Proper Music Festival for NI?

plank007 · June 7th, 2010, 12:58 AM

Was at the Snow Patrol Concert last night which was fantastic. Biggest concert ever in NI and this got me thinking....

Why does NI not have a proper mainstream music festival every year?....Ok we used to have Tennents Vital in Botanic which was replaced with Belsonic which was fantastic last year but it's hardly a proper festival up there with T, V or Oxygen never mind Glastonbury.

Ireland has Oxygen at Punchestown which is really good as it's basically the same as T in Scotland. However I'd like to think NI could support a similar festival each year.

Also got me thinking about venues. Castlewellan, Tollymore Forest Park as possible venues? I'm sure there's loads of other venues across NI that could stage something like this.

Anyway thought it would be interesting. NI definitely needs a massive yearly concert/festival. Snow Patrol aren't going to keep coming back to Ward Park every few years.

hovis · June 7th, 2010, 01:10 AM

Maybe this could be incorperated into a use at the Maze site?

J4mesMcK · June 7th, 2010, 03:19 AM

I missed Belsonic last year, which I was gutted about. I will definitely make up for it this year, especially since they have encouraged Soulwax to come back

I would love to see NI host a larger festival to rival Oxegen and T in the park, but the festival season is pretty congested these days. How much competition is there to get the big artists to pull in the crowds?

I'm not so sure Castlewellan would be the best place to host such a festival. It's a nice place and these kinds of festivals have the potential to cause a lot of damage, especially if the weather isn't very good, turning the place into a giant mud pit. I'm sure there are plenty of suitable venues however.

thevanishin · June 7th, 2010, 01:12 PM

Vital was cancelled because the European festival market is at saturation point. From a band/promoter point of view, a trip to NI for a mid-size event at the height of festival season is financially a bad idea, considering there are dozens (if not hundreds) of massive events around the continent where they can charge a bigger fee and minimize travelling costs between venues.

Oxegen survives because it's the only major mainstream festival in Ireland, Electric Picnic caters for a very specific market and attracts a different crowd. If Vital could only pull 20,000 customers per event, with some of the world's biggest bands headlining, there is no way an annual event of that size or bigger could be financially viable here, particularly with competition from the other festivals.

I've thought about this before (a lot of my friends promote gigs in their spare time) and the only way I can see annual festivals working in NI is to have them on the scale of Belsonic or smaller, so around 5000 people or less.

I think this model would work here because promoters can cater for a less mainstream market with smaller financial risk. Belsonic works well because of the excellent location and the choice of performers; one crowd-puller headlining each night, and the support acts cater for the niche market of die-hard fans.

Personally, I think Belsonic should be aiming to create something similar to ATP festival, where you get die-hard fans travelling from around Europe to see bands that have a fairly limited appeal. The city-centre setting works for events like this. After all, it's better to have people travelling to the city for gigs and spending their time and money there, rather than have them going to a field in the middle of nowhere and leaving their rubbish behind.

Now that I think of it, events like Trans Festival, Open House, Cathedral Quarter arts festival and the Festival at Queen's all cater for this market in some shape or form. The tourist board could be spending a lot of money to promote these events. If they aren't they certainly should be.

bfast1983 · June 9th, 2010, 07:25 PM

Tennants Vital said they couldn't keep putting it on because of the international festival scene was at saturation point... then Belsonic came along within 2 months and provided just as good a lineup and has gone from success to success. Same goes for the Beach Party in Portrush - original promoters said they couldn't attract the big names, then Col Hamilton and PLM took it over and brought Basement Jaxx, Chemical Brothers, Prodigy and most recently Fatboy Slim.

If there was a proper festival, of course it would attract people in their thousands. What I would like to see would be a proper electronic music festival - less of the Planet Love crowd and more in the line of Soulwax - JamesMcK you missed a good one, I bought my ticket for this year's one already

In fact the original Planet Love used to have a cracking lineup, with a Shine tent along with many others - we can attract all the big names to Northern Ireland now, would be nice to have them playing back to back.

There are lots of good and beautiful places we could stage a music festival - near Shaw's Bridge to be in Belfast, Shane's Castle in Antrim, the list is endless.

Why not call it the "Peace Festival", in celebration of the ceasefire, stage it at the Maze and try to get those good old media conscious people to do it for free!

J4mesMcK · June 9th, 2010, 09:10 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bfast1983

What I would like to see would be a proper electronic music festival - less of the Planet Love crowd and more in the line of Soulwax - JamesMcK you missed a good one, I bought my ticket for this year's one already

Sounds good, I was pretty gutted about missing Soulwax last year, but I caught their Soulwaxmas gig in the Ulster Hall at Christmas. Great show!

I would also love to see a big Electronic music festival, but I wouldn't be too keen on the Planet Love crowd.

Would any of the local production/promoting companies have enough money to risk on such a festival?

bfast1983 · June 9th, 2010, 11:58 PM

I was at the Ulster Hall gig too, was pretty much the same set and visuals tbh and I enjoyed it just as much a second time

I am supposing by the fact that they haven't done it yet that the answer is probably no, or else they are simply not interested in taking the risk. Belsonic and the recent events at the Ulster Hall have shown that people are interested in good electronic music, but I think they would need to keep the ticket prices prohibitively high to stop all the wankers of the day from getting in, which would make it non cost effective for Northern Ireland.

Take a look at one of the original lineups of Planet Love http://www.planetlovemusic.com/love03/love00.htm . Okay there's a lot of crap there, but the Lush arena had Digweed, Timo Maas and Shine just had a brilliant lineup. But yeah, you couldn't pay me to go there these days.

thevanishin · June 12th, 2010, 12:51 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by bfast1983

Tennants Vital said they couldn't keep putting it on because of the international festival scene was at saturation point... then Belsonic came along within 2 months and provided just as good a lineup and has gone from success to success.

I meant that Belsonic, while providing an excellent line-up and being successful, is still only catering for an audience about one quarter the size of Vital.

Having said that, I totally agree with you on the idea of a good electronic music festival. This might be of interest to you http://www.transbelfast.com/

hypnotoad24 · June 14th, 2010, 11:14 PM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thevanishin

Having said that, I totally agree with you on the idea of a good electronic music festival. This might be of interest to you http://www.transbelfast.com/

This is a class event. Went to a few shows last year- the best i saw was FM Belfast, who were tremendous. Was also interesting to see the locations of some of the gigs last year- for example, FM Belfast played in the Waterfront, but it was in the glass area overlooking the river. There were also gigs on at the viewing platform in Victoria Square- for 21 people! Never got the chance to go to one, but i imagine that would have been a great experience.

thevanishin · June 16th, 2010, 09:25 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by hypnotoad24

This is a class event. Went to a few shows last year- the best i saw was FM Belfast, who were tremendous. Was also interesting to see the locations of some of the gigs last year- for example, FM Belfast played in the Waterfront, but it was in the glass area overlooking the river. There were also gigs on at the viewing platform in Victoria Square- for 21 people! Never got the chance to go to one, but i imagine that would have been a great experience.

Is that the place advertised as the Waterfront Penthouse? The Dome gigs look fantastic, I wonder how the acoustics would sound up there.

hypnotoad24 · June 16th, 2010, 10:26 AM

Quote:

Originally Posted by thevanishin

Is that the place advertised as the Waterfront Penthouse? The Dome gigs look fantastic, I wonder how the acoustics would sound up there.

Yeah, i think the penthouse is the very spot- it was the top floor of the glass bit. The acoustics in the dome could be very interesting- the sound would get reflected back towards the viewing platform from all sides! Certainly, when you're up there on a normal day, it can seem quite noisy.

June 7th, 2010, 12:58 AM	#1
plank007 Registered User Join Date: Mar 2009 Posts: 3,618 Likes (Received): 5	Proper Music Festival for NI? Was at the Snow Patrol Concert last night which was fantastic. Biggest concert ever in NI and this got me thinking.... Why does NI not have a proper mainstream music festival every year?....Ok we used to have Tennents Vital in Botanic which was replaced with Belsonic which was fantastic last year but it's hardly a proper festival up there with T, V or Oxygen never mind Glastonbury. Ireland has Oxygen at Punchestown which is really good as it's basically the same as T in Scotland. However I'd like to think NI could support a similar festival each year. Also got me thinking about venues. Castlewellan, Tollymore Forest Park as possible venues? I'm sure there's loads of other venues across NI that could stage something like this. Anyway thought it would be interesting. NI definitely needs a massive yearly concert/festival. Snow Patrol aren't going to keep coming back to Ward Park every few years.

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June 7th, 2010, 01:10 AM	#2
hovis Registered User Join Date: May 2010 Location: Belfast Posts: 812 Likes (Received): 0	Maybe this could be incorperated into a use at the Maze site?

June 7th, 2010, 03:19 AM	#3
J4mesMcK Registered User Join Date: Jun 2008 Location: Belfast Posts: 136 Likes (Received): 0	I missed Belsonic last year, which I was gutted about. I will definitely make up for it this year, especially since they have encouraged Soulwax to come back I would love to see NI host a larger festival to rival Oxegen and T in the park, but the festival season is pretty congested these days. How much competition is there to get the big artists to pull in the crowds? I'm not so sure Castlewellan would be the best place to host such a festival. It's a nice place and these kinds of festivals have the potential to cause a lot of damage, especially if the weather isn't very good, turning the place into a giant mud pit. I'm sure there are plenty of suitable venues however.

June 7th, 2010, 01:12 PM	#4
thevanishin Registered User Join Date: Dec 2008 Posts: 323 Likes (Received): 0	Vital was cancelled because the European festival market is at saturation point. From a band/promoter point of view, a trip to NI for a mid-size event at the height of festival season is financially a bad idea, considering there are dozens (if not hundreds) of massive events around the continent where they can charge a bigger fee and minimize travelling costs between venues. Oxegen survives because it's the only major mainstream festival in Ireland, Electric Picnic caters for a very specific market and attracts a different crowd. If Vital could only pull 20,000 customers per event, with some of the world's biggest bands headlining, there is no way an annual event of that size or bigger could be financially viable here, particularly with competition from the other festivals. I've thought about this before (a lot of my friends promote gigs in their spare time) and the only way I can see annual festivals working in NI is to have them on the scale of Belsonic or smaller, so around 5000 people or less. I think this model would work here because promoters can cater for a less mainstream market with smaller financial risk. Belsonic works well because of the excellent location and the choice of performers; one crowd-puller headlining each night, and the support acts cater for the niche market of die-hard fans. Personally, I think Belsonic should be aiming to create something similar to ATP festival, where you get die-hard fans travelling from around Europe to see bands that have a fairly limited appeal. The city-centre setting works for events like this. After all, it's better to have people travelling to the city for gigs and spending their time and money there, rather than have them going to a field in the middle of nowhere and leaving their rubbish behind. Now that I think of it, events like Trans Festival, Open House, Cathedral Quarter arts festival and the Festival at Queen's all cater for this market in some shape or form. The tourist board could be spending a lot of money to promote these events. If they aren't they certainly should be.

June 9th, 2010, 07:25 PM	#5
bfast1983 Registered User Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Belfast Posts: 119 Likes (Received): 1	Tennants Vital said they couldn't keep putting it on because of the international festival scene was at saturation point... then Belsonic came along within 2 months and provided just as good a lineup and has gone from success to success. Same goes for the Beach Party in Portrush - original promoters said they couldn't attract the big names, then Col Hamilton and PLM took it over and brought Basement Jaxx, Chemical Brothers, Prodigy and most recently Fatboy Slim. If there was a proper festival, of course it would attract people in their thousands. What I would like to see would be a proper electronic music festival - less of the Planet Love crowd and more in the line of Soulwax - JamesMcK you missed a good one, I bought my ticket for this year's one already In fact the original Planet Love used to have a cracking lineup, with a Shine tent along with many others - we can attract all the big names to Northern Ireland now, would be nice to have them playing back to back. There are lots of good and beautiful places we could stage a music festival - near Shaw's Bridge to be in Belfast, Shane's Castle in Antrim, the list is endless. Why not call it the "Peace Festival", in celebration of the ceasefire, stage it at the Maze and try to get those good old media conscious people to do it for free!

June 9th, 2010, 11:58 PM	#7
bfast1983 Registered User Join Date: Apr 2009 Location: Belfast Posts: 119 Likes (Received): 1	I was at the Ulster Hall gig too, was pretty much the same set and visuals tbh and I enjoyed it just as much a second time I am supposing by the fact that they haven't done it yet that the answer is probably no, or else they are simply not interested in taking the risk. Belsonic and the recent events at the Ulster Hall have shown that people are interested in good electronic music, but I think they would need to keep the ticket prices prohibitively high to stop all the wankers of the day from getting in, which would make it non cost effective for Northern Ireland. Take a look at one of the original lineups of Planet Love http://www.planetlovemusic.com/love03/love00.htm . Okay there's a lot of crap there, but the Lush arena had Digweed, Timo Maas and Shine just had a brilliant lineup. But yeah, you couldn't pay me to go there these days.