Southbound Organisers Say "It’s Now Time to Move On"; No Festival for 2018

Don’t expect to see it return for 2018.

If you’re one of the hopefuls (like me) who thought Southbound might make a miraculous recovery for 2018, I’m sorry to say it’s time we gave up on the idea.

It’s almost July, which is around the time we’d normally get close to a line-up (or at least a teaser) of the acts we might see at the annual summer music festival.

However, according to event organisers, Southbound will be "put on ice" for 2018.

Southbound was a West Australian music, arts and camping festival that took place in Busselton, and in recent years has boasted guests like Peking Duk, The Wombats, Two Door Cinema Club and Arctic Monkeys.

The popular festival used to occur in January but after the devastating Waroona bushfires in January 2016 and a benefit concert that followed, the event was moved to December. Since then, any news of another Southbound has been very quiet.

According to the Southbound Facebook page, the festival that had a 13-year run was rested in 2017 as promoters Sunset Events chose to focus on new projects (perhaps the new brewhouse its co-director David Chitty has been a part of recently).

 

However, Student Edge spoke with James Legge, co-director of Sunset Events, who says they have moved their "focus towards other business ventures, so nothing is in the pipeline at the moment."

He said that having to compete with the national Falls Festival was one factor as well as the "significant change in consumer music trends."

"The festival is no longer viable."

"We are very proud of creating WA’s largest music and camping festival and all the amazing experiences for patrons over the 11 years it operated, but it's now time to move on," he added.

Despite Legge saying that the chances of the event happening in future years to come are “very unlikely”, it’s important to not forget about the other events that are still circulating the music scene, such as Laneway festival and the new addition, Fidelity festival, which is yet to announce a line-up.

Photo: iStock.com/monkeybusinessimages