Nathan Davies: As concert promoter Phil Rankine faces losing his company, what does it mean for Adelaide?

Adelaide concert promoter Phil Rankine — the man bringing Elton John to town — faces losing his company, and it will likely have a big impact on the music scene, writes Nathan Davies.

• Concert promoter’s company to be wound up
• Phil Rankine loses bid to have $1.1 million debt set aside
• Rankine’s company chased for $4 million
• Why won’t big names come to Adelaide?

I once asked famous rock promoter Michael Chugg what was the biggest barrier to bringing world-class acts to Adelaide.

“Never knowing if people will f--king come!” was the plain-speaking Chugg’s reply.

We have a reputation for being notoriously lackadaisical ticket buyers.

While East Coast punters will camp out in the rain for a week just to get their paws on a seat, Adelaide rock fans tend to sit back and wait. Wait to see if there’s something else on that night. Wait to see if the tickets get cheaper.

This makes promoters, the biggest gamblers in showbiz, extremely nervous. Why deal with all the stress, cost and logistics of putting on a show in Adelaide – and the associated heart attacks that come with waiting to see if it’s going to sell – when you can just tack on another night in Melbourne and sell it out?

That’s where Phil Rankine came in. Rankine, who cut his teeth in the industry running pre-internet fan clubs for the likes of Jimmy Barnes, had more faith in Adelaide punters.

His main business model involved picking up the shows that weren’t coming to SA and staging them himself.

Elton John will play two shows in Adelaide, and concert promoters say his gigs will definitely happen. Picture: Valentin Flauraud/Keystone via AP

“Adelaide punters are tough,” he told the Sunday Mail a couple of years ago. “I have faith in them.”

“They don’t care if it’s 40 degrees or pouring with rain – they’ll still turn up.”

And for a while his faith in Adelaide audiences was well-founded. Rankine had some remarkable successes hosting shows such as Santana, Cat Stevens, Lionel Richie and Stevie Nicks, at Botanic Park. Heck, he even got an in-form Dylan show.

If Rankine can’t manage to come back from his current troubles (and we should bear in mind that Chugg, Michael Gudinski and others have all had huge wins and losses and survived – promoters are the great survivors), then Adelaide’s live music scene will be very much the poorer.

And there’s not a long line of people waiting to take his place.