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

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.

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

Those Romanian vaccines are en route. 700k doses.

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.

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.

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/

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

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......

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.

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

if i was the promoter i would be whispering in Ballinlough Castle ear , the venue for body and soul and see would they be up for a scaled back EP. It would certainly rattle Laois county council that they would lose EP altogether

Naw, wouldn't like that, its like having Lisdoonvarna festival or Feile in Dublin, what's the point, the Picnic will always be a camping festival with after hours twilight fun, wouldn't change it for anything. If that was going to happen it might as well be cancelled outright and start making plans for next year and unleash a 2022 lineup poster. If I was in the government would fire all the media heads in RTE and hire better journalists that can give more honest and transparent news.

I agree, a random question from me. And should it not happen BD, let's drown our EP sorrows over a few pints outside The Crane. And raise a toast to the Salty Dog crew.

Will the Chemical Brothers be retained for the Saturday Night closer they were on the 2020 poster weren't they and they played Latitude so probably still around the UK anyway, maybe the Pixies could be nabbed from EOTR but then again that's on the traditional EP dates.

When will it be safe? It's summer and nearly all adults are vaccinated. It's worked so far for them. If it's not safe to open then when will it be in reality? Covid isn't just going to disappear

Cases dropping like a stone over the last 3 weeks, after an initial upswing from opening up. Vaccines appear to be working.