Reading And Leeds Restore Balance

Leeds also had an 80,000 sellout on the day that Arctic Monkeys headlined. Festival Republic chief Melvin Benn said it was a “bloody good year for Reading and Leeds,” while earlier in the season some other festivals had found it was just a bloody year.

Despite disappointments from the summer parks season and major rock fests Download and Sonisphere, It wasn’t all bad news.

Glastonbury sold out its 140,000-capacity site at Worthy Farm, while on the Isle Of Wight John Giddings was happy his smaller fest attracted over 50,000 people per day. In mid-July Scotland’s T In The Park sold out its 85,000 capacity, cementing last year’s Pollstar International Festival Of The Year’s position among Europe’s elite outdoor events.

LN’s situation improved when the V Festivals, which failed to sell out for the first time in years, still did 150,000 across the twinned sites, Reading and Leeds did a further 160,000 tickets and Creamfields (Aug. 22-24) sold out its 70,000 capacity.

Earlier in the year Denis Desmond had sold his 33 percent share of the V fests to Live Nation-Gaiety Holdings, LN is also the co-owner of Reading and Leeds producer Festival Republic, while the American firm had bought Creamfields in 2012.

The acts helping Reading and Leeds restore some balance to the UK festival season included Arctic Monkeys, Courteeners, Queens Of The Stone Age, Paramore, The 1975, and SBTRKT. The Creamfields lineup had Avicii, Deadmau5, and Steve Aoki.