Day One - Monster Management

I have been fortunate enough to get my PR placement with Monster Management.

Monster Management is a small boutique promotions company that specializes in music tours, event bookings, and venue consultancy. It is owned and run by Jeff Halley, the biggest event for the company is the summer music festival ‘Rollercoaster’ a concept that was originally conceived by Jeff and is now in its fifth year.

Working inside a small business meant I wasn’t given too much time to feel my way around, within an hour of walking into the office I had been handed my first mission, write a media release for street press (X-Press and Drum Media). It seems a whole lot harder to write a release when you know it is actually going to be sent off to the media, deadlines for editors seem a lot tougher to meet than due dates for assignments. Before I had even finished my release Jeff had already sent me two new projects to start on. (Jeff works at 100miles an hour on a slow day and stops for no one) He is impressive to watch and impossible to keep up with, I wasn’t too sure what I had gotten myself into.

While I currently work in a live music venue (outside placement) I deal with events from a venue point-of-view, my new role within Monster Management has allowed me to gain an insight into the Western Australian music industry from a new perspective. I am now involved from the ground up, from idea creation right through to final load out. This was the strangest part of the new experience for me, I was so used to dealing with the final product, running the event itself, to be at the very beginning developing and building the idea was a whole new challenge for me.

At the start of my first day I sat down with Jeff and he asked me what I wanted to get out of the placement, I wasn’t really too sure at the time, I am lucky that I know Jeff very well and am able to be quite open with him, although I still found myself giving him the usual clichéd student response, ‘hands on experience’, I was really thinking - a desk in the corner where I can stay out of your way and watch.

Now that day one, week one is out of the way I still don’t what I really aim to get out of this whole experience I just know that I’m ready to get involved.