What’s behind the lack of enthusiasm for this year’s music festivals?

The public sentiment about this year's crop of music festivals is an overwhelming "meh." There are good reasons for this.

The early signs were there. Several Australian music festivals scheduled for the Down Under summer months were cancelled. Then word started to come out of Britain about more festivals that wouldn’t happen because of various financial and logistical issues.

But the biggest wake-up call came when Coachella 2024 failed to sell out instantly like in years before. It took months to sell all the tickets for the first weekend; even as late as this past Thursday, tickets were still available for the second weekend, something that would have never happened in the past.

And it’s not just Coachella. There seems to be an overwhelming lack of enthusiasm for almost every major festival this summer. Lollapalooza has gone all hip-hop and pop. Except for the Red Hot Chili Peppers, Bonnaroo’s lineup doesn’t feel very exciting. Osheaga has Green Day, Noah Kahan, and SZA, but lacks the superstar punch of previous years. Same thing with Festival d’Été de Québec.

There have even been moans about Glastonbury, a festival that sells out in hours, months before anyone knows who will be performing. “These are the best headliners you can get?” seems to be the dominant complaint. Oh, it’ll still be the mud-and-booze-and-drugs riot it always is, but I doubt that Glastonbury 2024 will make anyone’s top 10.

So what’s the problem? Why are so many major music events suffering from a “meh” problem? Several reasons.

Going to a festival costs a lot. Between the price of a day or weekend pass, you need to get to the site (often a real hassle), find accommodation (if you’re not the camping sort or if that’s not available), and then reserve cash for food, drink, and merch.

TikTok is full of messages about food and drink prices (US$64 for two burritos and a juice and US$28 for a double vodka). That might have been doable in the era of funflation, that post-COVID time when many of us decided to make up for the lockdown years by spending whatever was necessary to travel and have fun. We may have reached our limits on that — at least as far as music festivals go.

Boomers, Gen X and Millennials were all avid festival-goers. Gen Z? Maybe not so much. “Generation Sensible,” as they’ve been called, isn’t into the party lifestyle as much as their predecessors — at least they don’t see this as a priority. Even those who do go to a festival, a study says that just five per cent of Gen Z is excited about drinking alcohol or doing drugs.