A co-founder of one of the biggest music festivals on the planet, Chicago’s Lollapalooza, has just taken a hot steaming deuce on our 2021 music festival dreams.
Despite multiple huge tours and festivals across Australia and the world rescheduling their COVID-cancelled 2020 events for next year, Marc Geiger doesn’t reckon they’ll end up going ahead either.
Speaking on the Bob Lefsetz Podcast, the Lollapalooza boss said he reckons “super-spreader” events like music festivals won’t make a full comeback til the pandemic is totally under control.
“In my humble opinion, it’s going to be 2022,” he said.
“It’s going to take that long before, what I call, the germaphobic economy is slowly killed off and replaced by the claustrophobia economy – that’s when people want to get out and go out to dinner and have their lives, go to festivals and shows,” he continued (via NME).
“It’s my instinct, that’s going to take a while because super-spreader events – sports, shows, festivals…aren’t going to do too well when the virus is this present.”
He then warned: “The next six months may be more painful than the last six months, and maybe the next six months after that are even more so.”
However, bear in mind that Lollapalooza is an event in America, where the scourge of the pandemic is far more insidious than it is here. It’s predicted up to 18,000 US citizens could die from the virus by August 8th, as cases over there continue to soar, with 10,000 new cases identified over the past 24 hours in the state of Florida alone (ICYMI the US also has 49 other states to worry about).
It’s possible that here in Australia, we could see things get back to normal sooner, depending on what happens with the current outbreaks in Victoria and NSW…
For now, a number of music festivals including UNIFY Gathering, Splendour In The Grass, Yours & Owls, Byron Bay Bluesfest & more have all announced events for 2021, while Falls Festival is still hoping to happen this December everywhere except Marion Bay.
We’ll bring you more news as it develops.
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