News broke earlier today that organisers of the now-MIA Big Day Out are planning to bring the world-famous Austin City Limits music festival to New Zealand next year, and appropriately re-dub it Auckland City Limits.
So the million dollar question is: what does this mean for Australia? Could we be in for a similar slice of the Austin City Limits action? Or could the long-loved Big Day Out be reborn in some other new and exciting way?
Unfortunately, there’s no definite answer as of yet. However, ex-NZ Big Day Out promoter Campbell Smith – who’s currently working with C3 Presents and American owners of the Big Day Out, Live Nation, to launch the new festival – reckons anything is possible.
“I haven’t had any further discussions with them about Australia,” he told triple j. “The only thing I know is [Australia] has great cities who love music so I think anything’s possible there festival-wise, it’s one of the best music markets in the world.”
While C3 and Live Nation have been fairly silent on the topic of the Big Day Out’s future since they purchased the iconic Aussie festival in December of last year, Live Nation Australasia’s President & CEO, Michael Coppel, has issued the following statement to triple j about what the new New Zealand festival could mean for Aussies:
“Auckland City Limits is a stand-alone festival that reflects the sister-city relationship between Auckland and Austin, and there are no plans to establish a similar festival to Australia at this time.”
However, as C3 is now part of the Live Nation family, we will of course be considering any opportunities in the future to provide Australian audiences major live events to supplement the current void in major capital city music festivals.”
Meanwhile, former BDO owner and current Soundwave boss AJ Maddah reckons the new festival across the ditch just might be paving the way for something similar Down Under.
“I’ve been to Austin City Limits and it is a brilliant festival,” he told the j’s. “Absolutely brilliant, I saw The Cure there a couple of years ago, which made me very happy. It’s a really good festival and if it’s going to be anything like that I think people have something to look forward to.”
“Obviously they’re testing the waters in Auckland and if it’s successful then hopefully it’ll come here.”
Sydney City Limits has a nice ring to it, after all.
Auckland City Limits will take place on Saturday, 19th March 2016 at Western Springs Stadium. Early bird tickets are on sale now.
Watch: Auckland City Limits Teaser
Auckland City Limits
Saturday, 19th March 2016
Western Springs, Auckland
Tickets: Auckland City Limits
