C3's Charles Attal On The Eve Of Lollapalooza Chicago: 'We’ve All Been Waiting For This Moment'

Michael Hickey / Getty Images – Lighting Up The Festival Season
Lollapalooza kicks off Thursday as the first true major multi-genre festival in the U.S. taking place since COVID.

Lollapalooza is nearly under way, a massive endeavor in normal times but with added significance as the first major, multi-genre urban festival taking place in the United States since COVID hit in March 2020.

This cannot be stated plainly enough, as even major events like Miami’s Rolling Loud hip-hop festival, also-Florida country festival Pepsi Gulf Coast Jam and multi-night Red Rocks runs are still small compared to the Grant Park Chicago shindig, which sees 100,000 attendees per day over four days in one of the largest urban centers on the continent.

This year’s event, taking place over four days July 29 to Aug. 1, has a characteristically massive lineup, with everyone from Thursday headliners like Illenium and Miley Cyrus to Tyler The Creator, Journey, Megan Thee Stallion, Post Malone, Foo Fighters, DaBaby, Modest Mouse and many others. The event also takes place while nationwide mask mandates, vaccination rates and news headlines continue to fluctuate, despite widespread COVID vaccine availability in the United States. This year’s entry policy states that attendees must bring a printed copy of their vaccine card, vaccine record or negative COVID-19 test. Unvaccinated guests are required to wear a mask while onsite.

C3 co-founder and longtime Lolla promoter Charles Attal gave Pollstar some input just before the fest kicked off, the 30th year since the event began as a touring festival topped by Jane’s Addiction and co-founded by frontman Perry Farrell featuring Nine Inch Nails, Ice-T, Siouxsie and The Banshees, Butthole Surfers, Living Colour, and the Henry Rollins Band.

Pollstar: Large multi-genre festivals are always ahead of the curve with what’s trending in popular music. How do you go about curating a lineup when things are delayed a full year and with such difficulty planning ahead?

Charles Attal: Artists are ready to get out and play, and the first calls we made were to the artists from the 2020 lineup who never got to perform. The vast majority of them were on board immediately and we curated open slots from there.

What can you tell us about ticket sales / capacity for this year? We’ve heard about the great onsales, which are encouraging.

We are doing the show at full capacity, which is 100,000 music fans each day. Four days sold out faster than the past few years and we only have a limited number of one-day tickets left at this point. We’re excited.

What are you personally looking forward to at Lolla this year? How about your other big events?

I’m really excited to see Miley Cyrus, Tyler, The Creator, Post Malone, and Modest Mouse.

I couldn’t be more excited about the immediate ACL Fest sellout and can’t wait to see George Strait in Zilker Park!

Logistically, what can you tell us about planning this year’s event and getting to this point? Big question, I know

We have the best team in the business, and we utilized the downtime to improve in certain areas and come up with some new

creative ideas. When we got the call that we were going to be able to move forward, the team sprang into action and has worked tirelessly to deliver an incredible festival. Everyone involved including our team, managers, agents and bands moved quickly to make this year a success.

We are so thankful for our partnership with the City of Chicago. They set forth some guidelines that had to be implemented in order for Lolla to move forward, and we are in constant communication as things evolve and change.

This year, major festivals like Lolla are the largest stage and best opportunity for fans to see the most popular artists, in many cases. Do you feel a sense of obligation to fans, artists and the industry?

Let’s put it this way – you know that feeling you get in your chest when the bass hits and the music is flowing through the air? We’ve all been waiting for this moment on a big scale to get those goosebumps and reconnect with music. At the end of the day, we’re ready to make that moment happen for a lot of music fans, but also, for ourselves. It’s going to be an incredible weekend.

With 30 years of the Lollapalooza brand, from a traveling festival tour to numerous changes in public music to now being a global brand, what is next?

We’re always looking to expand the brand, trying to find the right countries and the right partners. There are a bunch of options on the table and we hope to make some announcements in the near future.