Andrew McManus

Andrew McManus is an Australian live music promoter, and founder of several music promotion companies.

Andrew McManus has been a prominent concert promoter in the Australian live music landscape and has been promoting tours across, rock, pop, reggae, opera, classical and indie genres since the start of the millennium when he established the company International Touring Company (ITC) in Brisbane. His companies promoted notable and high profile tours of Australia by international acts include Fleetwood Mac, Mötley Crüe and Aerosmith.

McManus has also promoted comedians at the Melbourne International Comedy Festival with acts including Pauly Shore and Joan Rivers.

McManus is the former owner and promoter of the short lived World Wrestling All-Stars promotion, formed in October 2001 with its final tour in May 2003. The WWA toured Australia, Europe and New Zealand airing their shows on USA pay-per-view. McManus appeared on air a few times to make some announcements, but mainly ran things from behind the scenes.

In 2009, McManus organised the Impact Fighting Championships tournament, where cage fighters did not get paid, which McManus' solicitor said at the time claimed was the fault of a US partner.

In 2024 Andrew McManus and his company Apex Entertainment promoted the Pandamonium Rocks Festival. With shows across the Eastern States of Australia. The shows were quickly marred with issues early on with acts cancelling due to Apex entertainment not paying deposits to many of the acts. This lead to a scaling down of stages from 2 stages to 1 stage at each location. Ticket holders demanded refunds as entitled under Australian Consumer Law. However Apex was silent on the matter leaving many Ticket holders to pursue refunds though the banks and AFCA. Ticket holders who still wished to attend were offered a $70 refund, a hoodie or and extra ticket. Many who took this option have never received either of these. In April 2024 ticket holders who took one of these options also fell victim to a data breach were many personal details were leaked including banking details.

Those who attended the shows were disappointed. Namely VIP and disabled Ticket holders who had been promised raised viewing platforms to see the performance. To this day, many Ticket holders are still seeking refunds. Apex Entertainment and Andrew McManus have been claiming terms and conditions on returns or in some cases charging the Ticket holders again after receiving a refund from the banks.

In June 2024 Promoter Andrew McManus claims bankrupt mogul Mark Spillane caused $6m chaos for Pandemonium festival

The financial woes that threw a popular rock festival into chaos can be revealed amid a war of words between promoter Andrew McManus and twice-bankrupt mogul Mark Spillane.

Music Career
McManus' career arguably started with his managing a band room in Coogee Bay Hotel in Sydney.

McManus was shortly declared bankrupt for 3 weeks in 1992 through an action by AV-equipment hire company Jands, but had this annulled when he settled the outstanding debt.

McManus was the manager of the Australian rock band Divinyls from 1987 to 1994. 

McManus Entertainment was the promoter of reggae festival Raggamuffin since its launch in 2008. McManus promised to donate 10 per cent of the profits from the 2011 festival to the Premier's Appeal for the 2010–2011 Queensland floods, hoping to raise $500,000, but no money was given by McManus or any of his companies, purportedly due to there being no profits made. The festival that had drawn over 30,000 attendees saw only 400 people at the Adelaide festival on 2 February 2011. In 2014, McManus Entertainment partnered with Dawn Raid Entertainment to move Raggamuffin from Rotorua to Auckland.

In 2009, McManus' company lost $1.8 million on promoting The Who at the Melbourne Grand Prix.

In 2010, Huey Lewis and the News cancelled what would have been their first Australian tour in 20 years. McManus cited conflicts with their recording schedule as reason for the cancellation, with the band releasing Soulsville later that year, but McManus later admitted that sales were not strong, resulting in his company losing $800,000. The shows were never rescheduled. Peter Gabriel cancelled his tour that same year, which McManus also blamed on "scheduling issues", costing his company $1.2 million. He also lost a further $1.2 million due to $2 million in refunds for Whitney Houston's poor performance in Brisbane.

In 2019, American rock band Live were to headline a music festival Under the Southern Stars run by McManus' enterprise, One World Entertainment. The festival was disrupted by the COVID-19 pandemic, and Live pulled out. Customers were only offered a rescheduled ticket to an entirely different concert set for March 2022. One World Entertainment denied refunds and told those who did not attend in 2022 that they must attend a concert in 2023 as compensation instead, resulting in dozens of ticket holders lodging complaints with consumer affairs. McManus had assumed nearly a quarter million dollars in debt, and blamed state governments and cited the Live Performance Code of Practice as reason to refuse refunds. NSW Fair Trading suggested this refusal to provide refunds and instead offer a "like for like" replacement breached the Australian Consumer Law.

In August 2022, One World Entertainment in partnership with TEG Live presented the Australian End of the Road World Tour by rock band KISS to sold out shows throughout the country. Founding KISS member and bass player, Gene Simmons said of promoter Andrew McManus, 'He's family, and the best promoter in the world. We wouldn't be here without him.'

As of 2024, McManus is the promoter organizing the Pandemonium Rocks Festival, which is to be held across Sydney, Melbourne, the Gold Coast, and Brisbane in April. The Sydney show was originally scheduled to be held in The Domain on ANZAC Day but forced to relocate to Olympic Park due to noise concerns. On 8 April 2024, Pandemonium Rock music festival announced on Facebook that 6 of the original 13 bands advertised as performing had pulled out, including major headliners Placebo and Deep Purple, with only partial refunds offered in the form of merchandise and drink credits. On 19 April, it was revealed that a massive data breach had occurred when the festival organisers asked patrons who were seeking refunds to fill out a form containing names,email addresses, phone numbers, and banking details. In an Instagram post, the festival acknowledged they caused the breach by leaving the admin settings on the form on, allowing normal users to see the results of the form.

Liquidated Companies
In 1995, creditors were not repaid anything when his company Andrew McManus Management Pty Ltd went into liquidation with debts exceeding $230,000.

In 2010, after reggae band Herbs lodged a legal dispute with McManus, McManus' New Zealand company Andrew McManus Presents (New Zealand) Co Limited went into liquidation, owing AUD $300,000 to creditors.

ITC & Allegations of Phoenix Activity
On 11 May 1998, McManus registered his International Touring Company Pty Ltd (ITC) also known as the Ultimate Rock Symphony with the Australian Securities and Investments Commission (ASIC). McManus is purported to have sold this company to the public company Abigroup Limited in 2000. However, according to ASIC registers, no direct transfer of the business name took place at any time.

Instead, Abigroup Limited registered a new company under the temporary name of '''Mitchwil Pty. Limited''' on 22 August 2000. By 3 October 2001, McManus' company was owing almost $270,000 to creditors, and a liquidator had been appointed. Mere weeks after the appointment of a liquidator on McManus' company, on 26 October 2000, Abigroup's '''Mitchwil Pty. Limited changed its name to the almost identical name of International Touring Company Pty Limited''', while McManus changed his company's name to its more obfuscated ACN ("A.C.N. 082 577 526 PTY LTD"). Less than a month after that, on 16 November 2000, McManus became Director of Abigroup's new company of the almost identical name, which ran the entertainment at Sydney SuperDome.

McManus purports to have officially left this company in 2001 to start his company Andrew McManus Presents Pty Ltd (AMP). ASIC lists 9 November 2001 as a date of "Change to Alternate Director" for the new company. Abigroup's new company was voluntarily deregistered by September 2006. In response to the suggestion that McManus has engaged with illegal phoenix activities, McManus' lawyer denied the allegations and stated that "at all times he has acted honourably in relation to his commercial dealings"

AMP International / Miz
On 4 July 2011, the day before liquidation proceedings began, Andrew McManus Presents (International) Pty Ltd, also known as AMP International was renamed to Miz Pty Ltd. The company held only $15,251 in the bank, while it had debts exceeding $4.2 million, including $1.2 million to the Australian Taxation Office. The company was promoting tours of Stevie Nicks, Mötley Crüe and Joan Collins, when the company was liquidated in 25 August 2011, McManus Entertainment, which was already lobbying for a Sydney New Year's Eve concert,  soon took over these promotions.

Involvement in Secret Gambling
In 2009, it was revealed at a Racing Appeals and Disciplinary Board hearing that McManus had placed 954 bets valued at $1.78 million through bookmaker Simon Beasley over an 18-month span, requesting the bets remain private and unrecorded. It was not suggested that McManus himself did anything illegal, but Beasley was fined $50,000 for his part in the scam and disqualified from bookmaking for four years. It is said that transparency in bookkeeping is required to prevent opportunity for tax evasion and money laundering.

Fines for the Melbourne Storm breach
In 2010, McManus was involved in the Melbourne Storm salary cap breach by billing Melbourne Storm for "promotional" events through his company Andrew McManus Presents International to facilitate $800,000 in extra payments to players Greg Inglis, Cameron Smith and Billy Slater. McManus was fined $2.4 million by the Australian Taxation Office.

Conviction regarding the $702,000 cash found at Sydney's Hilton Hotel
On 11 August, 2011, a black suitcase containing AUD $702,000 was seized by police from room 3026 at Sydney's 5-star Hilton Hotel. Former cage-fighter Sean Carolan claimed that he was minding the money for Owen "O-Dog" Hanson who allegedly didn't want to lose more money at Sydney's Star City Casino. Owen Hanson has been described as a Californian "cocaine kingpin", believed to have trafficked a tonne of cocaine onto Australia's streets. Incongruously, Hanson claimed that the money was given to Sean Carolan to invest in Carolan's weight loss clinic. The day that the cash was seized, the two were witnessed in a heated conversation with well-known American high roller "Robin Hood 702", Robert Cipriani, who phoned Hotel security and left later that day for Los Angeles. It is suggested the professional gambler was to launder the money through these casinos, but instead lost most of it on the tables.

During interviews with police on 4 April 2012, Andrew McManus lied that he was the Australian source of the money, that it was the profits from a Lenny Kravitz tour, to be used to repay Owen Hanson Jr a deposit for an Australian tour of the Texan rock trio ZZ Top. McManus was accompanied to the interview by his former business partner and then-practicing-solicitor Michael Anthony Croke. The purported business relationship between Andrew McManus and Owen Hanson was fictitious, Michael Croke and McManus had fabricated their story together via an email exchange, and produced fabricated evidence in support of these false claims. McManus has subsequently claimed that at the time of talking to police, he was under the influence of cocaine, alcohol, and prescription medication including morphine. McManus' purpose for his perverting the course of justice was to gain a $200,000 loan from the syndicate, hoping this would fund his next project. McManus is said to have also accepted AUD $450,000 in cash from the Perth outlaw bikie gang, the Coffin Cheaters, who were said to be promoting the ZZ Top Perth tour.

In November 2014, police raided McManus' business in Richmond and his home in the Mornington Peninsula. On 10 September, 2015, McManus was arrested at Melbourne Airport, charged with perverting the course of justice, two counts of intention to defraud by false or misleading statement, and knowingly participating in a criminal group, for his part in a money laundering scheme to cover the syndicate's importing of 300 kilograms of cocaine into Australia from Mexico.

In July 2016 at the New South Wales District Court, McManus plead guilty of perverting the course of justice. In March 2017, McManus was sentenced to a 20 months intensive corrections order, with Judge Williams finding that he was unlikely to re-offend and had shown remorse.

Sentencing of McManus' Lawyer, Michael Croke
Andrew McManus' lawyer for the police interview, Michael Croke, also acted as the lawyer for co-conspirators Sean Carolan and Owen Hanson. Craig Haeusler only became involved in police questioning after McManus diverged from the group's prefabricated story. In 2020, Croke was found guilty by jury of all 6 charges against him, including perverting the course of justice and aiding a criminal group with McManus. Croke faced an aggregate sentence of 5 years and 9 months imprisonment commencing 5 May 2020. Croke was first eligible for parole on 4 February 2024.