Dark Clouds In The Spring Music Festival

Audience of Lokatara Fest 2019 (Instagram / @ lokatarafest)

Last weekend, shocking news came from Lokatara Fest 2019. Suddenly, the organizers canceled bringing their six headliners to the festival stage. Previously, Jakarta Rock Space was canceled. The concert for 25 years of the band GIGI was the same. Ari Lasso experienced it first when a promoter he called unprofessional caused the 27 year old concert to be canceled. The series of organizer failures is clearly a record. What's the matter? Isn't spring music just beginning? Welcome to VOI's signature Writing Series, "Harassing Music Performances".

Early Saturday morning, November 26th, a group of friends on our WhatsApp application suddenly got busy. A friend sent a tweet uploaded by Adib Hidayat, Editor in Chief Billboard Indonesia. Adib uploaded Instastory catches of a number of international bands who were originally playing at Lokatara Fest 2019 that day.

The Drums, Sales, Alex TBH, Gus Dapperton, Great Good Fine OK, until Sophie Meiers gave a similar statement about their cancelation at Lokatara Fest 2019. Blasphemous words filled the conversation in the group at that time. It's natural. Some friends have already paid Rp.440 thousand for one ticket. Moving on to the Twitter timeline, we saw more anger.

"Finish, bro. Just trade juice in front of Alfamart," wrote @ljatulah. The @indiedo account writes: I want to refund 3 tickets. Tell us how soon. DM on all platforms has no response. Others, @nejoux wrote: Refund, please. Unless you can return Sales, Gus & Sophie.

Lokatara is actually not a new player. Lokatara Fest 2019 is the second event after 2018 they managed to invite a number of foreign performers without any problems. Call it, Boy Pablo, Mellow Fellow, Rice Wine, and Yung Heazy. Lokatara Fest is a music festival that brings together a varied mix of music from home and abroad.

Before the two Lokatara Fest series, green promoters from Jakarta had also held various music events. Two series of Lokatara Project which brought many names of local independent musicians were successfully held in July and September 2018. On an international scale, we can see two Lokatara Live series, where they succeeded in bringing in Thai singers Phum Viphurit and Lamp.

Back to Lokatara Fest 2019. Recently, the organizer accommodated requests from ticket buyers for refunds. Information regarding the refund procedure was announced one day after the event was held. The organizer applies two categories of refunds. First, for those who keep coming to the Kuningan City Ballroom, where the event is held. Second, for those who didn't come at all.

For the first category, the organizer will refund the ticket purchase price with the difference in ticket prices on the spot. As for the second category, the number is intact. "Suppose the ticket price was Rp. 550 thousand. That means we will transfer Rp. 251 thousand which is the difference between the ticket price purchased and the ticket price on the spot yesterday," wrote the Instagram admin in response to the question @blueanddorange in the comments column.

Indeed, the cancellation of the six performers does not automatically cancel the title. A line of performers such as Mantra Vutura, White Shoes and The Couples Company, The Adams, Reality Club, to Svmmerdose are still in action. From abroad, a young musician from the United States, Peachy! So there is a bit of solace, although lately there have been problems that also include his involvement in Lokatara Fest 2019.

Question

That day, the issue of the organizer neglecting to pay the performers was the strongest news. A captured conversation has been circulating between an Instagram user and Sophie Meiers. In the conversation carried out through the Direct Message feature, Sophie explained that the Lokatara Fest 2019 organizer had not completed the payment and prepared a hotel for her.

Wow .... pic.twitter.com/ee9wdS8Hci

- suprapto (@adayangbangun) November 22, 2019

The organizers denied. According to them, all matters with the performers had been settled. According to them, the cancellation of the six performers on stage was due to a one-sided decision made by one of the performers, which they did not mention in detail.

"We are very sorry to announce to you that this morning we got the news that The Drums, Sales, Alex TBH, Gus Dapperton, Great Good Fine OK, and Sophie Meiers have canceled their performance. Neither of us wanted this to happen, but it's beyond our capabilities. , "written on Lokatara's Instagram account.

Another question for the organizers came back. It's over, Peachy! reveals all the chaos that he experienced during the festival. First, about the schedule to appear. Initially, Peachy! scheduled to go on stage at 17.00 WIB for 45 minutes. However, after the other six performers canceled, the organizers shifted Peachy! to 20.00 WIB with 30 minutes mentas.

"I enjoy the crowd and spend time with my friends in Jakarta. This problem does not affect my assessment of Indonesia which is very beautiful. However, Lokatara Fest has broken the contract, lied and withheld my money," wrote Peachy! on his Instagram Instastory.

Another problem was revealed by Peachy !. Problem of late payment, for example. According to the 18-year-old singer, the organizers should have paid off 30 minutes after she performed. However, he had to wait a little longer. Others, Peachy! also complained about his passport which was withheld by immigration due to visa problems which should have been the organizer's obligation.

The withholding of the passport made him miss his return flight to the United States. We have been trying to contact the organizers to clarify these issues. However, until this writing, there has been no answer.

Others

Lokatara Fest 2019 may continue to advance despite losing its six main performers. Things are even worse at a number of other musical events in the last 30 days. The Long Travel Concert celebrates Ari Lasso's 27 years of work, for example, which failed to take place.

The concert, which was supposed to be held on October 16 at The Kasablanka Jakarta, had to be canceled because the promoter, whom Ari called, was unprofessional. "Sorry, tonight's concert cannot be held. Hopefully there will be lessons for all of us," said Ari in his statement.

"That there are still parties who are not professional in carrying out their obligations. Why at the end I announced it, because I and other friends still have good intentions to wait until this second," added Ari.

Apart from Jakarta, the concert will actually be held in other cities, such as Medan, Solo, to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia. In the concert, Ari Lasso collaborated with promoters Optimus One and Concerts.id. The concert ticket price ranges from IDR 400 thousand for the Early Bird Festival A category to IDR 800 thousand for the VIP class.

After Ari Lasso, the band GIGI also experienced the same bad luck. The concert entitled 25 Years of GIGI, which was supposed to be held in Yogyakarta on November 2, was canceled. The news of the cancellation was conveyed through photos and videos uploaded by GIGI's official Instagram account.

"We hereby convey that for one reason or another, the # 25TAHUNGIGI event which was supposed to be held in Yogyakarta on November 2, 2019 has been postponed until an undetermined time," Armand represented his colleagues at GIGI.

For GIGI, this cancellation is suffocating. Because, previously, the concert was planned to be held on September 14. However, it was later decided to postpone it to November 2. Unlike Ari Lasso, GIGI did not explain the details of the cause of the cancellation.

"We apologize profusely to friends and also GIGIKITA throughout our beloved Indonesia. We will inform the next update soon. Keep the peace, love and respect," added the statement.

Most recently, before the 2019 Lokatara Fest, a rock festival entitled Jakarta Rock Space also failed to be held. Like the GIGI concert, Jakarta Rock Space was also canceled after the event was postponed.

Initially, the Jakarta Rock Space was planned to be held on October 18. However, because it was close to the inauguration ceremony of Joko Widodo (Jokowi) and Ma'ruf Amin, the event was postponed to 30 October. However, one day before the event, Garuda Nation as the organizer announced the cancellation of the distortion party which was supposed to be held at Livespace SCBD Lot 8, Jakarta. As a result, the festival that was supposed to bring together God Bless, Edane, Jamrud, and NTRL failed.

"We, from Garuda Nation, as the organizer of the Jakarta Rock Space concert, have a heavy heart to announce that the Jakarta Rock Space, which was supposed to be held on Wednesday, October 30, 2019, had to be canceled, due to a number of obstacles," wrote Garuda Nation on its official social media account.

Next article: Woodstock and Other Festivals that Turn to Disaster