Lollapalooza scrubs Israel gig
Travelling music festival, scheduled to take place in late August, is postponed indefinitely
Jessica Steinberg, The Times of Israel's culture and lifestyles editor, covers the Sabra scene from south to north and back to the center
Fold up the lawn chairs, put away the Jane’s Addiction shirts and throw the freak flag back in the storage closet. Lollapalooza may not be coming to Israel after all.
The traveling music festival, which was to be held in Tel Aviv’s HaYarkon Park between August 20-22, is being postponed indefinitely. Concert organizers had run into financial and production setbacks, and were reportedly having trouble recruiting top music artists.
The rumored lineup for the three-day concert was to have included Coldplay, Arctic Monkeys, Pearl Jam, The Killers, The Stokes, Foster the People, Mika, Example, Asaf Avidan and Uzi Ramirez.
The LA times quoted a spokesperson saying the concert had been postponed, though no later date was given.
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One of the concert’s production companies, Plug Productions Generator, wrote on the event’s Facebook wall on Wednesday that the festival would not take place summer 2013.
“We invested all our efforts to create the Lollapalooza Festival in Israel,” they wrote.
Perry Ferrell, the Lollapalooza founder and organizer, has often spoken of his desire to expand Lollapalooza abroad and to Israel, having played here with Jane’s Addiction. As of Wednesday evening, he hadn’t made any comment about the postponement.
Israel is no stranger to major rock tours, having hosted Michael Jackson, Paul McCartney as well as Madonna’s MDNA tour last summer, but it’s also had its share of cancellations over recent years, including The Pixies and Elvis Costello, all for political reasons.
Joshua Davidovich contributed to this report.
