A company which manages the financial affairs of some of Ireland's most successful pop acts has opened a new office in London as part of a drive into the British music industry.
Limerick-based Artwest Business Management manages the finances of Boyzone, Morrissey, the Cranberries, Kerri Ann, Westside and Ronan Hardiman, composer of Lord of the Dance.
The company's two directors, Mr Alan McEvoy (32) and Mr P.J. O'Riordan (26), brother of Cranberries lead singer Dolores, have also recently taken a 40 per cent stake in the Limerick radio station 95FM and are currently looking for suitable office space in Dublin.
The new London base will act as an administrative centre as the company tries to sign up British and international acts. The company hopes the high profile Irish names which form its current client base will entice other artists to leave their current business managers and join up with Artwest.
The two directors describe their work as "business management" and say it involves more than preparing accounts for the artists.
Mr O'Riordan entered the area after acting as business manager for the Cranberries, while Mr McEvoy spent years working for Mr Ossie Kilkenny, the longstanding accountant with U2.
The two directors describe the business as a 24-hour job. "If an artist contacts you, no matter what time, and they ask you to jump, you don't even ask how high," says Mr McEvoy.
The directors believe the large sums of money available to young artists should not be frittered away.
"You can only write-off so many Porsches and throw so many TVs out the window," says Mr McEvoy.
"Careers in the pop music industry can be quite short, so we advise bands to manage their money wisely when they have it, which doesn't always make us very popular," he adds. He currently spends about three days a week working on Boyzone's business affairs.
Mr McEvoy maintains that the more mainstream accountancy firms have been unable to provide a "personalised" service to pop musicians and this has left a gap for companies such as Artwest.
Pop musicians, he says, can be impetuous, demanding and suspicious, but overall are more interesting than most clients.
