Electric Picnic 2021 - Cancelled :( **No Ticket Sales / Requests **

alastair

I’ve been told that someone who works in merch for festivals - including EP, reckons it’s not happening. Take that for whatever it’s worth. I’m keeping the faith, but not very optimistic.

The Nal

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117698140#Comment_117698140

They will yeah, same as 2020.

There isnt a hope in hell this is going ahead btw. Literally not a 1% chance theres 70,000 people congregating together in 52 days. Everyone should make different plans.

davywalsh7

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700034#Comment_117700034

Spoke to them around the announcement of the new date change and they believed that it’s not happening. Haven’t been speaking to them about it since.

things change so fast with covid I guess maybe there’s still hope. Hard to imagine government givin us the go ahead to have 70k in a field within the next 7 weeks or so though

properbo

I'm fully vaccinated anyway. Still going ahead is what I'm been told We may just wait and see.

everlast75

Those Romanian vaccines are en route. 700k doses.

Stillill42

What a confused mess we are. I'd say this thread is the only place in the country outside musicians and crew that are still hoping this goes ahead. Anyway, there's always the music, lads. I've spent the day painting to Les Savy Fav (ta to the Primavera thread), Prefab Sprout and Suede. Which was lovely. Chin up, people.

Larbre34

I think it's a shame that they're treating people a bit like the Garth Brooks gig at this stage (albeit it's not the promoters fault here).

Having worked on licensing and safety plans in the past though, I would say there's less than a 10% chance now that EP will go ahead this year.

PTH2009

Things are just not adding up

Were ahead of the UK on vaccinations but there they have almost got rid of all there covid restrictions and us here still been frustrating ultra cautious

Why aren't journalists here asking the hard questions

hynesie08

As of Monday, security and logistics companies had an SOP with regards a full capacity festival, it's likely to barely break even with the additional measures and the extra bodies needed to make it work, but festival republic are convinced it's going ahead.

ghostdancer

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701218#Comment_117701218

LOL

"not adding up", "asking the hard questions"

Calm down Bob Woodward 🙄

They got rid of restrictions and their hospitalisations have increased 600% in 2 months.

And we've gotten rid of almost all the same restrictions now too. Luckily we delayed doing it a few more weeks and that's probably why ours didn't increase significantly like theirs.

Furious-Red

Was listening to Radio 1 on the way home from the train station and they had local FF and FG TD's from Laois talking about whats going on with regards to EP.

Have to say it made me angry in the way they were talking about the whole EP situation, so there might be a rant coming from me now ha so I apologise if I offend anyone. BTW I totally understand that with Covid nothing is easy and there will always be a level of uncertainty as we look ahead, but at the same I feel we need to start moving on with life and learning to live with Covid. The events sector is literally on its knees and has been since they closed up nearly 500 days ago, there was never a proper reopening plan.

During the interview on Radio 1, the FF TD said we should wait till January time before opening large events due to the delta variant as it is not the right time to open (But when will the right time be?) which means remaining more cautious at the expense of the events industry. They were asked people can pop over the border to the Belsonic gigs in Belfast to enjoy larger outdoor events which the FF TD replied oh but they are different because they are sit down events (think he needs to look up Belsonic). The most annyoying part was that they were asked if Catherine Martin gave the go ahead what would Laois council be happy with and the FG TD replied if they went back to the 5-10k capacity of the eariler EP days for 2021 with a fully Irish line up which is not viable for FR/MCD because of money that will need to be refunded.

Overall they are clearly very against EP going ahead in 2021 because of what happened in Feb when they had an outbreak in a nursing home which of course was very sad to lose people, but since Feb and up until the end of Sept we will definitely be at least 90% of the population will be fully vaccinated so we are in a completely different zone of protection. I think they did mention that the planning permission decision could be decided by the end of this week. If you look at the UK who are due to run R&L/IOW/Transmit around the same time seem to be going ahead anyways so its time we kinda caught up with them in that sense. Part of me would love Benn to up and leave Stradbally next year and move to another location in Ireland if it isnt allowed (That could just be me being petty ha).

Thank you for coming to my Ted talk/ word vomit rant.

Seathrun66

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700310#Comment_117700310

In terms of making different plans it's not like we're putting off Caribbean trips or dates with the cast of Gossip Girl to head to Stradbally. If we're not there we'll be cutting our toenails, supping IPA and watching Netflix all weekend.

Rfrip

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701451#Comment_117701451

coincidentally….Dan from gossip girl played at ep at body and soul main stage a few years ago. Was really good!

Stillill42

https://twitter.com/PointatPort/status/1422618242015809542?s=20

You have to hand it to them, they're working their asses off.

scruff monkey

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701218#Comment_117701218

They've gotten rid of all their restrictions as a political stunt to mask the damage that they've done to their economy and as a distraction from the shag bag of custards complete and utter corrupt mishandling of the pandemic. It's not because it's actually safe yet.

Dr. Bre

Next few weeks will be crucial

melekalikimaka

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701571#Comment_117701571

https://i.imgur.com/JBIHXFO.png

true

hynesie08

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701571#Comment_117701571

He's going to counter with "what about Scotland?" And ignore the fact that they rode out the delta wave before lifting restrictions, which is almost exactly what we're doing.

I don't want to be all "I know something you don't know" but behind the scenes September is being lined up as a very important month.

scruff monkey

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700310#Comment_117700310

52 sleeps, the time unit convention here is sleeps. It has always been sleeps and will only ever be sleeps.

kthxbai

bodhrandude

It like a see saw isn't it, fcuk knows, I want this so much to go ahead, if it does it will make up some what for the lack of gigs the last 15 months. Thank god for buskers and busking in Galway, live music is great for sanity. I dreaming of the next photo opportunity with fellow boardsies as I missed the last one.

Fatfrog

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701436#Comment_117701436

I must say I'm disappointed by rte in recent times, as blind boy pointed out every "debate" is planned for a 5-6 min duration, they'll usually pick massively opposing sides, 1 being a government rep and the other a slightly crazy opposer, throw a hand grenade in and let them have almost a personal argument rather than a factual informed debate. 5 min with a break inbetween, the debate will run out of time. The "winner" will be the slippiest fcuk rather than the most factual and practical. We the public are none the wiser about the actual issue.

Honestly what is going to change between end of September and Jan??

As much as I love the location I completely agree about moving venue.

I think there significance around the timing of the below, must be a decision by end of week?

https://www.facebook.com/85480429167/posts/10159449421059168/

Seathrun66

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700941#Comment_117700941

Paddy Mc, will we ever see him again?

Seathrun66

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117700941#Comment_117700941

And ironically we've even got the anti-vaxxers against us now, the one group who are all up for opening everything. #FeelingPersecuted

Stillill42

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702036#Comment_117702036

I fear not. I was talking to a guy who interviewed Martin, the brother, for a podcast recently. Lovely fella by all accounts, very open and willing to chat about life in the band but told him to forget about getting hold of Paddy. What a band, though.

Seathrun66

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701218#Comment_117701218

We're only (slightly) ahead on adults fully vaccinated. We're behind both on the percentage of the full population having the first dose and full population fully vaccinated. At our pace we will soon pass the UK on both I believe but the timeline is very tight. Were the authorities to have walk-in centres open seven days a week in multiple locations alongside the stadia/racecourse appointments then it would look very good indeed at the end of this month when final decisions have to be made.

Speaking out of ignorance without any experience of festival logistics i think that EP can be put on with four weeks notice. Scaling back acts, stages and some food outlets won't make much difference to us attendees. Latitude was given four weeks notice (25 June to 22 July) and FR have everything ready to go for this. I'm not optimistic but it's all in place.

And a very random question in terms of change of venue. Could EP be put on as a non-camping festival in, say, Phoenix Park with 2/3 stages? The logistics people for FR could handle it, and at a guess (possibly 30k attendees from the city) we're only talking 40k extra people in a metropolis of 1.9m. Were it to be another government test event then licences could be swiftly dealt with. After that the way is cleared for other events. But as is obvious there needs to be some will......

Seathrun66

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702056#Comment_117702056

What a band indeed. Paddy just saunters around Durham with a Tom Wolfe white suit, cane and pre-hipster Gandalf beard. Avoids the media, stage and recording studios which is a big loss. But we got Green & Scritti back so I have a little hope.

Seathrun66

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701436#Comment_117701436

I agree with all of that bar Benn upping sticks. It's pretty certain that you'd find objections to festivals going ahead in every last corner of the planet (pre and mid-Covid) and the same goes for poorly researched politicians. It's not asking too much for cleverer journalists to have done their homework and put said people on the spot.

Mike Guide 69

It would be interesting to see if indeed a big scale back of the festival was put in place,I mean there was going to be extra grounds ,stages put up for the 70k capacity,how that is going to be addressed is another thing. I see the festival that the Dutch government pulled the plug on remaining outdoor venues ,had a capacity I think of 25k over two days (Utreacht). There was the covid passes/certs check in place.Covid positive case figures were under 1,100 but even the organisers couldn’t confirm if all those cases occurred at the festival…..

Seathrun66

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117701472#Comment_117701472

As least expected responses go Rfip, yours is up there....

scruff monkey

https://www.boards.ie/discussion/comment/117702036#Comment_117702036

Doubt it, he's dealing with effects of Ménièrs which is nasty, it has recently fucked over Huey Lewis who cannot perform or sing* live anymore either. My mam had a very mild form of it for years.

*Insert what ever joke you want about "he couldn't sing anyway" etc but it must be pretty horrific to have the only thing you do being snatched away from you.