Bluesfest’s Peter Noble: “Strictly blues is not viable”

In a Facebook Q&A today, Bluesfest Director Peter Noble wrote candidly about Australia’s current festival landscape and Bluesfest’s conscious decision to change its tact.

“The music industry, festivals, and customer taste change regularly. It is becoming less and less possible, to do events that specialise in one area,” Noble wrote. “We have recently seen the demise of SoulFest, the Great SouthernBlues andRockabillyFestival and Soundwave. All events to [sic] attempt to special[ise] and draw one particular audience with like taste. It would seem this is no longer possible in Oz.”

Bluesfest draws on average 100,000 over the five-day Easter long weekend, but with acts including Kendrick Lamar, The National, City & Colour and Noel Gallagher’s High Flying Birds included on the 2016 line-up, it’s clear the award-winning festival is targeting new demographics.

“Strictly Blues is not viable – numbers not there,” Noble added in the Q&A. “In order for [us] to continue successfully at Bluesfest, we have widened somewhat our contemporary artists as well as the legends. However, the vast majority of artists still come under the Blues & Roots banner.”

Noble also revealed in the Q&A that Beach Boy Brian Wilson, who will be performing his solo LP Pet Sounds in its entirety, may have a connection to Bluesfest’s next announcement. “The headliners are pretty much all rolled out,” he told one Brian Wilson fan. “However I think there may be a couple of artists there that might be of interest.”

Noble took a stab at last year’s drop-outs The Black Keys in the Q&A. When asked if the Ohio-based band would show up on this year’s lineup, he said:

“If The Black Keys had been more forthcoming when their drummer had his accident in the surf and actually let their fans know that he had shattered the bones in his shoulder, then perhaps we all would have not had an expectation that they would have been able to tour and play Bluesfest 2015. We would have had more time to have replaced them and their fans would not have been so disappointed.”

Bluesfest organisers scrambled to find a last minute replacement and gave the headline spot to Melbourne band British India.

“We note this is not the first time The Black Keys have cancelled Australian tours at short notice,” Noble added. “We agree with you – we were very disappointed and I will go further and say … we were misled.”

One Facebook user asked what happened to US country music artist Sturgill Simpson. The Kentucky-based singer-songwriter announced the cancellation of his Bluesfest set early this month, his publicist citing “circumstances beyond his control”. In today’s Q&A Noble said: “There’s is a grave illness within Sturgill’s immediate family, he has decided as a result not to tour outside the USA while this matter continues.”

Later in the Q&A Noble said it is “highly unlikely” Bluesfest will invite Lenny Kravitz to play the festival after he cancelled his visit to Australia in February last year.

“It seems Lenny Kravitz’ concert ticket sales in 2015 were low,” he wrote. “As a festival, we MUST have confidence that the artists who contract with us to perform will actually show up! We believe [he] should have came [sic], and meet [sic] his contractual obligations. the fact that he didn’t, it is highly unlikely that we will have an interest in him in the future.”

Another Facebook user asked Noble what he thought about The Rubens’ track Hoops placing #1 in triple j’s Hottest 100 poll. “who are The Reubens [sic] ???,” Noble replied. “Kendrick’s #2’s will be more solid than anything that can be described by The Reubens as their #1’s …”

This week Noble was among the 604 people in the Australia Day Honours List. Receiving the Medal of the Order of Australia (OAM) on Tuesday, Noble was recognised for his for “service to live and recorded music, to tourism and to the community.”

Bluesfest is nominated inPollstar’s International Music Festival of the Year category; it’s up against Roskilde (Denmark), RockamRing (Germany), Primavera Sound (Spain) and Download and Glastonbury (UK). The winner will be announced at aceremony held in San Francisco on February 12.