Promoter Steve Brown figured a rhythm and blues concert featuring hit bands of the 1990s would be a hot ticket at the ShoWare Center in Kent.
But even the sellout crowd of more than 6,300 at the first Ladies Night Out concert Dec. 10 surprised Brown, who runs Ocean Records out of Lakewood in Pierce County.
“We thought it would do well and kind of thought it would sell out,” Brown said. “But there were 1,700 tickets left with a week to go. They were selling 300 to 400 tickets a day the last three or four days. We added an extra 250 chairs the last minute. We turned away several hundred people at the door.”
That success helped prompted Brown to go ahead with his plans for a Ladies Night Out, Volume 2 concert Feb. 10 at ShoWare. The concert features Bell Biv Devoe, Jon B, Al B Sure and SWV, also known as Sisters With Voices.
The first Ladies Night Out featured Shai, Silk, H-Town, Ginuwine and K-Ci and JoJo.
Brown, who works with Tim Brown (no relation) of Spanaway and La La Entertainment of Seattle to promote the concerts, has wanted to bring R&B bands from the 1990s to the Seattle-Tacoma area for several years. He found a private investor, who put up the money, and found just the venue he wanted at the ShoWare Center.
Brown also runs the Ocean Records music store in Lakewood and learned from his customers what people wanted as far as live music, especially people 30 and older.
“They want to see a good show, but they do not want to be at a nightclub,” he said. “They want to be somewhere without any violence and they don’t want to drive the I-5 corridor to Olympia. Kent is centrally located and has a nice, brand-new venue.”
Anyone who attends a nightclub concert must be 21 or older. Brown said a lot of military personnel at Joint Base Lewis-McChord in Tacoma are 18-20 and cannot see concerts at nightclubs. But the ShoWare concerts are open to all ages.
“There were parents who brought kids ages 16, 17 and 18,” Brown said of the first Ladies Night Out.
The concert’s turnout played well with ShoWare officials, who are aggressively working to see the fledgling arena make money. In its first two years of operation, and struggling through a major recession, the center has yet to make a profit.
“People were very into it and had a great time,” said Beth Sylves, ShoWare marketing director about the Dec. 10 concert. “It was a four-hour show. The artists were thrilled with the crowd. They got great energy from the crowd. People were dancing. It certainly exceeded our expectations.”
Sylves estimated about 70 percent of the crowd were females.
“We converted one of the men’s restrooms to a women’s restroom,” she said.
Brown said he labeled the concerts as “Ladies Night Out” to play to female audiences.
“We wanted to do something catering to the ladies,” Brown said. “Because as you know, where the ladies go the fellows are going to follow.”
Groups of four to six women or even as many as a dozen women attended the concert together.
Brown hopes for a similar turnout at the second Ladies Night Out event.
“It’s a hot lineup,” he said. “Anybody who listened to music in the ’90s knows these groups. The groups at the first concert and this show are some of the hottest groups of the ’90s.”
Bell Biv Devoe had three No. 1 singles in the early 1990s including “Poison,” “B.B.D. (I Thought It Was Me)” and “Word to the Mutha!” The group branched off from New Edition, a 1980s band.
The other groups also had popular hits in the 1990s including “Weak” by SWV, “They Don’t Know” by Jon B and “Nite and Day” by Al B Sure, whose single reached No. 1 on rhythm-and-blues charts in 1988.
“Jon B is very underrated,” Brown said. “A lot of the reaction I’ve heard is he’s the favorite on the bill even though he’s not the headliner. That guy can sing.”
Brown has plans to bring a third R&B concert in May to the ShoWare with the exact date and groups still to be determined.
If you go
What: Ladies Night Out, Volume 2 R&B concert
When: 8 p.m. Feb. 10
Where: ShoWare Center, Kent
Cost: $57, $52, $42 and $32
Tickets: www.showarecenter.com or call 253-856-6999
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