Paul Morris, founder of the AM Only booking agency and one of the best known agents in electronic music, is leaving Paradigm to work exclusively with superstar dance artist Tiesto, Billboard has learned.
His exit will be timed with the takeover of the agency by Casey Wasserman in a deal brokered with Tom Gores, the billionaire brother of Paradigm founder Sam Gores who had to cede control of the agency’s famed music department following a liquidity crisis that began during the onset of the COVID-19 pandemic last year. A source tells Billboard that Morris will focus full time on Tiesto, one of his longest held clients, and join the artist’s internal management group. Hits Daily Double was first to report the news of Morris’ plans.
Morris, a native Londoner who moved to Gainesville, Florida, as a teen with his father, got his start promoting parties and concerts at nightclubs near the University of Florida. He later relocated to New York and founded his AM Only booking agency out of the back of New York’s Breakbeat Science record shop in 1996, according to a 2015 profile from Billboard. After meeting Chip Hooper, the late Paradigm head of music, in 2012 Morris sold Paradigm a stake in AM Only and his company was full acquired in 2017. Morris quickly rose the ranks at Paradigm and served on the agency’s leadership team. He is also a founder of the of the Chip Hooper Award, given to a fast-rising young executive each year at the Billboard Live Music Summit.
Morris is credited with first signing Skrillex after seeing the iconic dance artist open for DeadMau5 and negotiated Tiesto’s first-of-its-kind residency at MGM Grand in 2013.
