San Francisco's mayor and EMPIRE's Ghazi Shami found a shared cultural playbook in Seoul

San Francisco's cultural recovery meets Seoul

San Francisco Mayor Daniel Lurie and EMPIRE founder and CEO Ghazi Shami traveled together to Seoul from April 21 to 23, according to Billboard, marking the 50th anniversary of the San Francisco-Seoul sister-city relationship. The trip was described as Lurie's first official overseas trip since taking office, and it carried a pointed argument: live music is not a side effect of urban life, it is civic infrastructure.

Two agendas, one city

For Lurie, who became San Francisco's 46th mayor in January 2025, Seoul offered a mirror. South Korea has made music and popular culture central to its tourism strategy, with the Ministry of Culture, Sports and Tourism announcing a goal to attract 30 million inbound tourists in 2026, partly through what it called "Global Festivals." That model is precisely what Lurie is attempting to build at home.

His administration's case rests on numbers. In summer 2025, San Francisco hosted three consecutive weekends of major music events in Golden Gate Park, including Dead and Company's three-night stand for the Grateful Dead's 60th anniversary, Outside Lands, and a Zach Bryan concert at the Polo Field. The mayor's office projected those events would generate $150 million in local economic activity and draw more than 450,000 attendees.

"We had three weekends of music that brought in close to half a million people," Lurie told Billboard Korea. "Music, arts, culture brings people together."

Policy as the other half

Programming alone is not the strategy. In May 2025, Lurie signed legislation creating five new Entertainment Zones across San Francisco, bringing the total to 21 adopted or pending, per the mayor's office. Under California state legislation championed by State Sen. Scott Wiener, the zones allow open-container alcohol consumption on closed streets during sanctioned events, reducing friction for outdoor shows and neighborhood activations.

Lurie also cited his PermitSF regulatory reform package, which he described as covering 20 pieces of legislation designed to make concerts, housing construction, and small business operations easier to navigate.

For EMPIRE, whose San Francisco headquarters sits at the center of all this, the trip had its own logic. The independent label appointed Jeffrey Yoo as senior VP of East Asia in October 2024, and the Seoul visit fits a broader push to deepen its presence across the region. Shami's role in the delegation, alongside arts and business leaders, suggested the label is positioning itself as both a cultural and civic partner, not just a commercial one.

"With Ghazi, it's about creativity, but it's also about the city," Lurie said. "I believe it has to be a partnership."

Sentiment and what comes next

Lurie referenced San Francisco Chamber of Commerce CityBeat polling showing that roughly 65% of San Franciscans now feel the city is heading in the right direction, up from 22% two years ago. Whether that shift holds, and whether Seoul's model translates, is still an open question. But the live music scene the mayor is building around it is already on the calendar.