Irish annual festival Electric Picnic has been cancelled as local council refused to grant a licence to run this year’s edition.
The art and music festival that has runs annually since 2004 shared the bad news on social media stating: “Together with all the fans of Electric Picnic we are extremely disappointed that Laois County Council have refused a licence for this year’s festival scheduled to take place 24th – 26th September 2021“.
They’ve added: “This is despite our proposal that everyone attending the event, including ticket holders, staff and artists, would have to be fully vaccinated and registered in advance for Department of Health contact tracing“.
An update from The Electric Picnic team: https://t.co/axzYM4FJOv pic.twitter.com/RDG16wqUsB
— Electric Picnic (@EPfestival) August 5, 2021
The news is even more disappointing seeing other festivals go ahead with similar vaccine proposals, like TRNSMT in Glasgow. “To see Scotland, a country with a similar population and virtually identical vaccine rollout and uptake as our own, only announce yesterday that they were easing restrictions and allowing events such as TRNSMT Festival in Glasgow go ahead in September makes this decision even more difficult to accept“.
Festival organisers described the news as “a huge blow and set back to our entire sector, which was mandated to close on the 12th March 2020 and such a decision now means the further loss of employment for over 3,000 people“.
The Fine Gael councillor said to BBC: “We’d all love to see it go ahead but, with no certainty it’s very hard“. “However in the current climate it’s the lack of certainty over Covid” added Councillor Conor Bergin.
The festival organisers thank all the fans and local residents for their patience and “huge ongoing support during this difficult time“. Alongside the dissatisfied fans, Liam Gallagher who was supposed to perform at this years edition shared his views: “Gutted to hear electric picnic has been cancelled was looking forward to seeing my Irish brothers n sisters and my cousin Guinness“.
Gutted to hear electric picnic has been cancelled was looking forward to seeing my Irish brothers n sisters and my cousin Guinness
— Liam Gallagher (@liamgallagher) August 5, 2021
The Electric Picnic festival has been cancelled for the second year in a row. The 2020 lineup included Rage Against The Machine, The Chemical Brothers and Lewis Capaldi.
