Country Roads Music Festival | Matt Connarton Unleashed

0:00 One other quick thing will do and then we'll uh and then we'll play some more tunes. And if you're just joining us live, of course we have the stiff Tones coming up in the third hour. And they're already in the building, so uh in just in just a couple of minutes. What do you mean, sort of not quite in the building. They're at the building. Oh, they'll let me know when they're ready to be in the building. Oh, okay, gotcha, gotcha. This is from Digital Music News out front. There is an actual Earth Well, it does say online that's one of their uh have heart, will travel very good and they do very good.

0:37 Uh. Country music festival issues full refunds after failing to launch, latest in spate of country festivals getting mixed. Until I saw this, by the way, that sounds occurred to me. You don't see a lot of country music festivals, like big, large scale festivals. Uh, contrasting with rock festivals and hip hop festivals. Yeah, lots of metal festivals. County country festivals seems like you don't see as many of them. And apparently there's some weird lights like their cursed or something. It says Michigan's Country Roads Music Festival issues full refunds following a twenty twenty five cancelation, but plans to revive the event for twenty twenty six, it says.

1:16 It says. After Faster Horses Music Festival announced its cancelation in January, event organizers aimed to fill the void with the Country Roads Music Festival at the same venue, the Michigan International Speedway. But now Country Roads has been canceled, with plans to revive the event next year. So what went wrong? Quote? All tickets will be fully refunded. You don't need to do a thing. We'll handle it on our end and make sure the money gets back to you as quickly as possible. The post says, this community means the world to us, and we can't wait to share something really special with you in twenty twenty six.

1:53 Oh, I missed the first paragraph of that. So the first paragraph of the announcement says, quote, this wasn't an easy call, but we truly believe it's the right one. Our goal has always been to create something meaningful for this community, and we want to give it the time and care it deserves. So that's from the Instagram post announcing the tourist cancelation. Country Roads was due to kick off on July eighteen, yesterday, at the Groves of Michigan campground, but its cancelation was announced just four days prior.

2:24 Wow, just four days before the festival they announced it was canceled. According to festival organizer Darcy Keys, their team was simply not prepared to pull off a festival in such a short amount of time, especially when many potential attendees don't order tickets until the last minute. By the way, so I've been involved in festivals. Festivals take I mean a large scale festival with national artists and the whole thing like what it sounds like they were doing, that can take like a year, a solid year year of planning.

3:02 It really can. Doesn't have to, I mean, it might only take six months. But it sounds like they tried to do something quick here that they just couldn't do. So Keyes also said, quote, I don't think that we ever got to that critical minimum ticket sales level. We probably only had about three and a half months, and I think in hindsight, it probably wasn't sufficient time to be able to promote the festival. Unquote, yeah, three and a half months is not enough time. For a major festival, but she isn't ready to completely throw on the towel.

3:32 Keys said that trying to put on the festival in such a short time this year was a learning experience and she looks forward to bringing the vision to life in twenty twenty six. Naturally, fans who were planning to attend have shared their disappointment on social media, but singer Mikaela Prue, who is due to perform at the festival, noted how such cancelations impact artists, especially lesser known ones, and that relates to what we were talking about with Jane's addiction. By the way, how you know, when when things get canceled, whether it's a tour, whether it's a festival, it affects a lot of people, especially lesser known artists like MICHAELA Prue, who many people were lined up to open.

4:11 Oh yeah. But also, you know, it affects everything, and it has a ripple effect. And if you're not if you're not super famous and rich, you know, you can really take a hit financially. It can really screw things up for you. MICHAELA Prue also said quote festivals are obviously a major way that growing artists like me get their name out there. It's also one of the main ways that myself and my band generate income unquote. It's a matter of hard times for up and cooming musicians compounded by hard times for potential attendees an economic struggle.

4:43 As economic struggles make it more difficult for fans to justify buying tickets to these events, more live music festivals will undoubtedly see the acts, leaving artists who depend on that income holding the bag. So there you go, So another another festival down the tubes and more lawsuits.