Download music festival, originally set to take place from 4th to 6th June at Donington Park, announced on social media that it has been cancelled this year. The rock festival has been called off for the second year in a row due to dates being a fortnight before 21st June, where restrictions on large-scale outdoor events are due to be lifted as part of the government’s roadmap out of lockdown. But to the relief of fans, they have announced headliners for 2022. Download festival has now been confirmed to take place from 10th to 12th June next year.
On a statement on their website, it says: “We never gave up hope of bringing the festival back to Donington this June and had been working so hard behind the scenes to make that happen, but sadly, we now know it’s not possible. We’re heartbroken for everyone in the Download family, from artists to suppliers and of course our passionate Download fans. We’ll be back on June 10th-12th 2022, as strong as ever, with an amazing set of headliners”
The headliners for 2022 are KISS, Iron Maiden and Biffy Clyro – the same headliners who were scheduled to play this year, except that System Of A Down has been replaced with Iron Maiden. The rest of the lineup is yet to be released. Tickets for next year will go on sale on their website at 10am on 5th March.
Iron Maiden’s frontman Bruce Dickinson says: “Like everyone, we were all hugely disappointed when the global pandemic forced the cancellation of Download 2020 which would have been Maiden’s seventh time headlining here. So we are delighted to be invited back and fulfil our ambition of playing Donington Park in every decade since the 1980’s!”
Download festival is the first of Festival Republic’s events to announce that it will be unable to go ahead this summer. Earlier in the year, Glastonbury festival has also announced that it has been cancelled due to the Covid-19 pandemic, to much dismay of fans. However, Wireless, Latitude, Reading and Leeds, which are all ran by Festival Republic and scheduled to take place after the 21st June, have been confirmed to go ahead. Festival Republic boss Melvin Benn said: “We see the numbers daily, it looks like everybody would have received a first vaccine by June 21, very comfortably, it looks like everybody would have received the second vaccine on the numbers that are being projected by August 9. Reading and Leeds Festival are three weeks later than that.”
Even though the current lockdown roadmap allows for music festivals to take place after the 21st June, it is dependent on infection rates and the government will review before every step of the plan that it is safe to lift restrictions.
