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Levelz return social media to flagging agency Elastic Artists

By | Published on Monday 7 December 2015

Elastic Artists

Manchester MC collective Levelz have given booking agency Elastic Artists its social network channels back, after last week hijacking the live firm’s Twitter, Facebook and Instagram accounts.

As previously reported, the Levelz team used Elastic’s social media pages to express their frustration about the lack of communication around the booking agency’s flagging financial situation, but mainly in a comedic fashion. They weren’t the first artists allied to the agency to take to social media to confirm they were owed money by the firm, though they were the only ones to do so via the company’s own online channels.

The directors of Elastic Artists, which is thought to be heading into administration, are yet to comment on the situation beyond a memo sent to clients last month admitting the company was “experiencing financial difficulties”.

Though one director did confirm to Resident Advisor that the police were looking into the activities of Levelz, and in particular a spoof ransom video the group uploaded to YouTube during the hijack. And according to Fact, one of the collective subsequently confirmed they had indeed been questioned by officers.

Which may or may not be why Elastic Artists got their social networks back, albeit so the company could pretty much immediately take them offline.

Back on their own Facebook page, Levelz confirmed the hijack was over. “We’re going to shut down this operation now”, they wrote. “Having made our point, in a way that’s made us laugh over this situation rather than cry, and got us some PR as we now have no money for promoting our next release, or to even pay our studio rent; and also, we know how the internet works, as we’re so last Monday now we had better knock it on the head”.

They went on: “We did this for all the artists, agents, assistants and promoters that have lost funds, and then been so disrespected by lack of contact, explanation or apology. We know that the agents who worked at Elastic really were in no way to blame and didn’t even have any knowledge of how ropey a financial position Elastic were in til the last minute. Arguably they have been dealt a worse card than everyone. This campaign was in no way directed at them”.

The message concluded: “We have heard, but can’t confirm, that our actions have pushed the company into administration quicker, meaning that ex-staff will now be getting their redundancies sooner. We do hope that is the case. Now that we are giving the reins to their social media back, we do hope Elastic Artists will take the opportunity to apologise and make a clear statement to shed some real light on the situation”.



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