Month: August 2022

The surprising announcement of the cancellation of the Music Midtown festival in Atlanta scheduled for September should prompt the Georgia legislature to address the reason for the cancellation as soon as possible during their next session starting in January.

A ruling this summer in a lawsuit concerning the current Georgia gun carry law and public property has festival promoters concerned about potential lawsuits if they try to ban guns from their events.

The lawsuit challenged the right of the Atlanta Botanical Gardens to ban guns since the Gardens are in Piedmont Park. The ruling allowed the Gardens to continue banning guns because of their long-term lease but did not address the issue of “temporary” events in public spaces such as music festivals, which in Atlanta are typically held in public parks (Piedmont, Central, Centennial, Candler, etc.).

The organizers of Music Midtown in Piedmont Park did not want to risk a lawsuit. They also expressed concern that artists would refuse to play at the festival if a weapons ban could not be enforced.

My hope and expectation is that the legislature will amend the gun carry law to allow bans for these type of “temporary” events, especially events with restricted access (I’m not even sure how a free event with no barriers could enforce a weapons ban). Someone with a personal firearm strolling through Piedmont Park is quite different from someone with a firearm at a music fest crammed with 20,000 people.

If the law is not amended I anticipate that all future festivals will either avoid public parks or just not take place, unless some festival promoter wants to challenge the law by banning guns and fighting a lawsuit.

After Sweetwater 420 (SW420), Candler Park, and the High Sierra Music Festival (HSMF), my festival season is probably over for 2022.

I was expecting a full Lockn’ Festival in Virginia in August of 2022 after the “special” Lockn’ Farm weekends in August of 2021 (Joe Russo’s Almost Dead, Goose, and Tedeschi Trucks Band), but it appears that the next event won’t be until next year – “See you on the Farm in 2023” is currently posted on their main page.

The Queen City Jam Session festival in Charlotte in mid-August has a great line-up, especially with a chance to see Oteil and Friends after they had to cancel from the SW420 festival. But mid-August in downtown Charlotte could be very warm. I remember Music Midtown in Atlanta having stages on various downtown vacant lots in the late 1990’s with no shade and very hot pavement, with little relief from the heat even after the sun went down.

The new Sacred Rose festival in Chicago at the end of August appears to be a superset of jam band festival artists (for example, including The War On Drugs, Khruanbgin, etc.). I’m concerned about the potential heat factor at that time of year combined with the main stage being in a bowl-like stadium with limited (or no) shade and freedom of movement. Maybe I’ll check that out next year.

The Resonance festival in Charleston in mid-September has some excellent artists, especially Goose, Umphrey’s McGee, and Eggy, but I’m not sure about the weather and mosquito situation in what sounds like a wetlands in the low country of South Carolina. Again, maybe next year.

The new FORMAT festival in Arkansas in late September has an interesting music lineup but the price seems a bit high, probably because of the combination of music and arts in one festival. As with Sacred Rose I’m inclined to give them a chance to work out the kinks in the first year and check out the schedule for year two.

The Austin City Limits festival in October is more interesting and remains an outside possibility. As of this date it looks like only single-day GA tickets are available. An interesting concept – most of the bands are playing on the same days on two different weekends, for example, The War on Drugs on Saturday the 8th and Saturday the 15th, Spoon and Goose on Sunday the 9th and Sunday the 16th