Festivals on the way out?
'The headline is: Put away your wellies, the festival frenzy is coming to an end, says Glastonbury founder
They quote Eavis as saying: "It's on the way out. We've probably got another three or four years. It's a very scary business. Womad and Latitude are not selling out. Partly it's economics, but there is a feeling that people have seen it all before."
"We sell out only because we get huge headliners. In the year Jay-Z played nearly went bankrupt. I don't see the market will be there in the future."
The report says that Latitude (next weekend) still has 1000 tickets available. Reading/Leeds has 40% of tickets available. Hop Farm only sold 20,000 of 50,000.
Tickets for Reading are available on Viagogo for £120 (down from £192.50)
efestival's quoted as saying:
"Festivals aren't being adventurous enough with their choice of headliners. Download has pretty much the same six headline bands on repeat."' '
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That Reading/Leeds statistic is surprising
Considering how quickly it sold out in the previous 5 years or so, ouch.
I think latitudes poor sales are largely due to a poor overly mainstream music line up.
Last year they pulled a bit of as rabbit out of the hat with B&S's first UK headline show.
sorry meant to say first UK show in 4 years
Although there is lot to see on the lineup...
I think I have to agree about the headliners. I mean, Paulo Nutuni ffs. And as much as I love The National, they were only considered big enough to headline the Word Arena 12 months ago.
The original rumours were Arcade Fire, Elbow and Pulp. If they had booked those three it would have definitely sold out...
well
glasto was £87 in 2000 and this year it was £195
the public aren't spending as much money in the last couple of years but festivals have continued to rocket in price
^ probably this
also think ameteur ebay touts played a big part in distorting how demand appeared, things sold out instantly not because of massive increase in demand but people snapping up tickets to sell for profit, with people less willing to pay over the odds and touts themselves weary of taking the risk thats probably declined
This makes me feel better about
How pessimistic I sometimes feel about popular music these days. There might be a lot of crap in the charts and on the radio etc., and a lot more crap hyped by NME or Kerrang, but festivals not selling is where 'my people' can speak loudest.
Also love the fact that - after going to Reading for 5 years straight - the one year I don't go is the year they have so many tickets left. Even if it is the year of The Strokes. And oh, how I wish I could see The Strokes.
what are you talking about?
There is pretty much no indie band music in the charts at the moment, and the majority of music festivals are populated by indie bands..I think that may be the reason that festivals are selling more poorly than they were five years ago, rather than it being because of 'the people' rebelling against chart music...
I wondered about this
I'd heard whispers that a few well known festivals were really underselling and I'd spotted the usual Latitude sellout hadn't happened, but R&L of all things being that far undersold is really surprising, it has a wider brand awareness second only to Glasto and their headliners aren't exactly box office poison most years. There's a lot of mid-range events taking this year to take chances with the perceived market expansion too, Truck's expansion and reorganisation for instance, that I worry about.
And on top of this
Vince Power says he's bringing back the Phoenix Festival in 2012! Lots of luck with that, given what's sprung up since it was halted after 1998.
Yeah, R&L's an odd one
Latitude not selling out doesn't really surprise me because they don't offer much that isn't covered by bigger festivals like Glasto and the repulsive V Fest, but I'd always assumed that as long as there were 16 year olds Reading would be safe.
Some serious nail/head interface with Michael Eavis' people have seen it all before comment. The reason things like Bestival, Green Man and End of the Road do well is that they always offer something a bit different, whereas other festivals just put the same stuff on every year and rely on people to buy tickets anyway (Reading and Leeds are especially guilty of this).
End Of The Road has put 1500 on its capacity and sold out two months in advance
(Green Man hasn't, but that's an underwhelming lineup this year)
Latitude likes to think of itself as different with all its arts tents and events, but it's still got the music front and centre so they have to justify headliners being a band that headlined the second stage last year and a run of the mill Radio 2 and adults favourite (I know there were complaints about PSBs and Grace Jones two years ago but at least they both put on a show). The other stuff's very nice but nobody goes specifically for it.
Apparently there was another late really cheap ticket giveaway for Hop Farm this year, and that's with Prince and the ever blindly adulated Morrissey headlining.
But EOTR and Green Man are still well below Glastonbury, etc. in terms of size aren't they?
They're also more narrowly focussed like ATP is. There is a level with these festivals. Take ATP: had it been possible to stay at Camber I wonder if they'd have seen the drop in attendance they had this year prompting them to stop May editions. The last May one was 55% sold or something but Butlins is at least twice the size of Camber. If EOTR was the size of Glastonbury it wouldn't sell out.
I'd love to think that
The Reading/Leeds thing is their own fault due to treating their customers with utter contempt year on year, but in reality it's more likely that the parents of all the kids who go can't afford to sub their ticket this year. I'd be interested to see if the age demographic of ticket buyers are any different this year than before
I put it down to market saturation
There are so many festivals in UK and Europe now that the bigguns are finding it hard to compete. When the line up leaks
(like with Reading and Leeds) and it's not good enough, people aren't going to pay £200 for the sake of it, they will go to a cheaper festival with a better line up.
Festivals aren't dead, they're bigger than ever, but more competition means you have to provide a quality product for the price if you're going to attract customers. In my opinion Reading and Leeds haven't been doing this, and now it's showing.
I would also put it down to saturation of the soil, turning it into sludge.
no more may ATPs being another example?
ATP, in festival terms, is its own ecosystem
idk though, tbh... they're just too freakin' expensive.
how much was t in the park this weekend? £200 + fees? RIDICULOUS.
i never really thought there was a limit to how much i'd pay for a festival, but i'm pretty sure i know that there is now. and it's probably £180/weekend. anything over that seems silly.
and what about european festivals? since i first went to primavera, i'm way way more likely to go to a european festival - they're cheaper (on the whole), and you also get a european holiday thrown in the mix. i wonder if the usual 16 year old reading/leeds goers are just heading out to benacassim instead. or something. idk, all speculative, obviously.
BUT, i'd be surprised if glasto was on the way out
i see it more of an institution than a festival
Glastonbury will survive because it's Glastonbury
There is, for many, no other festival.
Yeah but it's also not run by a corporation and it's not run in an area that can easily be used.
No matter what the demand for Glasto tickets it needs a lot of politics to make it work so it could stop well before others.
They'll just get less expensive.
WIN.
*less of them
They won't get less expensive, they'll try and get bigger names in.
Thinking some more
I wonder how much of this is down to the oft-heard modern music industry mantra of 'you don't make music from records, live music and festivals is the way artists make money these days'? Economies of scale would suggest that once the latter market because oversaturated the whole thing would fall in on itself.
Just my thoughts,
1) Reduce artist fees to a reasonable amount (especially headliners).
2) Stop increasing capacity + stop increasing ticket price
3) Stop believing LIVE MUSIC is booming...it's not. Over saturated CRAP. Too much hype and everyone is trying to make a quick buck.
4) UK needs to STOP and LOOK at how European festivals are run...
Which European festivals are well organised?
can you imagine Primavera's cashless bar snafu at Reading or T?
giggle
Good.
Shitty big festivals will have to have a rethink and either die or scale back. The megafest era was an unsustainable phase. Well-run, smaller, focussed festivals will be fine.
•Maybe the same rotating handful of headliners dating back to the mid 90s or before will finally be shunted off.
•Maybe now the pointless TV crews and unhelpful Radio 1 hype will piss off.
•Maybe you'll be able to go to a festival where it's not overrun by kids on a post-exam jolly, to whom seeing bands is an aside.
•Maybe you'll be able to get something better to drink than a lukewarm pint beaker of the sponsor's piss-flavoured alcohol.
•Maybe you'll not be herded around a shithole site like cattle.
•Maybe the facilities on site will reflect the ticket price.
Oh, wait... most of these maybes have already largely been sorted out. For anyone not going to R/L, V, or T, at lest. Glastonbury isn't exempt, but it's a different kettle of badgers and should have enough of a USP to weather a downturn and reconfiguring of the festival scene.
I'll post this again.
http://thepopcop.co.uk/2011/06/rockness-vs-doune-the-rabbit-hole/
^That tells you all you need to know about why big fests are struggling. And that's just Doune The Rabbit Hole being compared to Rockness. You can add at least another 25% of 'nah, fuck that for a game of soldiers' to the R/L, V, or T ratings.
T and V have both sold out
I'm not sure there's a lot of logic in the "if it doesn't sell out maybe everything will be better and the entire approach and clientele will change for next year" line. Of course festivals need to stop being sold as graduate jollies/alternative holiday vacations/fashion gatherings (and if I see one more piece about ideal festival fashion I'm going to go dressed as a crusty), but that's not going to be scaled back just because Reading's a bit emptier. There'll still be advertisers desperately seeking to court a younger market, there'll still be booking agents who see cartoon-style dollar signs for eyeballs when a festival promoter rings up (the man behind Indietracks has scaled back its reach this year for that reason), there'll still be price rises as promoters attempt to make up for shortfalls with more populist headliners (why else is the DiS stage day of Summer Sundae, a festival not known for overtly commercial leanings, having its main stage headlined by McFly and Example this year?) What will actually happen is in two or three years' time a few of those mid-sized, previously well run festivals will have to give in because even this year their press attention is being scaled back in favour of the mega-fests. The thought that less sales will mean better customer service is like if Premier League attendances were down next season and the reaction was "well, the TV rights will have to be sold to Channel 4 and the executive boxes will surely be coverted to terracing".
It doesn't really surprise me how badly Reading/Leeds is selling to be honest
it's garnered such a terrible reputation and it really is overpriced or was until the reduction, 120 pounds is a bargain to be honest. But when it hit 200pounds I think people realised it cost the same as Glastonbury where you can get a whole lot more festival for that money..
Put things aside hasn't secret garden party done exceptionally well this year? But then again it seems to have differentiated it's self enough from the rest of the market.
Also rock/indie rock isn't quite the seller it once was back 5 years ago
Reading/Leeds being a very rock/ indie rock orientated festival has felt the brunt of it me thinks.
Was talking to the boss about this before Glastonbury
He considers festivals to be a pain for all involved; a festival tends to lose promoters money, the artists struggle to reach a crowd depending on what time their slot is (unless they're well established/hyped/safe picks), and the crowd pay extortionate amounts of money for a ticket to stand (in some cases) in a mudbath.
Find it hard to disagree with him on that.
Find it really easy to disagree with that.
If the festival sells well, the organisers will have made money. A hell of a lot of festivals have sold out in the past few years, surely they wouldn't limit the ticket numbers so that they'd make a loss even if they sold out? You'll really have to show some evidence for that first claim.
For artists it's a big payday. They scrape by earning pennies at regular gigs for the rest of the year, performing to 'their' audience. Festivals are a chance for them to earn some good money and expand their fanbase, which is even easier now that a lot of festivals are being aired on tv and the internet.
Everyone knows how expensive festivals are, if they can't afford it then they won't go. Many of the bands that headline major festivals would be £30-50 to see on their own; if you calculated how much it'd cost to see all the bands you see at a festival in individual gigs it'd probably cost a lot more, with (most probably) poorer sound, less atmosphere and beer that's just as expensive.
the last part of that post
seems to be implying that seeing a band at a festival is preferable to seeing them at their own show - the opposite is true in the vast majority of cases
Strangely erudite and informed words from Bruce there ...
he's certainly moved on from "We learned more from a three minute record baby than we ever learned in school"
if Latitude only has 1000 tickets left, it's not exactly undersold, has it?
it had 1000 left 7 days ago, so i'm sure that figure has dropped since...
Whatevva - PHOENIX is back next year
I am not joking.
But anyway - there is a legitimate problem with a death of big young headliners at the moment, but I'm not sure it's the whole problem. Eavis is utterly fixated with the idea that Jay-Z screwed the ticket sales that year, but it's just bollocks - everyone had had a dreadful time at the two previous Glastonburys.
1,000 tickets still to go for Latitude isn't that bad, I don't think... I do think the relative dreariness of the musical line up has put people off, there are no coups like Thom Yorke this year, and whatever you say about Paulo Nutini's vast sales, I'm not sure they translate that well to festival attendees.
Reading/Leeds would seem to be the one that really in the shit, though... I think they need to have a think about their identity, really. They shouldn't really be letting Sonisphere and Download get away with the type of stadium grade headliners they've been pulling in, and I think The Strokes were a terrible miscalculation as a headliner...
The Strokes and Pulp co-headlined in 2002 as well
The Strokes were at their absolute peak in 2002
No band had ever been so hyped.
No one cares about them now
yes, this is true
i just think it's funny.
although, saying that,
at the time it felt like a bit of a 'so what', unlikes 2001 when, lest we forget, they were moved from midway through the Radio 1 stage to 4th from top on the main stage on the day (thus throwing out all the schedules) they were playing, due to safety concerns about x000 people more than the tent could hold trying to see them.
Yeah
I'm not sure who Reading/Leeds is for these days.
Ten years ago most of my friends who went were 16-18 year olds into alternative rock, metal, pop punk, emo etc. Kids like that would probably go to Download/Sonisphere now.
Jangly NME guitar music isn't cool anymore and 'indie music' seems to have morphed into dreary, middle-class, conservative, adult contemporary type stuff.
why does anyone believe just 1,000 Latitude tickets to go?
There is no way a promoter is going to say they have loads of tickets left to sell just a couple of weeks out regardless of how many are left.
Imagine if they announced 5,000 or 8,000 to go? Nobody would feel any incentive to buy and it would wreck their negotiating prospects with artists and "Comercial Partners" for next year.
why not believe it?
other festivals have been pretty honest about poor sales in recent years, not least Leeds/Reading and Glasto '08, and this year's hop farm. 1,000 is a perfectly believable figure (the website said 'less than 1,000 tickets) for a small-ish festival like Latitude. I just don't see the point in being kneejerk cynical about it. Bands will play next year if they get paid to do so.
festivals are clearly not on their way out
it's just that certain festivals have ramped up the price beyond all proportions (and not just the big ones - look at Truck, which has just about tripled in price in 5 years and still has the same sort of mid-level headliner plus some local bands thing going on). Also, Latitude not selling out this year is a combination of the capacity increase, a much poorer lineup than last year, and some of the bad press it got last year which probably put off some regulars.
It's pretty simple tbh - if your festival has a good lineup for its market, has a reputation for being a nice place to spend a weekend, and is reasonably priced, it'll do fine. End Of The Road and 2000 Trees have both sold out really early this year because they're just doing the right things.
Secret Garden Party
is a success. Tickets sold out two months in advance. Going for nearly double on ebay. Word is it will double capacity to 40k next year (was 4k in 2005)
the success of Secret Garden Party is kind of proof of the problem with headliners
in that it basically doesn't have them and it's built up its appeal without them.
indeed
from what I've heard, it's basically full of braying poshos on drugs.
It's bizarre, isn't it - the lack of meaningful bands means that it's not subject to the vagaries of musical fashion in any way, but I mean the idea that a lack of tangible musical identity actually increases its appeal is just weird. I mean, I know there's stuff on, but where does the ticket money even go?
*basically full of braying poshos on drugs*
Having been to two of their events, I can tell you this is entirely true. (Never get a posh girlfriend).
I think the point of it is it doesn't market it's self as a music festival
it's trying for a more ARTS festival vibe and it seems more focused on creating a world full of escapism as opposed to spending money on bands which could be better off spent creating an experience. I've heard nothing but good things about this festival because it is such an experiance and little distractions and that it's a certified get away as opposed to a corporate music event with an arena and campsite. It's got i's own identity and thats why it's so successful
it's great
basically like the night-time District 7/Shangri-La part of Glastonbury - but on all the time. Half the money goes on the design and funding groups to provide entertainment, they admit that. There is a lot of London A-level poshos, yes, but just ignore them. Potentially increasing ten times in size, in less than ten years, is impressive. It's a beautiful site as well.
they need some new big bands.
they need to charge less.
they need to scale back.
The inherent problem is
For a festival with R&L's demographic, there are no new big bands that could pull a big crowd for a headline slot. No rock/alternative/indie/metal bands are breaking through. They just don't get the hits needed these days. I think Arcade Fire are probably the last new band to headline off the back of their most successful album and not back catalogue (though i will be surprised if biffy don't headline very soon). They tried it with My Chemical Romance this year, but it was met with universal derision and cries that they weren't big enough. The thing is though, even if their last album was successful, due to all other rock bands failing, they're still one of the biggest bands that aren't just mining their back catalogue. Their last album went gold I think and they are still having minor hit singles. Unless they have been superhyped, most bands don't have hits at all these days.
maybe, but you look at the Download/Sonisphere headliners
and that's six bands that would probably have been a bigger draw, feels like Reading/Leeds have given serious ground, rock-wise, in recent years.
I dunno, I think the-dazzled's comments are pretty pertinent, the '00s seem like some sort of high watermark for festivals in terms of popularity and ticket price, if it's a choice between making no money and making money, the festivals will continue in scaled back form. I mean, according to wikipedia, Porno for Pyros and The The headlined Reading in '93. If it can survive that it can survive anything.
i was at that reading
porno for pyros were amazing.ive never seen such crowd baiting before or since!
ha!
I bet it was great, and certainly no disrespect to either band, it's just that even in '93, the commerical stature of those acts probably fell some way short of what would be expected of a Reading headliner now.
I'm old enough to remember
NME running an article on this in 1998, when the Phoenix Festival (returning next year as a one-off) was cancelled, basically saying rock is dead and all that. Then festivals became fashionable again and started selling out left, right and centre. So you could say it's cyclical but... the problem now (that we didn't have then) was price. The rise has been anything but inflationary.
The other problem for festivals that are "about the music" (i.e. just about everything except Glastonbury) is that... well, you can only have Kings of Leon and Kasabian headlining so many years on the trot before everyone gets bored. I've never got this thing where it's about the headliners because there's usually loads of stages, and decent stuff on the undercard, but for many people, for some reason, it is.
If enough tickets fail to sell, maybe the prices will come down a bit... supply and demand and all that. But I'm not optimistic.
if ever there was proof of reading and leeds being a massive fucking scrote-fest nowadays
it was the massive crowd that pendulum pulled (at leeds at least) in the tent whilst arcade fire were playing to not really many people at all, by headlining standards, on the main stage. i mean really
^ thats not proof of anything
I know plenty of pendulum fans who are a lot more friendly and less overbearing then Arcade Fire fans and Vice Versa, I fucking hate they way people place assumptions on peoples personalities entirely on music taste.
It seems to me
that the more awful & mainstream Glastonbury becomes, the more people want to go. I haven't been since 1995 when the headliners were Oasis (not one of their good nights), The Cure, who were brilliant as always, and of course Pulp, whose set was one of their career-defining moments. If someone like Beyonce had wandered onto the stage I like to think the bottles of piss would've flown (though that's more of a Reading thing). But the point is that in 95 it still felt edgy and different - you came home feeling changed somehow.
But it also seems there are way too many festivals these days, and the festival-going demographic is getting older and less willing to put up with sleeping in mud and being treated like cattle.
Factor in the cost of tickets, transport, food/beers etc, and you're paying the equivalent of a week on the beach for 3 days of entertainment of varying quality.
No-one's mentioned the economy yet?
Unemployment's up, inflation's up and wages aren't - things are especially bad for young people, who are probably the ones who spend more of their disposable income on music. The exchange rate is down 20% against the US dollar in the last three years, so promoters would have to pay more to get the same size bands, or book smaller bands.
Put all that together, and I'm not surprised many fests are struggling to sell out. (I do agree with a lot of the comments upthread, too).
Also if you took the combined ticket sales of UK festivals in 2011
and stacked them up against 1995 or something, it'd probably be about ten times as much.
That's an OK lineup
I'm sure you can find better (or should I say worse) than that
that line up is shocking^
i really couldn't justify spending that ammount of money to see 9 bands.
thing is though
that is a classic Latitude line-up. When I went a couple of years ago everyone was sat around reading the Guardian. Very middle of the road.
most fests i've been to had people sat about reading The Guardian to some degree
even in the early 90s at Glastonbury on the main stage field etc.
Oh noes!
Middle Classes at festivals! People reading the guardian! :O
I don't think you have a legitimate point when you berate a festival for people reading a newspaper (and one of the better ones at that).
Glad somebody finally said that
If you just sat there reading all weekend, something would be wrong. But Glastonbury (for instance) is exhausting even when it isn't mudbound and far more when it is. Sunday was my fifth day, and the first where you could sit down in a lot of places. So I don't see what was wrong in reading the paper for a bit while some bands parped away in the background (I obviously wasn't down the front). Then I got up and watched bands. I'm sure it wasn't just me.
Footnote: when you bought the Guardian at Glastonbury they gave you a free cloth bag with Elbow or Primal Scream lyrics. I put the two that I got onto eBay, and they just sold for a total of £53. :)
because it says
a lot about the level of entertainment on offer if people are sat around doing what they do everyday.
Totes this
When I was younger I'd do my best to leg it round fest sites all day every day getting AS MUCH MUSIC IN MY EARS AS POSSIBLE. I've realised this is futile now. It's ok to go to a fest and spend some precious minutes not watching bands.
It's down to loads of things, but mainly
- Festivals being too expensive and using up about 5 days of your annual leave these days, not including things like trains, ferries, accommodation, spending etc.
- There being too many of them
- Being in a recession essentially
- Line ups being transferable from each other, with few doing anything different
- Musical tastes being cyclical. Indie has had a very prominent decade in the limelight. I suspect if people have got any sense they're getting bored with it now, and something else is around the corner waiting to steal it's thunder. As much as I love Glasto, they limit themselves a tad as they need bands to be of a certain size to headline that mutha. The availability and amount of those bands every year dwindles, and isn't helped by Eavis himself having fairly conservative taste.
They'll be fine. But losing a few dozen of them really won't be a bad thing. At all.
Latitude not selling
Latitude has increased the number of tickets dramatically over the past 2 years and has sold more tickets than last year. Maybe its found its size. Otherwise generally I think Vamos has raised most of the important factors.
Surely a lot of the novelty factor is wearing off as fewer and fewer new acts are breaking through (esp. for the rock-ier fests). There will always be new 16 year olds excited about seeing the Foos or Metallica for the 1st time but as the audience ages, the motivation drops.
And I'm not sure the TV coverage helps. Coldplay and Beyonce at Glasto and then here they are again at T. Foos and the Big Weekend and whoah, they trundle through the same set at T. All this exposure surely sickens the average punter? All the anticipation / novelty is totally sucked out.
And that's before all the smaller boutique fests who think putting The Cribs or GLC on as headliners makes for a good bill.
Bestival lineup
is a good example. For me, a 42-yr old, it's practically a lineup made in heaven - The Cure, Primal Scream, PJ Harvey, Mogwai, Public Enemy - but is such a lineup of interest to the demographic who go to festivals?
Bestival does have a brilliant line-up
And I'd say there's enough of a mix in there, with all the DJs they have and Pendulum headlining alongside Bjork and the Cure
ENJOY PENDULUM AT BESTIVAL
?
I'm pointing out the mix they have, Pendulum are popular with the majority of teenagers whilst Bjork and the Cure are the more 'music fan' choice.
Don't worry about him, it's an injoke
But I hadn't spotted that Bestival hadn't sold out when it had by this time last year (despite this press release from nearly two months ago: http://www.virtualfestivals.com/latest/news/10297) Again, in my mind because of its reputation and who/what it can pull in Bestival would never not normally struggle.
the thing
about the bestival line up is that the dance selection is just sickeningly good so I don't think there's owt to worry about there.
well...
I don't know about anyone else but I booked my tickets based on the fact that all my favourite djs were playing there in on place. The hyperdub, Hessle, Numbers and Nights Slugs people there were enough to justify it by itself...
well
Bestival is almost sold out...
It is entirely about cost and line up.
Bestival has a brilliant line-up this year and as zahidf says is almost sold out. Leeds/Reading which normally sells really quickly has a shite line-up and isn't selling. At £200 it just isn't feasible for many people. You can go to Primavera (flights and accommodation included) for that price. Sunshine + stunning line-up.
A lot of the Leeds crowd were never there particularly for the music anyway its for the party and if the party costs a fortune it gets less appealing.
I very much doubt you can go to primavera flights and accommodation included for £200 unless you are VERY savvy with your flight and sleep in a rat infested hostel
I got my flights
for £80 and stayed in a nice place for £30 a night, so it wouldn't be difficult to do 4 nights and flights for around £200.
You'd still have to spend another 125 - 175 quid
to buy a Primavera ticket ...
£85 a ticket.
Sadly not
2010 prices: 99 to 180 euros (+ booking fee) depending on when you bought your ticket
that's euros mate.
Got my ticket for about £90
And the cost of transport to and from most UK festivals would have come to about half of that for me.
I admit that it is likely to cost a bit more going to Primavera but with that you can also do a bit of sightseeing and are guaranteed warm weather for a similar price.
what about the ticket?
i reckon primavera set me back about £300 + spending money, and i got my tickets and flights fairly early
I think the medium sized ones are in most danger
because they don't have the fame or niche audience.
Glastonbury will survive because it's Glastonbury (although whether they'll continue once Eavis stops is another thing), they sort of shoot themselves in the foot by being too sucessful in that their choice of headliners is very limited, though less so since they started booking acts like Jay Z. If you think of current, credible bands who are headliner size? Arcade Fire and Radiohead (and, as much as everyone loves them, they're in danger of becoming the 'Glastonbury in house band'), they do seem to have to rely on the legends or reformed bands now.
For the rest of them it really does seem to depend on the line up, I'm sure Bestival would have sold out ages ago if getting there didn't make it so expensive for most festival goers. End of the Road has a really strong line up this year and, because the people who go there will have heard of slightly more obscure acts, they can go on quality rather than popularity.
I agree with this
The middle ones are in danger of not really having a place. And I think the niche festivals that have grown into a mid-size fest sould be really careful of not finding themselves stranded. Green Man seems to have grown, yet still have a line up this year that looks like a rip off of the last two EotR's - I see it isn't sold out - any ideas on tickets sales for that one?
EotR has sold out a greater capacity because people LOVE it, because (in part) it is small. A lot of their ticket sales are due to word of mouth, but the cynic in me wonders if this would have been the case if everyone had known about the capacity increase at the start. Time will tell if they have ruined the tone of it with the increase.
I am still surprised about R&L though. Seems to have gone from an instant sell out, to no interest at all in a single year. Must be a bit nerve wracking if you have announced your entire line up on day one and this happens, as it's not like you can present any news to shift some more tickets.
i spent 200 quid on a flight & festival
to lisbon this week, by the beach and i will see arcade fire, strokes, tame impala, lykke li, portishead, arctic monkeys, jame smurphy, walkmen, elbow.
rather than going to some holier than thou festival somerset. where is the value for uk festivals?
Wouldn't pay 200 quid for that line up
even if it did include a flight, to be honest
Doesn't really compare with the average UK festival
It's on a much smaller scale, with only 2 live stages: 5 acts on the main stage, 4 acts on the second stage every day.
I'm a big fan of Leeds
but the price is frankly obscene for a semi-decent lineup and taking into account the fact that there are riots every year, unless you camp a million miles away from the arena. Fuck. That.
The whole Sunday night 'randomness! Lolz!' thing was a large part of why I stopped going to Reading.
Just meant that for the last night you had to keep an eye on your stuff to stop it getting burnt or trashed, even if you camped a long way from the arena. It really used to irk me that kids would burn their tents rather than leave them to be collected for a homeless charity if they were too thick to work out how to take them down. Twats.
All festivals of any large size are in danger while the music industry isn't able to create BIG bands.
Reading/Glasto and the like were built on the notion of there being lots of stadium sized bands out there which people generally couldn't get tickets to see any other way.
But we know already that new bands of that global scale are disappearing thanks to the change in how people listen to music, etc. Reading's headliners are mostly 10+ years old and massive because they came around before the industry changed. I don't think huge festivals of that type will be sustainable soon.
sadly
I can see bands like Mumford and Sons and Florence and the Machine turning into huge headliner acts in a few years. I'm not sure if this is better than festivals dying.
Except, you know, EVERY DANCE GENRE
Surely it's partly due to there being so much choice these days when it comes to festivals?
I think it's too many festivals offering the same thing rather than there being too much choice
Kendal Calling hasn't got a line up of huge star names yet
sold out 3 full months in advance. Creamfields has sold out the last couple of years. Manchester's Parklife also. small fests seem to be doing alright.
Kendal Calling
is a great lineup for the size/price though
There are so many reasons imo
And I'm sure I'll repeat much of what others have already said.
- Reading/Leeds has been damaged by it's stupid pricing. Too expensive for most teenagers except the ones really spoiled by their parents, or are prepared to work all summer for it. I wonder if the fact that less kids are going to go uni due to the fees will have an impact, or conversely kids/parents are having to save every penny for the fees. Also, Sonisphere has pillaged the rock day at R/L, I believe it's a touring European festival that outbids R/L by many ££££ to secure exclusivity shows by bands. Plus it's a shite festival in that there is nothing to do after bands finish unlike Glasto with shanghai la, latitiude has stuff on late and god knows what time Secret Garden Party finishes at night (i last went to reading in 2006 but doubt it;s changed, it has no more room due to its location).
- Latitude is probably just suffering from a crap line up and high ticket price. It pisses me off how it acts like it has no sponsors, but Tuborg just happens to be the main beer...
- There are no big bands coming through anymore, the era of that is probably over. Hence why muse, foo fighters etc play the same slots each year.
Festivals to survive will have to offer something an unique experience. When they can, they will often sell all their tickets regardless of the price.
Also,
End of the Road is a brilliant festival, that has been able to increase its capacity as it has confidence in it's audience. It offers a different experience, has it's own ethos etc. I dare say those who go regularly, like me trust the organisers (Simon and Sofia) decisions and that the festival will be brilliant each year. This year there is a real ale festival there i believe, and they are getting braver with their line up choices...Mogwai are not your typical eotr band! (like the huge fan i am, i'll be near the front hoping for Like Father, Like King :) ).
* My Father My King
Agree with most of your points, but not sure Latitude has ever claimed to be Sponsor free, they have a shitload of logos on their homepage. Isn't it Hop Farm that's supposed to be sponsor free, and looks like they could do with the money with their ticket sales.
I can't believe I made that Mogwai mistake.
Even more so as it's one of my favourites. D'oh!
Perhaps Latitude is more of a case of hidden sponsorship i.e. they stop short of calling it the Tuborg Latitude weekend.
Hop Farm is still in it's infancy, and almost every festival in it's growing years struggles (I don't think EOTR sold out till it's 4th or 5th year). Mind you, Im not sure Hop Farm's ethos of Mojo bands will ever be successful enough to be profitable.
End Of The Road nearly didn't make it to a second year
In its first year they ended up having to run a 2-for-1 ticket deal and was still only half full. The following year it fell about 500 short, and in year three it sold out for the first time.
Something that's just occurred to me
Why have the Foo Fighters not played Glastonbury since 1998? I know Eavis is wary about rock bands after the Pearl Jam Roskilde tragedy, but they're no more full-on than QOTSA or Biffy.
They've had Nine Inch Nails since then as well
yea thats
the only year ive ever been to glastonbury, think it was 1999 or 2000
SGP
has a midnight sound curfew Thursday and Sunday. 2am Friday and Saturday. No different.
This year Secret Garden Party stages close at:
Thursday 1am
Friday 6am
Saturday 6am
Sunday midnight.
I just came back from Obscene Extreme in Czech
Circa £35 ticket for a 3 day fest, Large crowds of people drinking 50p pints/absinth shots & crowdsurfing to obscure grindcore acts at 10am, people actually crowdsurfing to harsh noise acts too for that matter. Total mayhem with 1000s of people for the main acts at night. and FRIED CAMENBERT.
EVERYTHING is on the way out in the UK. In europe people actually care about music/festivals.
1000s of people for headline acts who would have a couple of 100 best for a London gig in some horrible camden venue...
This is the special thing about festivals. Same with ATP, getting people together in one place who would usually be part of some tiny scene in their own town. Kind of the same with ATP sometimes... This is why mainstream festivals are less relevant or interesting, there's nothing unusual about a large crowd turning up for some band everyone hears on the radio...
who
Do people think will be headlining the major festivals as new headliners? I'm saying yer Glasto and Readings?
I say Mumford and Sons, Elbow, Dizzee Rascal, Biffy Clyro and Bloc Party
This isn't who I necessarily want
But I agree with you on Elbow, could see them doing Glasto 2013.
Mumford and Sons - bloody hope not as I can't stand them but they are pretty popular and if they have another massive album then they could also be a contender for a Glastonbury 2013 headliner slot. Sounds a bit mad, but KOL did it pre-Sex On Fire and Pulp did it pre-Different Class.
Adele could headline a less rock-based festival. Although I think she said she doesn't like doing festivals.
If Dizzee Rascal has another hit album, he's a good shout.
I definitely don't agree with you on Bloc Party though. No way near big enough. They've become gradually less popular since their debut album. The general guy in the street who would recognise all of the above would only probably know 1 or 2 tracks of theirs.
Don't really know much about Biffy , but I could see them headlining Reading/Leeds.
It's difficult to think of many more to be honest. None of the class of the 00s really grew in to festival headlining-sized acts. Apart from the obvious one who have done it before.
*ones
Over exposure to the same ol', same ol'
After enjoying Glasto TV coverage (to a point, i.e. slightly less generic than previous years), it's sad to see BBC wasting money paying to televise the same average live bands a couple of weeks later at Rockness. What is the point? It's still available on the Glasto BBC site FFS! You don't even need to go to a festival anymore to get bored by all the same bands!
I used to love Big Chill, where you could see something/someone unique headlining a stage (Cornelius, Thievery Corporation,Sparks, Mad Professor, The Bays, Cinematic Orchestra,The Egg) then they doubled the capacity and became more and more generic and the magic (and the crowds) died. ATP has gone a bit samey now too.
Aaah, I do remember Porno for Pyros playing Reading all those years ago (after Rage Against the Machine which seemed strange at the time). I was wondering how the hell they ended up headlining, then the naked fire-eaters and topless trapeze artists started and the stilt people with massive dildoes came on sp*nking large swathes of white liquid over the crowd and I thought - wow, this is one Great freaky show - This deserves to headline!!
are festivals killing music?
Is music killing festivals?
Bloc weekend sold out in March
Just saying. That seemed decent value for money seeing as you didn't have to camp in a field.
is the Bernand Butler album put out on DiS killing festivals?
UK festivals are pretty rubz in comparison to European ones. Unfortunately I've recently started a new job so couldn't get time off, but I'm still hoping to get to Pully For Noise and Off Festival. Much cheaper, great line-ups, more cheaper line-up
*Brett Anderson
*Mr Anderson
NME reporting that Sonisphere want the Foos to headline next year. Can you feel the anticipation. Can you?