26 MONTEREY COUNTY WEEKLY october 5-11, 2023 www.montereycountyweekly.com The pandemic was naturally a devastating time for events businesses, and Good Vibez Presents was no different. “One-hundred percent, there were times I thought, ‘This is it—we’re done,’” company owner Dan Sheehan admits. “At one point, we didn’t know if we were going to get through it.” But the Monterey-based concert promoter persevered, doing what it could to hold itself over during that unprecedented time. There was some help from government initiatives like the California Venues Grant Program and the federal Paycheck Protection Program, but Good Vibez also staged virtual music festivals and leaned on its merchandise brand to make ends meet, Sheehan notes. And once the worst of the pandemic was over, Good Vibez Presents was among the events businesses that saw a boom—benefiting from the pent-up demand from a populace hungry to get back out into the world and party like it was 2019. That’s resulted in bigger audiences and new shows and festivals—like this week’s Rebels & Renegades Music Festival, which returns for its second year to Monterey County Fair and Event Center. This year, the country, folk and Americana festival is expanding to three days and will have bigger stages that will feature bigger acts—including alt-rock icons Wilco and country-rock group Whiskey Myers. Last year’s event drew around 9,000 attendees across the weekend, and Sheehan says this year’s expanded edition is “already past that.” “Last year, we booked it, got it up and running, had nine weeks to market it and it worked,” Sheehan says of the inaugural Rebels & Renegades. “We delivered such a great event that we wanted to expand on it this year.” He describes the festival’s alt-country bent as “good, folk American music” filled with “heart and soul” and authentic storytelling—a far cry from the poppier sounds out of Nashville that have long dominated the airwaves. “It’s a new wave of country that’s happening. A lot of young people are listening to this, which is great because you need to bring in new bands,” he adds. “It’s exciting to be part of something that’s on the upwards—that’s not always the case when you’re working with different genres of music.” Good Vibez Presents knows about working with various genres—the company now counts six festivals under its banner, which veer everywhere from reggae and hip-hop to rock and country. Perhaps its most well-known is the California Roots Music & Arts Festival, billed as the largest reggae-rock festival in the U.S., which brought the likes of Wu-Tang Clan and Stick Figure to the fairgrounds this past May. Good Vibez also promotes shows at venues like the Fremont Theater in San Luis Obispo and organizes the popular Night Market 831 at Sand City Art Park. Cali Roots is how Sheehan and his wife and company co-owner, Amy Sheehan, built Good Vibez into what it is now. The music fans, who started organizing shows together in Hawaii in the mid-2000s, began partnering with Cali Roots founder Jeff Monser in 2012, before eventually taking over the operation. “Before, it was a backyard party slapped together,” Sheehan says of Cali Roots, which launched in 2010. “We came together and implemented our skill set—booked the artists, changed the ticketing, brought our staff on and changed it to what it is today.” In addition to delivering good music to concertgoers, Good Vibez’s events are also a boon to the local economy. Nearly 45,000 people attended Cali Roots across its four days in 2022—80 percent of whom came from outside of Monterey County, according to data provided by the See Monterey tourism bureau. Those attendees spent more than $15 million in food, lodging and transportation, while the festival generated over $2 million in local and state taxes. “Events like Rebels & Renegades, which occur during Monterey County’s shoulder season, bring valuable business to our hotels, restaurants and local businesses,” See Monterey spokesperson Sandy Huerta notes. Sheehan says the company views its hometown, which hosts two of Good Vibez’s six festivals, as “a destination” capable of luring revelers with more than just music. Still, there are challenges—he cites the area’s relatively limited, prohibitively priced hotel options as a particular concern. “It makes it challenging for our fans to come [to Monterey] and afford the hotels,” he says. “It’s not just us—it’s Car Week, the Jazz Festival…Hotel [prices] are definitely becoming harder for our fans to ignore. It’s a long-term problem here.” As for any business, inflation has also become a greater challenge for Good Vibez. “Coming out of Covid, everything’s gone up: fencing, porta-potties, catering, insurance, trucking,” Sheehan notes. “Everybody’s hard costs have gone up, which trickles to us, which trickles to the fans. We have to be mindful not to make our tickets [priced] too high, but it’s hard sometimes when the costs are just astronomical. If you want so-and-so to headline, you have to pay them ‘x’ amount because that’s what sells the tickets.” So while Good Vibez and its team of around a dozen full-time employees are scaling up events like Rebels & Renegades, they’re also being more “streamlined, focused, narrower” elsewhere in their business, according to Sheehan. That means the Alta Music Festival—which was held in Avila Beach last month and featured acts like Sublime with Rome and Bone Thugs-nHarmony—won’t be coming back next year. “We’re looking at reducing our festival count and making every one count,” Sheehan says, describing the Alta festival as “one of those that didn’t quite work.” “Sometimes you have to throw things at the wall and make things stick—that’s business in general, not everything is going to work,” he adds. “I feel great about the future and excited about the growth, but with all growth comes pain and we’re dealing with that as well.” Party People Rebels & Renegades is festival promoter Good Vibez Presents’ latest Monterey music bash. By Rey Mashayekhi Rebels and Renegades Good Vibez Presents owners (and husbandwife duo) Dan and Amy Sheehan got their start organizing shows in Hawaii around 20 years ago. The Monterey-based concert promoters now run six festivals including Rebels & Renegades, which launched last year. Dan Sheehan says Rebels & Renegades’ lineup is geared toward “a new wave of country” that is luring younger listeners with “heart and soul” and authentic storytelling. @eyesofjem Daniel Dreifuss
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