I appreciate you being here and thank you for your time – but I must be heard!
Beautiful creatures of the Church-Wellesley Entertainment District, the City of Toronto, Nation of Canada, and especially the sacred realm known as GLOW BACK.
My name is Sean Young, and I am an entertainment entrepreneur working in both film and television, as well as in the music and live events industries.
My companies SERIAL SEAN and ELECTRONIC EARTH prioritize projects from indie under-represented and equity deserving groups – especially within the Toronto Church-Wellesley District.
I have been working tirelessly with the multiple levels of our government to not only preserve the queer artist network in our neighbourhood, the City of Toronto, within the province of Ontario, federally in our beautiful nation of Canada and in the broader spectrum of the global entertainment industry but as well, legislatively through the CRTC (Canadian Radio-television and Telecommunications Commission) hearing processes to make funding more accessible to new and emerging or indie artists and producers as the current state of eligibility to access those programs is set too high that only mid career level or legacy producers can access it – resulting in significant attrition to our industries.
When those legacy companies eventually stop working or retire there will be no eligibity to new or emerging artists and producers to fill those shoes, causing yet more attrition, which will eventually dissolve our local and domestic networks of artists.
I have been working to resolve these issues though my companies SERIAL SEAN and ELECTRONIC EARTH by appearing at multiple interventions related to the Modernization of the Broadcast Act at the CRTC – but, as I am also an indie level producer my voice is heard and acknowledged but has gone ignored in decision-making communications.
On the forefront of Music & Live Events, we also are facing/alleging a conglomerate acquisition and dismantling power with Live Nation.
We witnessed this when my colleague Ryan Kruger rallied and worked together with Canadian industry promoters and artists to produce the Digital Dreams Festival w/Live Nation – creating the sub-imprint ELECTRONIC NATION.
After two highly successful years Live Nation allegedly kicked all of the Canadian collaborators out and rebranded it to their own Dreams Festival working exclusively with their own artists and funneling all that Canadian money and effort back into the US – they are doing this all over the Earth realm and there are many many lawsuits on the global scale about it.
Most recently, Live Nation has allegedly acquired Toronto local events company Prism Festival, which operates alongside our own Church-Wellesley entertainment district’s Pride Toronto Festival and they are causing disruption through Ticketmaster (which is also a US Live Nation company) by allegedly not releasing ticket revenue to Prism to pay their artists on time which in turn harms those relationships and eventually Prism Festival will grow to be ignored by our own talent under the guise of ‘not paying artists’ (this was learned through first hand participation in conversations with those artists) – this could eventually lead to harming the reputation of Prism Festival and we already see more support to international i artists than the local artists that should be more celebrated alongside a festival celebrating Toronto – and again dismantles the whole purpose of supporting under-represented and equity deserving creatures of the Church-Wellesley realm through Prism Festival.
As I mentioned – I have been working to change these situations in the film, television and music, live events industries in the ways that the legislation allows – but the solutions I have presented have been ignored.
Tonight, here at The Well (who had no participation in this statement), I along with the support to me and my companies of my dear friend and colleague Frank at The Black Eagle, George (Northbound Leather), and future conversations seeking support from my global artist network, I am declaring that enough is enough!!
We have tried to do this their way and it is not working, so we must now collaborate and work together in the local and global artist networks to not protest, but collaborate and come together to demand attention and meaningful change to these issues at the legislative tables that I have access to.
Let me be clear, this is not a fight, protest, defaming or slanderous message/action – but the beginning of a conversational movement that will not be ignored if we unite and stand together because I love all of the communities and industries that I work and do business within and participate at as a humble servant of this movement.
My core is as an artist, I seek not fame, or power, but I am uniquely positioned to do this for our realms of entertainment because of my legal education, seats at the legislative tables and professional participation in both industries – so I am declaring now that I will be your GLOW BACK Spartan Warrior King in this conversational movement and represent the best good faith intentions of our collective industries locally and globally because I can not stand by and watch what I love and cherish die for greed and profit by the already ultra successful.
In true Spartan spirit, I decree, that GLOW BACK is a safe haven for all of the beautiful creatures of Church-Wellesley, the City of Toronto, the Province of Ontario, the nation of Canada and the GLOW BACK Party realm I command as it’s GLOW BACK Party Spartan Warrior King and Protector of all that we love.
In the following weeks there will be a statement released asking for support and I encourage you to engage with and collaborate with me in this conversation – but tonight is about celebration, celebration that we are starting something here at GLOW BACK that can effect change.
As a show of solidarity to all of the mentioned communities that you all belong to, I will be marching as the GLOW BACK Spartan Warrior King from The Black Eagle up to Dudley’s Hardware before a roundabout back to The Well for a public statement at midnight outside.
I hope you will join me in support – together, this conversation can not continue to be ignored!!
Sean Young aka SERIAL SEAN
Entertainment Entrepreneur, Producer (Film/TV and Digital Content, Music & Live/Special Events/Festivals), Cultural Events & Entertainment Journalist, Artist & Occasional DJ
Entertainment Entrepreneur, Producer (Film/TV and Digital Content, Music & Live/Special Events/Festivals), Cultural Events & Entertainment Journalist, Artist & Occasional DJ
Statement:
This statement was released at midnight during the GLOW BACK: THE RETURN event Q1 on the 21st day of the mid winter month of February in 2025.