UK: By contracting access control and cashless payment specialist Intellitix, Detonate will be 100% cashless this year. Radio Frequency Identification (RFID) wristbands are now the sole payment method for food, drinks and merchandise purchases across the entire site. The underground music promoter was established 16 years ago, running acclaimed club nights across Nottingham, Sheffield, Leeds and beyond. The team launched Detonate Festival last year and 2015’s one-day spectacular sees appearances from the best in urban music, including Nas performing his acclaimed album “Illmatic”, Sub Focus, Sigma and Wilkinson. “We’re excited by the opportunity to go ‘cashless’ because music is at…
Author: Festival Insights
USA: The Forecastle Festival, Louisville’s three-day music, art and environmental activism festival, is bringing back the The Bourbon Lodge, with a unique line-up of bourbon offerings, education, bourbon-inspired cuisine, and the return of the charitable partnership, Bourbon Cares. Wall Street Journal best-selling author Fred Minnick hailed Forecastle Festival as “bourbon’s most important festival for new consumers,” in 2013, praising its creation of “future connoisseurs.” Set to take place July 17 – 19, Forecastle will feature a diverse collection of Kentucky bourbon brands uniting to offer dozens of bourbon selections within the Bourbon Lodge, including those from Bulleit, Four Roses, Heaven…
UK: The Tank Museum at Bovington, Dorset, has announced Topher as its chosen provider of security and traffic management services for the annual Tankfest, set to take place from June 27 – 28. Tankfest is a two-day display and celebration of this famous family of war machines, and promises its visitors a great deal of noise, action and of course, tanks from all over the world. Tony Stirling, The Tank Museum’s operations manager, explained the decision to select Topher for Tankfest 2015, saying: “It was essential for us to find a traffic management service that would be able to not…
UK: After a successful partnership, Shambala Festival has awarded a two-year contract extension to Eventserv. EventServ’s partnership with Shambala Festival started in 2013 when it was appointed to supply fencing, barriers, observation towers and bridges to the festival over a three-year period. This has led to the renewal of EventServ’s contract to cover both the 2016 and 2017 Shambala festivals. This year’s Shambala is set to take place from August 27 – 30. Lee Collis, south regional manager at EventServ, said: “We always go the extra-mile for our clients and to win a contract extension is the ultimate recognition for…
FINLAND: Covered by a huge pressurised inflatable, Flow festival’s the Bright Balloon 360° stage will include an interactive screen installed by inside technology specialists Bright Finland. The Bright Balloon 360° line-up includes a string of international acts such as Mali-based desert blues band Songhoy Blues and Nick Zinner of Yeah Yeah Yeahs fame. Islam Chipsy will deliver a flavour of Egyptian folk music with an electronic edge and J. Karjalainen will step onto the round stage with his one-man Lännen-Jukka show. Also announced is the young and promising Swedish soul singer Seinabo Sey and U.S.based newcomer Natalie Prass, whose self-titled…
UK: Popular broadcasters Danny Wallace and Edith Bowman have been confirmed to host this year’s Sky Arts coverage of The Isle of Wight Festival from June 11 – 14. The pair will be roaming around the festival site and conducting exclusive backstage interviews all weekend to feature in the programmes alongside live performances from the Main Stage and Big Top. Edith Bowman said “I am thoroughly enjoying working with Sky on Guitar Star, and I am thrilled to be covering the legendary Isle of Wight Festival for them. It’s a great festival that I’ve been to many times and the…
UK: Academy Music Group (AMG) venues across the UK have endorsed and introduced the national Access Card scheme from Nimbus Disability, the tool to connect disabled customers with the service industry. AMG venues are official ‘CredAble’ providers, all of which have been audited and assessed for access by Nimbus, as well as recognised over several years by leading charity and access experts Attitude Is Everything, via its commitment to the ‘Charter of Best Practice’. The Access Card scheme – designed and implemented by Martin Austin of Nimbus Disability – allows disabled customers to easily and discreetly let businesses know any…
Yaw Owusu is the Creative Director of youth culture organisation URBEATZ, Director at creative solutions company the playmaker group and Nothin But The Music and the Music Curator for Liverpool International Music Festival. In this article he discusses the challenges of curating an event whose host city has a rich cultural heritage. My name is Yaw Owusu. I have a few roles depending on what room I’m in but my professional title is Music Manager & Curator. In a nutshell I manage music artists, campaigns and projects and curate events and festivals. Being called a curator is pretty new to…
GIBRALTAR: Bringing some of the world’s biggest live acts to Gibraltar each year, GMF will return from September 5 – 6, promising its biggest line-up to date in the picturesque and intimate surroundings of Victoria Stadium on the Rock of Gibraltar. Headliners this year are Kings Of Leon, who come to GMF as a British exclusive performance, and pop icons Duran Duran. Joining the headliners is a supporting cast including award-winning piano balladeer Tom Odell, breakthrough singer-songwriter Rae Morris, power pop superstars The Feeling, pop-rock chart smashers Lawson and reggae veterans Third World alongside names like Reach, Strange Brew, Tim…
UK: Several of the UK’s largest and most prominent music festivals, including We Are FSTVL, Ramblin’ Man Fair, Holi Festival of Colours, and Boomtown Fair, are now using Eventbrite to sell tickets for their upcoming festivals online. Combined, these four UK events expect to attract well over 100,000 attendees. Abandoning their in-house ticketing system in favour of Eventbrite’s scalable solution and fully mobile optimised ticketshop, the creators of the Holi Festival of Colours’ World Tour in 40 cities have decided to not only host their London flagship event at Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park through Eventbrite, but all of their European…