Mushroom Group, the promoters behind long-running urban and electronic event Future Music Festival, have officially announced their decision to discontinue the event, citing lacklustre ticket sales over the past two years.
“The decision to discontinue Future Music Festival was not made lightly. A point came though where it simply no longer made sense to continue,” said Mushroom Group Chairman Michael Gudinski.
“We believe in the festival industry in Australia and plan to announce an exciting new festival concept in the coming months.” The news comes less than a month after the conclusion of the festival’s 2015 event and the cancellation of its Asia leg.
While the 2015 instalment of the festival, which featured such acts as Drake and The Prodigy, was a success critically and received a good reception from fans, a statement from organisers says “ticket sales for the festival have underperformed” for the last two years.
The organisers continued with grave words for those in the large-scale touring festival market, writing, “Mushroom Group share the belief expressed by a number of promoters globally that the day of the large scale travelling festival in its current form is unfortunately numbered.”
“The company will continue its focus on touring through its highly successful companies Frontier Touring, A Day On The Green and boutique music festival Sugar Mountain and the world’s largest under 18 music event Good Life.”
“The Group are developing a new festival concept, which is planned for the same time period previously held by Future Music Festival.” No further details have been provided about the forthcoming new festival.
The decision to discontinue Future will be a blow to the Mushroom Group, who only purchased the struggling event in 2013. As Tone Deaf reported at the time, with the purchase Gudinski and his son Matt became sole directors of Future Music Pty Ltd.
The news of the cancellation leaves Australia with just one major touring electronic dance music festival, Stereosonic, the lineup for which is expected to drop in the coming months though with a return to a one-day format.
This is obviously a sad day for a long-running Australian festival brand and will no doubt have a considerable impact on the wider Australian festival market.
The loss of Future Music and the news that Soundwave will now be an East Coast exclusive leaves Australia with just Laneway and Stereosonic as the only touring music festivals that travel across the country, with Groovin The Moo spanning regional Australia.
