Coachella was the gold standard of music festivals. Has it lost its shine?
Coachella,Homepage News
Kaitlyn Huamani April 11, 2024
In 2015,
the
Coachella
Valley Music and Arts Festival
was one of the hottest tickets
on the planet in town,
selling out in
record time: 40 minutes
. AC/DC brought the house down with an electric set. Madonna planted a kiss on Drake on stage.
The then-unstoppable
Kanye West made a surprise appearance during the Weeknd’s performance.
Tickets sold out in
.So whats happened since then?
Ahead of Coachellas
opening start
on Friday, tickets for the second weekend of the festival are still available
(it took a month for the first weekend to sell out)
, and resale tickets are going for well below face value on StubHub and other secondary
market sites resellers
in an unprecedented year of sluggish sales
the slowest in a decade. So what happened?The festival that used to sell out consistently, no matter the cost or lineup and often before the lineup was unveiled seems to have lost some of its steam in its 23rd year of shows.
After the festival expanded from one weekend to two in 2012, it sold out almost every year since then
from that sub-hour whir as quickly as 40 minutes[Maane okd] in 2015 to four-plus hours in 2022 in its post-COVID return. The following year marked the first time in 11 years that the event did not sell out both weekends. At full capacity, the fest drew up to 125,000 concertgoers a day. Dave Brooks
,
the senior director of touring and live at Billboard Billboard’s senior director of live music and touring
,
says said
the dip in sales and fan interest is a natural off-cycle for Coachella.
I dont buy that the Coachella brand is permanently diminished at all, Brooks said. Obviously
,
this was an off
–
year, [but] its hands-down one of the best experiences out there.
Still, the Coachella craze from about a decade ago
, when getting a weekend pass was nearly impossible even a day after tickets were released,
has notably faded.
P Rising prices
,
criticism of the a less buzzy lineup than years past
and stiff competition in the live music space are all likely to blame.
Although interest has decreased,
prices on the
Coachella
website ticket prices
have not. Before fees, general admission tickets cost $499
– to $549,
and VIP tickets are going for $1,069
– to $1,269
.
While plenty of tickets are available at a lower price point on resale sites, cost is still a deterrent for many.
With
shuttle services to Indio, gas and lodging, transportation, parking , and
expensesor lodging
each racking up hundreds of dollars, some might
feel think
the cost
is not isn’t
quite worth the experience.
But after a year when fans shelled out insane amounts of money for Taylor Swift and Beyoncs concerts,
Stig Edgren
, a live event producer and
music industry
lecturer in
music industry
at UCLA,
says said
the lineup is more likely to blame for this years slump.
The internet was divided after Goldenvoice, the festivals
founder and
producer, announced the
Coachella lineup performers
in January. Lana Del Rey, Tyler , the Creator and Doja Cat are headlining with special guest No Doubt, and Edgren said the demand for these artists just isn’t there this year.
Goldenvoice didn’t respond to The Times’ requests for comment.
had
both wrapped up tours at the
close end
of 2023 and Tyler
,
the Creator performed at
the his
Camp Flog Gnaw Festival in November, so fans may have
just
recently seen the headliners at their respective shows and festival appearances.
This years artists also dont
come with have
the same
cult-like following rabid fan bases
as previous headliners, like last years international stars Bad Bunny and
BLACKPINK Blackpink
, and Brooks said
what this years the
lineup lacks
is
the commercially successful music stories that past years have boasted.
Other
recent notable
headliners include
Lady Gaga, Kendrick Lamar, Beyonc, Harry Styles, Billie Eilish and Frank Ocean
. The latter
caused a stir last yearmade headlines
with his controversial divisive performance and
subsequent
cancellation of his
set for the second W
eekend
2 set
, which
might have left a bad taste in outragedfuture
festival-goers
‘ mouths and possibly deterred future attendance
.
There
s are
also tough competitors in the festival space with flashier lineups than Coachella. Stagecoach, the popular country music festival, will take over the same Indio
polo
grounds
as Coachella
starting April 26 with headliners
Miranda Lambert, Morgan Wallen and Eric Church
. The Lovers & Friends festival will hit Las Vegas a week later, boasting a lengthy list of headliners
,
including
Usher, Janet Jackson, Alicia Keys, Gwen Stefani, Snoop Dogg , and the Backstreet Boysand more legendary hip-hop artists
.
That same weekend is packed with festivals across the country. Headliners
Post Malone, Stevie Nicks and Noah Kahan
will lead
the pack at
the Lovin Life Music Fest in Charlotte, N.C.
Weezer, Queens of the Stone Age and Foo Fighters
will take the stage at the Shaky Knees Festival in Atlanta.
Sting, Incubus and My Morning Jacket
will
be
perform
ing
closer to home in Redondo Beach at the Beach L ife Festival.
The Rolling Stones, Chris Stapleton, Hozier, Queen Latifah
and more will
also
close out the second weekend of the New Orleans Jazz & Heritage Festival.
The saturation in the concert and festival market that came with the spike
of in
live performances after the pandemic
may
also
be
causing fan fatigue that could be hurting Coachellas sales.
Bill Werde
, the director of
the Bandier Syracuse University’s
music business program
at Syracuse University
and
the
author of the industry newsletter Full Rate No Cap,
says said
the pandemic
created a lot of changes in affected
the promotion of festivals and concerts and fans’ purchasing
decisions habits
. As the availability of Coachella tickets ahead of its opening weekend shows,
Werde says
fewer people are buying tickets well in advance of events
, Werde says said
.
People want to look at something like this and want to pronounce the death of Coachella and it’s just too soon, Werde said. This is one of the strangest times weve ever experienced in live music in the history of the business, which is to say, specifically, this rebound from a period of not having shows for a couple of years. Finding out what the new normal looks like is going to take a couple more years.
Werde
noted said
the lack of early commitment from ticket buyers coupled with the increased cost of putting on a show creates a “dicey environment for festivals.” Other
notable majorfestivals fests
across the country, namely Jay-Z’s Made in America Festival, have been canceled this year.
Another factor for those hesitant to take the
dive on buying tickets plunge
could be
that
the
allure of the
“
C
ouchella” experience.
is somewhat comparable in terms of seeing the sets, T
hanks to Goldenvoice’s partnership with YouTube ,
that allows
fans
to can live
stream performances from up to
four six
stages
live from the comfort of their homes
.
Beyonc’s 105-minute set attracted a record 458,000 simultaneous global viewers on YouTube in 2018. The festival’s opening weekend amassed 41 million unique viewers.
“When you’re standing at the back of 50,000 people, it’s like, Well
,
shoot, I can get a better seat at home and then I can do Uber Eats and have seven margaritas and this will be great, said
Tommy Dietrick
,
the
founder of the Desert Stars Festival in Joshua Tree.
The target audience for Coachella, the die-hard music fans who
once
duked it out for tickets
in 2015
, may have also changed their concert-going preferences.
The consumer may be growing up a bit and may not want to be standing in a mud pit or in the hot sun, Edgren said. When you go to Coachella, you’re basically standing up the whole time and it’s an ordeal.
Dietrick, who also produces music at Joshua Tree Recording Studio, noted that Coachella attendees now get an experience that is removed from the “community element that music is actually really all about.
They’ve squeezed too hard on the class people that were going there to escape and have fun, he said.
Coachella also seems to attract a different kind of music fan today than it did at its inception and in its early years, when it boasted legendary headliners like Paul McCartney, Prince, Nine Inch Nails
, and the
Red Hot Chili Peppers
and other classic artists
. With
less globally renowned names leading the performances fewer rock bands
and more brand partnerships
popping up
, the festival has been criticized for becoming a “plaything for influencers,” as Werde put it.
Beyond the changes
in to
Coachella’s audience, the music and entertainment industries are also experiencing shifts in terms of what it takes to become famous and build a following. Werde said the music world is facing “enormous fragmentation” because of the volume of musicians creating and sharing their work online. He
calls called
this new phase “the age of a thousand niches” and
notes noted
that fans’ following of celebrities is getting wider, not deeper.
These are real changes that are happening in the star system, and festivals are dependent on the star system. Festivals create this experience around all these stars and if those stars get smaller, those festivals get smaller. If those stars get fewer, those festivals are going to struggle.
In its
25th 23rd
year, Coachella seems to be reaching a stabilizing point where it is no longer the hottest ticket of the year
,
but is still attracting a wide audience.
“The form of struggle that Coachella is having is probably a form of struggle that a lot of people would kill to have,” Werde said.
Like fellow long-running music festival Lollapalooza
in Chicago
, Edgren said Coachella has settled into a new phase and will likely continue to experience ebbs and flows with its sales in coming years.
There’s no way any event or festival like that can sustain that kind of success forever. There’s just no way, Edgren said. There has to be dips, some years are slightly better than others. They’re not the new kid on the block anymore.
