oh You labels, Liberation and Bloodlines, Mushroom Music Publishing, neighboring rights operation Good Neighbor and the new addition, Reclusive Records.
Frontier Touring, founded in 1979, is Australia’s leading independent promoter and a record breaker. Gudinski and Frontier Touring produced Ed Sheeran’s achievement Share tour of Australia and New Zealand, which handled more than 1.1 million tickets, a historic record for a single journey.
In 2018, Frontier was ranked the third largest promoter in the world according to Billboard Boxscore, with gross ticket sales of $ 245.1 million and 2.77 million tickets sold on 440 reported programs.
The following year, 2019, Gudinski sold a 50% stake in Frontier Touring to American concert promoter AEG, unifying a long-standing relationship that expanded the pipeline of artists and audiences between the two continents.
“Michael Gudinski was unique,” says Jay Marciano, chief executive of AEG Presents, who brokered the final details of the merger directly with Gudinski. “In a business built by advanced thinkers and risk-takers, he was still far above many of his colleagues. The global music industry as we know it would not be where it is today without Michael’s vision and creativity. Our business really missed one. legend, AEG lost a partner and I lost a friend. He will be missed. “
The AEG business happened when Gudinski was meeting with the former partner Michael Chugg, which announced a joint venture in March, bringing its companies together 40 years after forming Frontier Touring in 1979 and splitting into two companies in 1999.
Eagles Manager Irving Azoff said the prosecutor’s death represented the “end of an era” for the promotion of Australian music. “He was everything to import and export music inside and outside Australia,” said Azoff Advertising panel. “My heart is with Sue and the family. He was one of the greatest promoters that ever existed. ”
The last tour under the Frontier Touring banner, Midnight Oil’s Makarrata Live Tour, started on Sunday (February 28) at Mount Cotton in Queensland.
With the pandemic disrupting tours in 2020, Gudinski found a way to keep the music playing. MG led the properties of the small screen From the Home Front, The sound and The State Of Music.
“This is not about my record labels,” said Gudinski Advertising panel in an interview last year. “This is about Australian music.”
And on the pandemic that threatened to bring down the live industry, Gudinski pondered: “I learned that you must turn something negative into something positive”.
Gudinski has achieved almost everything in his extraordinary life and career, including an Order of Australia (AM) Member Medal in 2006 for services to the entertainment industry and a Melbourne Cup victory. With his passing, Gudinski loses the one thing he coveted silently: America’s number one.
Gudinski leaves behind his wife Sue, son Matt and partner Cara, daughter Kate and husband Andrew and their children Nina-Rose and Lulu, and more than 200 employees of the Mushroom Group, which he often calls “family”.
“Michael was one of the last truly colorful characters in our industry. He was always full of energy [and] optimism, all with an intense passion for live music, “says Rob Light, head of music at CAA.” He was one of the great promoters, whose productions were events. He touched all aspects of the music industry, and all of them with great success. And if you’ve ever met in Australia, there were no better hosts to show you incredible moments than Michael and his wife Sue. “
Dave Brooks contributed to this story.