Australia: FestivalX, Melbourne Arena, Snowboxx, Falls Festival

Live Nation Australia has partnered with Hardware and Onelove, creators of major electronic music festival Stereosonic, for new multi-genre touring FestivalX. It also announced new multi-year team-up with Australia’s second largest teleco Optus for customer benefits.

Covering hip-hop, pop, EDM and electronica, FestivalX stages in Auckland (Nov. 29), Brisbane (Nov. 30), Sydney (Dec. 1) and Melbourne (Dec. 2). It has positioned itself as the first of the traveling summer festivals this season. The event promises to “deliver some of the biggest music superstars that have dominated music, radio and streaming charts across the globe.”

Said LN CEO Roger Field, “FestivalX is going to showcase the best local and international talent while bringing fans a new festival experience. It’s going to be huge, and it’s going to be the pre-summer party fans have been waiting for.”

Hardware’s Richie McNeill revealed stage designers and builders “responsible for some of the most spectacular looking stage designs at EDC, ID&T etc” would be used. He noted the event was in planning “for awhile now and the time is right! Fans and the industry want a reliable, value for money musical experience showcasing the faves and new artists.”

Through the Optus Perks plan, prepaid, postpaid and broadband customers can access LN event presales, special promotions and premium fan experiences. The first promotion began in August, with Optus customers in the running to win a year’s worth of LN VIP passes valued at A$20,000 ($14,654). LN’s Roger Field said, “With the huge growth of the experience economy, and with live music at the centre of this, Optus values the power of live bringing a number of benefits to their customers with this partnership.” A May 2018 report by National Australia Bank, Australia’s experience economy ranks musicals at No. 6, festivals at No. 7, live theatre at No. 8 and live concerts at No. 9. Australian holidays and restaurants filled first two spots. 

Ann earlier LN partnership, for the Australian version of the UK’s heavy rock Download festival, with UNIFIED and Secret Sounds, returns for a second year after it bowed this year in Melbourne. The second instalment returns to Melbourne’s Flemington Racecourse March 11 and expands to Sydney, at Parramatta Park March 9.

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The 10,500-seated-capacity Melbourne sports and concert venue Hisense Arena becomes Melbourne Arena effective immediately.  Opened in 2000, it was previously Vodafone Arena and Hisense Arena. Tennis Australia bought the naming rights August 2018 initially for five years, and opted for a non-commercial name that would give it international branding and Melbourne as a sports and music capital. 

This is the second name change this year for a major Melbourne sports and concert venue. On Sept. 1, Etihad Stadium becomes Marvel Stadium after a eight year deal signed March with the Walt Disney Company Australia.

European winter festival Snowboxx makes its debut in the southern hemisphere in the southern winter of 2019. It will be in New Zealand’s Queenstown region which has 700 hectares of slopes, with most of the action in two spectacular mountains, Coronet’s Peak and The Remarkables.  

Staged in Avoriaz, France, promoter Rob Tominey says he will translate its successful slopes-by-day-EDM-music-by-night format. The music acts will be from around the world, New Zealand as well as from Australia which the event is heavily marketing in. Another of Tominey’s company Mainstage Festivals’ events,’ Kala festival on the Albanian Riviera will also expand Down Under in the future. 

Cardi B, Migos, Khalid Announced For Origin NYE

Origin NYE, Dec. 30-31 in Perth’s foreshore Langley Park, has scored a number of major names. Cardi B and Migos will play there as one of two Australian performances, while the festival has secured the Australian exclusive for Khalid and Australian EDM act Pendulum.

Sydney agency UNDR Ctrl launched a management division UNDR  Ctrl  Mgmt. First signing s EDM act Bag Raiders, whom founder Paul  Stix began working with in 2010 when he moved from London. He said of his move to management. “With nearly 20 years’ experience in the Sydney and London music industries, I have picked up a few handy tips along the way.”

Falls Festival – which stages in Byron Bay, Tasmania, Victoria and Fremantle – has upped its initiatives against sexual assault along with overall patron safety and crowd behaviour.  This year there will be Increased CCTV cameras, 24-hour security, greater police presence, event staff to undertake psychological first aid training, sexual assault counsellors on site and specific training for all event staff in dealing with the reporting of incidents. Co-producers Jessica Ducrou and Paul Piticco said Sydney criminology lecturers Dr. Bianca Fileborn and Dr. Phillip Wadds undertook research at the last Byron event on sexual assault, and their upcoming findings would generate more safety initiatives.