Festival Republic buys into Electric Picnic – official
Jim Carroll
Press release as issued this afternoon below the fold. FYI Festival Republic is the company formerly known as Mean Fiddler and is co-owed by MCD via Gaiety Investments and Live Nation.
(1) All those rumours were bang on. (2) Will this new MCD/POD love have any bearing on POD’s venues or is it solely a Picnic thing? (3) Will Aiken Promotions now do their own festival? (4) There sure will be some interesting culture clashes in Stradbally in September! (5) Will both POD and MCD be booking the Picnic? (6) How will this impact on the Picnic’s vibes? (7) Who the hell will headline the Picnic? (8) Does the Competition Authority have anything to say? (9) I assume it was just bad timing that this news broke late on the eve of a bank holiday.
“The UK’s leading festival & event promoter Festival Republic is investing in the Electric Picnic Music & Arts Festival in what will be a fresh new chapter in the festival’s evolution. After five years the festival has become one of the most heralded around the world receiving critical acclaim from music fans and media alike. It is now a three day multi staged family event with some of the biggest names in music performing as well as featuring the Body & Soul area, a large spoken word area, an arts & crafts field, theatre, comedy and a designated family campsite and kids area.
Festival Republic, which is co-owned by Live Nation & Gaiety Investments, has a festival portfolio which includes the iconic Glastonbury as well as the Latitude festival and Reading & Leeds festivals in the UK. “I have been a friend of John Reynolds for a long, long time and have been a fan of the Electric Picnic Festival since its inception; it is Ireland’s version of Glastonbury as far as I am concerned and has been a great inspiration to Latitude too. I am very excited about partnering with John and his team to become part of it” said Melvin Benn, Managing Director of Festival Republic.
Part of this new deal sees the buying out of Aiken Promotion’s interest in the festival.
With regards to the new collaborators John Reynolds says: “I look forward to the new partnership with Melvin Benn and his team. I have worked with Melvin on a number of projects over the years and I really look up to him as festival promoter.”
The Electric Picnic Music & Arts Festival will take place as usual in Stradbally on 4th, 5th & 6th of September. This year’s lineup will be announced beginning of April which is when tickets will also go on sale.”
i wonder what the capacity will be this year?
So Aiken are out. What acts does that automatically rule out for Picnic then? Animal Collective, Josh Ritter, etc. Or could Aiken-promoted acts still take part?
Just looking at the artists listed on Aiken’s website, you would imagine a very different vibe at Picnic this year without them.
It’s hard to tell what the impact of this will be. At least we know it’s definitely going ahead though.
Jim,
Wouldn’t happen to know if this is the result of a certain court case with IMRO, would you?
cripes. Wouldn’t have predicted that 2 years ago but with MCD snapping up EP acts since last year it’s not wholly surprising.
Don’t know quite what to think. Good if it keeps it going as before and improves on last years lacklustre line up, bad if it means EP turns into a generic “festival” with an identical rent-a-programme like all the others on the circuit.
Suddenly less certain about my plans for the w/end of the 4th Sep…
One wonders what was behind the POD/Aiken split and it must have been serious to have driven POD to Festival Republic instead. Obviously there a very few potential partners out there to take on Aikens role. I don’t think that the likes of Bestival would have the financial clout to invest in the Irish markets.
I can’t see why the competition authority would need to be involved. It’s not a monopoly and there’s nothing to stop anybody else entering the market. Even if you base it on solely on outdoor ticket sales, many of the Marlay Park gigs would equal (or nearly equal) the EP in terms of capacity.
For all the hand wringing over the loss of the vibe or whatever the fuck people are bemoaning it should be noted that Latitude has a great reputation.
i’ll second that latitutde comment far and away the best festival i was last year.
Huge amounts of cash,time and planning put into the site and design of the entire weekend.
None or almost no branding by anybody which is something that electric picnic could learn from.
C
I do agree is possibly the most branded festival in the country, I do think that they manage to do it very tastefully. Having said that I can only recall two brands from 08 – Nokia and O2 (other than Heineken poring the beer).
With a Latitude connection established, can we please get Joanna Newsom for the EP?! Anybody listening?!
I wish they would hurry up and publish the line up already!!! Ive been the last four years and i wont be going this year if the line up is as bad as last year