The often outspoken festival promoter AJ Maddah has voiced concerns that the Western Australian capital of Perth will be rubbed from Australia’s national music festival scene as early as next year.
Maddah is one of the major promoters responsible for bringing some of the world’s international mega stars to Australia for festivals such as Big Day Out and Soundwave, but made remarks on Twitter suggesting Perth will not be on the receiving end of some major festivals in 2015.
Maddah, who saw the Harvest Festival cancelled last year due to poor ticket sales, made the comment in response to a WA Megadeth fan heading interstate to catch one of the band’s sideshows.
@SaXplayin Thanks for your support Sadly may have to get used to coming over as I reckon there will be zero festivals going to WA in 2015 🙁
— AJ (@iamnotshouting) January 23, 2014
The promoter explained the possibility of Perth losing festivals was not due to a lack of demand as was the case in the demise of Harvest.
“It is not ticket sales which I am very happy with. It’s state and Local Govs making it impossible,” he said in relation to the ongoing battles festivals are having with local governments over curfews and noise regulations.
Specifically referring to the Claremont Showgrounds, Maddah said the local government’s motive is “… all about pushing events out of Showgrounds so it can be flogged off to their developer mates for apartments & town houses.”
Big Day Out was recently moved from Showgrounds to Arena Joondalup, 25km from the city centre, however Soundwave’s long-term future remains uncertain.
“We’re trying to move. Not sure if we can,” said Maddah, also stating he’d prefer not to bring the event to Perth should location difficulties persist.
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