Why Ayreon, Avantasia, etc will never happen here...
These type of one-off shows are simply not possible.
1. You have to coordinate a date with everyone's schedule.
2. You have to pay everyone. I hate to tell you, but not everyone is interested in performing for free when they have mouths to feed. It would take insane money to get it done in some cases.
3. The level of interest is just not there. Why fly over to the States to do a one-off show that will not effect your bands in terms of a promotional push and sales impact?
4. Rehearsals. You have to get everyone together in advance for a minimum of a week to rehearse. Guess what? You have to pay everyone for that week as well including hotel costs, studio time, instrument rentals, food per diems per day, travel arrangements, etc.
5. Then you have to get them to the show after all of that.
6. Visa restrictions could nail you. You cannot approach this as a work visa because you have to prove to the goverment that you have been a band for x amount of years with stable members, documentation, etc. The U.S. borders are insane now.
7. There are some hardcore people out there, but do you think the general masses would fly to Atlanta and spend hundreds of dollars on top of that for a single night show? It's certainly not going to happen to the level of making a profit on a show.
I do appreciate that some of you think I can pull off miracles with shows like that or reunions (Kiske? never in a million years). However, you need to scale back your expectations.
Glenn H.