ROAM booking agency

A live performance from The Sheepdogs, one of the more than 800 artists repped by ROAM. Photo Credit: Talitatwoshoes

North America-based Arrival Artists has officially merged with London-headquartered ATC Live to form ROAM, which is being touted as today’s “largest independent booking agency.”

Arrival and ATC formally disclosed their union and new name this afternoon, after initially working together in 2020. That’s the same year in which five former Paradigm agents established Arrival, which had offices in New York, Chicago, and LA.

Meanwhile, ATC set sail back in 2011 and cultivated a 500-act roster prior to the Arrival combination. As the joint ROAM boasts an 800-strong roster, then, that places Arrival’s pre-merger lineup at about 300 artists.

Now, all these professionals – including but certainly not limited to The Sheepdogs, Khruangbin, The Nude Party, STRFKR, and Temples – are part of ROAM, which is said to be the fifth-largest booking agency overall.

On the personnel front, the newly minted operation has pointed to an over 80-person team, with offices in (on top of the cities mentioned above) Paris, London, and Glasgow.

Also aboard ROAM are Arrival co-founders Ali Hedrick, Erik Selz, John Bongiorno, Karl Morse, Ethan Berlin, and Matt Yasecko. And ATC founder Alex Bruford, besides partners Clemence Renaut, Colin Keenan, Ed Thompson, Olivia-jane Ransley, Sarah Joy, David “Skully” Sullivan Kaplan, and Will Church, have likewise transitioned to the combined entity.

In more words, that entity emphasized plans to leverage both local insights and global expertise en route to maximizing long-term opportunities for repped talent across all career stages.

“We’ve proven our ability to take artists from clubs to festival headlines and arena touring, and to add value to established artists of all levels through diligent and strategic work,” elaborated Bruford, now a ROAM agent. “The creation of ROAM significantly enhances the choices artists have for worldwide representation.”

“We’ve built companies and cultures we’re proud of, and ROAM takes that to the next level,” added Ransley, ROAM’s operations director. “We’ve created an environment where agents can confidently prioritize long-term career success for their artists, supported by the infrastructure and expert departments to break into new markets, expand audiences, and sharpen ticketing strategies.”

At the top level, the pandemic-era shutdown and adjacent layoffs prompted the creation of several booking and talent agencies.

Technically, five-year-old TBA was itself founded by five Paradigm vets, to name one example. Though it doesn’t exactly come as a surprise, decades-old players aren’t quite thrilled about the influx of competitors or the alleged circumstances surrounding their launches.